An open letter to Mr. Low-life Ghetto Trash
***Disclaimer: The views of this author, as expressed in this post, are limited to the specific people who committed the crimes mentioned herein, and are not to be taken as representative of the authors opinion of the VAST majority of Detroiters.***
Thank you Mr. Low-life Ghetto Trash for choosing my friend Paul’s car to break into last Friday. Many people would not have cared enough to go through all of the trouble of throwing a battery through the passenger side window and leaving with two non-descript bags.
You might have noticed as you pawed through my bag, the blue thing with all of the pieces of thin stuff inside it – that is what we college students call a “book”. Books are what people like me and my friends use to gain the knowledge necessary to secure what we call jobs – so that we never have to live next to you and your associates. And if we do live next to you; we spend some of the money we earned (another concept for another day) to get a really good security system and camera’s (to either scare you away or catch your sorry ass as it slithers back ito the hole you live in).
I will grant you that it is ironic that I write you this letter, what with it being unlikely that you know how to read and all; but it does me good to give credit where credit is due. You make up the half of the social ladder that makes good half possible!
Fun experience.. especially considering I take it they got away with nothing of major resale value. But a battery? Come on, the woman who broke into my jeep did it with her bare hands…
They couldn’t have known this from the street, but inside the bag I had a $75 pocket knife, $110 flashlight, $125 sunglasses, $85 textbook (they tried to return it the next day at Marwil’s, but were turned down becaus they didn’t have the reciept), a $25 leatherman, and the bag itself was nothing flashy, but cost $75. Then there were little odds and ends like spare batteries and a $1.99 fresh tin of Altoids! You are right though, a lot of it didn’t have resale value like this semesters class notes.
Hey, premtive strike here…I know that the stuff sounds really expensive for what it is, but believe me, I am not rich by any stretch…I just like to have really good quality stuff, if I am going to use it every day. My net worth, basically dropped by a third!
Hey Doug… Sorry about smashing in your friend’s car window with that car battery. On the street we don’t necessarily deal in cash/credit exchanges, but with the barter system. You and your friend Paul have been conscripted into our social experiment.
Usually these interactions between individuals are of a face-to-face personal kind in non-market economies. Little or no attempt is made to calculate the contribution of individuals or to calculate individual shares. Social pressure generally obligates individuals to freely share food and other products of their labor with whomever needs it or asks for it in the community. This operates as an economic leveling mechanism. As a result, there is little or no possibility of saving and becoming more wealthy than anyone else. Subsequently, the incentive to work is not only derived from a desire to acquire what is being produced but also the pleasure of working with friends and relatives. In addition there is potential for increased social prestige from doing the job well. This is radically different from a factory or office job in a modern market economy. In that kind of work, strangers come together, often in impersonal groups of thousands. Every minute of labor is accounted for because pay varies with the specific job an individual does and how much time is spent in doing it. The goal of work is likely to be primarily the money that is paid for doing it rather than the pride in producing a good product or working with friends. However, there is a greater opportunity to save and accumulate wealth in market economies.
Do you find it curious how you can so easily list the prices of your $75 pocket knife, $110 flashlight, $125 sunglasses, $25 leatherman and $75 bag? I find it disturbing that you have fallen subject to the marketing campaigns of big corporations to purchase their frills products.
The $85 textbook – knowledge that is freely acquired from our ever troubled unused libraries – was given to another of our homelsss brotherhood who (unbeknownst to me) tried to turn it in for an exchange. Marwils refused to perform the barter, feeling that knowledge must have a price.
PS: I am enjoying the Altoids…
Mr. Ghettotrash,
If I unload everything I care about from my car and leave it unlocked would you still find something to take? The radio is factory, I don’t have a full-size spare, and I think the thing’s only running on 2 of its 4 cylinders anyway.
Newbie at livin’ in the city
Newbie:
Most people underestimate the amount of useful components in what they thought was an empty automobile. We, People-of-the-Street, can remove your seats to use for unexpected guests; your floor mats make wonderful ice barriers in the winter time; even the car’s antenna comes in handy for measurement comparisons.
Just be considerate and leave your house keys on the same keyring as the ignition keys — we’ll find PLENTY to barter with!
