When I saw Citizen Jane, the documentary about Jane Jacobs, a few months ago, I probably drifted
through a third of it. Just tired, nothing to do with the film. I felt like I needed to see it
again, which I was able to do this afternoon at a local rep. Glad I did--there were whole sections
I missed the first time.
A couple of points before I get to the real purpose of this post. I see so many documentaries
these days that end with a rah-rah call to action. Normally, I’m just not the organizing type,
with a kind of ingrained skepticism verging on antipathy about such things. I’ve always felt like
the minute you’ve got more than three people trying to accomplish something together, you’re
headed for mind-numbing inertia. A big part of this comes from what I first witnessed during the
dissolution of Nerve and Graffiti in the late ‘80s, and then again with CKLN a decade ago, where
well-intentioned scenarios of how to save the day never amounted to anything. But Citizen Jane
almost makes me a believer. Three times Jacobs took on Robert Moses, the imperious New York City
developer (the film makes a good match for Best of Enemies, the Vidal-Buckley documentary), and
three times, through what Republicans contemptuously called community organizing during Obama’s
presidency--and with an assist from some big names in the literary world--she crushed him.
Actually inspiring.
And, much less consequential, I laughed at the way the film pulls an American Graffiti in reverse.
In Pauline Kael’s original 1973 review, she took George Lucas to task for a postscript that lets
you know what happened to the four male principals but completely ignores the (more interesting,
in many ways) three females. Citizen Jane gives you a postscript on Jacobs, nothing on Moses.
Even as the film’s villain, it is a two-person dynamic on display, and Moses ought to get a few
words too.
A couple of years down the road, after I retire, my plan is to sell my house and relocate to
somewhere where I can buy something much bigger for considerably less. Right now, I’m focussed
on London, Ontario. We’ll see--a sudden slowdown in the housing market may interfere. Anyway, I
also want to move because of the issue that Jacobs devoted her life to: the transformation of
the city into something very different and much less vibrant than what it once was. With Jacobs,
this was rooted in the proliferation of public housing and roadways, the destruction of neighbor-
hoods, and the general disregard of public planners for life on the street. With me, the trans-
formation has more to do with the realities of a changing economy: the two-decade disappearance
of the record stores, book stores, and rep houses that used to define Toronto for me, replaced
by condos and box stores and sushi restaurants. To be precise: record stores, essentially gone
(or so expensive they’re qualitatively something else); book stores, going fast; rep houses,
lingering, but also qualitatively something else (they’re more like a repository for newer re-
leases either not suited to the multiplexes, or a month removed from their first run; older
films are mixed in occasionally). There’s less and less reason for me to stay--I’d rather have
the bigger house.
Something else occurred to me, though, a phenomenon just coming into being when Jacobs died
(2006), one whose stranglehold on city life today she couldn’t have foreseen: the sight of
person after person walking around with their heads glued to a device, oblivious to everything
and everyone around them, living in some alternate universe that could just as well be relocated
to Antarctica or Neptune without them even taking notice. It’s pathetic--I get the feeling some-
times that half the people in Toronto haven’t made eye contact with another human being in five
years.
People I work with kid me a lot because I don’t have a cell phone. It’s a running joke that I
enjoy and even nurture (I recently bought a rotary phone at a garage sale so I could put up a
jokey post on Facebook). But--above and beyond the simple fact that I have no earthly need
for an iPhone--there’s genuine disgust behind my aversion to them, a disgust that extends, yes,
to some of those same people I work with (why I’m posting this here, out of view, rather than
something much shorter on Facebook). They’re great people, and on this one narrow point
they’re no different than the rest of the world. Nevertheless: whenever I’m sitting in the
staff room talking to someone who’s not looking at me because he’s messaging or scrolling
through whatever on his cell phone, I just want to reach over, grab it, and smash it into a
million pieces. (Punctuated, for flair, by “Oh, I’m sorry--did I break your concentration?”)
It is unbelievably, profoundly rude. And that’s what Jacobs’ city streets are more and more
being reduced to, invisible backdrops for personal-device time, and ditto for every other
restaurant patio and public space you pass.
If Jane Jacobs were to walk around downtown Toronto today, I have to wonder: would she think
this wasteland of insularity and isolation even worth saving?
(Please check back for future posts just like this one. Next week I'll be addressing motor-
cycles, Twitter, and clouds.)