In Seattle, the pursuit of the almighty dollar began to supersede all other considerations on November 13th, 1851.

Ah, yes! A Thursday to remember!

Dear Seattle;
I was first born here in 1980 and soon found myself in the warm embrace of 19 and 20 year old artist parents. After 17 years of growing up broke as fuck I went to school for an engineering degree. Now I've got a home in a city I still love and a job that occasionaly makes me want to gouge out my eyes and alost certianly leads me to damage my liver with regularity.

Everything has a price. Hopefully the path we take has a price tag we can manage. Best of luck to those of you getting royally fucked by the Seattle economy. It can be real shitty out there.

Dear Seattle, moved here in 1989, made $ from Apple MSFT and dot com
IPOs bought house don't pay rent. Didn't waste it all on rad parties. Still here. Sux2BU

Perfect.

The blogs and weeklies in San Francisco are replete with these. Even recently read one (by a lovely friend and neighbor, no less) decrying the expense and homogeneity of SF as the reason they're moving to... wait for it... OSAKA.

Ain't no privilege like liberal arts privilege.

In case you need to leave anywhere and must screed about it:

http://tinysubversions.com/leavingEveryw…

@7 That's amazing, thank you.

San Francisco and New York are vastly more expensive – and yes the art gets better and better. Let's embrace science -- and Darwinism -- to recognize that economics is a fantastic way to de-breed cities of thier many truly shitty artists, each with their derivative seen-it-befores, and an invitation to creative people who under the stress of the city or a challenge to stand-out, really push art forward.

In short, Seattle has bred a legion of artistic pussies. Nobody (but economics) is telling you what what we've known all along: "Kids, you're not that fucking talented. Move on and make room for the next."

Face it: We are stuck in a plaid-collar ghetto. Anywhere USA worth moving to is already a zillion times more expensive, and everywhere else is packed with glassy-eyed tongue-talkers, other deranged religious nutz, and neo-fascist, hate-crazed, gun-fellating RepubliKKKans.

We'd better make the best of Seattle.

I don't want to leave Seattle, I want to invade it.

Wow I'd love to see what kind of awesome art Zok's economic Darwinism breeds. I'm sure it's diverse, fascinating, thought provoking and pushes its medium in new directions. Because Van Gogh was a millionaire cut-throat capitalist.

Dammit. Rolled my eyes too hard, now they won't go back.

Oh for fuck's sake. This is a capitalist country, and it's responsible for all the liberties and the incredible standard of living you take for granted, but yes, it's responsible for gentrification, as well. You can't have one without the other, kids. Stop your belly aching about not being able to afford your rent, work harder or shut up.

It should be signed, "love, ____________ [name of ex-Stranger writer].

@11 - totally. Area-wise, the percentage of the US not populated by flat-earth xenophobic psychotic Jeeboids is TINY. See this graphic: http://i.eroshare.com/083n25qt.jpg

The non-insane places are full of the people who are intelligent and actually produce something. The rest are self-denying welfare queens (not the brown people they hate).
There's a massive premium to live in the still-sane(ish) parts of the country.

Self-styled "artists" are not owed a living, especially in a high-cost location. Want some cheese with that whine?

Oh hell no. No one deserves to live with dignity or access to their needs unless they make more than $70,000 a year. Which anyone can do because tuition is so cheap these days. Honestly, no one deserves economic or social justice other than the tech workers of the world. They're the only ones who've proven themselves worthy of justice, or of the ability to live in reasonable comfort or prosperity, for they've learned the holiest trade of them all, proving their souls worthy. The world and all it's inhabitants should bow down to you and offer up it's spoils. Anything should be yours, no matter who it belonged to six months ago. All other people are faceless serfs before your entitled glory.

This isn't about artists conquering tech workers. It's about justice and accessibility for ALL. And if you can't see that, you have no place pantomiming your way through participation in counter-culture, because you are a self-serving fascist. High-minded concepts of social justice are the driving force behind counter culture, they're it's beating heart.

The comments on the Stranger have gotten progressively dumber as the bros come in and the Stranger progressively betrays it's readership. Too many self-righteous assholes willing to sell their fellow man up the river to feel personally justified. So yuck.

I was born in Seattle in 1973. My dad was born in Seattle in 1942. I left Seattle 8 years ago because it was too expensive, too crowded and completely fucked by all you transplants. None of you have a *right* to it. You want to live there? You choose expense and traffic. Guess what, I moved a few hours away where I work 3.5 days a week, make art for myself, take vacations, own a house, enjoy a low cost of living and relish something else you'll never have an abundance of there - sunshine. Suck it, suckers.

The American Way: From immigration to gentrification, "this place is awesome so we totally need to keep anyone else from moving here now that I'm here and it's at maximum awesome!"

I kind of dig this, but I can't figure out if it is the typical Stranger piece about the ppor artists and terrible gentrifiers, or if it is a spoof of same. I think it works pretty well as a spoof, maybe an ironic spoof that contains a bit of empathy as well. But it seems surprising that the Stranger would do a piece that in any way takes a poke at what they have previously been championing, atrtists andslackers that seem to think they have a right to live in the city for cheap, yet pretend that they actually care about real poor people.

Lest anyone misunderstand, I mean to say, this is quite subtle and brilliant. My compliments to whoever wrote it. Wish they had been given a credit.