MR. GHETTOTRASH
Good luck” securing “a job w/ all the knowledge you are siphoning from books. It’s looking like you’re going to need some extra help in that dept. so if books do it for you , more power to you . I know it doesn’t help that the Battery- Tosser ALREADY has a job … I can see where your bitterness comes from ! Was the car parked at street level or did the fearless entrepreneur have to use a portable ” social ladder ” to gain access ? I hope to God he/she doesn’t READ the purloined volume because then it’s going to be even harder for the “nice ” people in Human Resources to decide who is going to get the job ? The sour-grapes guy who can’t stand “half ” the population OR the self-motivated go-getter w/ an appreciation for good quality stuff. I think you’re both gonna get screwed on this one because your employability profiles look disressingly similar ! How’s somebody supposed to choose ? Maybe you can reconsider your unwillingness to locate to the” other half of …. ” ( hint: looks bad to be “inflexible ” on job apps…) Failing that, ….have you considered self-employment ? HOT TAR roofing is a winner ; AND you can use your beloved ladder !
I’m sorry about your friends loss.
perhaps were it a shiny new very desirable car parked in a mall lot as this is where most cars are stolen from and not from a space called “ghetto” the precursor to concentraition camp this act would be more understandable, but heck a battery through the window is much like a pair of aeroplanes through the window. A means to an end. I don’t make cars or money, I don’t destory ecosystems or send millions to war. The bad things I do are personal. I steal to eat or feed my addictions. Hell, I don’t even make or import the things that I eat or am addicted to. I just assumed that your friend was richer than I and could get more of whatever it was that I took from his car. Which car was that anyway? I mean “your” people make all that stuff. “your people make the Battery I threw. “Your people made the place I live a ghetto. I’m not saying I’m right, but it maybe time to concider an old saying. “When in Rome…
…Your teacher may just screw your buddy.”
Plutonic education can be painful without the right amount of lube.
So, in a world where most people are abused and discontented. Your friend should be grateful that his books and altoids were not taken. One should have good breath when filing a police report and with a good education, he can
Build a better mouse trap.
& when you move you classist, racist asses to the moon would you be so kind as to take GW and Oprah with you?
What place is this where people actually give away batteries. the person who broke my window tried to remove my battery.
One of the chief problems with relations between the suburbs and the cities occurs when people elevate crime to a point where it is considered tantamount to self-expression or political demonstration. My friends, many of whom live in the city do not need an explanation for why they steal – because…THEY DON’T STEAL!
I guess I have more respect for situations that lead a person into poverty than you do, “GHETTOTRASH,” because you lump all homeless people together as thieves. So that you know, people find themselves on the streets for a variety of reasons; and most will not steal from you. For you to blanketly assume that the person who broke into Paul’s car was a “street” person really betrays a lot of classist brainwashing on your part. “Ghetto” is a state of mind; and along with “Low-life,” is a choice not a forgone conclusion based on one’s zip code. For the sake of your aspiring role as an advocate; you would do well to remember the distinction.
But, alas, any effort on my part to try to explain the difference between stealing and activism would be lost on a person such as yourself, who has never possessed so much as a single of their own thoughts. The least you could have done when you launched into your self-important appeal for socialism would be to cite the Communist Manifesto, from which you lifted your argument. But hey, you can’t show that you plagiarize, much less read with the towering intellect of Joslin there to remind you how fruitless it is to engage in such an activity.
By the way, nice dig at the end there about, “[having] fallen subject to the marketing campaigns of big corporations to purchase their frills products” – but I must admit I have heard it delivered with so much more passion when the usual purveyors of such pablum – that is to say high schoolers – who rattle it off after their parents don’t raise their allowance.
Oh, and Perwinke Bubbles, it’s cool that you did the whole pretend-to-be-the-guy-that-stole-the-stuff gag, but, um, Ghettotrash already took that one…sorry, I know sometimes its such a pain to have to actually find out what’s going on before you jump into a conversation. :( And one more thing…I never said that I had any knowledge of the guy being drunk or high…but it was a nice touch though how you implied that with your asinine compilation of statements; which, when taken together hint at what you would call your, “point.” I guess I would advise you to aim at making a little more sense next time. I know it comprimises you a little as an artist, but people won’t laugh at you as much and actually mistake YOU for being drunk or high! :)