Lifted from the comments, a small point, on suburban versus city living. And those who would prefer that you didn’t have a choice:
A thread ensues.
In the comments, Jacob adds:
I like living somewhere where you don’t have to explain things like this.
Well, yes. Quite.
Not having to guess whether some stranger sitting on your wall at 11pm is a threat, or just someone with an impaired sense of boundaries – and not having to do that regularly – is freeing. Likewise, being able to park your car on the street outside without fretting, routinely, about whether someone may try to steal it, or steal some part of it, or just vandalise it out of moron spite, is similarly non-trivial.
And contra Mr Gifford, a thing one might wish to enjoy.
Update, via the comments:
Mr Gifford, since you ask, is a proponent of the “15-minute city.” He doesn’t much like car ownership, or people having the option of living in the suburbs. He’s also rather disdainful of the fact that some of us would rather not “live closer to all kinds of different people,” a proximity to difference – now there’s a euphemism – that is presented as some kind of unexplained moral imperative.
That some people prefer to have neighbours with broadly compatible values and expectations – say, regarding behaviour, noise, the observation of normal boundaries, things of that kind – seems to vex Mr Gifford. The word “privilege” is deployed in a rumbling kind of way.
A rumbling we’ve heard before, while marvelling at its implications.
Update 2, via the comments:
Regarding Mr Gifford’s enthusiasm for our proximity – that’s coerced proximity – to “all kinds of different people,” MattS notes,
Diversity implies diverse preferences about noise and boundaries in public spaces, and diverse views about how to interact with the passing scene, with strangers, and especially with female strangers.
Another non-trivial point, one touched on here, and about which readers may have views somewhat at odds with those of Mr Gifford.
Dicentra adds, not unreasonably,
But fantasizing about making everyone walk everywhere while lugging things is stridently ableist.
YOU WILL CARRY THOSE FOUR BAGS OF SHOPPING ON PUBLIC TRANSPORT. OR DIE IN THE ATTEMPT. CITIZEN.
And where, needless to say, you will delight in being surrounded by “all kinds of different people.”
At which point, this came to mind, along with this. And of course this infinitely charming scene. Among many others.
Update 3:
In the comments, Daniel Ream adds,
A great many unusual ideas can be made to work if everyone involved is filthy stinking rich.
And if everyone involved has shared values and behavioural expectations – the kind of cultural common ground – and moral common ground – that Mr Gifford would presumably disdain as problematic, as mere “privilege.”
A while ago, I mentioned that for many years a neighbour has had an ‘honesty box’ on a small, home-made stand on the pavement outside their house. Passers-by can help themselves to surplus produce from the owner’s vegetable garden, or small plants, or unwanted toys, or whatever. People leave the suggested, very nominal charge or whatever they deem appropriate.
In a box. That doesn’t get robbed.
Almost every time I pass it, I’m faintly pleased that it exists. It does seem rather symbolic. And it serves as a reminder that I’ve lived in neighbourhoods where such a thing would very promptly be vandalised and thrown into the road, and where delight would be taken in its destruction – and in the misery of its owner.
And the difference between the two scenarios – or between this scene and this one – is not caused by poverty, or indeed “privilege.” It’s about being better people. The kind of people one might, say, prefer as neighbours.
Update 4:
Regarding the reference to better people, EmC replies,
You’re not supposed to say that bit out loud, David.
To acknowledge the obvious does have an air of scandalousness. Such is the practised dishonesty of our times. But at risk of being thought “privileged,” or insufficiently egalitarian, I would prefer to walk down the street without someone doing this in order to do this. To me or anyone else.
Outrageous of me, I know.
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