One Billion Earth Homeless? Is this for real?
Posted Apr 21, 2008 9 comments
If it's accurate, the situation is way worse than I thought. I feel like a total dick when I type something like that, but damn, it's true. I was startled to find this on page 287 of the super-dope book Worldchanging
There are 1 billion squatters in the world today, almost one in six people on the planet. If current trends continute, there will be 2 billion squatters by 2030 and 3 billion (more than one third of humanity) by the midpoint of the twenty-first century.
To keep up with the influx, the world must build 96,150 homes a day - roughly 4000 homes every hour. Generally, only squatters are prepared to make this effort. Their homes start out as mud and cardboard hovels. But once they know they will not be evicted and they can exercise control over their communities, they create permanent, thriving neighborhoods.
There's a couple other gems as well:
Alone, squatters have little power. Together, they can create great things. "The problem of the urban poor can only be solved by the urban poor, not anybody else," says Jockin Arputham, head of Slum/Shack Dwellers International, a global squatter-organizing effort. "The urban poor will be the change agents of the city."
And from the "other cultures are beautifully surreal" department:
A generation ago, the tiny hamlet of Sultanbeyli on the Asian side of Istanbul was just beginning to attract immigrants from the east. Those early arrivals lived in hovels, pirated electricity, and survived without water or toilets. But as more people came, the citizens of Sultanbeyli pursued their political rights - and this has made for an amazing transformation.
In Turkey, if squatters build overnight without being caught, they cannot be evicted without being taken to court. This is why Turkey's squatter areas are known as gecekondu, meaning "it happened at night." Further, once a gecekondu community has two thousand residents, it can petition the federal government to recognize it as a legal municipality.
Today, Yahya Karakaya, Sultanbeyli's popularly elected mayor, works in an air-conditioned office on the top floor of the seven-story squatter city hall building, with a view over the city of 300,000 people who do not fear eviction.
I'm still waiting on a recently ordered copy of The Job
Also worth considering that there's already a thriving global market in "Authority Kits" -- as Mao said, power comes from the barrel of the guns which are sold by the billions, all over the Earth, every year. Official-looking, comfortably fitted police unforms are nice and all, but in actual practice all you need is a group of people who all have guns, right?
Yeesh. Welcome to the Kali Yuga, and enjoy your workweeks.
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Commenting is not available in this weblog entry.1. Dan Bartlett on Apr 22, 2008 at 12:40 AM permalink
Yeah, pretty startling. People who argue for the perks of modern civilisation are usually talking about perks for a small elite; the average person in civilisation is either starving, homeless or making your clothes in China, on shitty wages. I remain optimistic… but I think we’re in for a struggle first. The caterpillar’s immune system fights the cells of the butterfly right up until they’re strong enough to trigger a full transformation.
When I travelled to Brazil, I saw the slums of some of the big cities, and it was unreal. Million dollar mansions on hills with slums on all sides. Highest death by gunshot rate in the world and armed guards at every expensive shop. In a way, the fact that people can survive in slums is testament to human adaptability, but it’s still a sad thing when we have enough cash for everyone to be millionaires.
By the way, thanks for all your great posts! I went through most of this site over the last few weeks and found some real gems. The recent Brainsturbator post with links to your favourite sites was also a treasure chest for me!
2. Clay Richard on Apr 22, 2008 at 4:55 AM permalink
Squatters don’t equal homeless.
Robert Neuwirth’s Shadow Cities is worth a look.
3. Themikenesedude on Apr 22, 2008 at 8:56 AM permalink
Here’s what I’m wondering: I live in an area where the education system- well- sucks! It shows too in how people treat each other and the kind of stupid shit that comes out of people’s mouths that you expect they should know about. Did you know I recently met someone in their 20s who didn’t know how to read A MAP?! She asked how taxicabs would be able to get directions before GPS (as if there was no world before GPS or the iPhone) and I said “Well, duh! They would use a map!” Yes in those exact words. Her jaw dropped open and she said “Woooww- That would’ve been hard. You’re so smart...” Of course I mentioned afterwards how I was just stating the obvious and rolled my eyes.
At the same time there are volumes of examples of stupidity (Some of which are the equivalent of a “Get-Me-And-My-So-Called-Friends-Into-Jail-Free” Card.). Someone I know does things so manic and so stupid that I’m either convinced I have to babysit a fucking addict again, he is more depressed than I am, or he’s an agent. I mean who says, “My boss says I sell shit! Well I’m not gonna take it!” And then sarcastically goes up to cops saying “Hey look at me! I sell shit! I want attention! Blah!” Doesn’t he even realize that a lot of people in positions of authority are characterized by their lack of a sense of humor?! Another great example is when some female who pissed on my inside back patio and threw a bunch of stuff around my bathroom twice ($30 worth of cologne fell in the toilet when she was spazzing.) was told by me, “Yeah I remember you! You pissed in my back patio!” and then she’s like “I don’t remember that but I could see myself doing that. When I have to go I just go. I just go to the bathroom everywhere”. And then the men at the party were still pawing at her- even moreso actually.
So basically the whole point is how do you depend on a community when where you’re at a lot of people are responsible for helping elect Bush into office and you’ve had to deal with literally like probably 200 people in almost a decade be disrespectful, stupid, and incapable of thinking outside of themselves. And when you act respectful and try to be even-handed people just walk all over you because they think that you’re too nice (since after all you don’t act like a manic embarrassment who is an idiot committing a slow suicide). I’m already on the third group of people I have to cut off because the culture where I’m at is so shallow and it’s a spiritual ghetto where I live. The two happiest times of my life here are the times when there have been the biggest brushfires and at those points I had the biggest smile on my face. Otherwise I just felt like I was walking into what I imagined to be like one of Matt Groening’s* nightmares.
