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Source: (consider it) Thread: Thank God I'm a country boy!
LeRoc

Famous Dutch pirate
# 3216

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I wonder if there is mileage in a thread about urban vs. rural attitudes, positions, mentalities ...

The well-known Dutch writer Geert Mak once said "The great cultural divide in our world isn't between the West and Islam, it isn't between the North and the South, it's between rural and urban mentalities." I believe he has a point here.

Sure there are differences, but in their everyday lives I believe that people from São Paulo, Johannesburg, Moscow or Sidney have more in common than what divides them. And on the other hand, I've worked with farmers in places like Haiti, Brazil, Mozambique, Palestine and Thailand, and I've always been surprised at how well their stories seem to connect with eachother.

I'm from a rural background myself. Of course this is very relative in a densely populated country like the Netherlands, but even there I feel a difference between the folks from my region and those from Amsterdam, those arrogant, talkative, unstrustworthy bastards. (Sorry, let myself go there [Smile] )

Politically, the way this works out is that rural people are generally more conservative and urban people more progressive. I've been told that this is because a farmer always wants the security of his next harvest, I don't know if this explanation holds. But the current political situation in the US for example seems to play out sharply along urban / rural lines. (Sometimes I think: what if Democrats managed to reach out more to rural people? Surely they have something in common. Rural schools or hospitals for example.)

So, how urban / rural are you? How do you feel about the importance of these differences? Does my explanation about the political outworking of this hold water? What can be done to bring these groups closer together? (Or maybe shouldn't that happen?) I'd like to hear your opinions.

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I know why God made the rhinoceros, it's because He couldn't see the rhinoceros, so He made the rhinoceros to be able to see it. (Clarice Lispector)

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Palimpsest
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# 16772

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I'm a city boy. It's how I grew up and I like it. I'm also gay, which until recently meant it might not be pleasant in a small town with conservative religious people running the place.

In the United States, modern agriculture is hollowing out rural communities. It takes fewer and fewer people to manage mechanized agriculture. This may be temporarily offset when there's an oil boom, but in general rural areas far from the urban sprawl are depopulating.

In the past there have been coalitions between urban working Democrats and Farmers, typically in the face of a common foe, the bankers of Wall Street. This is best seen in the fact that food stamps for the poor and agricultural subsidies tend to be in the same bill. These coalitions often happen when a financial depression means that both groups are suffering enough to forget differences.

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cliffdweller
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quote:
Originally posted by Palimpsest:


In the United States, modern agriculture is hollowing out rural communities. It takes fewer and fewer people to manage mechanized agriculture. This may be temporarily offset when there's an oil boom, but in general rural areas far from the urban sprawl are depopulating.

In the past there have been coalitions between urban working Democrats and Farmers, typically in the face of a common foe, the bankers of Wall Street. This is best seen in the fact that food stamps for the poor and agricultural subsidies tend to be in the same bill.

Which is breaking down for exactly the reason you cite-- that today, agricultural subsidies are no longer helping small, struggling rural farmers (in fact, they often hurt them) but rather are enriching large corporate factory farms.

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Pomona
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It can be very difficult to live in rural areas if you're outside the norm in those areas, eg if one is an immigrant in a monocultural small town or village. Minorities of all kinds usually find cities easier to survive in.

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Consider the work of God: Who is able to straighten what he has bent? [Ecclesiastes 7:13]

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deano
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In the Uk, well England, it is a little more homogenous in that you get people living in the country but work in towns and cities. In the Scottish highlands and parts of Wales that may be different.

Of course urban born and bred types are probably less likely to work in the country, but t'other way round is common I think.

I really don't know about the questions asked in the OP though. I prefer the country, but within twenty minutes drive of town! Perhaps that explains why I'm on the left of the Conservative Party!

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"The moral high ground is slowly being bombed to oblivion. " - Supermatelot

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LeRoc

Famous Dutch pirate
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Thanks for your answers. Yes, looking from I do think that some of the policies from the more conservative party in the US can hurt rural communities. And I guess a sense of traditionalism with a dose of religion mixed in mean that these people still vote for these politicians. I'm not sure if how sustainable this is in the long run.

quote:
Jade Constable: It can be very difficult to live in rural areas if you're outside the norm in those areas, eg if one is an immigrant in a monocultural small town or village. Minorities of all kinds usually find cities easier to survive in.
Yes, I can imagine that. I guess it also creates a self-strenghening mechanism. The 'outsiders' who usually also think more liberally leave, and the more conservative ones stay, making the conservative / progressive divide among rural / urban lines even bigger.

