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i've always taken this to explain why americans are so obsessed by 'dont tred on me' freedom -- they have so little of it where its actually experienced: at the

i've always taken this to explain why americans are so obsessed by 'dont tred on me' freedom -- they have so little of it where its actually experienced: at the daily, local, level

yostrovs 3y ago
I've always taken comments like this to explain why [whoever you are] are so obsessed by 'dont tred on me' freedom -- they have so little of it where its actually experienced: at the daily, local, level
bravetraveler 3y ago
You'd be surprised, most of those types I know are from rural areas where there is far more of that liberty In a city I can't even leave a garbage bin in front of my garage. Rural, I could burn it in my front yard Big country is big, isn't homogeneous.
- hirundo 3y ago
  And it's self-reinforcing. I live in a rural county the size of Connecticut with just 5k people in it. The people that choose to live out here are frequently the ones who particularly value that extra freedom ... including law enforcement. It is almost routine here for the sheriff to announce that he will not enforce some state or federal code or another. Talk to a deputy about crime and he'll ask if you have guns, and then recommend that you buy one if you don't. The county government does little and our property taxes reflect that. I can and have burned very large piles in my yard, but we're not savages. I have to notify the local volunteer fire department first, or they're libel to show up, and not happily.
  - doubleg72 3y ago
    Odd, I live in a rural area as well. When I cross the state line into the new york state back country, I literally see garbage piles in some people's front yards. Like they don't wanna pay for garbage collection, so it piles up in their yard for months until they burn it all. The fire dept are all volunteers and don't just randomly show up to a fire unless someone calls it in. We burn wood in the yard for leisure or to get rid of brush, but im more of a get garbage to its place kind of guy.
    - hirundo 3y ago
      We have no garbage pickup in the county, we haul it to one of four collection areas. Those cost $140/year plus about $7/100lbs, so no doubt some more thrifty neighbors are burning household trash instead, but I just burn slash and take household trash to the dumpsters. There's a high fire risk in this area and smoke watchers will report it, and the VFD gets dispatched. They don't respond individually.
  - woodruffw 3y ago
    I don’t have a particular rural vs. urban point to make, only a general observation about law and freedom: a place where law enforcement feels empowered to ignore the law is a place where law enforcement is effectively the sole power. In effect, a dictator’s prescribed freedom.
    - hirundo 3y ago
      I agree. Rule of law is critical and requires consistency. But given the choice I'd rather live in a jurisdiction where law enforcement tends to use their discretion in favor of less rather than more centralized control. That bias towards less control seems to be inversely correlated with population density.
      - downut 3y ago
        We spent 25 years out in the rural West, though we preferred to live in a town. We left because over the last 15 years the decay of uniform public law enforcement has essentially led to "norms" being enforced by the local landowning elites. And they have certain characteristics that make them highly identifiable. IOW, if you look like them, you get all the space you have said you prefer. If not, well, there's not a lot to limit the potential downsides. This has also led to a large increase in trash behavior out on the public lands. Lots of new wildcat trails/double track for instance. For us it got pretty uncomfortable a few times in the last 5-6 years. We began to post the shotguns in a highly visible place in the camp, or in the truck. That definitely helped.
      - tstrimple 3y ago
        I guess that works just as long as according to their discretion that you're "one of the good ones". Folks who are in the out-groups have experienced the tyranny of this "discretion" for generations. Sundown towns didn't disappear as soon as the civil rights act was passed.
    - talent_deprived 3y ago
      > a place where law enforcement feels empowered to ignore the law is a place where law enforcement is effectively the sole power Like New York? The above commenter said law enforcement advised them to get guns which is what I've experienced growing up rural; tyrannical power mongers who are as you said, the sole power, try to take people's guns away.
  - reaperman 3y ago
    *liable to show up
- mjburgess 3y ago
  it feels to me Americans are more legislated: city laws, county, state, federal. That there are more neighbourly oppressions: your community has more rights against you (about what your lawn looks like, etc.). And so on. Americans also feel more taxed, again, at every level above. Ironically, I think the more centralised power is, the more uniformly its managed, the more free one feels under it -- since there arent as many competing interests to worry about
- GaryNumanVevo 3y ago
  Actually it's funny, my grandfather has been cited numerous times for burning brush on his property recently. Apparently it's always been a law on the books where he lives but the fire department never enforced it
bitshiftfaced 3y ago
> they have so little of it where its actually experienced: at the daily, local, level Quite a sweeping generalization considering we're talking about a headline of a single, unusual case.
lolinder 3y ago
This kind of thing makes the news because it's rare. Drawing conclusions about the amount of freedom experienced by everyday Americans from your news reports is like doing the same for airplane safety: you'll come to the conclusion that the aberrations are the norm. Where I'm at, the city doesn't even care if you put up a fence blocking sight triangles at an intersection, much less what you do with your property that they can't see.
- yieldcrv 3y ago
  It makes the news because of the state’s (or any public institution’s) obsession with undermining and reinterpreting our rights for their benefit The obsession with reminding us how flawed and comedic our checks and balances are, how little accountability there is. how “but at least you can talk about it” will be used to invalidate the issue by people indoctrinated by our compromisestitution
  - JumpCrisscross 3y ago
    > obsession with reminding us how flawed and comedic our checks and balances are Literally on an article documenting the state being checked. A corollary to those who choose security over freedom deserving neither is those who choose nihilism over truth and activism are choosing a weak form of mental security.

