In The duty of a beautiful weekend in July, Jean-François Lisée goes there with a column entitled “Dear Montreal”. In this eulogy of our city, he puts into perspective the long-term work accomplished since he has lived there. The point of view, the place of gaze, conforms to what the market encourages, to what the latter wants to show. The choice to conceal the reasons for the departures obviously goes with the apology he makes for the city.
Another day, the author will perhaps be able to place himself from the point of view of artists, students, families, workers and forces of change who wanted or are still trying to act with pain and misery for society by struggling against the market. It is for them that we should have set up areas and places freed from incapacitating structures a long time ago. It is for these people that we should allow action against speculators and multinationals.
Jean-François Lisée does not speak of what could have existed, of what we should see. The shoe market is surely not against it. And apart from the departures, what about the obliteration of a whole section of urban society whose only success is to contribute to the reduction of the unemployment rate by working in fields most of the time remote from talents, objectives, aspirations and needs of society? I imagine everything looks good when you see the busy cafes, bars, stages, streets and bike paths. The surface is improving.
From an especially bourgeois point of view, it is even perfect.
If the image of the city is attractive, if what it reflects is so admirable, tell us what it really reflects, especially who. When we talk to her like a woman, who must be beautiful since the men who come here for her tell us so during the Grand Prix or the repechage, this image, who should she really please? Who else has time to see all that beauty there after work?
However, time, in the city, is the money of the city and, like everywhere, always, this paid time does not come back any more. When beauty is enough for Montreal to be the accomplished metropolis, what’s the point of inscribing it in a great unfinished dream where we would be free there? So who still wants to transform it into a place of life rather than an area of exploitation where the smallest square of bricks is put up for auction? When the majority of small owners will no longer be able to pay what they managed to mortgage less than five years ago, who will Montreal be for? When behind the facades the social fabric deteriorates, unravels and the threads give way through wear on the arteries, what do we retain of the mix?
The image gleams like a puddle at the foot of a stainless steel mister on a pedestrian shopping street where the price of cheese follows that of rents. Critics are rare in front of the new constructions of the architects who, for the most part, follow the money, then hope for beautiful photos before the appearance of the anti-racist and anti-capitalist graffiti which are the only elements to break the perfect reflection.
I’m waiting for what’s next. Several are already ready. However, the city should be considered as a common good accessible to all its inhabitants, who should be able to live there and shape it in their image, as Henri Lefebvre proposed 54 years ago with his concept of the right to the city. The right of refuge is yet to be invented. For the moment, speculation is cleaning up.
As for certain shared dreams, to really live well in Montreal, we will need great means and great visions, held at arm’s length with the certainty that allowed what happened, but combined this time with the courage to act. against the market. And beyond what we welcome today.