RANT: F**K the Friends of Rittenhouse Square
F**K the Friends of Rittenhouse Square. There, I said or typed what every sane person in the city of Philadelphia is thinking. This has to be the most narcissistic, out-of-touch, NIMBY group of elitists since, well, the Friends of Rittenhouse Square.
Yes, there was one shooting in Rittenhouse Square Park this year. ONE! This is in a city that averages more than 1,000 shootings a year and one shooting about every six hours.
What’s the solution that the brilliant minds over at Friends of Rittenhouse Square come up with? They ban sitting on the stone wall surrounding the Park.
Philly.com did a piece on the “no-sitting” rule at the park and some of the pieces of information are priceless:
In October, wall loitering came up several times at a community meeting attended by more than 300 people. One attendee asked whether anything could be put on the ledges to stop people from sitting there. She suggested planters.
Four signs had been installed in the interior of the park along with several new no-smoking signs, aimed at what neighbors have called a chronic problem of marijuana use.
Yes..those darn people sitting on the ledges smoking marijuana are creating such chaos and havoc in the park something must be done about it. Planters. Yes! Genius! No. Even better. Let’s outlaw sitting on the ledges!!! YES! Who are these people?
For one, the Friends of Rittenhouse Square are a disgrace to the “Friends” moniker which the Quakers have steadfastly worked for hundreds of years to build a reputation of tolerance, love, and empathy. These “Friends” are nothing but paranoid protectionists of some idyllic world they feel they are entitled to live in because of hefty mortgage or rental payments. They even have a police presence in the Park now FROM ONE VIOLENT INCIDENT!
Rittenhouse Square Park isn’t their park. It’s the city’s park. If people who pay property tax, sales tax, or the ludicrous city wage tax want to sit on the ledges, then they should be entitled to do so.
BillyPenn.com also did a solid piece on this issue.
The officer said the signs were put up now so they could “nip it in the bud” (no pun intended, probably) by spring when more people are in the park. For now, people sitting on the wall are getting warnings. He said they could receive fines in the future.
The wall on the outer edge of the park, where bike messengers like to sit, is not off limits, according to the officer.
An exception to the sitting ban is a small area where bike messengers like to gather. I guess the Friends want to make sure they or their businesses get their deliveries on time so they seek to appease the bike messengers. Who knew bike messengers carried such clout with these Friends? Good for them!
Don’t give us the “no-sitting” ban is for the structural integrity of the wall, which the Friends have been quoted as mentioning, and then allow a certain area to be used for sitting. That makes zero sense, is completely inconsistent and renders that justification moot.
The entire country is moving toward decriminalization and legalization of marijuana and these knuckleheads think it’s the gateway drug not to other more serious drugs, but to vandalism and violent crime. If these “Friends” of Rittenhouse Square actually believe this, in light of massive amounts of research indicating otherwise, they are also probably a bunch of climate-denier.
Perhaps the Friends of Rittenhouse Square will do a film screening this summer of this hot, new, topical film:
I have had interactions with the “Rittenhouse Shooter.” He participated in a youth basketball program that at which I volunteer. He lives near the Rittenhouse area. I’m pretty certain that marijuana and wall-sitting sitting contribute to his stupid decision to rob someone he knew and then shoot someone trying to intervene, probably in a state of fear and panic. A poor education system, living in poverty, a lack of anger management skills, and bleak job prospects probably had a much larger role in his decision to rob someone than weed and wall-sitting.
We live in the big city. Shootings happen. That’s not an excuse, but the reality. I live a block off South Street. There have been three shooting incidents within one block of my house in the last year. Do we ban people from walking on South Street or concerts at the TLA? No. Area residents meet with law enforcement and request more of a police presence on certain streets and they raise money for more lighting.
The fact that police are dedicated to sitting in the Park and enforcing this ban is a waste of city resources and an insult to citizens throughout the city who deal with much worse environments on the daily. I feel sorry for the poor police officers who have to enforce this stupid rule.
Where my activists at? Someone needs to organize a sit-in, I mean sit-on where hundreds of people descend upon the Park and sit on wall just people have done for decades.
It’s 2017. Weed smoking is here. Don’t people still smoke? Weed vaping is here. Deal with it. There aren’t enough benches for everyone who wants to enjoy the Park so they sit on the wall. That’s life. Dedicate your efforts, time, and money to the communities surrounding the Park in order to improve those communities and provide hope and basic skills to many of the children living there who aren’t part of the gentrification movement. That would be far more effective than banning sitting on the wall.
The recent Presidential election gave us more ridiculous wall discussion than any of us needed for a lifetime. And now we have to deal with this asinine wall issue? Who needs enemies with friends like the Friends of Rittenhouse Square. Do us all a favor and move to the burbs!