A Philly musician responds to that Vice punk piece
Please note: This article is published as an archive copy from Philadelphia City Paper. My City Paper is not affiliated with Philadelphia City Paper. Philadelphia City Paper was an alternative weekly newspaper in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The last edition was published on October 8, 2015.
Yes, people will tell me to lighten up, but do you know who never lightens up when you bad-mouth their city? New Yorkers. I know this because I was one for 28 years. So, don't even.
—Cynthia Schemmer
Yes, people will tell me to lighten up, but do you know who never lightens up when you bad-mouth their city? New Yorkers. I know this because I was one for 28 years. So, don’t even.
—Cynthia Schemmer
By now, you might've heard about that Vice/Noisey piece from yesterday. Half of it was a bunch of trolling anti-Philly stuff, half was about all the awesome bands that currently call this city home. Emily Guendelsberger dissected it nicely.
Cynthnia Schemmer, a teacher who plays in Radiator Hospital and Heavy Bangs — both of which were singled out for praise in the article — has some complicated thoughts about what writer Dan Ozzi chose to insult.
The classism in the first part of the article is infuriating to me. Of course it is, not only as a teacher in Philadelphia public schools but also as a compassionate human being. The comments Dan Ozzi makes regarding high school drop outs and “GED mouthbreathers” are not only offensive in regard to class and privilege, but they are also seemingly ignorant considering the circumstances these people face and the abominable state the Philadelphia education system is in: 23 schools have closed and around 4,000 layoffs, including teachers and counselors, have occurred in the past year. This isn’t funny to me. This is fucking awful.
Read the whole thing here.
In my mind, it's not at all at odds with my pal Drew Lazor's piece at Philly Mag about this city's inferiority complex. There are some things we should let slide (dumb, trolly blogbarf) and some things we can't (tone-deaf classism).
