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It’s also simply untrue. Even in such small, tight knit communities people have privacy and secrets.

NoMoreNicksLeft 2y ago
First, they're never "tight knit". That's probably impossible with anything over Dunbar's number. Second, with absolute certainty, the vast majority of those people hate the vast majority. There, the social and political life of those people id structured so that maybe about 3-5% of them can be important and have high status, and they're all willing and capable of murder to take that high status away from those who already have it. Finally, they really do know everyone's secrets, including who murdered who to achieve the high status. If you lived in such a town as a child, you might not have picked up on any of this, because there's this thin veneer of civility. It's not so much a community, as it is a collection of people who, by accident of birth and geography, happen to live within distances of each other where municipal incorporation was inevitable. Whether this meets your personal definition of community or not is a matter of opinion, but it probably correlates really well with whether you are cynical or hopeful.
- germinalphrase 2y ago
  Perhaps my experience in such a place has been more fortunate than yours, but I don’t recognize the majority of what you’ve written as accurate.
- mateus1 2y ago
  This is an insane and sad view of community life. Even with inequalities and ruling elites people are still able to find joy and share a sense of community.
  - NoMoreNicksLeft 2y ago
    No, they're unable to do those things with any population larger than Dunbar's number. Occasionally they put on a show that things are different, for people who will be gone in a few hours, if it would be embarrassing for people to see what it's really like. You do know about Dunbar's number, right? It's why you didn't fall asleep last night sobbing in grief at the 10 gorillion people who died horrible deaths last week. You're incapable of caring about anyone except for a very small number of people (probably fewer than 250), but it seems slightly shameful if you publicly acknowledge that you don't care about anyone (except that small number I cited) so you ignore it or lie about it. There is nothing insane about my view, though I suppose it might be sad. Humanity doesn't scale, now we can't be termite-people like the hivemind had its heart set on. Tragic.
    - k4rli 2y ago
      I might not care for the people but I can care for the community. You are maybe too used to American ghettos.
      - NoMoreNicksLeft 2y ago
        That's an even weirder concept. You don't care for humans, but you care for the gigantic monstrosities that they sometimes collectively create, the ones that cause misery, sorry, and kafkaesque dystopias? I have morals which prohibit me from deliberately or recklessly cause human individuals harm. But I have no such morals towards communities... if it were possible to murder communities without harming the humans that were part of those, I might just do it for the fun of it.
williamcotton 2y ago
Yes, in their houses, and never out in public. The tension here is the expectation of privacy for signals broadcast outside of one’s property and into the commons. We don’t yet have a firm grasp on how to handle the issue of extending privacy into these shared spaces. There just seems to be two unreconcilable polar extremes at the current moment without a clear path forward. You know already which way these forums lean and in an environment with populist karma and up and down votes there’s not much room for compromise.

First, they're never "tight knit". That's probably impossible with anything over Dunbar's number. Second, with absolute certainty, the vast majority of those people hate the vast majority. There, the social and political life of those people id structured so that maybe about 3-5% of them can be important and have high status, and they're all willing and capable of murder to take that high status away from those who already have it. Finally, they really do know everyone's secrets, including who murdered who to achieve the high status. If you lived in such a town as a child, you might not have picked up on any of this, because there's this thin veneer of civility. It's not so much a community, as it is a collection of people who, by accident of birth and geography, happen to live within distances of each other where municipal incorporation was inevitable. Whether this meets your personal definition of community or not is a matter of opinion, but it probably correlates really well with whether you are cynical or hopeful.

germinalphrase 2y ago
Perhaps my experience in such a place has been more fortunate than yours, but I don’t recognize the majority of what you’ve written as accurate.
mateus1 2y ago
This is an insane and sad view of community life. Even with inequalities and ruling elites people are still able to find joy and share a sense of community.
- NoMoreNicksLeft 2y ago
  No, they're unable to do those things with any population larger than Dunbar's number. Occasionally they put on a show that things are different, for people who will be gone in a few hours, if it would be embarrassing for people to see what it's really like. You do know about Dunbar's number, right? It's why you didn't fall asleep last night sobbing in grief at the 10 gorillion people who died horrible deaths last week. You're incapable of caring about anyone except for a very small number of people (probably fewer than 250), but it seems slightly shameful if you publicly acknowledge that you don't care about anyone (except that small number I cited) so you ignore it or lie about it. There is nothing insane about my view, though I suppose it might be sad. Humanity doesn't scale, now we can't be termite-people like the hivemind had its heart set on. Tragic.
  - k4rli 2y ago
    I might not care for the people but I can care for the community. You are maybe too used to American ghettos.
    - NoMoreNicksLeft 2y ago
      That's an even weirder concept. You don't care for humans, but you care for the gigantic monstrosities that they sometimes collectively create, the ones that cause misery, sorry, and kafkaesque dystopias? I have morals which prohibit me from deliberately or recklessly cause human individuals harm. But I have no such morals towards communities... if it were possible to murder communities without harming the humans that were part of those, I might just do it for the fun of it.

williamcotton 2y ago

Yes, in their houses, and never out in public. The tension here is the expectation of privacy for signals broadcast outside of one’s property and into the commons. We don’t yet have a firm grasp on how to handle the issue of extending privacy into these shared spaces. There just seems to be two unreconcilable polar extremes at the current moment without a clear path forward. You know already which way these forums lean and in an environment with populist karma and up and down votes there’s not much room for compromise.