Politically I'm rather left-wing and thus much closer than urban than rural people in general terms. But the thing is, I like rural people! I feel very much at home amongst them, I like talking with them, I like their culture, their parties ... A strange thing is that. (It might have been different if I were gay though.)

quote:
deano: I prefer the country, but within twenty minutes drive of town!
If I'd ever settle down, that would be my choice too.

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I know why God made the rhinoceros, it's because He couldn't see the rhinoceros, so He made the rhinoceros to be able to see it. (Clarice Lispector)

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Arabella Purity Winterbottom

Trumpeting hope
# 3434

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I grew up in the market town of a rural area. Most of my extended family in the area are farmers, market gardeners, or tradespeople. Very few have any sort of higher education.

They are, almost without exception, loving, hardworking and tolerant people, pillars of their churches, and not much for fussing around matters of personal choice. I have already told the story of my elderly aunts having a go at the church on my behalf.

They are generally conservative voters, but interestingly, the electorate they're in had a strong swing to the left at last week's election (possibly a split vote, but hey). In the more rural electorate, they have one of the most left leaning right wing politicians I have ever met!

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Stetson
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quote:
So, how urban / rural are you? How do you feel about the importance of these differences?
I was born and raised in Edmonton, a medium-sized city(about a million, if you count the suburbs), the capital of a province considered to have a strong rural influence, exerting a conservative political effect. Since the 1980s, however, Edmonton has had an on-again off-again habit of electing left-wingers to city hall and the provincial legislature, possibly reflecting its status as a government, university, and union town.

With the exception of my family, it seemed like almost everyone in our neighbourhood came originally from rural areas, mostly in Canada but a small handful from overseas. I rarely visited the countryside, but always thought I had some idea as to the culture there, as a result of living among transplants.

In my 30s, I moved to the fifth largest city in Korea, also the (now former) capital of a largely agricultural region. However, this particular agricultural region is considered to be very left-wing, and my city was the site of a famous and tragic uprising against the military dictatorship in 1980.

A few years back I moved to a smaller city in the same region, expecting to find it even more monocultural and left-wing than the previous place. Actually, though, I meet more people in this city from elsewhere in Korea, since it's a bit of an iddustrial hub and thus attracts workers to its factories, shipyards, etc. As many of these workers come from the more conservative provinces, I have had to accustom myself to hearing right-wing opinions from Koreans.

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Stetson
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quote:
Does my explanation about the political outworking of this hold water?
Well, in Canada, there is a whole tradition of agrarian socialism, reaching its apex in the old CCF parties and, for a while, the NDP. Even my home province, the notoriously conservative Alberta, was governed in the 1920s and 30s by the United Farmers, an economically populist outfit with a crazy-quilt ideology that had some overtones of socialism.

These days, I think Canada has fallen more in line with the pattern you reference, ie. rural areas being conservaitve. Saskatchewan, the crade of agrarian socialism in Canada, sent 13 Conservatives, one Liberal, and zero socialists to the federal parliament last election.

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I have the power...Lucifer is lord!

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Stetson
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quote:
Originally posted by Arabella Purity Winterbottom:
I grew up in the market town of a rural area. Most of my extended family in the area are farmers, market gardeners, or tradespeople. Very few have any sort of higher education.

They are, almost without exception, loving, hardworking and tolerant people, pillars of their churches, and not much for fussing around matters of personal choice. I have already told the story of my elderly aunts having a go at the church on my behalf.

They are generally conservative voters, but interestingly, the electorate they're in had a strong swing to the left at last week's election (possibly a split vote, but hey). In the more rural electorate, they have one of the most left leaning right wing politicians I have ever met!

Interestingly, my home province and New Zealand are among the very few places in the world where orthodox Social Credit had any impact as an electoral force. I'm not sure if they were rural or urban based in NZ. In Alberta, definitely rural in origin flavour, but pretty popular across the board.

