CBC duped about Downtown Eastside homeless

It's good to see some debate on this issue.

Most participants in the opera who have come to the Downtown Eastside from other neighbourhoods are not, as you suggest, current or past "volunteers". In fact, they pocket money that funders intended for residents of Canada's poorest postal code.

According to a Downtown Eastside actor/singer in the opera, who incidentally was relegated to the Chorus because people from other neighbourhoods were considered better singers, each actor/singer got a $200 honorarium for participating. She believes that each writer got $400 and the Music Director got $4,000. Presumably the seven musicians that the Music Director imported also got paid. Honorariums are pocket change to people with a house or a condo -- but a $200 honorarium is a big deal to most people living on the Downtown Eastside. 

When Carnegie is selling funders on the idea of arts projects on the Downtown Eastside,  they emphasize that the funding will aid local residents. Look at the wording Michael Clague, a retired Carnegie Director who continues to help with arts funding, used when speaking to the Courier in Aug. 2004 as part of a fundraising drive for the Downtown Eastside Arts. “There is a lot of indigenous talent in the community”, Clague said. He went on to note that private funds raised for the arts have created 40 part-time jobs “for locals” working on the Downtown Eastside Play or the Downtown Eastside Film Festival in which films made “by local residents” were shown.  

Shouldn’t your headline read “CBC Abandons News and Pimps Poverty?” Good story! It’s about time we got some honest journalism instead of the same old party line. Don’t forget that neither Ethel Whitty nor most of her staff belongs to the neighborhood, they’re all exploiting it. I guess they can’t find honest work elsewhere. <?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" /> The Heart of The City is a pimp living off the avails of impoverishment and poverty and no way will it open any doors to let anyone out. The Carnegie Community Centre Association (CCCA) bylaws expressly forbids any payment or payment from any part of any invoice to be paid to any “volunteer” (classified as employees in their bylaws) by either the CCC or CCCA. They must work for tickets and even then all charity ends with the paid staff, as “volunteers” caught giving a hard earned coffee or dinner ticket away to a deserving person will be expelled.

I am curious to know how the anonymous "Reliable Sources" of Downtown
Eastside Enquirer managed to get so much personal information about my
friends and neighbours, without revealing him/herself.

also, the CBC article never claims that the cast of any of the people involved in the opera are homeless.

Read the CBC article here... 

Leonasha,

You left the following comment: "also, the CBC article never claims that the cast of any of the people involved in the opera are homeless."

This is inaccurate.

The following claim appears in the article on the CBC website: "The cast of Condemned is mainly homeless and low income people, with little or no experience on stage."

Thanks for taking the time to comment, nonetheless. 

"The cast of Condemned is mainly homeless and low income people, with little or no experience on stage."

One of us is homeless, all of us are low income, and all the amateurs involved had little or no performing experience.  What's the problem? 

 Leonasha,

AGREE: I agree with your statement that one person in the opera was homeless (although I explained in the article that he was homeless by choice.)

DISAGREE:  I disagree with your statement: “all of us are low income.” Do you really consider these people to be low income?  The lead actor/singer who, in her other life, is dog trainer and lives with her physician husband and two kids.  The woman who owns a home in Burnaby, where she lives with her child and long term steady, stable husband.  The woman who owns a condo in Kits and has stashed her inheritance in a trust.  The woman who works as a welfare advocate for a local church.

------------------------

You state that “all the amateurs involved had little or no performing experience.” Whether people had performing experience was not a focus of the article, so I don’t want to delve into it too much.  But I will say that not all of the people imported from other neighbourhoods were rank amateurs. One lead actor/singer, for example, is at least a semi-professional musician/singer with a stage name; she has had gigs around the city with a band. The problem here is this: at least one DTES resident – who was not, incidentally, involved in producing the article -- lost confidence in her singing when she wasn’t considered as professional as the imported talent and was shunted into the chorus, which was then allotted very little practice time.

Your blog is factually wrong in numerous areas:

1. There is no relationship between the Director and Vancouver Moving Theatre.

2. The director may or may not be good at writing grants.  Who knows?  Contrary to your implication she had no role in funding the opera.

3.  Depends on who you ask, but there's more than one homeless person in the opera.

4.  The person referred to as "perpetually sleep deprived" was not the one you referred to.

5.  The title of your blog is "CBC duped...".  Nobody made a factually incorrect statement to the CBC.  The CBC is perfectly capable of duping itself; for example, it also reported that the characters in the opera win their battle, which is not true...a fairly basic misunderstanding (but not one you bothered to mention).

6. However, the CBC statement that most participants in the opera are either homeless or low income is factually correct, contrary to your implication.  Guess the CBC is not alone in failing to check its facts, eh?

7.  It is not true that no band members have an address in the DE.  At least two do.

8.  Matters of addiction and mental illness are private and none of your business.  Suffice to say that with regard to who is what in the opera you don't know what you're talking about, and your speculations are harmful and ugly.

9.  Thanks for raising the useful question about who is a community member.  I count a community member as someone who participates in the community, not necessarily someone with an address in the city-defined boundaries of the DE.  What about people who grew up here, but who no longer have an address?  Do they cease to be community members the day they move out?  What about the nice folks in the condos who would like to "clean up the streets" (spell that get rid of the unsightly poor).  What about the long-standing crackheads who have reasonably nice digs somewhere else?  What about the people who have come here every day for 25 years?  What about the bloodsucking hotel owners?  Your definition is silly.  Actually, if someone isn't a member of the community it's you, since you find it ok to post details about people's lives, make incorrect and false accusations, divide people into little camps ("high-functioning low income"--give me a break, please), and all without having the guts to stand behind your opinions by identifying yourself.  You pick your "sources" to reflect the worst possible case without checking to see whether the person you're talking to has an axe to grind (incidentally opening THEM up to resentment for being so foolish as to talk to you).  It means that everyone has to watch their backs because they don't know who's listening for those nasty, juicy details that will seem to paint the author as someone in the know.  It means people unwittingly finger (innocent) others, potentially creating conflict  and enmity.  Not a good situation for a community, unless they find the snake and out him or her.  Fortunately, there seems to be a pretty solid consensus about JR: Whoever that MYSTERY PERSON is, they are not a community member.

Last but not least:  I had to come over to this venue, because JR declined to post it on the other.  Guess the truth is not such welcome comment.