Capitalism--not People's Park--killed Cody's Books (Part 1)

Since the announcement that the original Cody's Books in Berkeley is going out of business, local pundits, politicians, capitalists, and scissorbills have created a shit-storm. As happens so many times when influential businesses close, the capitalist class and its enablers have predictably placed the blame for this tragedy upon the shoulders of the usual suspects: the homeless, young punks, holdovers from the 1960s counterculture, and the city of Berkeley itself. As usual, the real truth goes unreported: Capitalism killed Cody's.

The original Cody's books is located on the Southwest corner of Telegraph Avenue and Haste Streets in Berkeley's "south-side" neighborhood, less than a half-mile from the University of California campus at Berkeley. Cody's Books is unionized and to many it represents the quintessential "independent" bookstore: Authors periodically give public readings of their books; Cody's carries a much wider selection of titles than their corporate competitors; shoppers are welcome (if not encouraged) to spend hours sitting, browsing, or reading from among the millions of books on their shelves; their magazine and periodical section surpasses even those of the local smokeshops (another Berkeley institution); creative graffiti is allowed to remain on the bathroom walls. I myself spent many an hour losing myself in a good book at Cody's only to find I lost track of entire afternoons.

Cody's is a neighborhood landmark in a neighborhood that is itself, a landmark. Berkeley's "Southside" is close to the famous "Sproul Plaza" site of the famous Free Speech Fights on the 1960s. Nearby, the late Mario Savio made his famous speech:

We have an autocracy which runs this university. It's managed. We asked the following: if President Kerr actually tried to get something more liberal out of the Regents in his telephone conversation, why didn't he make some public statement to that effect? And the answer we received -- from a well-meaning liberal -- was the following: He said, "Would you ever imagine the manager of a firm making a statement publicly in opposition to his board of directors?" That's the answer! Now, I ask you to consider: if this is a firm, and if the Board of Regents are the board of directors, and if President Kerr in fact is the manager, then I'll tell you something: the faculty are a bunch of employees, and we're the raw material! But we're a bunch of raw material[s] that don't mean to have any process upon us, don't mean to be made into any product, don't mean to end up being bought by some clients of the University, be they the government, be they industry, be they organized labor, be they anyone! We're human beings!

 [Wild applause.]

There is a time when the operation of the machine becomes so odious, makes you so sick at heart, that you can't take part; you can't even passively take part, and you've got to put your bodies upon the gears and upon the wheels, upon the levers, upon all the apparatus, and you've got to make it stop. And you've got to indicate to the people who run it, to the people who own it, that unless you're free, the machine will be prevented from working at all!

[Prolonged applause.]

Now, no more talking. We're going to march in singing "We Shall Overcome." Slowly; there are a lot of us. Up here to the left -- I didn't mean the pun.

Located nearby is Cody's counterpart, the almost as famous Moe's Books. Moe's is to used books as Cody's is to new ones. Moe's was featured briefly in "the Graduate". I have lost nearly as much time at Moe's as I have at Cody's.

Not more than half a block east of Cody's on Haste Street is the even more famous "People's Park". While many may be unfamiliar with Cody's, they're well aware of People's Park. People's Park has long been a source of contention (as well as a countercultural icon). As described by the City of Berkeley's official website:

The plot of land up Haste Street from Telegraph Avenue was once covered with community housing inhabited by political activists and members of the counterculture. In the late 1960s, the University of California purchased the land and tore down the houses with the plan of building athletic fields. In the face of protest, the university delayed building the fields and left the land vacant, angering community members even further.

 On April 18, 1969, the underground paper The Berkeley Barb ran an announcement calling for everyone interested to bring building materials to the lot on Haste and Telegraph to build a community park. People from all walks of life came to participate in the creation of “the People’s Park,” a huge group effort creating solidarity and community.

Eventually, the university decided to take their private property back. They bulldozed the garden, the pathways, and even the sandbox and put a fence around the lot, enraging community members who had put so much hard work into creating something positive. Thousands of protesters gathered to express their dismay. The protests got out of hand and turned into riots when some people used the chaos as an excuse to be destructive. Rocks and metal rods were thrown at the police. Eventually, the National Guard, in full battle gear, was ordered in by Governor Ronald Reagan to put down the protests. Many people were injured, one was blinded, and another (James Rector) was shot and killed. The streets of Berkeley were shrouded by a blanket of tear gas for days during the demonstrations. The National Guard occupied the City for weeks.

After the riots, the land was reclaimed by the community, which rebuilt the park. In the 1990s, the university attempted to reclaim the park for other uses, and once again met with community resistance and protests. For a period of time, the university and the City of Berkeley had an agreement for the City to run the park, but the agreement has expired and the park is currently both owned and managed by the university.

This is the so-called "objective" history. Pundits on the right often cite People's Park as the personification of the "People's Republic of Berkeley". Capitalists hate People's Park, because it represents a living example of public defiance against the iron laws of the "free market" and their near hysterical sacred cow of "private property". Since it so often goes unreported in proper context, I felt compelled to present this more partisan view of People's Park from its supporters:

Someday a petty official will appear with a piece of paper, called a land title, which states that the University of California owns the land of the People's Park. Where did that piece of paper come from? What is it worth?

 A long time ago the Costanoan Indians lived in the area now called Berkeley. They had no concept of land ownership. They believed that the land was under the care and guardianship of the people who used it and lived on it.

