> It still weirds me out that people in USA are such bad neighboors

Don’t mistake single news articles for cultural norms.

Things like these are in the headlines because they’re weird, rare, and noteworthy. I assure you this situation isn’t playing out across the entire US. Stereotyping an entire massive country based on a single news story about a weird dispute between neighbors is just illogical.

This is outrage journalism. The entire purpose of the story is to make you think “that’s outrageous!” and get angry. The journalist who wrote it might have even exaggerated the situation or left out key details to make it as sensational as possible.

Don’t take the bait.

> based on a single news story

I've seen more than one story about this sort of behaviour from US housing associations.

Bad HOA stories are more common than bad wisdom teeth stories. If I'm at a party and somehow bring up some silly complaint my HOA has filed I am sure to get several other people chiming in about their HOAs. It is common.

This has nothing to do with the law and every to do with the HOA that the people in this article from 2009 willing joined when they bought their home.

I know it's fun to hate on the USA at every given opportunity but this is less some systemic issue with the US and more a squabble between a few individuals who are violating a contract they chose to sign, and their neighbors who also signed said contract because they wanted to live in a place without laundry flapping about.

Calling HoA voluntary is like calling ToS voluntary. Technically it is, but practically it's very one sided.

With HOAs you can democratically change the laws as you see fit. This is a substantial difference.

"and their law so restrictive in some cases"

Note that there was no law against this.

"This coming from the country where morons want to own a gun to protect their property and all other bs excuses, it's rather comedic."

This is highly inflammatory and disrespectful language and some might see it as trolling to get us off topic.

"And she received two anonymous notes from neighbors saying they did not want to see her underwear flapping about."

This is what she says happened. There content of the note is not provided, they didn't reach out to the officials, they didn't interview neighbors.

Hanging laundry is normal in some areas of the US too. Although it might not be normal to hang it along the road in your front yard (most have it in the back yard). I'm guessing there are some legal things in Portugal that annoy you, no? That's all that's objectively and factually happened here.

Although I do disagree with the use of anonymous notes and getting the government involved in petty stuff. But for every story of bad neighbors doing this, there are orders of magnitude more unreported stories of neighbors helping each other.

> This is what she says happened. There content of the note is not provided, they didn't reach out to the officials, they didn't interview neighbors.

Yes, and? I find it plausible something like that happened based on my own experiences here. I see minimal incentive for her to lie. This isn't a court: that's enough for me to assume it true for the purpose of idle commentary.

> But for every story of bad neighbors doing this, there are orders of magnitude more unreported stories of neighbors helping each other.

That's consistent with there being a serious problem. You can't compare "raw number of bad things" to "raw number of good things" like that. Trivial example: if 4% of a neighborhood is shot at that's a neighborhood with a big shooting problem.

Plausible is a very low bar. We have to weigh what is more likely. She may not be outright lying, but it seems significantly more likely this isn't the full story and may include exaggerations.

"that's enough for me to assume it true for the purpose of idle commentary."

Why don't you assume what I'm saying is the truth? This is a story with terrible journalism. There's really no reason to assume this is the whole story, or even an accurate one.

"That's consistent with there being a serious problem. You can't compare "raw number of bad things" to "raw number of good things" like that. Trivial example: if 4% of a neighborhood is shot at that's a neighborhood with a big shooting problem."

Please read the context. We aren't talking about shootings. The prior comment implies bad neighbors being common in the US. I'm saying thats not the case. Clearly assessing what is common would be useful to compare raw numbers.

> This is highly inflammatory and disrespectful language and some might see it as trolling to get us off topic.

Only in the US it is. The rest of us agree.

I know it's a big place in its own right and opinions differ inside the US too; I'm sure I'm not the first who, when adding all these peculiarities up, come to the conclusion that many or most Americans just don't like/trust their fellow Americans. So much seems to be about keeping others away, down, invisible, out or even dead.

Again, this seems like a stereotype that you have with no actual experience.

I would bet there people in your own country who do not agree. Sounds like you're marginalizing them, which is not nice.

There really aren't.

What country then?

I'm waiting...

> It still weirds me out that people in USA are such bad neighboors (and their law so restrictive in some cases).

I’m sure bad neighbors exist in Portugal.

> For the pic seems to be her home, her property and she can't even hang her clothes to dry.

The picture is literally refuting what you’re claiming? She was able to hang her clothes to dry.

The US is huge and diverse. This is just the stuff you hear about.

against a rising tide of housing associations who oppose the practice

...and which are not present everywhere in the US.

It's an American passtime to get involved in other people's business.

My experience in the US is that most folks' attitude about their home is that they should be able to do whatever they want, but no one around them should be able to change anything unless they like it.

America is full of people who believe in their right to be completely their own person, and that everyone else should be exactly like them as well. By force, if necessary.

This is much more common in HOA-style developments.

You still get it in older non-HOA governed areas, but it's at least then at the level of laws (our town bans roosters and taxes chickens insanely high for example, lol).

> For the pic seems to be her home, her property and she can't even hang her clothes to dry.

Sure, but there's limits to what you can display on your front lawn without annoying the neighbours, no?

As per the pic in the article, she's handing her clothing in the front yard, which, even in a country where drying-by-hanging is the norm, is still considered tacky and stupid.[1]

Now, maybe she doesn't have a backyard, or maybe it doesn't have enough space, but the article didn't say so. They also pick a single quote used in the anonymous notes - "Don't want to see your underwear" (or something similar), without the rest of the anonymous note. My guess is that she has already had notes asking her to do this in the privacy of her backyard.

I wish they (or the woman herself) could have stated why it has to be the front lawn or nothing at all.

> This coming from the country where morons want to own a gun to protect their property and all other bs excuses, it's rather comedic.

[1] I'm 46 years old in said country, and I have never before in my life seen people hang their laundry on their front lawn. How common is this in Portugal?

> As per the pic in the article, she's handing her clothing in the front yard, which, even in a country where drying-by-hanging is the norm, is still considered tacky and stupid.

Not in Scotland. In smaller towns you'll even see poles installed next to the sidewalk to hang your laundry in public.

The country I was referring to wasn't Scotland.

After all, Scotland is an outlier in this regard - there's a number of non-third-world countries where people are regarded as trailer-trash (or the local equivalent) for hanging their clothing in the front yard.

When I lived in the United States, I realized that it is not a uniform country at all. Just as Europe varies greatly from one country to the next. Something that is common in New York City may be illegal or considered outrageous in Utah, or vice versa.

Without rules, there will be one neighbor who will start an auto repair shop on his front lawn. Another will stock pile trash. The next will have their RV blocking your view of the street etc...

HOA owns the land, so in a HOA you only have a fractional ownership of the land through the membership in the HOA. As the result of such an arrangement you have to obey the HOA's rules.

Often the HOA is just a covenant bound to the land, so you own the land but have to follow the covenant.

Getting rid of a HOA is a fun exercise, and it's sometimes done, but rarely.

Did you know that communities in Germany have quiet time rules in force around noon? Did you know that in Germany they also have rules about when trash can be set out for collection and how that is to be done? Did you know that the rules I mentioned are enforced with equal vigor as the enforcement rigor you are "You Americans"-ing about?