Posted on 06/26/2023 7:43:09 AM PDT by MtnClimber
Around 90 A.D., the Roman historian Tacitus traveled through Germania observing the lives of its inhabitants. It was quite an eye-opening journey for him. Among his many observations, he noted how the Germanic people chose to live in small separate dwellings, separate from even extended family. Often these dwellings would house just a mother, father, and their children. That seems normal to us today, but it certainly wasn’t to Tacitus and the Romans, or much of the civilized world at that time.
Authors Michael Lotus and James Bennett wrote of this in their groundbreaking book “America 3.0: Rebooting American Prosperity in the 21st Century Why America’s Greatest Days Are Yet to Come.” The Germanic tribes would take this radical cultural trait with them, when in the 5th Century A.D. they would conquer Britannia. In fact, the German tribe of Angles would give England its future name. While this cultural trait would not remain as powerful in Germania or in much of Europe, it would further migrate, most notably to America, Canada, and Australia. The idea of owning a single-family home is not unknown to the world, of course, but it planted its deepest cultural seeds here in the United States. The epitome of the American Dream is to own one’s home – a home is a man’s castle.
Why the history lesson? Because the yearning to own one’s own home is under threat and the ability to buy and own a piece of land in America is under intense attack from the Left. But then what isn’t under attack from the Left. Our communities, families, churches, every aspect of middle-class lifestyle is seen as an obstacle to the Left’s utopian dream of a new society, a roadblock in the efforts to radically transform society.
The Left is now pushing policies that promote a “densification” of living. These new “smart cities” include dense living in small, cramped dwellings in cities where the need and use of a car are eliminated. The question of what people may want becomes irrelevant. That some younger people choose to live in dense living arrangements in cities is often true. But most younger people, when they marry and have families, choose to live outside of dense cities; they vote with their feet and choose to live in suburbs.
The war on home ownership, the suburbs, and efforts to force people into dense living arrangements is not new. For years, Stanley Kurtz has written about the Left’s attack on the suburbs, as have demographers such as Wendall Cox and Joel Kotkin. Kurtz’s book “Spreading the Wealth: How Obama is Robbing the Suburbs to Pay for the Cities” detailed the war on the suburbs that Barack Obama had undertaken almost immediately after being elected President. The war on the suburbs was just a part of his radical transformation of America.
The Left is attacking middle class life across the world, but we see the war on single family homes and on the suburbs happening most directly in America and across the Anglosphere. The reasons for this middle class life lies in our uniqueness in choosing this form of living. But it’s all about culture, and not about being “Anglo”. Immigrants to America eagerly fold into this lifestyle choice. I live in a suburban community 25 miles outside of Los Angeles where, while non-Hispanic whites constitute the largest group (45%), they are not a majority. There are large minorities of Hispanics and Asians, many of them first generation immigrants. They all opt to share in the American Dream of home ownership. And before this becomes a racial conversation, which today is where the Left takes everything, let’s be clear: this has nothing to do with “white flight.”...
I have no desire to live in a blue beehive city.
Green Acres is the place to be.
Farm livin’ is the life for me.
Land spreadin’ out so far and wide
Keep Manhattan, just give me that countryside.
I will not become a hivedweller in a democrat hellhole city.
Idiot leftist:
New York is where I’d rather stay.
I get allergic smelling hay.
I just adore a penthouse view.
Dah-ling I love you but give me Park Avenue.
*
Sign me up.
BTTT
In my personal life and professional career I've come to look at the dynamics of "home ownership" and "suburbia" very differently than they are portrayed in articles like this. Two general points that guide me on this:
1. If you live in a suburban area and work in a nearby city, don't consider yourself a "suburbanite." You are an urban resident in almost every respect, and your socioeconomic indicators cannot be detached from your ties to the city.
2. Related to the previous point ... If you don't live and work in the same municipal or county jurisdiction, I'd say a lot of the characteristics of "home ownership" go right out the window. In fact, I'd suggest that the separation of home and work locations has been one of the most destructive features of suburbanization in the post-WW2 era.
Your argument fails because you don't consider the various levels of urbanization, e.g., village, town, city, Metropolis, Megalopolis. Also, socioeconomic indicators aren't necessarily bound by where you live. Ever hear of remote working?
“I have no desire to live in a blue beehive city!
