Just imagine you are planning a night out with friends. As someone who grew up in a small town, our options were very limited. You could go to the movies, the bowling alley, or go to someone’s house. If you wanted dinner, there were only a few restaurants serving a small variety of cuisines. It would be impossible to do a different thing every night for more than a week or so.
In a big city, you could do something different every night and not run out of different things to do for years. You could eat a different restaurant every night, eating a completely different cuisine each time.
If you are simply counting things to do, a city is ‘superior’.
I get what you're saying and agree to some degree. But at the same time, i think it's actually the last line ("if you're simply counting things to do") that I would personally quibble over as the sacred metric of what's better than the other.
Maybe some people don't really care about having ten gazillion different restaurants and would prefer at least three solid parks/hiking trails you can't get around some big cities? Maybe some folks would be more than happy to trade going to the theatres with having a home with 5+ acres to raise a chicken farm or other critters on, or if not that then at least the privacy and the minimal light pollution.
Some trades that people are willing to make kinda aren't so obvious.
> / decency / civility
That hasn't been my experience in small towns recently, unless you happen to fit in well with the people there. There's a highly aggressive paranoia and acting out.
> functional municipal government
They are almost powerless, IME. How small a town are you talking about?
Just goes to show it's all subjective.
Few American cities were founded > 200 years ago. None were founded more than 1565 (United States), and the oldest dates from 1502, Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic.
That said, what a New Yorker visiting small-town Europe is probably referencing is the contrast between NYC and Small European Town. The specific town will likely be largely interchangeable with numerous others of similar description.
By contrast, a small town in the US or Canada largely resembles some of the less-distinguished suburbs of NYC itself: same language, same government, same mass media, same history, same chain stores and franchises. Far fewer people, however, and a much smaller economic and cultural ambit.
Even for small towns in which there is some distinctive culture ... it tends to be a single motif which dominates the entire town, rather than the melting pot of a major metropolis. Marfa, TX; Silver City, NM; Santa Fe, NM; Asheland, OR; and Napa, CA all have distinctive cultures, but it tends to be all-of-a-type.
Exceptions tend to be smaller college towns, for obvious reasons, but even here, the odds for highly-diverse communities tend to be lower than in larger cosmopolitan cities. And you can climb far up the major metro region and still find fairly stultified culture --- Chicago, IL, wears its "second city" moniker as a badge, but you'll still find there's some real edginess there about it if you press a bit or scratch beneath the surface. (The fact that it's third by size, and that Los Angeles also evinces a somewhat similar attitude toward New York doesn't help.)
I mean, NYC has a ton of culture but it's a young city.
I disagree with you premise.
And if it's not what I managed to communicate effectively, I can assure you it is not at all my intended meaning.
Which would then falisify your own premise.
But I’d argue NYC has more culture than say Edinburgh, Scotland despite the later having a far more extensive history.
Contrast though US cities of roughly comparable population (506,000 for Edinburgh), say, Sacramento, CA; Kansas City, MO; Mesa, AZ; or Atlanta, GA. Two of those are also state capitals, roughly matching Edinburgh's political status.
Remmeber that size was another key factor. Again, not sole, but key.
Global cities ratings gives additional ratings and bases for same:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_city
GWAC ranks Edinburgh above all of the US cities, save Atlanta, which is just above it. Mesa and Sacramento are not ranked.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Globalization_and_World_Cities...
I went on to start my career on the east coast over 25 years ago, and then the west coast (Boston / SF / SEA / LA). I'm now back in a Midwestern monoculture community because of family. It's not an easy cultural adjustment if you've acclimated to something that's not monoculture.
In my case, the appeal of large city blended culture is that (1) I can find my tribe much more easily and (2) the tribes all have to get along because there's no dominant tribe enforcing its norms on the others. (There's obviously generalization in this statement, but I'd argue that relative to a monoculture community that these things are more truth than not. SF, SEA and others have plenty of challenges, but IMHO it's in part because they've become monocultures, or at least tech has become the dominant tribe and asserts its will on other cultures.)
If you enjoy living in the monoculture you occupy, there's no reason to leave. Visiting or temporarily living in blended cultures will not feel better to you, as it causes more stress than where you came from. But it's very presumptuous to assume that others would find living in "flyover" country better than the life they currently lead.
The conformity is kind of the point and makes it better for the rest of us.
I really don't care if you want to live an limited life experience and assume it is the only possible way of life. But when you start telling other people that they must live like you want them to because they want to live in the same area you do is just too much to take. It doesn't truly affect you other than you have to accept something you don't agree.
> And there it is! We only want ourselves to be comfy, but nobody cares what effect it has on anyone else. Just as long as everyone conforms to your way of thinking.
