United States News
See other United States News Articles
Title: It’s Spreading: More Anarchists Are Fixing Potholes Because the Gov’t Won’t Do Its Job
Source:
The Daily Sheeple
URL Source: http://www.thedailysheeple.com/its- ... he-govt-wont-do-its-job_042018
Published: Apr 10, 2018
Author: Carey Wedler
Post Date: 2018-04-11 05:42:55 by Deckard
Keywords: None
Views: 3203
Comments: 21
Image credit: Open Source Roads As government agencies continue to prove themselves incompetent at local, state, and federal levels, some citizens are taking responsibilities typically assigned to the authorities into their own hands. One of these responsibilities is maintaining the roads, a task most people believe only government entities can carry out. In Indianapolis, Indiana, however, where the roads are in disrepair and require hundreds of millions of dollars to upgrade from “poor” to “fair” condition, two young men are taking a radically different approach: they are filling potholes themselves and building open source technology to crowdfund a community-based, voluntary solution to the problem. Chris Lang, 22, and Mike Warren, 28, launched Open Source Roads, which they describe as “a grassroots volunteer-driven organization dedicated to fixing the roads, using the philosophy of open-source” that aims to “draw attention to the failing infrastructure of Indianapolis and the legislative cutbacks that have created this problem.” The Indy Star reports that the duo repaired over 100 potholes last year and have continued their work into this year, investing their own money to clean up the road systems. They seek to challenge the government’s control over road maintenance, citing the bureaucracy’s inability to do so successfully. “We want to fill a lot of potholes, and we want people to help out and see that we don’t need to rely on this monopoly for it, and I want that to be what starts the people in charge talking about change,” Lang told the local outlet. “If the city is going to fail at their own monopoly, why should they have that monopoly?” Though they don’t aim to overthrow the Department of Public Works, they want to provide other options. Lang, a mechanical engineering student, and Warren, a software developer and Uber driver, say they have spent between $800 and $1,000 of their own money repairing the roads but also raise funds through their Go Fund Me campaign, dubbed the “Campaign to fix MUH ROADS.” “The city has been out to fix many of them, but despite their efforts, potholes still exist in the neighborhood,” the page, which has already surpassed the $500 fundraising goal, reads. “People have been calling the city to come out and finish the job, but to no avail. Given the importance of this to me, I have decided that, if the government won’t do it, maybe I ought to do it myself.” The pair was inspired by the Portland Anarchist Road Care project, a group of anarchists who have taken it upon themselves to repair roads that Oregon city government has been unable to fix. Lang told Anti-Media he identifies as an anarchist and that Warren has anarchist leanings. “Up until now, we’ve tried to remain politically ambiguous,” he said, “but truthfully this was all founded on anarchist beliefs we share and designed to promote a general acknowledgment of the failures of the state.” Lang and Warren do not have a permit to repair the roads, but so far have been able to proceed, drawing on skills they learned by watching videos on the internet about how to fill potholes. Though the city has not yet attempted to physically halt them, Betsy Whitmore, chief communications officer for the Indianapolis Department of Public Works, told the Indy Star in an email that they should obtain the necessary permit, citing public safety concerns. “I usually feel more unsafe driving than I do working on the roads,” Lang said in response to that sentiment. Further, as he told Anti-Media: “It is terrifying trying to navigate some of these roads, and people are actually crashing/getting hurt on a daily basis. The safety factor is well accounted for in our work, and I fully believe our work is as safe as we need it to be. That being said, we’re always trying to get better gear and improve our techniques to better adapt to safety situations. Every spot we hit is strategically picked, and we are careful to make sure incoming traffic has a realistic path around us.” He also said they often have more than two people working on any given pothole, with volunteers coming out to help fill the potholes and also direct traffic. They believe the work they are doing goes beyond simply filling holes in roads and is contributing to saving people’s lives. In their Open Source Roads group on Facebook, they refer to an incident where a man in a wheelchair was thrown into the street after hitting a pothole. Bystanders came to his rescue and moved him out of traffic in an effort similar to Open Source Roads’ desire to tap into the community to improve people’s lives rather than waiting on a government that has proven its inability to live up to its responsibilities. He stressed that their work is “directed activism” — not just two guys trying to fix potholes: “This was something Mike and I, being active political anarchists and formerly working in libertarian organizations together, chose to do specifically for this purpose: So people would ask ‘Why do we need the government, then?’ And the very visible and clear response from the state has just been shrugging off these issues, for a long time.” He continued: “We’ve done bigger things, like work to fight for immigrant and incarcerated peoples’ rights, to not build new jails, ending the drug war. But we needed to stop thinking globally, and start acting locally. Potholes were a very real, and very utilitarian, way to approach that, and anyone can do them. So it promotes the ideas of anarchism in a lot of ways, I think.” In the spirit of non-government, open-source solutions, they are also working on a website and app that will allow community members to volunteer, as well as map potholes and provide details that will help workers plan repairs. As Anti-Media journalist Derrick Broze observed while reporting on Portland Anarchist Road Care last year, whether or not these voluntary groups will outcompete the government remains unclear, “but one thing is certain: the community is a shining example of what a determined group of individuals can do when working together on a common goal.” Delivered by The Daily Sheeple
Post Comment Private Reply Ignore Thread
Top • Page Up • Full Thread • Page Down • Bottom/Latest
Begin Trace Mode for Comment # 12.
