SMART CITY & DICTATORSHIP

We often take a critical view on social media, pointing out the flaws in urban design practices.
Recently, however, we've started to highlight positive examples and encourage solution-oriented thinking.
In one of this reviews, someone managed to see fas...ism instead of open liberating spatial quality. 
Hm!  

In our latest post, we shared our positive opinion on the renovation of a train station in Brussels. We commended certain design choices, particularly the station's open layout, large public space, and visual transparency. Although we usually advocate for city benches, we recognized that due to the station's small size and high traffic, benches could be placed nearby rather than directly in the station.

While the feedback was largely positive, one comment offered a different viewpoint.

We identified the commenter, known for having divergent views on the city and its significance. Despite the somewhat radical tone, we believe the comment was made sincerely and with good intentions.
On our video celebrating the station's open design, this individual shared the following comment.

Quote:
"No benches is part of the Smart City (acronym for S-urveillance M-onitoring A-nalyse R-eport T-echnology) is not HUMAN. You HAVE TO move constantly, you may NOT stay at a place and meet or stop. That is the real project. (And you have no past, no future. Only instable behaviour, constant change, and EMPTINESS for the mind. History memoir quality solid stable and intelligence, gatherings for ALL is pure fa....cism) (only Youth and only agitation and emptiness) (Giovanezza, hymn of Italian fa....ists, Jugend, for na...is, Juventud, for Spanish fa..ists). Destroy every past and history and replace it by cult to emptiness. And conformist stupidity.
correction: Fa...cism hates intelligence, human free gatherings, own personality, but promotes mass Conformism events, festivals, all organised from TOP), fa...cism hates exchanges, collective knowledge, history, quality, solid stability. Smart City is pure techno fa...cism"

We responded by thanking the commenter, while noting that we find the comment somewhat extreme and lacking context. Nonetheless, we acknowledged that many of the points raised are indeed valid.

To support our statement, we are sharing an illustration from our book, "The Urban Revolution is a Fun Sketch."

The illustration depicts two interpretations in one sketch.
- a person ensnared by the efficiency of smart city technology, or,
- a person trapped in a malfunctioning smart city.

This serves as a metaphor for a scenario where the urban space itself can become a dictator. In such cases, we tend to view objects as creators of authority rather than the actors who have imposed the objects.