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I have the power...Lucifer is lord!

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LeRoc

Famous Dutch pirate
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quote:
Stetson: Well, in Canada, there is a whole tradition of agrarian socialism, reaching its apex in the old CCF parties and, for a while, the NDP. Even my home province, the notoriously conservative Alberta, was governed in the 1920s and 30s by the United Farmers, an economically populist outfit with a crazy-quilt ideology that had some overtones of socialism.
That's interesting, I'd like to learn more about that.

The North-Eastern part of the Netherlands (the region where I was born) has an interesting history of agrarian socialism / communism. Around 1917 they even proclaimed the Soviet Republic of the Ems (a local river), waiting for the Russians to arrive. Mostly it was the poor farm workers who were into this though, not the rich landowners. However, there were some exceptions; Sicco Mansholt came from a family of rich socialist farmers.

I'd love to know more about the Canadian agrarian socialists. It's a topic that interests me. Were they farm workers, or large-scale farmers, or ...?

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I know why God made the rhinoceros, it's because He couldn't see the rhinoceros, so He made the rhinoceros to be able to see it. (Clarice Lispector)

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Sober Preacher's Kid

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# 12699

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They were family farmers, you would call them large scale and they would hire farm hands when necessary, but if you were family, it was your job to tend to the family farm.

You have to go back to 1917. The Conservative Government of Sir Robert Borden implemented Conscription and pressed farmers to grow every bit of crop they could "for the War Effort"; crop rotation be damned, which every farmer can tell you is madness. Borden had promised not to conscript farmers sons and reneged on that promise.

Borden wouldn't listen to farmers, and as a result they formed a third party, the United Farmers, known as the Progressives federally. However that party was unstable and petered out in the early 1930's. Parts of it formed the "Ginger Group", the core of what became the CCF.

There really wasn't urban in Saskatchewan at that time, nor in most of the Prairies except perhaps Winnipeg, and even that town was strongly left-wing. Also, at that time the Prairie Provinces were treated as colonies by the Federal Government/Canada's Elite.

By design, the quarter-section lots which could be homesteaded for low cost were not enough to really set up a viable farm, and the neighbouring lots were "Railway Lots" which had to be purchased from the railways at high prices. Thus most farmers were deeply indebted to banks and mortgage companies (based in the East, naturally). The railways and the lenders were the feudal lords of the West, they controlled all transportation, the all-important rail freight rates for grain, and the land. And all of it was federally regulated by Eastern interests, not provincially regulated.

Widespread crop failure, drought and price slumps in the 1930's led to financial, personal and agricultural disaster on the Prairies. the Government of Saskatchewan went broke in 1935 and had to rely on Federal assistance to stay afloat.

The CCF was organized in Regina in 1933. The original manifesto is here: Regina Manifesto.

Note the points about tariff reduction for agricultural exports, co-operative institutions and anti-Big Finance planks. In power the CCF implemented a moderate number of "Crown Corporations" or State Enterprises, but nothing ever approaching the level of "Central Planning", though it did included a number of social programmes, especially Canada's cherished public health insurance system.

The CCF was in power from 1944 - 1964.

Even today most electoral races in Saskatchewan are Conservative/NDP.

The modern NDP began as a "Farmer-Labour-Socialist" coalition in 1960 and that is still the basis of the party today; the NDP wins many seats in northern and remote areas where there isn't much industry or where the industry is so concentrated in one-industry towns that a strong "us/them" attitude develops.

And if you ask people like me, one of the key problems with the Ontario NDP is that it is too Toronto-focused and doesn't pay enough attention to rural areas of Southern Ontario, so its platform doesn't sell as well as it could.

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AmyBo
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We've still got the DFL 'round here, another Minnesota oddity. Our Democrats are historically Farmer-Labor. From my own perspective it makes sense - a lot of the first wave of farmers here were Scandanvian and tended to be more progressive. Now we have a big city-countey divide, though, and it seems to be the biggest city becoming more myopic and the conservatives all running to exurbia - hence a state that sends both Michelle Bachman and Keith Ellison to the House.
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no prophet's flag is set so...