Can you please lower the rhetorical temperature?
> But when you start telling other people that they must live like you want them to because they want to live in the same area you do is just too much to take.
There's plenty of cultural orthodoxy in cities as well, it's probably just more agreeable to you.
What are you referring to? In large cities, you can think and do what you want and nobody will much care or notice unless you force them to.
I do care what effect it has on others. I want say 80% of people to be comfy. Often that involves imposing norms on the other 20%. There’s lots of norms that (1) a majority like and benefit from that (2) break down if you don’t enforce them on the minority.
Unrestricted individual choice can affect others by changing market conditions and creating what in economic terms you’d call a race to the bottom. That’s the logic behind OSHA regulations and the minimum wage, for example. You can apply the same logic to social and cultural issues.
And it's completely unnecessary - in fact, people do very well living in freedom, as you can see in most places (by population) in the free world. No societies have been more successful, and it's not close.
You’ve got the causation backward. Freedom from social conformity is a luxury wealthy societies can afford. Western countries, including America, became rich at a time when they were still quite rigidly conformist. And some of the most conformist, such as Puritan New England were the most prosperous.
It’s also worth observing that those same societies are now literally dying out. Post-Christian Europe literally has to import people from societies with rigid social norms—among others, strong social pressures to start families and raise children—to take care of their elderly.
(I have plenty of criticism of racism and other discrimination in the US. It certainly isn't ok and I am going to help fix those problems.)
> Post-Christian Europe literally has to import people from societies with rigid social norms—among others, strong social pressures to start families and raise children—to take care of their elderly.
They need immigration in that respect (and so does the US) simply because of birth rates.
Immigrants have come from those societies to the US (and certainly parts of Europe) for generations. Some are too old to give up their old ways, understandably, but their children embrace freedom and those are the people of the US today.
And again, do you cede to me the power to make you conform to what I want? Why should anyone cede it to you?
You’re erroneously conflating collective freedom and individual freedom. The US was founded on religious pluralism, which meant different religious groups coming here to be free from persecution back home, usually due to politics. For example, the Puritans left because they believed England was insufficiently committed to the Protestant Reformation. But that didn’t have anything to do with individual freedom within those groups. Many of the groups that came to America, like the Puritans, were regarded as extreme and fundamentalist back home: https://paulspassingthoughts.com/2017/01/17/an-examination-o... (“In 1637, the general court of Massachusetts passed an order forbidding anyone from settling within the colony without first having his orthodoxy approved by the magistrates.”).
> They need immigration in that respect (and so does the US) simply because of birth rates.
What causes the low birth rates in those places and the higher birth rates in the places immigrants are coming from?
> Some are too old to give up their old ways, understandably, but their children embrace freedom and those are the people of the US today.
Sure, the kids become socialized into the culture of individualism—that just means that the society is unsustainable without continuing to import people from those societies with more traditional and conformist culture. Put differently, post-Christian Europe is sustainable only through population arbitrage.
All those people are coming to the US, not vice versa!
Sometimes. But we've also found it necessary to have laws governing road traffic, and pollution, and noise abatement, and fraud, and robbery. That's because humans often focus narrowly on their own desires when making decisions unless they're compelled, under pain of fine or imprisonment (which aren't always effective), to take others' interests into account as well.
It is easy for someone who is fairly close and doesn’t have to adjust much to say that the cost of conformity is worth it for the gain.
The 'rest of us' being people outside the monoculture? Things aren't so good there.
Conformity limits people's freedom, often greatly, often in very fundamental ways. People can't chose their religion, sexual orientation, politics, interests, career, etc. You are free to chose conformity if you like, but the problem is that conformity is forced on others.
But my question remains: why are you this way and why do you think it's a better way to be than the majority? What factors external to the conformist group contributed or influenced you, if any?
For the record, I, too, have fled regions and communities, both physical and virtual, where I was a deviant. I asked myself these questions and I have answers if anyone were to ask. I'm just curious what answers others have come up with, and whether they have ever asked themselves those same questions. I'm also curious if others have found their own answers lacking and how that is handled.
They are overwhelming, brutal, oppressive experiences of millions of people. Not bland, but poison to the people and our society.
> why are you this way and why do you think it's a better way to be than the majority?
I think this majority is non-existent - there is just too much variety. And regardless, I don't care about some 'majority'; I don't make choices for or against them - not in response to them at all. I am what I am, I live the way I want to live, the way that suits me best (which is probably most 'efficient' in many ways, including economically, matching me to resources, needs, etc.). Why would I live any other way? In fact, that attitude puts me in the majority in the US.
The whole argument smacks of another attempt by reactionaries to encroach on the freedom of others, now trying to force conformity to what they want. I'm sure they wouldn't want roles reversed!
