August 27
...serving up your daily dish.
Spotted on Church Street by Myra Banks and photographed by our own Warren Levinson, an apparent grassroots campaign against Gene Wilder um, Dick Grabowksy. Not only are they all over downtown Montclair, but one sticker has been spotted on Watchung, near the site of the demolished Marlboro Inn. Ok, so what do we do to save Montclair? Wait, we've got it. Everybody go out and buy an organic fig newton from the health food store on Church Street. That'll drive Dick crazy.
August 27, 2005 in Controversy | Permalink
Save Montclair! Plaster the Town with Ugly, Off-Color Fliers!
Posted by: Chris | Aug 27, 2005 11:15:29 AM
LOL, Chris, and you know they'll eventually end up littering the streets and sidewalks.
Posted by: Miss Martta | Aug 27, 2005 11:29:23 AM
and I justlearned that Bob & Andy, from the Health Food store, are going..they have to be out by the end of Aug. So, go on over and say bye to two long time members of our community.
Posted by: wayne robbins | Aug 27, 2005 11:45:58 AM
This is Awesome! At least someone is saying something. Ugly? It's subjective. That's the problem with Montclair is we want to be an artistic expressive community of free-thinkers, but we criticize the first person who is artistic, expressive, and free-thinking! It's like voting; if you don't vote don't complain. Hey, Miss Martta & Chris...what are you doing to bring on change? Do something!
Posted by: tom | Aug 27, 2005 1:23:11 PM
This is Awesome! At least someone is saying something. Ugly? It's subjective. That's the problem with Montclair is we want to be an artistic expressive community of free-thinkers, but we criticize the first person who is artistic, expressive, and free-thinking! It's like voting; if you don't vote don't complain. Hey, Miss Martta & Chris...what are you doing to bring on change? Do something!
Posted by: tom | Aug 27, 2005 1:23:43 PM
Do something? Tom, How 'bout you go and buy property and do what you want with them? Let's see what kind of a Dick you are.
Posted by: grme | Aug 27, 2005 2:00:59 PM
grme,
How very American of you! If you have money then you have privilege? I think it's typical of the over-fed trust fund recipients who are tearing down places like the Marlboro Inn. Why does Europe have so much history standing and we don't? Answer: We keep tearing our history down!
Posted by: marge | Aug 27, 2005 2:43:02 PM
Last time I looked, Dick was restoring buildings, not tearing them down.
Posted by: Greg Spinelli | Aug 27, 2005 2:50:27 PM
Yeah. Like how he restored/relocated 12 Miles West to Bloomfield sharing the neighborhood with Dollar Dreams and C-Town! Thanks Dick!
Posted by: larry | Aug 27, 2005 2:59:26 PM
I dont understand the relationship between the title and the post...?
- Jersey Perspective
Posted by: Jack | Aug 27, 2005 3:01:01 PM
wayne, i'll do that. over the rainbow was such a service to the community and fed so many who couldn't afford those trendier spots. so sad to see it go.
i wish i were one of the trustfund fortunate, i'd buy it up and help them create a place that would bring trendy to shame. they made the best smoothies!
sorry to see the real pot of gold over the rainbow is being replaced by hungry money.
Posted by: lily | Aug 27, 2005 3:10:08 PM
Europe has so much history standing because their history dates back hundreds of years before ours.
Thank goodness for Historic preservation committees designed to help save what can be saved. I'm all for that.
But, How does hanging vulgar peices of paper around town contribute to Montclair?
Free speech? Artistic expression? Activism? No, it's littering.
Posted by: grme | Aug 27, 2005 3:16:43 PM
BTW, it doesn't take a trust fund to own a store or property. It takes a smart, hard working, risk-taking businessperson.
Maybe you can do it, Lily.
Posted by: grme | Aug 27, 2005 3:21:02 PM
Then why wasn't the Marlboro Inn preserved? For those of us that don't have the money to buy property, "vulgerity" is our only way. It's all in the translation of the flyer. Don't be a Dick, Don't be a Bush, Don't be a Guy who has power and takes advantage of it! I think this grassroots organization is speaking for those of us without the financial megaphone to make a statement that is written in the sky. There are flyers posted in town everyday, Why is this litter? Because you disagree? So it's great to have freedom when it only benefits you?