Proceed to see sea
# 15560

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The farms in western Canada export their kids to the city. The city people, former farmers or descended from them, consider the farm to have been Eden. A place to return to, a place of pleasure and good old days, of tradition, whether of values or cooking with bacon fat. Of course, when in the farm-Eden, they couldn't wait to get the hell out, because it was hell: weather, bugs, floods, drought, dust bowl, can't pay the bills, club root on canola, or smut on the corn. A curious paradox.

With the alliance of the left in Canada to labour, to the unions, in the cities where most of people now live, things have greatly changed. Farmers are small to medium self employed agribusinesses now. Thus the low corporate tax rates, the averaging of income over years and other things have transformed them into conservatives about economics.

However, the conservatism about economics also means distrust of out-of-province corporations, which provides what could be seen as a socialist twist, except it isn't. Hence the largest corporate presence in most the Canadian prairies being the co-op, which means gas station, grocery stores, pharmacy, hardware. Owned by the people who own shares. Banking is done by credit unions, also share holder owned. This also accounts for the government owned Crown corporations which provide variously electric, natural gas, telephone, cable television, internet, cellular telephone, landline telephone, automobile insurance, house insurance. -- I don't think some of this fits with conceptions of conservatism and socialism in other places. But why would I buy anything from some out of province company which keeps it's profits out of province? Keep the ownership local. It is also found that nonlocal companies can't or won't provide rural services.

So in answer to the OP, conservatism may look rather progressive and lefty if you ignore the history. SPK mentioned the Regina Manifesto above, which looks rather communist if you read it. Yet, the social welfare, public (government) ownership of industry and keeping the rich out of province people under control are considered conservative. And what would be considered progressive is to let the large corporations headquartered elsewhere to come in.

[ 25. September 2014, 04:02: Message edited by: no prophet ]

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Palimpsest
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Another thing that is changing the divide is that a large number of city people are moving to the red states, in a blue state diaspora This is increasing the population of these states, but it's also turning them more liberal. It's already happened in New Hampshire, where immigrants from Massachusetts turned a very conservative state into a more liberal one. Colorado and Arizona are both in the process of changing and even Texas is looking less a Republican certainty.
People are getting priced out of the big cities in New York and California. Some of this is urban to urban migration, but some of it is moving to smaller towns.

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Heavenly Anarchist
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I was brought up in an urban environment, a very rough council estate in Luton known in the1980s for its race riots and now for its drugs problem. I spent my 20s living in London, Bethnal Green so fairly central and spent most of my weekends in the West End. I loved my time in London, it was great fun and confidence building, but I decided to leave it when I got married as the busy-ness of a city made it difficult to manage my bipolar disorder.
We spent a year in a very small Cambridgeshire village where everyone knew each other which I really liked, though amenities were an issue with no car then (I got very fit with the 3 mile walk into Cambridge though!). We now live in what was once a village but is rapidly being swallowed up by Cambridge, until recently my house looked out upon open fields but now there are houses appearing.
We will be moving further out to a small local town in the next few years, a village would be nice but very expensive here. I do prefer smaller places now, a small market town in Suffolk would be my ideal. I like the slowness of life and friendliness of a small community. We have quite an eccentric lifestyle, in our dream world we'd have a smallholding with some barns to make and sell crafts from, but I've never had problems fitting in in the city or village, it would be the urban estate of my youth that would probably take most exception to my alternative dress and outlook, conformity being a big issue in such a society, ime.

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Marvin the Martian

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quote:
Originally posted by no prophet:
The city people, former farmers or descended from them, consider the farm to have been Eden. A place to return to, a place of pleasure and good old days, of tradition, whether of values or cooking with bacon fat. Of course, when in the farm-Eden, they couldn't wait to get the hell out, because it was hell: weather, bugs, floods, drought, dust bowl, can't pay the bills, club root on canola, or smut on the corn. A curious paradox.

I'm not sure it's as curious as all that. People value the traditional way of village/farm life, where traditions are respected, values change seldom, and there aren't too many people running round getting in the way of each other. But the jobs and the money are in the cities, where change is constant and overpopulation is rife.

