Wanting Nice Things and Discrimination

[big W]

Originally Posted by Coldrsx

Thanks for this and always good to run into you. This perception is certainly not uncommon and there are a good number of us working to change this.

I should mention as to not make me sound like a huge Debbie downer on the mall, there has been some progress due to moving the food court up to the third floor. Its much brighter and coupled with the security being present and visible it has made a huge difference in the perception in that part of the mall. In addition, the East Parkade seems to have cleaned up due to increased security there and I hate to say it the Y closing. It seems that less people are loitering at the parkade entrance and that will help the image of the area. While it is bad to say this but reality is people have a more welcoming image of a clean cut guy in a business suit than if that same guy had a scruffy beard and scruffy clothing and perception can become reality.

[240glt]

^ that's a pretty sad commentary. Goes to show ya, Discrimination lives everywhere, and everyone does it

[adam-machiavelli]

How do I flag a whole discussion to be deleted? I find this entire conversation thread to be just about kicking people when they're down. Frankly it makes our City look like a bunch of mean-spirited, smug, Richie Riches!

[SHOFEAR]

^
Typical sjw response. Dont like the discussion, scream its going to offend somebody and demand its too insentitive to discuss rather than have to go through the mental gymnastics of having to defend something silly.

Do you know what is unacceptable? Things like thursday morning at 7:00 when some loser hood rat in a (likely stolen) bike was blasting down the side walk on south side of jasper ave pretending he was going to hit people but then swerving at the last second.

Im glad threads like this make you uncomfortable. The crowd that wants to tip toe and put their head in the sand when it comes to expecting that this fraction of the population behave with some accountablility and gives them free reign to harrass, act like animals, etc, needs to be reminded that there are a ton of people who have had enough with this shit and are tired of being told the only option is to look the other way.

[Black Star]

^ This

I've listened to the SJW also known as left wing nuts or solialist quacks for far to long. I've had it. Generally they do themselves in by simply opening their mouths. But now the time has come to really fight back against this craziness. They are all offended by everything!

[240glt]

Well lets take it back to the incident that started this thread.. poor Gary Moosdos got kicked out of the mall for no reason other than he was native. The racist mall cops profiled him and kicked him out. The social justice zealots on this thread were quick to pounce, condemning the mall and Oxford. What those folks didn't know is that Moosdos was bringing banned individuals into the mall to "council" them. He didn't tell anyone at the mall he was doing this, and he sat in the same corner where all the drug dealers sat. Had he approached the mall management they probably would have supported him, but he didn't and all security saw was a guy who was always with banned individuals at the mall

Yes it was handled poorly, but the fallout was ridiculous. I had my staff spat on and assaulted, people would come up to guest services and scream at them, call them all kinds of awful things, the hate mail... it was insane. We all went through cultural diversity training, our director had to make a public spectacle of herself as demanded by Moosdos and his group.. when asking the city for honest help scumbag councilor Scott McKeen said and I quote "oh no, you guys are going to have to take a few more direct hits to the face before we're going to help you" and our lovely mayor picked his side.. so fuck him too.

So you want a pretty downtown with no scruffy looking people ? Well some eggs need to get broken to do that. And the zealots like the ones at the beginning of this thread will cry. They don't care about the whole story or the truth, they just want do the fashionable thing and respond with riteous indignation

[Channing]

I had my staff spat on and assaulted, people would come up to guest services and scream at them, call them all kinds of awful things, the hate mail... it was insane.

For simply being associated with Oxford. Huh. It's almost like it's not okay to associate simply working for the mall with being racist.

[240glt]

It's almost like it's not okay to associate simply working for the mall with being racist.

Well it shouldn't be I wouldn't think. You'd have to be a special kind of person to actually draw that correlation

[Channing]

Originally Posted by 240glt

Well it shouldn't be I wouldn't think. You'd have to be a special kind of person to actually draw that correlation

Huh. Like a special kind of person to correlate Gary Moosdos with those who were actually banned based simply on association.

[240glt]

^ clearly you only read what you wanted to read. Good for you

[adam-machiavelli]

Originally Posted by SHOFEAR

^
Typical sjw response. Dont like the discussion, scream its going to offend somebody and demand its too insentitive to discuss rather than have to go through the mental gymnastics of having to defend something silly.

etc etc.

I'm neither offended nor insensitive. I am not going to have a whole debate with you because you are using "patriotically correct" terms like sjw and I am too busy engaging is real world activism and direct action. All I'll say is I am complaining because you're arguing based on illogical and incorrect data. It's as if we had a conversation about why the world is flat.

