Letter: Eco-terrorism on the Coast—Part 2

Satire’s tough.  Keep your day job.

I could see how in your frustration you might connect vandals to environmentalists.  But how about the repeated vandalism of POST trail signs at Moss Beach Bluff about restoring sensitive habitat, asking people to stay on trails.  What’s with these people who think it’s OK to destroy signs they don’t agree with and who think that’s going to change anything for the better?

Comment 3 by Barry Parr  on  Jan 12  at  10:52am  •  All my comments • 

Steve, I’m not sure what you mean by eco-terrorism.  Could you please be specific and cite some examples here on the Coastside?

Lisa,

Thanks for sharing your story.  Perhaps POST might want to use stronger materials.  It may cost a little more up front but in the long run saves money because things stay up better.  I’d be glad to share ideas on how POST can do this once I see what they are doing.

Hey,  this might even be a new side line for me being a sign post consultant.

Steven Hyman asks, “What do you think?”

This is silly self promotion which hardly qualifies as satire. The references and analogies seem weak.  From your prose, you appear lost in your own head.

The political issues are buried so deeply in inappropriate metaphors, it’s impossible to discuss them.

This isn’t a personal attack.  I’m just reacting to what was written.

The reason it’s impossible to discuss is more fundamental—some people appear to be pushing the concept that anyone who opposes any development in any way is an eco-terrorist.  As the saying goes, [“That’s not right.  It’s not even wrong.”][1]

  [1]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Not_even_wrong

>>The reason it’s impossible to discuss is more fundamental — some people appear to be pushing the concept that anyone who opposes any development in any way is an eco-terrorist. As the saying goes, “That’s not right. It’s not even wrong.”<<

I couldn’t agree with this sentiment more strongly—this is one of the *key* problems on the coastside—the drive to vilify those who don’t agree 100% with one’s views.

The slow-growth side is equally guilty of this—just look back a few comments about where one poster said that one member of the MCC is a creature of the Board of Supervisors and a member of the development lobby—with no facts to base these outlandish claims upon other than that member doesn’t toe the party line.

How can you have a serious discussion in an environment like this?

Let’s start with a few basic ideas:

1) People who oppose development are NOT eco-terrorists.

2) People who support *some* development are not shills for the building lobby.

Can we agree on that?

—Darin

What has been very disappointing to me as a long time resident is how continually divided we are as a community and how so many projects are fought tooth and nail for many many years.

I know I’ve said this many times here before and we can just say that we respectfully disagree. I think people’s rights have been trampled here for a long time and nothing is done about the little guy. Whether the family on Terrace,  the Kehoe and Pullman ditch, the house on 3 acres, or the hundreds of PUD owners and nobody cares.

The Big Guys got this figured out and have us right where they want us, broke.  And we did it to ourselves.

To me the world is a spectrum of gray. To many here its either black or white.  With firmly entrenched positions like this,  there’s little common ground.  The plight of my silly sign speak to the bigger picture here.

Comment 9 by Cheri Parr  on  Jan 12  at  5:49pm  •  All my comments • 

**What has been very disappointing to me as a long time resident is how continually divided we are as a community and how so many projects are fought tooth and nail for many many years.**

Steve - I’m curious how someone so disappointed in the divide is helping the matter by calling his neighbors “terrorists”?  What exactly are you doing to make that divide smaller?

I’d like to discuss the topic of the political extremes, no middle ground and everyone in the community being held hostage to the extremists.  I’ve seen some follow ups, I’d like to respond to, here.  But, I don’t think it is appropriate to have such a discussion under this topic.

Some suggestions for a new topic header, ” eco-terrorist or shill for developers?”, “Is there a middle ground?”,  “Why don’t polite people talk about religion or politics?”  or “Why can’t we all get along?”

Comment 11 by Kevin Barron  on  Jan 12  at  7:19pm  •  All my comments • 

Vince, it was a blatant personal attack. Nice try on the backpeddle. You are obviously on opposite ends with Steve’s piece, and it clearly shone through.