I would love to live in a small village where some small vestige of the good old days is maintained and traditions are respected. But I also want a job, and the facilities (shopping, recreation, etc.) that come with being in a city. I guess the ideal would be a city where some small vestige of the good old days is maintained and traditions are respected, but that would be impossible because of all the outsiders that would keep moving in and forcing things to change and get more crowded. So it goes...

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quetzalcoatl
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I live in Norfolk part of the time, and there is something that we value there, that we don't get in London: big open fields, village shop, huge skeins of wild geese in winter, hares in the fields, a sense of quiet, few cars, huge garden, owls hooting.

Of course, it's not all bliss, we also live next to a farm with huge piles of turkey shit, and a corn dryer, which works all night, also rats and mice.

But I've tried it as a permanent thing, and I start getting antsy, and miss London.

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betjemaniac
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I'm determinedly rural, and can't cope with cities (London is my idea of a nightmare).

However to make life work I drive 25,000 miles a year commuting daily to work nearly 40 miles away, and have done for around 5 years now.

But, when I'm not in the office, I'm in the fields, following the local hounds, getting involved in the harvest, and where a ploughing match is a social function to look forward to. I will have my own farm by 2020 - that's the plan anyway.

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And is it true? For if it is....

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que sais-je
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quote:
Originally posted by Stetson:
... in Canada, there is a whole tradition of agrarian socialism

[tangent]
My home county of Norfolk is (and was) one of the most rural parts of England and remains proud of its radical heritage (including municipal socialism). A blog entry found on Google summarises some of our heroes. Kett, hanged at Norwich Castle, is now commemorated there as a "courageous leader in the long struggle of the common people".

Thinking about East Anglia's heroes suggests its radicalism is more about opposition to change imposed externally than social justice per se. After all 'radical' is etymologically about 'roots'. Our local heroes are Boudicca, Hereward the Wake, Kett, Tom Paine, Elizabeth Fry, Edith Cavell all remembered for bucking authority. Even Nelson, a local lad, is partly admired for his famous insubordination. The motto of Norfolk is "do different".

Yeah, yeah, I know, NFN - Normal for Norfolk. I felt a sudden pang of nostalgia.
[/tangent]

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"controversies, disputes, and argumentations, both in philosophy and in divinity, if they meet with discreet and peaceable natures, do not infringe the laws of charity" (Thomas Browne)

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Matt Black

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What about us suburbanites? I love the countryside, but couldn't live in the middle of nowhere, nor could I live in a big city, but I like to be able to access both easily (demanding? Moi?). I would therefore tend to favour policies which deliver viable infrastructure to sustain my sort of community and provide that access.

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Pomona
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See, I'm the opposite. Could either do absolute isolation (on a Scottish island or something) or a big city, but suburbia is hellish to me. Unfortunately it's where I currently live (it's a former military barracks converted into a very small town, which is an odd-feeling bit of suburbia in the middle of a rural area). I think it might be related to my social anxiety - it's easy to be anonymous in a big city, which I appreciate. The kind of place where everyone knows each other (whether a town or a village) would be really stressful to me.

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Consider the work of God: Who is able to straighten what he has bent? [Ecclesiastes 7:13]

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que sais-je
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quote:
Originally posted by Jade Constable:
The kind of place where everyone knows each other (whether a town or a village) would be really stressful to me.

Hell is other people!

I live in a bit of town which seems to have been forgotten. People talk about 'going into Bristol' when it's under a mile to the big shopping area. My wife talks of going to 'the village shops', a lot of people say "Hello!" - or often "As-salamu alaykum!".

It seems a good compromise.

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"controversies, disputes, and argumentations, both in philosophy and in divinity, if they meet with discreet and peaceable natures, do not infringe the laws of charity" (Thomas Browne)

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Gwai
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In my world, suburbia is white, middle-class, straight-acting, and utterly terrifying. I would rather live anywhere in the U.S. you can think of before I lived in a suburb. I'm white, middle-class, and married to a man, but such places are alien and feel soul-killing.

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A master of men was the Goodly Fere,
A mate of the wind and sea.
If they think they ha’ slain our Goodly Fere
They are fools eternally.


