Discrimination by any other name would smell as despotic.
Posted on 07/10/2020 7:16:02 PM PDT by lightman
The HBG Flea, a monthly “curated pop-up market,” has announced that it will hold its first event since March, a limited event on Saturday that will require face masks and encourage social distancing.
“We’re excited to be back - this is like our family and we miss the vendors and community a lot,” Mary Imgrund and Meghan Weaver, co-founders of The HBG Flea said in an e-mail.
The show’s organizers also announced via its Facebook page earlier this week that in an attempt to be more inclusive, people of color from here on out will be able to get a vendors space for free and will be given preference in the application process.
“We saw and heard that the flea is not representative of the entire vibrant community of Harrisburg, and as a white-owned business operating in a gentrified part of town, we believed it was our duty to not just offer empty platitudes towards inclusion but actively put our values before our profit,” Imgrund and Weaver said. “Focusing on getting more diverse art into the market is one way to uphold our mission of supporting our community. We also really don’t want the focus to be on us - it’s about making sure our space is reflective of the amazing multitude of arts in Harrisburg, some of which hasn’t been nearly present enough, and we needed to do something material to make that happen.”
The deadline to apply to the next HBG Flea event on Aug. 1 is Saturday while the deadline to apply for the Sept. 5 event is July 25.
“Artists can now indicate on our application if they believe their artwork or products would help make the flea more representative of the Harrisburg community, and we will sponsor their participation fee,” Imgrund and Weaver said. “This policy will be practiced in perpetuity.”
Imgrund and Weaver said that they have received a number of new applications from new artists and they said that the response has shown them that the change was necessary. And while they have received both positive and negative feedback from their Facebook post, they have chosen to focus on the positive feedback.
“There was a lot of both very positive and very negative reactions to the post,” Imgrund and Weaver said. “We don’t want to center those who took umbrage with the announcement, but rather those who said that they welcome more diversity in the art and those who now feel their work will be appreciated and welcomed for the first time. Representation is extremely important to us, so while some may decide to shop elsewhere, others will see themselves represented adequately for the first time, and that value is immeasurable. We don’t want to just offer words of support, we want to take action.”
Booths typically cost $25 for a small space and $50 for a larger space, according to the company’s website. And all vendors must obtain the proper licenses through the city of Harrisburg.
This Saturday, July 11, the company will hold a limited event from noon to 3 p.m. in the Midtown Cinema parking lot, 250 Riley St., Harrisburg.
The event will be limited to 16 vendors and only 200 people will be allowed in the parking lot at a time. Face masks are required for both shoppers and vendors. If the event is at capacity, HBG Flea said it may ask people to wait in a socially-distant line to enter.
“We are requiring face masks and offering some handmade ones we made at a “pay-what-you-want” price, we are limiting the number of vendors to 16 maximum in the parking lot (instead of the typical 50) to make sure we can space them out enough for shopping to happen without crowding any one vendor, and we are limiting the capacity in the parking lot to 200 and will ask shoppers to form a socially distant queue to enter,” Imgrund and Weaver said.
The HBG Flea is usually held on the first Saturday of each month and features vintage and antique goods, original art, craft and handmade items, food trucks and prepared food and upcycled goods.
HBG Flea holds its events at Strawberry Square in Harrisburg half of the year and in the parking lot of the Midtown Cinema the other half of the year.
Discrimination by any other name would smell as despotic.
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Neosegregationists
We are moving away from equality to something else.
It is actionable, yes?
Weren’t “Lady’s Nights” forced out of existence?
stealing this, but is People of Color the same as ‘colored people’?
This pisses me off. It should be free for all vendors or none.
I do not live in that area but if I did I would avoid that market.
Racists...
Too Frog.
Queue was coined during the French Revolution. Queues to the guillotine? Or to watch the events at that time?
Free everything is just around the corner
+1
What is the inverse of Jim Crow?
Jane Jackal?
If you include their racist preferences, it sounds like it should be a smashing success.
Doesn’t this violate the Civil Rights Act of 1964? Charging different rates based on race?
Why not just self-identify as black or hispanic? Seriously.
More free gibs.
I hope mostly peaceful looters go in and trash and steal the whole thing.
I have done shows before and have had to pay for space this is not right.
When people get used to preferential treatment,
equal treatment seems like discrimination.
For non white people only.
I saw Blade Runner. This is how it starts.
I love your Greek proverb but that is almost tagline-worthy!
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