Anyway how do you MAKE people consider community and that what they do effects you and others when they are so short-sighted and the whole culture here is so short-sighted. I mean there was an okay hotel a friend of mine lived at. But a rich yuppie bar-owner had messed it all up and turned it into some really tacky richyrich hotel for billionare yuppie swingers. (They have some bottles to drink from there for 10K.). Anyway I visited my friend when it was the old place and before imminent domain made it look as ugly as a bad rap-music video and it just sucks that millions or billions were put into this place and all the foot-traffic is stopped and the news is there why? Because the owner gets a new car. I felt like screaming at the top of my lungs to all the people looking at the really hot car, “WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH YOU PEOPLE?! Don’t you know that you are contributing to poisoning yourself and me and everyone around you?! Do you know why your vanity and envy and lame excuse for a culture industry is toxic?!” It was another moment where I felt embarrassed and disgusted with being a human being because of the values that were apparently so much more important. But THAT is the sad state of where I live and what community is here.
I remember once I walked by a demonstration on the Iraq war and how many people were protesting?! Like five or six veterans! Half-a-dozen people concerned and giving hardly any voice in number! And do you know where everyone else was? They were doing coke, booze, or strippers. Since well where I live that’s all that matters and it’s a damn shame- “Yep your priorities are screwed if you don’t believe in the three necessities: coke, booze, and strippers. Yep, those gotta come before your nation and your friends and lovers and family...” It’s gotten to the point that nobody even takes any pride whatsoever in their jobs at all anymore.
Basically I’m on edge because it’s a lot healthier to have a network and have some community, but what do you do when it seems like you just don’t trust anyone in your community anymore because it values selfishness and crushing or ignoring the little guy so much. I mean where I live you even have to be rich or have family to support you at all.
And what do you do if your only recourse is to have family help you and you want to make sure that they can stand by you and not look down on you or just blow it for really positive, amazing projects of yours.
*: ("From Hell” comic strip; “The Simpsons” Creator) nightmares.
4. Thirtyseven on Apr 22, 2008 at 4:42 PM permalink
I definitely think “Squatters = Homeless” in economic terms, Clay. One billion people who are ignoring the property/money game is highly signifigant.
What if they threw an economy and nobody cared?
5. Themikenesedude on Apr 22, 2008 at 5:36 PM permalink
And of course that’s what I’m also basically coming back around to- Is there any way to “GET” anyone to care? Is is better to just do the Sysiphus thing and do all the work yourself? Is there any way to get a community of individuals that are their own islands to come together and do things for each other?
6. Mr. Nowhere on Apr 23, 2008 at 8:02 PM permalink
The squatters are the pro-active homeless who wised up. Beats curling up in the fetal position and dying on the sidwalk while everyone steps around you. Besides, there’s lots of vacant foreclosed homes to squat in these days or so I’m told.
But getting back to the economy for a minute: ever notice how the recessions seem to be happening more often, and how they tend to affect more people each time they happen, and how the “recovery” period tends to benefit fewer and fewer? Our last recession ended with the so-called “jobless recovery”, what a joke. How exactly is this recession going to end? You can’t breathe new life into an economy the size of America’s with service industry and temp agency jobs. Our production base is gone. In a nutshell: we’re fucked.
But I hear the Army and Marines have a few openings…
7. Thirtyseven on Apr 24, 2008 at 1:37 AM permalink
Found a great little resource:
http://squattercity.blogspot.com/
Also, one of my new favorite websites:
http://subtopia.blogspot.com/
8. Themikenesedude on Apr 24, 2008 at 4:33 AM permalink
Thanks Thirtyseven.
Hopefully those resources can encourage communities to empathize with and support their neighbors.
I’ve also got some resources I’ll post here that have to do with living off the grid and might have some excellent examples of self-sustainability....
9. Themikenesedude on Apr 24, 2008 at 2:36 PM permalink
And here they are:
http://www.caretaker.org
http://www.planetfriendly.net/wwoof.html
http://www.housecarers.com/
http://www.organicvolunteers.com
http://www.couchsurfing.com
http://www.globalfreeloaders.com
http://joomla.servas.org/
http://www.hospitalityclub.org/
You can read more details on this self-sustenance AND travel blog entry here:
http://blog.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=blog.view&friendID;=3030962&blogID;=348437725&Mytoken;=B8CD3854-D36F-4367-94DBF02325918A252141756 . Hopefully, it’s useful for self-sustaining communities because the two aforementioned topics criss-cross each other at enough of the sites. (The last entry “Lonelyplanet.com” is just a travel site, which is why the blog-owner probably didn’t make a hyperlink for it- Or she just didn’t have time. I don’t know.) Couchsurfing.com is kind of like a social networking site so be careful going into that. Not to be hysterical but you don’t know someone really until you meet a person and most of the time you don’t REALLY know them until much later than that even. I just put that one in because it can reduce rent ten-fold and reminds me of something a friend of mine did with going on the road when he was young and couch surfing and traveling with just enough money to get by in his wallet.
Also my insomnia and workaholism (or stubborness - I like that word better because it’s two syllables less I have to say) have effected my typing and grammar but the “Housecarers.com” URL IS correct! If you type in “Housecareers” you’ll just get a parked site (until someone picks up a “housecareers” domain name at least).