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Matt Black

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See, I like it! My kids go to a Catholic school which means they get to meet kids from many ethnic backgrounds (and we their parents). It is largely hideously bourgeois but that's OK because we are too (if anything, most of our friends are better off than us). We have easy access to open countryside, the market town of Fareham, 'Olde Worlde' villages like Titchfield and Wickham, plus the cities of Portsmouth and Southampton and, last but not least, the sea; best of all worlds!

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"Protestant and Reformed, according to the Tradition of the ancient Catholic Church" - + John Cosin (1594-1672)

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quetzalcoatl
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Yes, I forgot the sea. In summer we drive up to Titchwell, go bird-watching, and lie on the beach. You can't do that in London!

But in Titchwell, I can't go to the Tate gallery, or a million other places that I like in London.

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Gwai
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We're lucky enough to have a lake bigger than some seas a few blocks away--and that's wonderful--but I admit I do miss nature. I would say though that most people who live in the suburbs don't actually go hiking/camping/whatnot to get into nature any more than most people in the city actually go to museums/plays/whatnot to experience culture.

[ 25. September 2014, 13:48: Message edited by: Gwai ]

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A master of men was the Goodly Fere,
A mate of the wind and sea.
If they think they ha’ slain our Goodly Fere
They are fools eternally.


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LeRoc

Famous Dutch pirate
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(Blatant attempt to steer the thread in more Purgatorial waters again. I don't know how much of I say I have in this, but as the OP'er I wasn't really looking for "I like the countryside better!" "No, I prefer the 'burbs!" [Biased] )

quote:
Sober Preacher's Kid: You have to go back to 1917. The Conservative Government of Sir Robert Borden implemented Conscription and pressed farmers to grow every bit of crop they could "for the War Effort"; crop rotation be damned, which every farmer can tell you is madness. Borden had promised not to conscript farmers sons and reneged on that promise.
That's interesting, thank you. What I've learned in basic sociology class is that farmers are naturally conservative because they perceive progressiveness as risk-taking. They always need the security of their next harvest, so they prefer to keep things the way they are. More generally, their connection to the land they inherited from their forefathers makes them more traditional than city-folk who might live in a rented house. This is reinforced because the more progressive-minded people feel the rural area as a limitation (or in the case of some minorities, a threat) and leave, while the more conservative people stay behind.

But as your example shows, all of this can change when a conservative government messes too much with farmers. Interesting.

quote:
AmyBo: Now we have a big city-countey divide, though, and it seems to be the biggest city becoming more myopic
I feel that this sense of myopy about the country-side is real. I can sense it in the Netherlands too. And speaking as a leftie, I admit that the left is often guilty of it. I'd like to be able to find ways to change that.

(Which of course would lead to the suburbs people saying: "What about us?" [Biased] )

quote:
Palimpsest: Another thing that is changing the divide is that a large number of city people are moving to the red states, in a blue state diaspora
I think in the US there are two effects that might contribute to states becoming bluer: the exodus of liberal city folk, and the influx of immigrants (mostly Hispanics). I'm not sure if they always run in parallel. Nate Silver seems to say that the first effect is small.

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I know why God made the rhinoceros, it's because He couldn't see the rhinoceros, so He made the rhinoceros to be able to see it. (Clarice Lispector)

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Piglet
Islander
# 11803

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I'm what I'd describe as "small-town urban". I grew up in Kirkwall* (population about 6,000) in the Orkney islands, which was urban enough to have most of the amenities one needed (except good clothes shops, for which one had to go "south" to Aberdeen, Edinburgh or wherever), but rural enough to feel safe walking home alone at midnight.

There was a cinema, a swimming-pool, a small theatre and lots of clubs, societies and festivals (the St. Magnus Festival in particular brought a huge amount in the way of cultural experiences), and I can't say I ever felt deprived.

Since then I've lived in Belfast and now St. John's, Newfoundland, and I'm happy to be a small-city girl - we live close enough to w*rk that commuting isn't a pain, and if we want some countryside, less than half an hour's drive will take us there.

As my Ship title implies, I'm an islander and happy to be one, with the caveat that I like to get off the island at least every 18 months or so, to avoid feeling a bit stir-crazy.

