WITH NO-HOLDS-barred taunts and disparagement, the Globe’s Shirley Leung has in a calculated and provocative way engaged in what a Shakespeare audience would surely recognize as “bear baiting,” when characters bemoan of being tied to a stake, bayed about by many enemies. Except that in 2015, the “enemies” to her Boston 2024 Olympics promotional columns are exasperated, frustrated, and often politically marginalized people who just want to live in or near a sustainable city with reliable highways, safe bridges, efficient trains and subways running on schedule to get folks to their jobs, schools, medical appointments, and cultural events.
Instead of hearing the pleas of the public with sensitivity, Leung uses words and phrases from the remoteness of her laptop to advance the cause of a moneyed elite. These self-proclaimed gatekeepers think that they have carved out for themselves the exclusive right to create, shape, and control downtown Boston’s destiny as an enclave for the affluent. Our “city on the hill” is morphing into “a city at the till.”
Advertisement