Though one who's proved quite hostile to other cultures and practices.
For me conformity has always just been boring and restricting, and I consider it an all around negative. I like to try new things, and I live to experience as much of what life can bring as I can. So I find the idea of artificially restricting ones options on how to dress, sing, what to eat, how to dance, what to make of art, what stories you can tell, how to make love, how to play, how to express yourself, what to talk about, who you can be with, what games are allowed, what you're supposed to do on Sunday morning, etc. just an all around negative. It feels like a choke hold on my life, which is the most precious thing I have, so restrictions on the extent of how much I'm allowed to live and experience seem completely unreasonable and oppressive to me.
But I'm a pretty confident and courageous person, I don't have anxieties, and I enjoy getting out of my comfort zone and trying new things, learning, discovery, are all things I'm drawn too. I know people who aren't like that, have more anxieties, so I never really thought that for them maybe conformity was like a relief, a way to take out a source of stress of the unknown with clear strict rules and conventions that they can rely on.
Restriction of choice can likewise be welfare maximizing. People’s brains aren’t fully developed until 25. Which is remarkable if you think about it. People spend a third of their lives walking around without all their faculties. And even after that most people have trouble making good decisions. Not just dumb people, but nearly everyone. Why are there fat doctors and nurses? Rigid social norms can help people make better decisions, especially the people who need the most help with that. Again, there is a reason individual choice is emphasized almost solely in societies rich enough to afford letting people make mistakes.
So when you say "rest of us" here you're coming from a society that's on the edge of survival?
That's a context I definitely wasn't thinking. I'd assumed based on the conversation we were talking about cities vs small towns in relatively well established countries.
Honestly, I'm not sure I buy your hypothesis though, even if I think of struggling countries, feel you'd have to back it up with more reasoning and data. I don't really see how conformity would help. It still seems to me like it's just an obstacle, all innovation or attempts at change or trying new or different ways are shut down and repressed. If the current way of life isn't yielding the kind of outcome needed to lift them above that edge of survival, continuing to strictly enforce and being against anyone trying to go against it seems counterproductive to me.
I'm not saying you get rid of law and order. But I don't see the benefits of say banning certain type of medicine, foods, dances, music, art, social interactions, love making, natural selection of a mate, methods of trade, methods of construction, etc.
> there is a reason individual choice is emphasized almost solely in societies rich enough to afford letting people make mistakes
I feel you might have the cause and effect reversed. It could just as well be that there is a reason societies that emphasize individual choice are often the ones to become prosperous and rich.
Alternatively, perhaps there is a dominant culture in major US cities and you simply don't feel pressure to conform (because you're already conforming). Imagine someone expressing support for traditional values, police, Israel, etc or expressing criticism of BLM, Roe v. Wade, "soft-on-crime" policies, etc in a major US city--that person would definitely feel pressure (if not harassment) to conform to progressive politics. Hell, in my major US city, I feel chafed for not believing that cars are a completely unmitigated evil, and I'm sure there are a whole lot of areas where I don't feel chafed by the dominant progressive politics.
Boy, where do you get off?
>can't believe that there might be people who want to live another way
As it apparently goes for you as well. The fact that someone that would like to live outside of the city, but not want to adopt the "small town limited life experience while--knowing--their way is the only way". Anyone coming from other experiences is always a threat to these small towns so they are labeled as outsiders and always treated suspiciously instead of welcoming like they like to preach.
My guess is that this attitude is where:
>In small town USA, the local culture usually is inferior.
Big cities often have people from many different cultures, including small towns, which is neat, and interesting things can happen when different perspectives collide, but, for the most part, cities just operate under the generic mass media American culture.
But, in my experience, people living in rural areas rely on their immediate neighbors for more than those living in larger developments. This is conducive to the development of a strong local culture, and outsiders who move in expecting the mass media American culture will likely not feel welcome.
Having lived a variety of places, I personally prefer the rural culture (at least here in Vermont), but I would not say big city culture is inferior...just different.
A tip: if you say a person's culture is inferior, they probably will not see you as worth listening to.
This might be true for some people in large cities, especially the wealthier and the transplants from other places.
However, poor people in cities have a huge sense of community. They rely on their community a ton, and everyone works together to survive. The neighborhood is the community, and it is much like a close knit rural community, only compacted into a smaller city neighborhood.
I think they would find neighors very welcoming - even the toughest cities and neighborhoods are mostly friendly people - but the culture would be unfamiliar and the newcomer would have to adjust.
> it may be easier to travel to an area of the city with more generic culture where they do feel welcome
I'm not sure where that is in many cities, other than suburbs. You can't escape the richness of large cities.
Sure, I agree, with emphasis on the newcomer adjusting.