* a City and Royal Burgh, just not a very big one. [Smile]

eta: Sorry, LeRoc - I cross-posted, and having read your post above I realise I've fallen right into the "what I like about one or the other" trap. [Hot and Hormonal]

[ 25. September 2014, 14:05: Message edited by: piglet ]

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I may not be on an island any more, but I'm still an islander.
alto n a soprano who can read music

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LeRoc

Famous Dutch pirate
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quote:
piglet: eta: Sorry, LeRoc - I cross-posted, and having read your post above I realise I've fallen right into the "what I like about one or the other" trap. [Hot and Hormonal]
No problem, I guess it's bound to happen with a thread like this.

What I'm looking for is: do you feel that being from a rural background has shaped your way of thinking? (I guess being from an island has an even stronger effect.) Is there an explanation for this? Is the divide between urban vs. rural mentalities a good or a bad thing? It obviously has an effect on politics, but are there other effects too? Can we do something to overcome it? Should we?

Or at least something like that ...

[ 25. September 2014, 14:11: Message edited by: LeRoc ]

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I know why God made the rhinoceros, it's because He couldn't see the rhinoceros, so He made the rhinoceros to be able to see it. (Clarice Lispector)

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Gwai
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I too was feeling I'd spent WaY too much time posting about what I like about where I live. I think for me it's about having spent too much time very unhappy in the country and very reminded of how easy it can be for a town to curl up and ignore everyone who is different. I'm sure cities do have similar social faults (different from the risks of living in a city) though I'm not sure what they are, but the faults of a city are too close to me to be so obvious.

What tendencies to cities have that are frustrating? I gather it's partially that cities tend to have the money, and ignore the smaller towns?

[ 25. September 2014, 14:21: Message edited by: Gwai ]

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A master of men was the Goodly Fere,
A mate of the wind and sea.
If they think they ha’ slain our Goodly Fere
They are fools eternally.


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Piglet
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quote:
Originally posted by LeRoc:
... I guess being from an island has an even stronger effect ...

Absolutely. Orkney is what I'd call "small-c conservative" - they've been voting Liberal for God knows how long, but I suspect it's at least in part to preserve the status quo. Also, in a place as small as that, everyone knows everyone else, so people tend to vote for the person rather than the party.

The Scottish Nationalists never made any headway there*, partly because the candidates they fielded tended to be complete chumps, but mostly because to an islander "Central Government" is of necessity going to be remote, and unlikely to understand the needs of island communities. To an Orcadian, it matters little whether that central government is based in Edinburgh, London or Timbuktu.

* In the referendum, Orkney was the joint highest "no" vote, at 67%.

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I may not be on an island any more, but I'm still an islander.
alto n a soprano who can read music

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Karl: Liberal Backslider
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quote:
Originally posted by Gwai:
I too was feeling I'd spent WaY too much time posting about what I like about where I live. I think for me it's about having spent too much time very unhappy in the country and very reminded of how easy it can be for a town to curl up and ignore everyone who is different. I'm sure cities do have similar social faults (different from the risks of living in a city) though I'm not sure what they are, but the faults of a city are too close to me to be so obvious.

What tendencies to cities have that are frustrating? I gather it's partially that cities tend to have the money, and ignore the smaller towns?

Partially that, but as I grew up with fields at the back of the garden I've always felt being in an environment where instead there's just more and more streets behind me and it's miles to the real world (yes, to me the natural world is real, the city artificial) to be claustrophobic. The other problems I have with cities is that they always seem to be noisy and grubby. Good honest cowshit I can cope with; litter, city grime and graffiti get me down.

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LeRoc

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quote:
Gwai: What tendencies to cities have that are frustrating? I gather it's partially that cities tend to have the money, and ignore the smaller towns?
I guess one thing rural people dislike about cities are the traffic, the noise, the distance from nature ... But as some people on this thread already admitted, they like the easy access to facilities.

Looking more towards mentalities, the ignorance (or myopy) of cities towards small towns definitely seems to be a part of it.

