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Bushwick Gentrification Flame War: "This Is The Face Of Hipster Racism"

Emma Whitford

Published Jan 7, 2016

Modified Jan 8, 2016

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Emma Whitford

Published Jan 7, 2016

Modified Jan 8, 2016

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A Bushwick-based gallery announced Thursday that it had canceled its plans to generate and promote a list of the 200 most "innovative" residents of the neighborhood, after several long-time residents and activists criticized the list for its perceived racial bias and indifference towards the impacts of gentrification.

While all of the comments have since been deleted from the event's Facebook page, longtime Bushwick resident and local activist Will Giron has posted a series of screenshots documenting controversial comments made by Park Slope gallery owner Ethan Pettit. Many of Pettit's comments were directed at Anthony Rosado, a lifelong Bushwick resident and activist, and one of the most vocal commenters on the thread.

Described in a Ted Talk bio as a "writer, performer, and cheerleader" in the early Williamsburg art scene in the 1980s, Pettit gave a talk at TedXBushwick in March 2015 entitled "Art Causes Gentrification." In the talk he posits that, "Artists seed in the neighborhood all of the essential elements we need to get the neighborhood going."

In numerous posts since deleted from the event page for the "Bushwick 200," Pettit came to the defense of Rafael Fuchs of Fuchs Projects, a gallery at 56 Bogart Street where the event was planned, as first reported by DNAInfo.

Pettit referred to Bushwick as a "blighted and crime-ridden community" and added later that "artists were the first wave of gentrifiers who turned this mess around."

On Thursday afternoon, Fuchs publicly distanced himself from Pettit on Facebook, stating:

Ethan, you are not a part of my group, neither you are representing me.... my intentions are to have understanding and real communication and dialogue with many other tenants in Bushwick, including ones that are labeling me as a racist !!! ... I believe you have good intentions, but step aside, speak for yourself. As a matter of fact, your contribution to the whole deterioration of a dialogue, and you are one of the reasons that it went completely wrong.

Fuchs initially advertised an event that would honor locals in categories from art to restaurants and real estate.

"Lighten up y'all. In the real world out there beyond the borders of ethnocentric barrio you seek to preserve, these kinds of '200' lists are routine, healthy and illuminating," Pettit wrote.

"Just because some white guy concocts some app, or some white girl vandalizes homes with crochet, does not mean they transform the conventional," Rosada argued.

In another comment, Pettit responded to accusations that he is a "white racist" and "white colonizer." To Rosado he wrote, "Just because I don't have some breeder family that talks in tongues on Sundays, does not mean I am not rock solid with my bohemian peeps in the hood."

Expounding on churches he added, "You'd rather have those noxious houses of superstition in your neighborhood, than a place like TEDx where you might actually learn something?"

In response to a comment from Giron challenging the "Bushwick 200" event's inclusion of real estate as a category in light of "the endemic harassment and displacement of working class Black and Latino families from the neighborhood," Pettit wrote: "Your neighborhoods were in bad shape dude. It was not some magisterial Inca civilization I assure you."

"This is the face of hipster racism. The ugly side of what many gentrifier artists who open up studios in Brooklyn really feel about the communities they displace," Giron wrote on Facebook. "All of us united in calling Ethan out on his racism and the problamatic nature of this event. Expecting that these comments would be deleted by Fuchs and the narrative distorted, I took these snapshots as proof of the conversation."

Explaining his decision to cancel the event, Fuchs wrote, "For the sake of peace in the community, we are canceling the event. We don’t wish to cause any trauma to anyone and any grief to the community, neither to create a platform that will ignite unnecessary violence."

He added, "We cannot tolerate any racial and hate notions and comments from anyone. Fuchs Projects is an art gallery, not a social organization."

Asked to speak with Gothamist, Pettit declined to comment. In what may or may not be his last Facebook comment on the matter, he wrote, "The protesters have been victorious, they have succeeded, and they should be commended. I congratulate all of them on a fight well fought. It does not matter if this outcome has been the will of the many or the will of the few."

Tagged

bushwick

Bushwick 200

Ethan Pettit

Fuchs Gallery

gentrification

Emma Whitford

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