>I'm not sure where that is in many cities, other than suburbs. You can't escape the richness of large cities.
To clarify, I just mean locations that attract people of a wide variety of backgrounds. That is not to say those locations are 'un-rich' or anything. I just mean that interactions there are governed more by mainstream American culture than by anything specific to that city or neighborhood or the people involved.
I would say it's the opposite. Cities are their own worlds and cultures (many, many cultures per city); they have the critical mass to ignore mass media. Mass media doesn't understand or address the richness of life in cities; it's for the suburbs.
But I certainly agree that mass media does not understand or address the richness of life in cities (or anywhere else).
Yes, I agree that many perspectives are omitted.
> mass media does not understand or address the richness of life in cities (or anywhere else).
It captures the suburbs pretty well, IMHO.
Also, he says he came from a small town so I don't think it is fair to characterize him as a coastal elite.
I'm sure he came from a small town and perhaps the "Dylan is a coastal elite" take is inaccurate (I'm also not sure that's what the parent is suggesting), but the following seems pretty unambiguously elitist-there's no more charitable interpretation that doesn't flout reason.
> In small town USA, the local culture usually is inferior.
I have not travelled all over USA to have a taste of every possible small town, but the ones I did visit that had monoculture often also had a very 'conform to us or leave' type of vibe.
Much better phrased than I was able to do it.
>I have not travelled all over USA to have a taste of every possible small town, but the ones I did visit that had monoculture often also had a very 'conform to us or leave' type of vibe.
With the size of the US, even traveling within the US it is still similar everywhere you go. An interesting bit about Europe is that you can visit totally different culture with a few hours travel by train. I can travel the same distance and still be in my same state, so traveling to new cultures is difficult. It's just a unique state of things, not a claim of better/worse
I agree, and I love this about Europe, but what you're experiencing is monoculture at national scales. You have large regions with single dominant cultures (as opposed to a Europe that is a uniform blend of every culture). I also suspect this is key to Europe's minimal inequality--it's a lot easier to get things done when most people have similar values and when people are willing to conform to the system there's obviously going to be much less inequality (they're not working against the system).
We just look at Europe and say "guys, you're just white, leave it be".
However, I think some of your conclusions are either mistaken or not thinking about the consequences.
For example, small towns that have a single culture are great if you feel a part of it. However, even many people who are born and raised in the monoculture do not feel a part of it. For example, if you are LGBT, or even just have interests outside the monoculture. In a city, everyone can find a group they can connect with; in a monoculture, that isn’t the case.
Secondly, your last sentence seems to imply that cities are more dangerous than rural areas. However, if you look at the data, that is not the case… people in cities have a lower mortality rate than people in rural areas: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-06-07/rural-urb...
If you think of culture as art, food, tradition, dancing, music, games, etc. I feel many small town simply don't have a lot of it. Its not just about diversity, there's just not a lot of culture to experience, they don't always have their own music, or art scene, they don't always have their own unique foods, or games or way of dancing. And their tradition are often just standard Christian traditions.
I don't think this is anything bad about the people of any small town, in my opinion this is more inherent to the fact that the town is small in itself. That religious organizations tend to have a bigger stronghold on small town making them more conservative culturally, which seems to hold back the culture from growing more unique. And that small towns often don't have as much financial means.
Sometimes it's also that you won't be able to participate or experience the culture of a small town if you're not in it already. While going to a big city it'll be in your face and there'll be festivals, and restaurants, and other places you can go and experience it first hand. In small towns sometimes it's all happening at people's homes and backyards, so you have to be in it already.
This isn't always true though, some small towns have great culture, but seems there's less of those. It tends to be towns that have retained traditional historical pagan cultural heritage, playing folk music, festivals, foods and traditions of yore.
Overall a lot of small town are very charming and can still have a lively and interesting culture. Suburbs on the other hand are just soulless in my experience. Even their architecture and design are copy/pasted and manufactured blocks.
Because different cultures are better at different things, so a mixed culture is better at more things than a monoculture.
The benefits of the small town american culture is that it is a mixture of cultures already from the immigrants that moved there a while ago.
The improvements are continuing over time as more and more cultures join in
Yeah we tried that for like 200 years. Fought a war over it. Didn't work out so great.
In small town USA, the local culture usually is inferior. The local culture tends to be very monoculture. It's the larger cities where the culture tends to be more diverse. Getting out of small town into the nearest larger town opened me up to a hell of a lot more than the people that never left. However, even in that larger town, it's still limited. Yes, I eventually went to the west coast to have even more multi-cultural experience. Later, I even got to finally start travelling internationally to expand that multi-cultural experience further.
Maybe it's a broad brush to paint with, but my local culture 100% was inferior, but I imagine it's not unique