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For Anyone Who’s Had Their Heart Broken by San Francisco

Updated: Apr 19, 2018 11:26
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San Francisco is a special place. A place where we never leave the house without layers. Where it’s normal to call in sick to work because it’s finally 80 degrees and you want to drink a beer in the park. A place where most adults have costume boxes and where we regularly dance in the streets because our sports teams keep winning everything.

San Francisco is a magical place. We run into friends and acquaintances no matter where we go. And we make local heroes out of people who’d be locked up anywhere else, people like Emperor Norton and Frank Chu. We see people walk around in bondage gear, or in nothing at all and think “Yup, that’s my city.” And when we hear “Nobody’s got it better than us,” we really believe it.

San Francisco is place for people who don’t belong anywhere else. When war tore apart Latin America in the 70s and 80s, we said “Come to San Francisco.” When queer people around the country needed a place to be safe, we said “San Francisco is your home”. When artists, and tech nerds, and musicians, and freaks, needed a place to be themselves we said “You belong in San Francisco.”

But we live in a heartbreaking place too. A place where 98 year old ladies are served with eviction notices and legendary music venues are shut down because the new neighbors think it’s too loud. We live in a place where there are nearly 10,000 homeless people and we have to walk the streets worried about stepping in human waste and needles. We live in a place where our city officials are so blatantly corrupt that it’s really, truly, honestly not funny. It’s so not funny it hurts.

We live in a place where the people we love get kicked out of their homes so that they can be turned into Airbnb Hotels. Where anyone who makes under $100k a year is considered poor. Where working class people, people of color, and artists – the people who’ve made this city special, have been forced to flee. Heartbreak is so prevalent in San Francisco that at this point, it’s just part of the experience of living here.

If you live in San Francisco for a given amount of time, it will eventually break your heart.

So we’ve made the below shirts as a symbol that says “Yes, I do love my city and yes it has broken my heart.” Buying one not only gives you something dope to wear, it also helps support running BrokeAssStuart.com, an endeavor that costs thousands of dollars a month. It helps us continue to fight the good fight and try to help you piece you heart back together every time it breaks. Check out another way you can help us keep doing what we’re doing right here.

Guys’ shirts here. Gals’ shirts here.

I heartbreak SF

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Broke-Ass Stuart - Editor In Cheap

Broke-Ass Stuart - Editor In Cheap

Stuart Schuffman, aka Broke-Ass Stuart, is a travel writer, poet, TV host, activist, and general shit-stirrer. His website BrokeAssStuart.com is one of the most influential arts & culture sites in the San Francisco Bay Area and his freelance writing has been featured in Lonely Planet, Conde Nast Traveler, The Bold Italic, Geek.com and too many other outlets to remember. His weekly column, Broke-Ass City, appears every other Thursday in the San Francisco Examiner. Stuart’s writing has been translated into four languages. In 2011 Stuart created and hosted the travel show Young, Broke, and Beautiful on IFC and in 2015 he ran for Mayor of San Francisco and got nearly 20k votes.

He's been called "an Underground legend": SF Chronicle, "an SF cult hero":SF Bay Guardian, and "the chief of cheap": Time Out New York.