Hi Reddit! I'm the angry dude in the video (thats private so I can't see it). Gonna address a few things in this thread.
I am not a passerby - Superdont - your just wrong. I own flatspot. Started it when I was 20.
Why the hell is this video private! Bummer, would have loved to see it. I'm not ashamed in the least.
GAG was protesting Bestie. Which is immediately across the street from my business. On the floor above bestie there is housing for elderly chinese people subsidized directly by the rent revenue from bestie. Those sausages are turned almost immediately into housing for elderly chinese. They are also absolutely delicious. Their ice cream sandwiches are also dank.
3 a) The owners of bestie had to launch a kick started to open their business. One of them is a recent father, and neither are "rich" by any means. Their staff are well looked after in one of the most expensive cities in the world. Ie. Not a chain store. Owned by people who live here. Who then make living here possible for others. . .
Many of the small biz being protested are in retail locations that had been empty for years. Spaces that are owned by benevolent societies that manage housing for elderly chinese. Would you rather they rented the spaces to begin to pay for the existing housing that isn't fully maintained or utilized? Or would you rather they leave them vacant until a developer makes them a deal they cannot refuse on a property that doesn't even pay for itself to remain standing? (Ie. small businesses are currently paying the rent bills that are keeping some of these buildings from being turned into condo developments.)
I haven't been paid since I opened my business. Thats not a trick of business owner tax evasion, thats just how a small business goes in the founding years. It might look big, but its very delicate. It might have a lot of stock, but it has more debt. A boycott of small biz in chinatown would effectively exclude me from having a home or a vocation, and would dissolve 5 years of my life.
As an evil gentrifying business here are some of the things we do locally because we think its important.
Work with Onyx and Intersections to host at risk youth for job placement programs to build their employable skill set so they may have references for future employment.
Have a gear donation program in the store where we help local people who cannot afford simple pieces for their board get what they need to continue using their board for transportation.
Run 2 free weekly open to the public skate lessons for anyone and everyone who is interested.
As someone who grew up to lesbian parents on welfare, and spent the vast majority of my formative years living in both Toronto and Vancouver's chinatown, I both feel completely at home in chinatown, around chinese culture and people, and totally at ease with anyone in the LGBT community. The fact that I think GAG is a bunch of raging assholes is not because they are Gay, and not because they want to "save chinatown". I love gay people and chinatown (not that it needs saving in the ways they espouse). They piss me off because they have no fucking clue what they are talking about, and frankly have NO VEHICLE FOR CHANGE other than their shitty songs, and generally dilute and misdirect the conversation. Even spending the time to write this is an unnecessary waste of time that could have been avoided had they done a a little homework. But alas, they did not, and now have to hold fast to a faulty position and try to mark themselves as victims. Too bad they took down that video. . . .
LAST POINT: The GAG came to chinatown with a series of "christmas carols" - which are traditionally used to make people feel welcome and safe in their homes during the holiday season. The message in these carols was that small businesses were not welcome in chinatown. That they were actively harming its residents. That the cost of living was going up as a result of our presence. That we do not have a right to a home or vocation because of how we have chosen to live. That we actively exclude those in need from being able to live here. So I lost my shit, and was super mean. But just because they wrapped their message in a cute little song, and put their message on a flowery bed sheet doesn't mean that their message is remotely nice. They sang, in unison, that I should not have the home I worked for. I should not have the business I worked for. They took a ritual of community cohesiveness and welcoming and turned it into an agenda for displacement. So yes, I am angry, I say mean things, I yell. I am also affected by gentrification. Being a son of a single lesbian mother on welfare doesn't really set you up to displace poor people, I don't have a safety net, I don't have anything other than what I worked for. The GAG are the ONLY people against small business in the area, and continually hijack the conversation in the area to focus on their own mandates. Ultimately, there is no meaningful conversation to be had with these people, and most of their attempts to enact change blow up in their face because they don't actually represent the needs or feelings of the area.
HEY GAG READ THIS: IF I EVER SEE YOU HOLDING A PROTEST IN CHINATOWN AGAINST SMALL BUSINESSES AGAIN I"M GOING TO SINGLE HANDEDLY DISMANTLE IT LIKE I DID THE LAST ONE. YOU SUCK AT ACTIVISM. YOU SUCK AT RESEARCH. AND YOU SUCK AT RHYMING AND SINGING. AND YOU SUCK EVEN WORSE AT STANDING YOUR GROUND. THIS IS MY HOME. THIS IS MY COMMUNITY. THE PEOPLE I LOVE AND CARE ABOUT LIVE HERE, AND WE ARE FAMILY, NOT BY BLOOD, BUT BY CHOICE. I WILL FIGHT FOR IT HARDER THAN YOU WILL EVER KNOW. BECAUSE THIS IS THE ONLY HOME I HAVE EVER KNOWN. YOU WILL NOT TAKE IT FROM ME. YOU WILL NOT MAKE ME FEEL UNWELCOME.