I wouldn't make suggestions because I don't have experience with Detroit. I haven't lived in the city nor have I studied the people, culture, politics, and history nearly enough to be knowledgeable on how to 'fix' it, and they as a rule have not either. The worst part of it though is their treating Detroit as a pet project; as something that doesn't have real people with real consequences and real, complex, long-rooted issues.
Neither do I, but I was wondering where your comment came from. It seems like you have had experience with these middle class suburban hipsters. I can get quite irritated when people don't take these issues seriously. It is so easy to draw a colourful line on a map of the city. But to think of the consequences of that line, that action drawn, requires much more effort. On a slow day a while ago I had the pleasure of working with someone like that. We were developing plans to renovate a retirement complex. But then he came along, to 'help' us out. Instead of analysing the current space and finding new opportunities to use, he said let's just make it green and make everything sustainable so we can get a subsidy on it. It came down to throwing the current plan away and creating a new, green plan based on the flimsiest of arguments, which wasn't gonna work anyway. I tried to convince him but he wouldn't see that this might be important for the people actually living there, and my colleagues couldn't care less about it. I can still get angry over that, it's enraging.I wouldn't make suggestions because I don't have experience with Detroit.
...as something that doesn't have real people with real consequences and real, complex, long-rooted issues.
I understand that. My housemate is from Detroit and on top of having to see these things on how to make the whole world better (usually through asinine and racist arguments) she has to receive them from people in person every day. I can't fathom what that's like.