Posted by: lauren | Aug 27, 2005 3:28:34 PM
and although Europe is older--they started by saving and perserving their sites--they have pride in where they live--humble at times though it may be-we are consumed with bigger- and better-and our history is slandered by self interest-
instead of loving our history-even with it's horrors as Europe itself has had-we divide ourselves with our own needs instead of the needs of all--and we gave away our hard earned monies to countries who hated us even when we had nothing to do with their plight-instead of investing in our own history and plights.
we have our opinions, our own and want to force them down each others throats-
soon there will be an exhibit--it will be of unclad Americans somewhere in a zoo-and it will tell our story---
how a country so wonderful and free divided itself --how everyone wanted to be an "American" yet when they got here they couldn't wait to drop the guise and really just live here and suck it dry while wearing their own coat of arms from somewhere else or promoting anything but that which was known as "The United States of America"-
-and it will tell how these people rewrote our Constitution and burned our flag--
and how we fought amongst ourselves and while we were busy fighting our own interests --the outsiders came and conquered -
-and the place will be here but it will no longer be the United States- and those that come upon the exhibit will sit outside the cage and wonder what it meant to be free-truely free and the price it cost.
Posted by: cstarling | Aug 27, 2005 3:48:29 PM
You know, Dick is one of the nicest, warmest, self-made men I know.
I am sure that he is amused by these flyers.
Posted by: Kevin Lee Allen | Aug 27, 2005 4:24:10 PM
Tom, your powers of persuasion have talked me into LOVING the fliers, and I don't even live in Montclair. Now I want to see MORE fliers there! Can you put this one up on your front door and on all the telephone poles on your street?
Don't be a PU$$Y
BUY A $300 COLANDER
Posted by: Chris | Aug 27, 2005 4:24:22 PM
What is wrong with progress? Why is this town so resistant against change and growth? Get with it, let's get Montclair into the 21st Century, and LET'S GO DICK!
Posted by: belinda | Aug 27, 2005 5:31:39 PM
Because "change" and "growth" often means that those with money and power get to ride roughshod over the interests of those who have less.
I know, it's the American way.
So is resistance.
Posted by: latebloomer | Aug 27, 2005 5:39:48 PM
who does the poster suppose will come and save Montclair--
"This is Awesome! At least someone is saying something"--
"For those of us that don't have the money to buy property, "vulgerity" is our only way."
"I think this grassroots organization is speaking for those of us without the financial megaphone to make a statement that is written in the sky"
i think these should be placed in bubbles over the caged humans heads...
i want that to be representative of civilization at it's finest...
Posted by: cstarling | Aug 27, 2005 6:29:47 PM
Let me get this straight. Some folks above confuse smarmy name-calling with striking a "blow" for free expression, individualism, perhaps even anti-capitalism.
Sure, children, sure. Right on, while I'm at it. Now, go grow up.
Posted by: cathar | Aug 27, 2005 9:22:12 PM
And your lateness, I notice you chiming in too. Before you do so again, will you at least tell me if you've ever read "Das Kapital?" Or something (slightly) more accessible, like "Repressive Tolerance" by Herbert Marcuse?
What does "resistance" have at all to do with those silly-ass stickers? And how relevant was the razing of the Marlboro Inn to the "revolution" some posters seem to think is nigh? Not one of you sticker fans is exactly Zapata, no matter that perhaps you see yourself that way. The only thing some might have in common with this pure revolutionary, now I think of it, is a tendency towards illiteracy. His was total, yours is at least political.
Posted by: cathar | Aug 27, 2005 9:37:54 PM
The time to "save Montclair" has come and gone. The Montclair of my youth is now "a patient etherized on a table." The time to save Montclair was when the first developer approached a public official with a "vision." Now, I'm afraid, it's too late.
Posted by: Miss Martta | Aug 27, 2005 10:45:18 PM
Right, and everybody thinks the Montclair/anytown of their youth was oh-so-wonderful, and change is bad and we all have to save Montclair. Save Montclair from *what*? Developers? Developers, albeit different ones, helped create "the good old Montclair" as well. Just because you don't like what's happening at this very moment with these specific developers...it's ridiculous to proclaim that Montclair is beyond saving. The sky is not falling, chicken little. Towns and neighborhoods change...they're never static. And the changes happening today could be reversed in ten years. Who can say? I say go for it and fight Mr. Grabowsky, but there's no reason to proclaim that all is lost.
Posted by: A Youth | Aug 28, 2005 1:12:27 AM