Excuse me here: sorry if I seem to be speaking about fundamental rights and individual freedom, but we are all Americans here, aren't we? From the first time we learn about civics and government -say around fourth grade or so- to the day we die, we live with the knowledge that our system of government is the best on the planet because it encourages individual expression on a level not seen anywhere else. Yeah, the European Community can have all the consolidation they want, the former Eastern Block can just sit back and enjoy their renaissance, and all these things are good. But none of these countries enjoy the potential for social mobility (in both directions, mind you) that we in the USA take for granted.

Of course some of us take self-expression more seriously than others. Just walk past the magazine rack at any supermarket checkout and view the deluge of media images that work ceaselessly to numb your brain and force you into a narrow set of narcissistic and materialistic values. Lots of people buy into that stuff. Can you imagine? There are people who actually read Cosmopolitan. Who actually follow the "lose 10 pounds in a week and flatten your tummy so you can please him better" diet. But hey, far be it from me to judge someone because she lives in a reality I can't even imagine. I mean, that's what I'm talking about. Here in America you're free to be whoever you want to be.

Our social system is complex, but it's actually pretty resilient. If it was at all fragile it would have collapsed a long time ago because the goddess knows we sure hack at sometimes. Still, many factors work together to make our individualism possible, and if you erode away enough of our fundamental rights the system will fail and we will no longer be the idiosyncratic, eccentric, sometimes downright nutso bunch of crazies the rest of the world both fears and loves. We will fade into the same dull obscurity many of our predecessors now live in, seeing the world from the seats of virtual tour busses, paddle-boating our way along the artificially deepened river of life, gawking at phony re- creations of our aboriginal roots and wondering how it would feel to be real.

One of the more important rights we have, and one that's really taken a beating over the years is Freedom of Assembly. We all have it, it's guaranteed in the Constitution. It's supposed to be a fundamental cornerstone of law, because one of the things the founding fathers were angry about was King George's government issuing edicts banning certain groups and meetings. By law, you cannot prevent me from associating with whomever I want in public or in private. Freedom of Assembly has been compromised for the sake of social engineering in the last 40 years, much too flippantly in my opinion. But still, at the individual level no one denies that we have the right to hang around with anyone we want to.

The problem is, even if we still have the right to assemble, we are losing our ability to do so, and our government is doing nothing to help. Where are the places we can sit and talk? Sure, we can meet in small groups in each others' homes, but where is the neutral ground, the common area, the public meeting hall? It doesn't exist. TCC builds a "Tribal Hall," they name it after one of the most respected elders in the native community, and it's a pretty nice place, but guess what? You can't use the place unless you pay lots of money. And you are absolutely banned from feeding anyone. No, that's out of the question. You have to hire the corporation to feed your group. This is not a tribal hall. This is another excuse to take money from your friends and neighbors, another way of bleeding your own family.

Where is the common ground in this city? Mayor Hayes and his group of money-slaves virtually gave away a half-block of prime downtown property to a group of professional rent-collectors from Anchorage. That land could have been used to build a community center, something that would benefit us all. But no, we couldn't have a place to assemble. Sorry folks, but things that benefit the community don't benefit politicians. I mean, there's only so much campaign money you can squeeze from car washes and spaghetti feeds. Bake sales didn't send the Kelly family to Juneau. What gets people elected is gas pipelines, and privatization of utilities, and goddamn giving away public land so the Families from New York can have another hotel.

Okay, so I'm irritated about the new Mariott Hotel project. A friend assures me that if I just trust the Downtown Association's vision, Fairbanks will be a better place. And since I don't have a choice I'm sitting here trusting away. Build the thing, and get it over with, but we still need common ground. Will the new Mariott, or the new Sattlers, or the new Whatever-Lamonts-Is-Going-To-Be have a comfortable little coffee shop where we can all sit around and argue about politics and maybe play a game of chess? Not damned likely. None of these places will ever belong to us, nor will the Tribal Hall ever belong to the Tribes.

So be it. So we'll continue to gather in small groups, continue to be isolated from each other, continue to be funnelled into positive-cash-flow forms of public interaction. One of these days the people of this town will realize just how badly they've been screwed. I just hope that by then it won't be too late to salvage something out of the lifeless facade that the marketing folks are building for the folks in the busses to enjoy looking at. return to features