The Left is attacking middle class life across the world, but we see the war on single family homes and on the suburbs happening most directly in America and across the Anglosphere.
The reasons for this middle class life lies in our uniqueness in choosing this form of living. But it’s all about culture, and not about being “Anglo”. Immigrants to America eagerly fold into this lifestyle choice. I live in a suburban community 25 miles outside of Los Angeles where, while non-Hispanic whites constitute the largest group (45%), they are not a majority. There are large minorities of Hispanics and Asians, many of them first generation immigrants. They all opt to share in the American Dream of home ownership. And before this becomes a racial conversation, which today is where the Left takes everything, let’s be clear: this has nothing to do with “white flight.”...
The Left is attacking middle class life across the world, but we see the war on single family homes and on the suburbs happening most directly in America and across the Anglosphere. The reasons for this middle class life lies in our uniqueness in choosing this form of living. But it’s all about culture, and not about being “Anglo”. Immigrants to America eagerly fold into this lifestyle choice. I live in a suburban community 25 miles outside of Los Angeles where, while non-Hispanic whites constitute the largest group (45%), they are not a majority. There are large minorities of Hispanics and Asians, many of them first generation immigrants. They all opt to share in the American Dream of home ownership. And before this becomes a racial conversation, which today is where the Left takes everything, let’s be clear: this has nothing to do with “white flight.”...
One of our relatives in a good size MW metro area has seen her 15-20 minute commute each way go to 30+ minutes and worse on Fridays and Mondays. This has resulted in traffic jams across town.
She and her husband are from basically 2 large families, and many of them are looking at moving back into a rural area and working from home or a shop or from their homes.
The area, they are looking at has a bank, one restaurant/small grocery store/combo filling/service station and a lot of vacant stores on the little main street.
Good medical care is about 60-90 minutes away or less.
They can get home or office delivery from Amazon/Costco on most items from food to whatever.
I was on my lawn tractor from around 6:30 PM until dark last night mowing everything. It was too hot/humid prior to that. I had just mowed most of the property last Wednesday.
Sometimes a condo starts to sound appealing.
Those of us born in the 15 years after WWII had, what I believe was, the best environment, communities and society. It was safe for children and adults and the opportunity and variety of open avenues of life were outstanding. The drug culture was ten years in the future, the progressives were in hiding as the communists they were.
Some areas had some cancerous segregationist elements still at work but the areas were know and shrinking.
Education was affordable but not confining — you could achieve a lot without a college degree but many learning paths were open to the tech and science outbreak to come.
I can relate, but I would have it no other way.
This is an announcement from Genetic Control:
‘It is my sad duty to inform you of a four foot restriction on
Humanoid height’
I hear the directors of Genetic Control have been buying all the
Properties that have recently been sold, taking risks oh so bold
It’s said now that people will be shorter in height
They can fit twice as many in the same building site
They say it’s alright
Beginning with the tenants of the town of Harlow
In the interest of humanity, they’ve been told they must go
Told they must go-go-go-go
Genesis - Get ‘Em Out By Friday
Of course, “15 minute cities” have no provision for churches, especially not Orthodox parishes and dioceses!
The whole “15 minute city” movement is EVIL, and it has little to do with “climate”!!
We live in Chicago exurbia in a neighborhood of 1 + acre lots. Anything with less space and I’d be claustrophobic. Takes about 1:45 minutes to mow with lawn tractor.
I understand. It just gets old when I am mowing every four days and it is still to tall.
Plus, I have not fertilized since early April.
Keep in mind, I CREATED this monster.
I bought a 100% wooded 12 acre lot eleven years ago. Mature 100+ year old timber within 15’ of the house built in 1972. So, I cleared every tree within 40’ of the house and about 2 acres. We selectively cut the remaining 10 acres.
So, I went from having no lawn at all to now about 2 acres.
I have a 6’ finish mower for my Massey Ferguson compact cab tractor.
So, I can mow the 1 acre field with that. The area around the house is done with the 1999 John Deere LX255 42” rider.
The 1999 JD is on its last leg. Welded the deck three times. Head gasket once. The hood is cracked/broken. Front bumper is gone. Seat has a cover on it. I am on my third set of blades. Replaced the main drive deck bearing for the second time this winter. But, it sill runs.
I really need an Exmark or Skag 52” commercial mower.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.