Monday, October 15, 2007
Working Class in Toronto and the Shaw Street Massacre
At first blush, the image of the house on Shaw Street is an eye sore to say the least. However, sitting in lecture last Tuesday, I could not help but view the house as emblematic to the value of a dollar in Toronto. To me, the house seemed altered, compressed, to represent the reality that Torontonians experience daily – we need a lot to get a little. Sure, the house is tiny, and, thus, appears inundated with icons of ancient prestige, but the reality of Toronto realty is that this house is worth big bucks. In my area, Don Mills, a duplex can cost up to $400 000.00, a small house can run upwards of $600K, yet outside of the Greater Toronto Area, $600 000.00 will buy two large homes. So, is the owner of the Shaw Street home putting on airs, or does his asserted status fairly represent the kind of lifestyle he has acquired? This brings me back to the question, “Is there a working class in Toronto?” The answer is no. In Toronto, the average salary is higher than those outside of the GTA, but that is largely due to the fact that the cost of living is so steep. Many people who work in Toronto, cannot afford to live here, and this is why Toronto is nearly impossible to navigate before 10AM on any given weekday. Those who can afford to live here, often live modestly, regardless of being able to live quite comfortably 60KM outside of the city – like our good friend on Shaw Street (although, the term “modestly” should be taken lightly in this case). For all we know, the owner of the Shaw Street Massacre had a dream to buy an expensive home and live like a Greek god – unfortunately he opted to purchase his palace in our fair city and did not get quite as much bang as he would have liked for his buck. Thus, he had no choice but to overcompensate resulting in the complete disarray apparent on Shaw Street today. To conclude, I would like you to visualize this symbol, $, being compressed and hold that image with the Shaw Street home in your mind. Now, take those images and stretch them – suddenly both make sense.