#1. To: Deckard (#0)
No, it is not spreading at all. This is the same pair who were in the news for this stuff last year. Even if they succeed, they're just unpaid help for the local governments whose leaders are likely to cheer this on (somewhat) and then try to cut taxes from maintaining streets to spend on something else. Gee, thanks, guys, because you donated your labor and materials, we can spend more money on tranny rights and buying sculptures of dead politicians.
That notion just gave me MORE agita. Thanks.
Question unrelated to this thread: Is there a "SIGN-OUT" feature at LF? Thanks.
No. However, you can just delete your LF web cookies and that will sign you out. The cookies must be present at all times if you are signed in and it is transmitted along with all your web requests back to the server to indicate that you are a signed-in member of LF. On Firefox, you can get rid of the cookie and log-off by going into Preferences->Privacy & Security->History and click the Show Cookies button. There you will see the two cookies for LF, named Remote1 and Remote2. Delete those and you are signed off LF. As soon as you sign in again, they'll be created again. It is a little faster to go through FF's Inspector. Right-click anywhere on any LF page and select Inspector. At the top of the popup Inspector window, look for the Storage tab and click it. On the left you'll see Cookies and you'll see Remote1 and Remote2 listed there along with their expiration date/time and their value. Remote1 contains your member number here at LF. My Remote1 is "311". Yours will be "242". Stone's will be "9". These are the same numbers used as the HID for our user member pages too. It's the number of our member record in the users table of the database. In that list in Inspector, just right-click on Remote1 and/or Remote2 to have a variety of options to delete them or add custom cookies manually. Deleting them in the Inspector will also log you out. Once the cookies are gone, you're just another anonymous bozo here at LF, as far as cookies are concerned. You might still be traced by your IP number though. If you need instructions for Chrome, it is very similar but slightly different names. Load an LF page, right-click anywhere, select Inspect from the popup men. A window panel will load, showing the page source. Along the top tabs, select "Application". At the lower left, find the Cookies entry and expand it, click the https://libertysflame.com entry and you'll see Remote1 and Remote2 to the right where you can delete them. If you delete either Remote1 or Remote2, you are considered logged off. Deleting both isn't strictly necessary as far as LF is concerned.
#13. To: Tooconservative, A K A Stone (#12)
(No.) And why not, Stone?? Thanks TC... I've got a program called "Click & Clean" that supposedly removes web cookies. DOES NOT WORK FOR LF. (the other methods are too time consuming. I do appreciate your explanation, work, and suggestions to address in in the alternative. I guess the easiest way is just to log off the computer completely.)
Top • Page Up • Full Thread • Page Down • Bottom/LatestTitle: It’s Spreading: More Anarchists Are Fixing Potholes Because the Gov’t Won’t Do Its Job
#10. To: Tooconservative (#1)
Gee, thanks, guys, because you donated your labor and materials, we can spend more money on tranny rights and buying sculptures of dead politicians.
#11. To: All, A K A Stone, tooconservative (#10)
#12. To: Liberator, Pinguinite, A K A Stone (#11)
(Edited)
Is there a "SIGN-OUT" feature at LF?
Replies to Comment # 12. Is there a "SIGN-OUT" feature at LF?
End Trace Mode for Comment # 12.
[Home] [Headlines] [Latest Articles] [Latest Comments] [Post] [Mail] [Sign-in] [Setup] [Help] [Register]