[Landlocked]

Originally Posted by 240glt

^ clearly you only read what you wanted to read. Good for you

We live in an age where logic is the enemy of extremists on both sides of any spectrum and facts are only facts when they support your cause.

[esquire]

We get this same kind of hand wringing about Portage Place mall in downtown Winnipeg. It has fallen harder than ECC and in many ways, it barely even functions as a mall anymore.

While on one hand it's easy to lament the 80s when the place was full of national chain retailers, on the other the place is indeed functioning as the gathering place it was always intended to be. Obviously the demographics are probably a bit different than what the developer was aiming for, but does that mean it can only be a success if the people hanging out are well scrubbed white people with sufficient levels of disposable income?

I dunno... if the well scrubbed white folks prefer to shop in suburbia instead, then someone might as well be using the place.

[Landlocked]

Originally Posted by esquire

We get this same kind of hand wringing about Portage Place mall in downtown Winnipeg. It has fallen harder than ECC and in many ways, it barely even functions as a mall anymore.

While on one hand it's easy to lament the 80s when the place was full of national chain retailers, on the other the place is indeed functioning as the gathering place it was always intended to be. Obviously the demographics are probably a bit different than what the developer was aiming for, but does that mean it can only be a success if the people hanging out are well scrubbed white people with sufficient levels of disposable income?

I dunno... if the well scrubbed white folks prefer to shop in suburbia instead, then someone might as well be using the place.

It's so funny when racists use the race card to the point that it stops working.

[240glt]

Part of the problem is that the city basically treats ECC like a defacto day shelter.

Having said that, the mall has done great things for marginalized and at risk people who spend time there

It's too bad this went down the way it did, but had Gary approached the mall and asked if he could do outreach there he probably would have been supported in a number of ways. I am sure he knew who he should talk to.. everyone does

But he chose to bring banned individuals in without permission. The mall doesn't ban people for being FN. In fact it's actually pretty hard to get banned period. You've got to have done something pretty bad to get banned from that place.

Fact is downtown Edmonton is rough and has a lot of social problems. When people and the city start putting pressure of to deal with those issues without providing support, these things will happen.

[Channing]

Originally Posted by 240glt

^ clearly you only read what you wanted to read. Good for you

I'm not saying the people getting mad and assaulting mall staff over that incident are in the right. They're absolutely not.

Neither was security when they kicked Gary out. You say it's hard to get banned, but that incident showed otherwise, at that time.

You've just made it look like Oxford is the one getting wronged here, and if Gary had just done better it would be all fine.

It was a two way problem.

[Landlocked]

Originally Posted by Channing

I'm not saying the people getting mad and assaulting mall staff over that incident are in the right. They're absolutely not.

Neither was security when they kicked Gary out. You say it's hard to get banned, but that incident showed otherwise, at that time.

You've just made it look like Oxford is the one getting wronged here, and if Gary had just done better it would be all fine.

It was a two way problem.

240glt stated 'Moosdos was bringing banned individuals into the mall to "council" them'. Are you saying he's not telling the truth? You've vaguely stated that Gary didn't do anything worthy of being kicked out, but didn't address 240's direct statement to the contrary.

[240glt]

It was a two way problem.

I agree. But that's not what was being said when the incident happened.

Regardless, I'll again re-iterate that the situation was handled very poorly by the security at the time.

Also at the time, the mall was experiencing an unprecedented amount of disorder and criminal activity. The city had put a significant amount of pressure on the mall to deal with those issues, while offering absolutely zero assistance, at the same time as they were giving Darryl Katz exclusive access to dozens of police officers to help deal with any issues that might sully the reputation of the ice district. And when Oxford did ask for help the city threw them under the bus.

So yes security acted inappropriately, Gary Moosdos should have consulted with the mall prior to performing outreach at the mall with banned individuals, and the city abdicated its responsibility in assisting in dealing with the problems that led up to this event.

Unfortunately only one of those three were held to task for their part in the incident.

[noodlenoodle]

I'd think encouraging people to trespass on private property would be a pretty cut & dry bannable offense.

[Channing]

Originally Posted by Landlocked

240glt stated 'Moosdos was bringing banned individuals into the mall to "council" them'. Are you saying he's not telling the truth? You've vaguely stated that Gary didn't do anything worthy of being kicked out, but didn't address 240's direct statement to the contrary.

At the time security kicked him out and banned him he was alone eating. There is video of this.

Unfortunately only one of those three were held to task for their part in the incident.

Of the three, Gary has the least power and I would argue lost some intangibles in the incident.

The City probably has the most power and came out looking like nothing was their fault, which I also disagree with.