Steve, well-written and clever. Titanium prices have fallen in recent weeks, you may want to look into that as an alternative.

Hi Cheri,

Its not my place to be the peacemaker.  Like many,  I have my views and others have theirs.  I’ve been a big supporter of property rights issues here for a long time.  I also have stated repeatidly, that there are many injustices that go unresolved.

Despite what many may think here,  I don’t really care about the big developers.  Its not going to make me any money in the short run so why waste my time.

What I do see happening is a shift in the publics attitude to where they are getting fed up with this do nothing,  fight till you die and are broke attitude.  Its my opinion that with no disrespect the no-growth movement is losing influence here because of its poor track record.

It would be great if we could agree on things but the areas of common ground are very few. Beachwood,  for example,  is one of the huge polarizing issues where its either black or white,  no gray.

I do enjoy posting here and would do so more often if the topics interested me more.  TA is fun but its a little rough and rude cause of the different format.

Don’t mean to sound like the voice of doom but I don’t see things changing in terms of people’s attitudes.  That’s too bad cause there are big issues facing us and all this fighting isn’t helping.

As far as my silly sign,  I’m just having fun while pointing out how disrespectful people are.  I’m convinced,  it was done because of its location next to open space.

Comment 13 by Cheri Parr  on  Jan 12  at  10:35pm  •  All my comments • 

My take is that this is exactly the problem Steve.  There are plenty of folks out there complaining, but when asked to step up their answer is frequently along the lines of yours, “Its not my place to be the peacemaker.” 

I’m not asking anyone to take on the role of peacekeeper of the coast single-handidly.  But far too many are willing to toss out vitriol and then in the same breath express disappointment in the very divide they help maintain.

The result is that a large number of people, who don’t exist on the fringe, with ideas and the energy to find solutions are quickly beaten down by either extreme.

While I may complain about things taking an eternity to get done (no need to repeat the long list of stalled projects),  I do offer solutions.  But why don’t we talk about the rights of the property owner in the picture above.

I think the creation of PUDs is an abuse of zoning and done to restrict an owners rights.  Zoning also goes by the name of Police Power and what we have seen here over the past 20 years is Police Power Brutality.

But if the PUD zoning wasn’t bad enough,  Tony’s lot was also further burdened by the creation of the Railroad Ave ROW.  To remind everyone,  his property his directly next to this 50 foot restrictive easement on the corner of Railroad and Filbert.

I’d like to see NP3 drive down to City Hall in his green bus and get through that high speed revolving door blocking access to property owners and sink his sharp teeth into those PUD zoning pages and chew them up.  What solutions do you think should be done to help Tony and the hundreds of other PUD victims in developing their properties?

Kevin Barron writes:

“Vince, it was a blatant personal attack.”

It wasn’t.  I was commenting on what Steven Hyman wrote.  I said that explicitly.

“Nice try on the backpeddle.”

I don’t see a back peddle in my post.

“You are obviously on opposite ends with Steve’s piece, and it clearly shone through.”

How can I be on opposite ends of something that is incomprehensible to me?

Here is this one sentence form Steven Hyman’s original post:

“NP3 graduated #1 in his class at Camp GITMO and has specialized in the highly controversial yet highly effective eco-terrorist fighting technique of weed boarding.”

How was a post with a real estate sign sunk in the ground three times and dug up twice by vandals, be trained at an offshore interrogation and detention center for all edged terrorists against the USA?  What is an “eco-terrorist”?  “Eco-terrorist” is in the title and all over the original post.  Barry asked the question directly.  Mr. Hyman has not answered the question in three subsequent postings.  I’m guessing “highly controversial weed boarding” is a reference to water boarding.  What is the whimsical, allegorical, satirical association with a post with a real estate sign and vandals?

Please, if you can, deconstruct this sentence form Mr. Hyman’s original post and explain to me how I am on the opposite end of what Mr. Hyman wrote.