InShaw Fatwah: Baby hipsters to be banned from Shaw

After 2 glasses of wine and a deep thoughtful reading of the DCist post and comments on Saint Ex’s ruling against popped collars I issue this: no more baby hipsters in Shaw.
Street credits- you can not pick up Shaw street credits or “street cred” in Shaw. We don’t issue these credits. Unlike the rocks for jocks class you went to, you don’t get credit for just showing up. Want credit? Hang out on Martin Luther King Ave/Blvd/St in any town, doesn’t have to be DC, could be BFE, GA. But if you find a MLK street hang out there, call your friends and you’ll get credit when you ‘get’ what I’m referencing. About .005 st. creds.
Please I beg you stop using my ‘hood to boost your sense of self worth or hipness or what ever because face it, you’re just gonna turn around and leave me for some newer younger prettier neighborhood with better parking. And all you guys ever care about is parking. And, you know, you’ll be all like, “You used to be cool. You changed. You’re not the same neighborhood I knew. Blah, blah, blah.” The only thing Shaw can be is Shaw. We can’t go around trying to make you hipsters happy by being locked in some time warp of ‘used to be’, you gotta like this hood for what it is now. Baby, things change, people change. If you think this thing we got going is all played out, then I guess we’re played out and we got to go our separate ways.
Call me.

7 thoughts on “InShaw Fatwah: Baby hipsters to be banned from Shaw”

  1. Dear Mari,

    I’m suspicious.

    In my experience, the people who complain most vociferously about “gentrification” are in fact the early gentrifiers themselves.

    Those early gentrifiers have usually only been in the neighborhood just a couple of years before the masses rush in so they feel overly entitled and self-righteous, and sometimes downright insecure.

    If you grew up in Shaw, please excuse my ignorance, but most folks in their 20s and 30s living in the city are originally from the suburbs (I assume you may be, too). In reality, I have no idea about your situation, but I’m suspicious, to be quite honest.

    Cheers,

    LB

  2. I think it’s more complicated than wanting “cred”. It’s that the coolest, most interesting places tend to be where people are doing their own thing rather than focusing on making as much money as possible. Artists, owners or quirky clubs, musicians — none of them tend to make a lot of money, so they gravitate toward the cheaper parts of a city. That attracts the attention of rich people who want to enjoy the resulting culture, and gentrification commences.

    I don’t know if there’s anything that can be done about it (although banning popped collars isn’t a bad start).

  4. Well I am not a long term resident and I don’t think I’ve screamed loudly against gentrification. But I was annoyed that someone said Shaw was ‘played out’ and to be ‘real’ you gotta live in another part of DC. I like Shaw because of the location and the walkabilty and bikabilty of living here, not some eluvsive ‘cool’ factor.

  5. too funny, all this stuff about “being real” & having “street creds”. Makes me think of “Holiday in Cambodia”, by the Dead Kennedys.

  6. I actually think most of the gentrifiers in Shaw aren’t originally from the DC suburbs, they’re originally from other cities and towns all over the country (as most DC “residents” in NW and Capitol Hill are).

    And I’d bet that the most recent prior address of many of the gentrifiers were apartments in Adams Morgan and Logan Circle.

    John

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