Catholic missionaries took the land away from the Indians. No agreements were made. No papers were signed. They ripped it off in the name of God.

The Mexican Government took the land away from the Church. The Mexican government had guns and an army. God's word was not as strong.

The Mexican Government wanted to pretend that it was not the army that guaranteed them the land. They drew up some papers which said they legally owned it. No Indians signed those papers.

The Americans were not fooled by the papers. They had a stronger army than the Mexicans. They beat them in a war and took the land. Then they wrote some papers of their own and forced the Mexicans to sign them.

The American Government sold the land to some white settlers. The Government gave the settlers a piece of paper called a land title in exchange for some money. All this time there were still some Indians around who claimed the land. The American army killed most of them.

The piece of paper saying who owned the land was passed around among rich white men.

Sometimes the white men were interested in taking care of the land. Usually they were just interested in making money. Finally some very rich men, who run the University of California, bought the land.

Immediately these men destroyed the houses that had been built on the land. The land went the way of so much other land in America -- it became a parking lot.

We are building a park on the land. We will take care of it and guard it, in the spirit of the Costanoan Indians. When the University comes with its land title we will tell them: "Your land title is covered with blood. We won't touch it. Your people ripped off the land from the Indians a long time ago. If you want it back now, you will have to fight for it again."

The Bay Area IWW's history is intertwined with The History of People's Park. Many of those who originally created People's Park were (at least partly) influenced by the history of the Wobblies of old. The riots that took place in the 1990s (caused at least as much by the University and dozens of police departments that invaded Berkeley at that time as Park supporters) brought SLAPP suits against four activists, one of whom (Bob Sparks) was a dues paying Wobbly. In 1995, the Bay Area IWW celebrated the 90th Anniversary of its founding convention in People's Park (during the People's Park's own anniversary celebration).

It would be quite correct to point out that People's Park and its ardent supporters (including the author) are not without fault or conceit. It would be accurate to state that People's Park has attracted more than its share of wingnuts, junkies, or even the occasional genuine scumbag (muggers, rapists, or petty thieves with no sense of class consciousness). It would be grossly inaccurate to blame their actions on the ideals of those who created People's Park and those who continue to support it. In any revolution, no matter ho noble in its intent, no matter how small in size, there can be miscreants who take advantage of the good work of others. The challenge for revolutionaries is overcome these weaknesses. It's safe to say that this hasn't happened with People's Park, but then, the experiment called "America" has its warts as well.

Despite all of this, People's Park has coexisted with Cody's Books now for well over four decades. Yet now that Cody's is closing and it's apparently People's Park's fault! At least, that's what some local pundits are saying. Witness for example, the comments of Moe's Book's current Manager, Gene Barone, from the Business section of the June 11 issue of the San Francisco Chronicle, People's Park cause of Telegraph's decay. (Funny, Moe's isn't going out of Business. Did People's Park activists deliberately target Cody's and ignore Moe's?).

Somebody should ask Gene Barone if he thinks that the solution to homelessness is to pave over all parks. Certainly, Golden Gate Park in San Francisco and Central Park in New York City have their share of problems. Perhaps we should just pave over the entire planet and make it into a giant parking lot! By his logic that would eliminate blight entirely. It boggles my mind that the manager of a bookstore that carries such incredible troves of knowledge could be so colossally stupid!

If that's not bad enough, examine this asinine screed by Chistopher Hitchens wannabe Chris Thompson of the East Bay Express, Leaders Fiddle While Berkeley Rots.

Chris Thompson should ask himself whether or not he'd be happier at the National Review or Reason Magazine. His screed is not directed at People's Park in particular (he offers it as a tangential swipe), but rather neighborhood activists who dare to assume that new businesses that want to set up shop in an existing neighborhood (in this case, a satellite Berkeley Bowl in southwest Berkeley) should have some accountability to the people that actually live there! Nope. In Chris Thompson's view, capital should have near absolute power.

Local control versus market fundamentalism the real issue here.

Quite possibly, residents and local business owners agree that People's Park is more of a problem than a landmark. They may ultimately be right, but without conducting a very careful, scientific, and objective study--something I am certain has yet to be done--there is no factual basis upon which they can draw such a conclusion, only perceptions and prejudice.

Ever since that Cody's owner, Andy Ross, announced the store's closing, the capitalist press, local pundits, local business owners, and anti-"left" opinion holders have blamed homeless youth that hang out on Telegraph Avenue, "drugs", "permissive culture", and especially People's Park.

So far, virtually nobody across the political spectrum from far right to far left has raised so much as a peep in opposition.

For all of the howling done by the ideologues on the right (particularly Debra J Saunders, David Horowitz, and most of Fox News) about how Berkeley is an intolerant and totalitarian dictatorship of "political correctness" (read: any opinion that challenges Eurocentric, America-first, market fundamentalism), the silence is just deafening. The rhetoric being spouted about Cody's and People's Park is pure right wing dogma (who else but Christian Fundamentalists blame all of society's ills on "Permissive culture"?!?) Liberals and even some "leftists" are jumping on the Horowitz inspired bandwagon.

While it will no doubt win me no friends, I intend to break that silence and state, for the record, unabashedly, that Cody's is a casualty of a disease that affects not just Berkeley, but the whole of the world itself. That disease is not People's Park and those on the "left" who support it, but capitalism itself.

To be continued. . .