Yeah above a certain population density you're mostly free from your neighbors gossiping at church about your project boat yard ornament or marijuana cultivatin

Yeah above a certain population density you're mostly free from your neighbors gossiping at church about your project boat yard ornament or marijuana cultivating hobby or loud parties because you don't know your neighbors and probably don't go to the same church but the trade-off is that if you do step out of line they sick the local bylaw czar on you instead. This is what I mean by more resources to track down minor deviance from social norms. Some things are more tolerated in the city but the trade-off is that the things that are not tolerated are addressed by the government (which means fines that will make you destitute if you don't step in line and men with guns who will put you in a cage if you don't pay). By contrast you can usually tell the small town busybodies to pound sand and unless you're actually negatively affecting a lot of people with whatever it is you do then it's probably a non-issue. Those people are always crying wolf about things and nobody takes them seriously because everybody knows that most of their complaints are unfounded or not serious enough to be worth dedicating the community's limited resources (at a small enough town level the distinction between private action and government action does get a bit blurry) to doing anything about it.