So Frank, the public critic of a private real-estate development, is
publicly secret about himself. The rest of the world is obliged to
expose its inner workings to Frank on demand, but Frank owes nothing to
the rest of us in return. We can't even know where he lives! Yet he
claims the authority to order other people how to spend their money,
because he is their secret neighbor, and he knows better than they do
what they should do with their own property.
Frank, what is your address, what is your phone number and what is your
economic interest in this discussion?
-- Tony West
What do you do for a living, by the way, Frank? Where do you live,
and how do you afford to live there? Can you please tell the
neighborhood exactly who you are? You are a frequent angry critic of
how your neighbors manage their properties and their public spaces;
yet we know strangely little about you. What's the scoop? How much do
you pay to your landlord for the environment you think this proposed
hotel would disrupt? If information about the hotel is rightfully
public, isn't information about you rightfully public as well? Tell
us who you are and where you are.
No, the two don't follow. There is nothing even roughly equivalent. My
personal information is rightly private. Information regarding an
application for a zoning variance is just as rightly public. I really
have no secrets but I don't respond to bullying. Sorry. Besides, the
size and source of my income has no bearing on my value as a member of
this neighborhood.
Frank
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