i've always taken this to explain why americans are so obsessed by 'dont tred on me' freedom -- they have so little of it where its actually experienced: at the daily, local, level

yostrovs 3y ago

I've always taken comments like this to explain why [whoever you are] are so obsessed by 'dont tred on me' freedom -- they have so little of it where its actually experienced: at the daily, local, level

bravetraveler 3y ago

You'd be surprised, most of those types I know are from rural areas where there is far more of that liberty In a city I can't even leave a garbage bin in front of my garage. Rural, I could burn it in my front yard Big country is big, isn't homogeneous.

hirundo 3y ago
And it's self-reinforcing. I live in a rural county the size of Connecticut with just 5k people in it. The people that choose to live out here are frequently the ones who particularly value that extra freedom ... including law enforcement. It is almost routine here for the sheriff to announce that he will not enforce some state or federal code or another. Talk to a deputy about crime and he'll ask if you have guns, and then recommend that you buy one if you don't. The county government does little and our property taxes reflect that. I can and have burned very large piles in my yard, but we're not savages. I have to notify the local volunteer fire department first, or they're libel to show up, and not happily.
- doubleg72 3y ago
  Odd, I live in a rural area as well. When I cross the state line into the new york state back country, I literally see garbage piles in some people's front yards. Like they don't wanna pay for garbage collection, so it piles up in their yard for months until they burn it all. The fire dept are all volunteers and don't just randomly show up to a fire unless someone calls it in. We burn wood in the yard for leisure or to get rid of brush, but im more of a get garbage to its place kind of guy.
  - hirundo 3y ago
    We have no garbage pickup in the county, we haul it to one of four collection areas. Those cost $140/year plus about $7/100lbs, so no doubt some more thrifty neighbors are burning household trash instead, but I just burn slash and take household trash to the dumpsters. There's a high fire risk in this area and smoke watchers will report it, and the VFD gets dispatched. They don't respond individually.
- woodruffw 3y ago
  I don’t have a particular rural vs. urban point to make, only a general observation about law and freedom: a place where law enforcement feels empowered to ignore the law is a place where law enforcement is effectively the sole power. In effect, a dictator’s prescribed freedom.
  - hirundo 3y ago
    I agree. Rule of law is critical and requires consistency. But given the choice I'd rather live in a jurisdiction where law enforcement tends to use their discretion in favor of less rather than more centralized control. That bias towards less control seems to be inversely correlated with population density.
    - downut 3y ago
      We spent 25 years out in the rural West, though we preferred to live in a town. We left because over the last 15 years the decay of uniform public law enforcement has essentially led to "norms" being enforced by the local landowning elites. And they have certain characteristics that make them highly identifiable. IOW, if you look like them, you get all the space you have said you prefer. If not, well, there's not a lot to limit the potential downsides. This has also led to a large increase in trash behavior out on the public lands. Lots of new wildcat trails/double track for instance. For us it got pretty uncomfortable a few times in the last 5-6 years. We began to post the shotguns in a highly visible place in the camp, or in the truck. That definitely helped.
    - tstrimple 3y ago
      I guess that works just as long as according to their discretion that you're "one of the good ones". Folks who are in the out-groups have experienced the tyranny of this "discretion" for generations. Sundown towns didn't disappear as soon as the civil rights act was passed.
  - talent_deprived 3y ago
    > a place where law enforcement feels empowered to ignore the law is a place where law enforcement is effectively the sole power Like New York? The above commenter said law enforcement advised them to get guns which is what I've experienced growing up rural; tyrannical power mongers who are as you said, the sole power, try to take people's guns away.
- reaperman 3y ago
  *liable to show up
mjburgess 3y ago
it feels to me Americans are more legislated: city laws, county, state, federal. That there are more neighbourly oppressions: your community has more rights against you (about what your lawn looks like, etc.). And so on. Americans also feel more taxed, again, at every level above. Ironically, I think the more centralised power is, the more uniformly its managed, the more free one feels under it -- since there arent as many competing interests to worry about
GaryNumanVevo 3y ago
Actually it's funny, my grandfather has been cited numerous times for burning brush on his property recently. Apparently it's always been a law on the books where he lives but the fire department never enforced it

bitshiftfaced 3y ago

> they have so little of it where its actually experienced: at the daily, local, level Quite a sweeping generalization considering we're talking about a headline of a single, unusual case.

lolinder 3y ago

This kind of thing makes the news because it's rare. Drawing conclusions about the amount of freedom experienced by everyday Americans from your news reports is like doing the same for airplane safety: you'll come to the conclusion that the aberrations are the norm. Where I'm at, the city doesn't even care if you put up a fence blocking sight triangles at an intersection, much less what you do with your property that they can't see.

yieldcrv 3y ago
It makes the news because of the state’s (or any public institution’s) obsession with undermining and reinterpreting our rights for their benefit The obsession with reminding us how flawed and comedic our checks and balances are, how little accountability there is. how “but at least you can talk about it” will be used to invalidate the issue by people indoctrinated by our compromisestitution
- JumpCrisscross 3y ago
  > obsession with reminding us how flawed and comedic our checks and balances are Literally on an article documenting the state being checked. A corollary to those who choose security over freedom deserving neither is those who choose nihilism over truth and activism are choosing a weak form of mental security.