4 ms·

What gives you the right to decide what your neighbors do with their land? Would it be "democratic and moral" if I got a group of friends together who decided t

What gives you the right to decide what your neighbors do with their land? Would it be "democratic and moral" if I got a group of friends together who decided that your house was too big and forced you to downsize?

BobbyJo 4y ago
Is this a counter argument? It seems supportive of the point if anything. "Less invested but larger group of people telling a smaller group what to do".
- ladberg 4y ago
  Yeah sorry my argument might not have been exactly clear, I'm not trying to argue either way on how local/global governance should be. I'm trying to say that less governance over property rights is better. It happens in this case that the state is in favor of less governance over property than local governments so I'm in support of the state here, but that doesn't always hold true and I'd be pro-local if the situation was reversed.
voakbasda 4y ago
Zoning is based on the principle that it's not your land. You are merely its steward for the short time that you are on this planet, and then someone else will become its steward. Know that time will come eventually, the rules prevent someone from causing damage that society does not want to be forced to clean up. But yeah, these rules are draconian and surpass their intended spirit, creating regulatory capture for the construction industry and preventing perfectly acceptable possibilities that the community would want. For example, I want to create a summer camp for kids here on my farm, but zoning and other over-regulation actively prevents me from building any of the needed dorms, classrooms, or kitchen/bathing facilities. Countless possibilities like this are being crushed every day. I personally have given up trying.
Ensorceled 4y ago
This underscores is the hilariously hypocritical nature of these arguments: "my property rights give me the right to deny others their property rights" It's very much like the "first speaker" issue with free speech "advocates"; somehow the first homeowner/speaker has greater rights than the newer homeowner/speaker. The lack of self-awareness is breathtaking sometimes.
- salawat 4y ago
  >It's very much like the "first speaker" issue with free speech "advocates"; somehow the first homeowner/speaker has greater rights than the newer homeowner/speaker. Got an example there? Not sure I'm following.
  - Ensorceled 4y ago
    The "first speaker" has free speech, but if you use your free speech to criticize my speech, you're censoring me ("cancel culture") and depriving me of my free speech, so the "second speaker" does not have a right to free speech. Example: Dave Chappelle makes a joke about trans people, other people criticize Chappelle and vow to boycott Netflix. Those are BOTH free speech but a lot of people think Chappelle's free speech rights should take priority over his critics. To be clear, I believe Chappelle has the right to make trans jokes and I also believe he has brain worms about the issue and has become distinctly unfunny because of it.
    - salawat 4y ago
      Mmmmkay. I see where you're going. But I don't think > but if you use your free speech to criticize my speech, you're censoring me ("cancel culture") and depriving me of my free speech, so the "second speaker" does not have a right to free speech. entirely follows; in particular since the hallmark of "cancel culture tends to be communicating with other people to orchestrate action or dissociation of the one of the speakers from society. It seems much closer to something akin to the practice of industrial blacklisting/secondary striking in employment/labor reltions law. In that you're using speech to command/coordinate a group to force an action or change in circumstance on someone else. I'm not saying mind, that even those and similar activities don't have a place, but they are examples of "patterns of speech elevated to action", and thereby removed from the arena of "free speech", and firmly plopped in the "freedom of association"/situationally labelled and verboten bucket. The spirit of free speech is you are free to voice things without the threat of government force gagging you, or compelling you to say otherwise. Now... Where is the dividing line between the "Government" and "a sufficiently large group of people that there is warranted a stepping in and reminder that "if a government employee eould be specifically restricted from keeping you from saying this then mayhaps as a very large group of citizens it warrants the same consideration of restraint; as we've all got a vested interest in not windi g up on the wrong side of a snowball network effect"... That's an entirely different kettle of fish.
mantas 4y ago
For example - insolation. If somebody builds a massive apartment building in place of a detached house, its neighbors would get much more shade.
repsilat 4y ago
It's a coordination mechanism in the prisoners dilemma. Building is defecting, zoning is legislating cooperation. In this scenario you and folks who want more building are the justice system: you want defection, you want building. You say, "how is it moral for prisoners to constrain each other's actions?" but they voted for it freely because mutual cooperation is better than mutual defection, even if they personally would defect given the choice.
gumby 4y ago
> What gives you the right to decide what your neighbors do with their land? Seems like there's a spectrum (even if the dividing line is in the wrong place on that spectrum right now). Many suburbs prohibit owning roosters (they wake your neighbors at dawn) though female chickens are OK. I think it's OK if you can't open a slaughterhouse next door in an urban or other dense area. It's also reasonable to require that new construction be up to code, as your close-by building not to fire code could threaten my home. At the other extreme are restrictions on how you paint your house or operating a slaughterhouse in a low density agricultural area is none of your (distant) neighbors' business, assuming the roads are up to the new traffic. Increasing infill density doesn't seem bad to me, but even then, you need adequate utility and road capacity, and it's easy for NIMBYs in town to prevent that from being upgraded.

