What is “hard-core pornography?”
That was the question the Supreme Court had to decide in a long ago case that prompted one of the judges to answer, “I shall not attempt to further define the kinds of material (hard-core porn)…But I know it when I see it.”
That case came to mind recently, when a friend of mine was expressing frustration about a story he was writing about Detroit. He said that there were things about the assignment that shocked his sensibilities. He said he felt a moral obligation to investigate the subject matter and write a story about it. But, after “talking with” one of the people involved in the matter he’d lost his direction.
He couldn’t quite nail the story. But, he didn’t quite know why either.
A short time after our conversation I texted him, “Gentrification – it’s like pornography – You know it when you see it.”
To extend the metaphor: if gentrification is akin to pornography, then Detroit’s recovery plan is like the urban renewal equivalent of hard-core pornography – hypergentrification – plus, equally reprehensible corollaries like abandonment, displacement and the exponential growth of the inequality gap that one might expect when civil society has broken down.
The City of Detroit Now & Beyond Bankruptcy: Hypergentrification, Abandonment & Displacement
Coming Very Soon!
