5 ms·

That’s a solvable problem though. Regulations could be changed to require more buffer areas for the landfill. Also, another thing to think about it is that you

That’s a solvable problem though. Regulations could be changed to require more buffer areas for the landfill. Also, another thing to think about it is that your parents likely picked the best place available for their means. Not many people choose to live next to landfills if they can afford something better. Had the landfill not existed, your parents would have likely needed to live next to some other type of hazard. It’s unfortunate, but a reality of our economic system.

titzer 4y ago
That's a heck of a dystopian view, TBH. Be glad it was just the landfill, otherwise it might have been a nuclear dump? Welp, guess that's just economics, nothing we can do about that, poor unlucky rubes! I know you didn't mean it that way, but it can sound extraordinarily tone-deaf to talk down to people like this.
- nostrademons 4y ago
  A lot of people on the Internet would rather be right than liked. The medium lends itself to this: there's little point in having random people you will never meet like you. I thought OP was making an interesting point about economics, personally - that there's sort of a law of "conservation of unpleasantness" in a market economy, and if it wasn't the landfill, there would be some other thing objectionable about your property. You approach your career very differently (and by capitalist standards, usually more successfully) if you figure that you're going to dislike some things anyway, but might as well be deliberate in choosing what you dislike.
  - lukas099 4y ago
    This was a really good comment, thanks.
  - titzer 4y ago
    It's not necessarily about being liked; that's part of our current culture's narcissism problem. It's about what kind of society do you want to live in. Do you want to live in a society where the prevailing attitude ranges from the personal "welp, sucks to be you! be grateful you have anything at all you gutter trash" to the non-personal "it's unfortunate this machine runs on frickaseed baby faces, well I guess there's nothing we can do". To be clear, I'm exaggerating for comedic effect here, not accusing. It'd be great if our society could move past those two sides of the same coin to a more "oh, look, here's an area where people are getting screwed, maybe we can fix that". That's a kind of problem-solving attitude focused on people, not a popularity contest.
    - thwayunion 4y ago
      Agreed. But, if we're not problem-solving, I'm more the happy to smile along at happy hours and hold very long grudges.
thwayunion 4y ago
> Also, another thing to think about it is that your parents likely picked the best place available for their means. Not many people choose to live next to landfills if they can afford something better. Had the landfill not existed, your parents would have likely needed to live next to some other type of hazard. It’s unfortunate, but a reality of our economic system. Yes, it's my parent's fault for being poor. (Actually, not poor, just not upper middle class in the wrong metro, although most of my colleagues from university onwards called it "working class" so maybe so.) Unfortunate, but reality :-|
aozgaa 4y ago
Not sure about your second point. Let’s consider an oversimplifying example where population is homogenous in an area/nation. If 50% of the land is unpleasant, then 50% of the population will live next to unpleasant stuff. If only 20% is unpleasant, 20% will love, saving 30% of the population. Managing a landfill/sewage plant can be worthwhile.
AnIdiotOnTheNet 4y ago
> That’s a solvable problem though. The vast majority of our problems are, we just continue to refuse to solve them because some rich asses will be slightly less rich if we do.

titzer 4y ago

That's a heck of a dystopian view, TBH. Be glad it was just the landfill, otherwise it might have been a nuclear dump? Welp, guess that's just economics, nothing we can do about that, poor unlucky rubes! I know you didn't mean it that way, but it can sound extraordinarily tone-deaf to talk down to people like this.

nostrademons 4y ago
A lot of people on the Internet would rather be right than liked. The medium lends itself to this: there's little point in having random people you will never meet like you. I thought OP was making an interesting point about economics, personally - that there's sort of a law of "conservation of unpleasantness" in a market economy, and if it wasn't the landfill, there would be some other thing objectionable about your property. You approach your career very differently (and by capitalist standards, usually more successfully) if you figure that you're going to dislike some things anyway, but might as well be deliberate in choosing what you dislike.
- lukas099 4y ago
  This was a really good comment, thanks.
- titzer 4y ago
  It's not necessarily about being liked; that's part of our current culture's narcissism problem. It's about what kind of society do you want to live in. Do you want to live in a society where the prevailing attitude ranges from the personal "welp, sucks to be you! be grateful you have anything at all you gutter trash" to the non-personal "it's unfortunate this machine runs on frickaseed baby faces, well I guess there's nothing we can do". To be clear, I'm exaggerating for comedic effect here, not accusing. It'd be great if our society could move past those two sides of the same coin to a more "oh, look, here's an area where people are getting screwed, maybe we can fix that". That's a kind of problem-solving attitude focused on people, not a popularity contest.
  - thwayunion 4y ago
    Agreed. But, if we're not problem-solving, I'm more the happy to smile along at happy hours and hold very long grudges.

thwayunion 4y ago

> Also, another thing to think about it is that your parents likely picked the best place available for their means. Not many people choose to live next to landfills if they can afford something better. Had the landfill not existed, your parents would have likely needed to live next to some other type of hazard. It’s unfortunate, but a reality of our economic system. Yes, it's my parent's fault for being poor. (Actually, not poor, just not upper middle class in the wrong metro, although most of my colleagues from university onwards called it "working class" so maybe so.) Unfortunate, but reality :-|

aozgaa 4y ago

Not sure about your second point. Let’s consider an oversimplifying example where population is homogenous in an area/nation. If 50% of the land is unpleasant, then 50% of the population will live next to unpleasant stuff. If only 20% is unpleasant, 20% will love, saving 30% of the population. Managing a landfill/sewage plant can be worthwhile.

AnIdiotOnTheNet 4y ago

> That’s a solvable problem though. The vast majority of our problems are, we just continue to refuse to solve them because some rich asses will be slightly less rich if we do.