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Benches outside Tesco
Forgive me if any other Stroud Greener has already started this discussion, but I'm absolutely incandescent at the sudden removal of the three benches outside Tesco -- with no consultation of the local community. My partner, and many of my neighbours, are either disabled or elderly. They relied on those benches while waiting for a taxi or to rest a bit before walking home with heavy shopping. The benches were provided by Islington Council but were clearly situated on Tesco property, as shown by the brass-stud demarcation line on the pavement. So who's to blame? Tesco's duty manager (who looked as if he had at least a year to go before his 'A' Levels) told me it was all the council's fault. No doubt the council will blame Tesco. In either event, we NEED those benches back!
What do other people think?
What do other people think?
Comments
(1) elderly and disabled people (who really DID use the benches) are now worse off; and
(2) this council-sponsored vandalism was done without any consultation with Stroud Greeners.
I might add that the street people who sometimes congregated there are, despite whatever problems they may have, just as much a part of our community as anyone contributing to this thread. There are certainly one or two of them who have been in Stroud Green for as long as I have -- 16 years.
Please, in continuing this discussion, can we leave out the class snobbery of 'respectable' vs. 'undesirable'?
Oh and by the way what's happened to your Red Star flag?
See you there prob.
commissar17 as always is slightly confused and removed from reality.
The benches probably could and should have stayed in my opinion.
Again, as with the Local Gangs thread, we need to be reaching out to vulnerable people in our community. And putting pressure on local government to make suitable arrangements that consider as many people as possible.
This cannot be done by just removing the benches. The problem then moves somewhere else and someone else has to deal with a social problem not of their doing.
NIMBYism is not the way to deal with problems.
Nicely rounded arguement Arkady.
You know exactly how full their lives have been then?
And you think everyone who lives in SG contributes to society?
Antisocial behaviour is a problem, but from where it stems is the bigger problem.
Just hiding behind your skinny jeans and silly hat won't stop the problem. But generalising about everyone who gets pissed on those benches is narrow minded and is Snobbish, even if that sounds like the equally narrow minded (just a different narrow alley) commissar17.
Not everyone on those benches is anti-social, and I have certainly not had any problems with any of them (but to be fair, I also draw the line at bongos)
I have had more problems on SGR with pissed wankers coming out of the bars, or wankers being rude in many of the restaurants, or maybe I am just generalising.
Shot?
Sent to a remote Scottish Island?
Moved as far away from Tories as possible?
Or is there a greater problem that involves a failing system that is not going to get any better with adding to depravtion, which will in fact widen problems that have been growing for many generations.
Fuck 'em unless they bow to my mighty tax paying self worth.
Depriving people and telling them to get on with it helped in the 80's didn't it? didn't it.............?
It would be great if they did replace them.
I am sure Arkady would agree... yes?
Arkady 'Ultimately people need to take responsibility for their actions, or lack of actions. I’m very happy to pay a substantial contribution from my taxes to assist the mentally ill or addicted to do that. But if they are not willing to do so then there will be consequences, such as being deprived of their benches.'
Which, whilst using the bench removal as an example is more of a generalisation about all people who have problems, all people who do not pay tax....
Misscara and Andy have the best point on here really anyway.
This may only be a temp thing and the benches may return, none of us have bothered to find out.
Arkady, as usual, has exposed yourself as narrow minded in the worst possible sense - A Tory sounding sense.
And I have, as usual, reacted as it is impossible to let that kind of shit pass without comment.
Nice to take my mind away from work, but probably not healthy..
Thanks Arkady - Keep chasing that Rainbow
Surely the money spent removing the benches could have been better spent offering the drunks help towards leading a full, healthy life? Then everyone's a winner.
There’s an assumption that A) they’ve had that opportunity and not taken it and B) that slipping back to alcoholism (to use the bench example) is down a lack of motivation. It’s not, it’s much more a case of fear and desperation driving them towards the comforting familiarity found at the bottom of a can of special brew.
At the risk of sounding preachy, Stroud Green's poorest residents should be looked after by those with the means to do so, not left to rot because we expect them to share our values but give up on them when we realise they don’t.