Ghost of a flea: Fruits, nuts and flakes

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September 24, 2008

Fruits, nuts and flakes

Long time Flea-readers will know I am a long time resident of the Annex, Canada's Islington in miniature. Writers, journalists and college professors (cough cough) and the broad spectrum of Canada's one lock-step idea (what Kathy Shaidle and Pete Vere call "the tyranny of nice") are here to be found in abundance. The result is a rich diversity of socialist appropriate SUVs, indulgence for aggressive pan-handling and a kind of public selfishness that I have found difficult to describe to those who have never been exposed to it. Here I was, trying to articulate this phenomenon in light of the new Annex Sobey's (think Tesco Metro) when I find John Glionna has done an excellent job for me -- from an ethnographic perspective -- describing the same phenomenon at the Berkeley Bowl.

You may be shocked to learn progressives behave badly when out in public; pushy, finger-pointing behaviour is common, as is a habit of helping themselves to what other people have worked for. And, of course, righteous indignation a store-owner should ban them from the premises.

Store manager Larry Evans says the policy is a fair response to doctors, lawyers and college professors who help themselves to bags of cookies, nuts and vitamins, stick their fingers in pies and guzzle from bottles of sake, assuming the rules don't apply to them.

"There's a sense of entitlement to this town," Evans said. "People think, 'If I want to do it, I'll do it, just try and stop me.' "

Seven years on the job, he said, has given him insight into the city's sometimes sharp social elbows.

"Berkeley residents are angry -- they're mad at the president, the economy, all kinds of stuff. And this is the place where it seems to get released, the local supermarket."

A formative moment of my undergraduate experience followed an annual dinner held by the religious studies faculty of an unnamed university (for which I owe my undergraduate minor in religion). I watched a senior member of faculty pocketing cheese on the way out the door. I mean literally taking raw chunks of cheese and stuffing them in his blazer. I still shudder to think of the de-linting process.

Posted by Ghost of a flea at September 24, 2008 08:07 AM

Comments

That reminds me of Boulder, CO which I lived outside of for a while. I was once accosted by a dreadlocked panhandler downtown and refused to give him any money. As I was walking away, a heavily pierced young female UC Boulder student, I assume since she was carrying a tote bag with their logo, chastised me for being selfish and not giving the man any money.

Who knows they might have been a team.

Posted by: dpatten at September 24, 2008 09:26 AM

I used to live on the Danforth, near the "Big Carrot" (an organic, politically correct, etc., grocery store). Trying to shop there was eye-opening: the customers were rude to the point of self-parody. Pushy, loud, obnoxious louts and loutesses littered the aisles (in both senses of the word). And the children, of course, were left to run free . . . and run they did.

The kids would run into one another and bounce off random adults, while the parents used their baskets in the same way riot police use their shields and batons. It was difficult to get out of the store unbruised.

I've never met so many insanely self-centred, self-righteous, morally censorious prigs in my life. Rather the opposite of "nice", actually.

Posted by: Nicholas at September 24, 2008 09:43 AM