BobbyJo 4y ago

Is this a counter argument? It seems supportive of the point if anything. "Less invested but larger group of people telling a smaller group what to do".

ladberg 4y ago
Yeah sorry my argument might not have been exactly clear, I'm not trying to argue either way on how local/global governance should be. I'm trying to say that less governance over property rights is better. It happens in this case that the state is in favor of less governance over property than local governments so I'm in support of the state here, but that doesn't always hold true and I'd be pro-local if the situation was reversed.

voakbasda 4y ago

Zoning is based on the principle that it's not your land. You are merely its steward for the short time that you are on this planet, and then someone else will become its steward. Know that time will come eventually, the rules prevent someone from causing damage that society does not want to be forced to clean up. But yeah, these rules are draconian and surpass their intended spirit, creating regulatory capture for the construction industry and preventing perfectly acceptable possibilities that the community would want. For example, I want to create a summer camp for kids here on my farm, but zoning and other over-regulation actively prevents me from building any of the needed dorms, classrooms, or kitchen/bathing facilities. Countless possibilities like this are being crushed every day. I personally have given up trying.

Ensorceled 4y ago

This underscores is the hilariously hypocritical nature of these arguments: "my property rights give me the right to deny others their property rights" It's very much like the "first speaker" issue with free speech "advocates"; somehow the first homeowner/speaker has greater rights than the newer homeowner/speaker. The lack of self-awareness is breathtaking sometimes.

salawat 4y ago
>It's very much like the "first speaker" issue with free speech "advocates"; somehow the first homeowner/speaker has greater rights than the newer homeowner/speaker. Got an example there? Not sure I'm following.
- Ensorceled 4y ago
  The "first speaker" has free speech, but if you use your free speech to criticize my speech, you're censoring me ("cancel culture") and depriving me of my free speech, so the "second speaker" does not have a right to free speech. Example: Dave Chappelle makes a joke about trans people, other people criticize Chappelle and vow to boycott Netflix. Those are BOTH free speech but a lot of people think Chappelle's free speech rights should take priority over his critics. To be clear, I believe Chappelle has the right to make trans jokes and I also believe he has brain worms about the issue and has become distinctly unfunny because of it.
  - salawat 4y ago
    Mmmmkay. I see where you're going. But I don't think > but if you use your free speech to criticize my speech, you're censoring me ("cancel culture") and depriving me of my free speech, so the "second speaker" does not have a right to free speech. entirely follows; in particular since the hallmark of "cancel culture tends to be communicating with other people to orchestrate action or dissociation of the one of the speakers from society. It seems much closer to something akin to the practice of industrial blacklisting/secondary striking in employment/labor reltions law. In that you're using speech to command/coordinate a group to force an action or change in circumstance on someone else. I'm not saying mind, that even those and similar activities don't have a place, but they are examples of "patterns of speech elevated to action", and thereby removed from the arena of "free speech", and firmly plopped in the "freedom of association"/situationally labelled and verboten bucket. The spirit of free speech is you are free to voice things without the threat of government force gagging you, or compelling you to say otherwise. Now... Where is the dividing line between the "Government" and "a sufficiently large group of people that there is warranted a stepping in and reminder that "if a government employee eould be specifically restricted from keeping you from saying this then mayhaps as a very large group of citizens it warrants the same consideration of restraint; as we've all got a vested interest in not windi g up on the wrong side of a snowball network effect"... That's an entirely different kettle of fish.

mantas 4y ago

For example - insolation. If somebody builds a massive apartment building in place of a detached house, its neighbors would get much more shade.

repsilat 4y ago

It's a coordination mechanism in the prisoners dilemma. Building is defecting, zoning is legislating cooperation. In this scenario you and folks who want more building are the justice system: you want defection, you want building. You say, "how is it moral for prisoners to constrain each other's actions?" but they voted for it freely because mutual cooperation is better than mutual defection, even if they personally would defect given the choice.

gumby 4y ago

> What gives you the right to decide what your neighbors do with their land? Seems like there's a spectrum (even if the dividing line is in the wrong place on that spectrum right now). Many suburbs prohibit owning roosters (they wake your neighbors at dawn) though female chickens are OK. I think it's OK if you can't open a slaughterhouse next door in an urban or other dense area. It's also reasonable to require that new construction be up to code, as your close-by building not to fire code could threaten my home. At the other extreme are restrictions on how you paint your house or operating a slaughterhouse in a low density agricultural area is none of your (distant) neighbors' business, assuming the roads are up to the new traffic. Increasing infill density doesn't seem bad to me, but even then, you need adequate utility and road capacity, and it's easy for NIMBYs in town to prevent that from being upgraded.