There are other things that are strikingly similar to me in all parts of the world:
  • Rural people perceive urban people as overly talkative. I feel that there is definitely some truth to this, that in general rural people talk less and urban people talk more.
  • Rural people are more 'closed': they won't tell you anything about themselves or open up to you until you really know them.
  • Rural people see urban people as arrogant.
  • Rural people tend to romantize their own honesty and see city folk as dishonest.
  • Rural people see themselves as more hospitable than urban people.
I guess a lot of this has to do with the fact that if you live in city, closely surrounded by many people, you have to assert yourself more.

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I know why God made the rhinoceros, it's because He couldn't see the rhinoceros, so He made the rhinoceros to be able to see it. (Clarice Lispector)

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Marvin the Martian

Interplanetary
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quote:
Originally posted by Gwai:
What tendencies to cities have that are frustrating?

For me, it's how impersonal they are. The sheer number of people reduces everyone to the status of "face in a crowd", or at best "member of a specific demographic".

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Matt Black

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You don't get that so much in the 'Burbs, IME, but in part I think that's because, having lived, worshipped and worked in the same area for over twenty years, you do get to know a lot of people through the often-interlocking fields of home, church and work. That of course has the downside of fostering a form of parochialism, which I have noticed a lot around here eg: Titchfield definitely isn't Fareham, which isn't Gosport, and neither Fareham nor Gosport are Portsmouth or Southampton*, the latter two having their fiercely rival football teams, etc; plus I know many people here who have lived all their lives in Fareham.

And, yes, I know the plural of 'anecdote' isn't 'data' [Biased]

*As an example, I asked one of the first criminal clients I represented here in Fareham whether she was local, and she replied, "Oh no, I'm from Portchester." Portchester is less than three miles away which shows that, even in quite built-up areas, people can still, as The League of Gentlemen would put it, 'live locally'.

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"Protestant and Reformed, according to the Tradition of the ancient Catholic Church" - + John Cosin (1594-1672)

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Piglet
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quote:
Originally posted by LeRoc:
... in general rural people talk less and urban people talk more ...

You may be right (possibly in the sense that there are some "city types" who like to hear the sound of their own voice), but I think it depends on the situation.

Walk down the street of a village or small market town, and people will be talking to each other, calling greetings across the street or whatever; travel on the Tube in London and no-one will say anything to anyone else except the odd "excuse me" if they accidentally jostle you.

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I may not be on an island any more, but I'm still an islander.
alto n a soprano who can read music

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Stetson
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no prophet wrote:

quote:
However, the conservatism about economics also means distrust of out-of-province corporations, which provides what could be seen as a socialist twist, except it isn't. Hence the largest corporate presence in most the Canadian prairies being the co-op, which means gas station, grocery stores, pharmacy, hardware. Owned by the people who own shares. Banking is done by credit unions, also share holder owned. This also accounts for the government owned Crown corporations which provide variously electric, natural gas, telephone, cable television, internet, cellular telephone, landline telephone, automobile insurance, house insurance. -- I don't think some of this fits with conceptions of conservatism and socialism in other places. But why would I buy anything from some out of province company which keeps it's profits out of province? Keep the ownership local. It is also found that nonlocal companies can't or won't provide rural services.


In 1930s Alberta, Premier Aberhart(aka "Bible Bill") started what essentially amounted to a government owned bank, after the courts invalidated the rest of his populist banking legislation.

This state-run financial institution has survived for decades under various governments, including some of the most right-wing ever seen in Canada. It's especially popular in rural areas, which have made it into one of the untouchable icons of Alberta politics.

And the funny thing is, the establishment of such a bank is something that would be considered way too radical, even for an NDP government, anywhere in Canada today.

ATB Financial

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Lucia

Looking for light
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Looking at maps of UK parlimentary elections in recent years in general it is rural areas that tend to return Conservative or Liberal Democrat MPs and Labour MPs tend to represent urban areas.

Certainly I grea up in a rural area where the Conservatives were thought well of even during the Thatcher years. It's an interesting question as to why this is so.

Is it to do with attitudes, or wealth, or more self sufficient communities? There is of course poverty in rural areas as well. Maybe the more progressive voices just somehow don't resonate with the rural population, either because their concerns are not addressed or they feel that they are not listened to, or that the issues that are being prioritised are not the ones that concern them particularly in rural areas.

Perhaps progressive politicians need to engage more with those in rural areas to hear their concerns and show that they have policies that will address those concerns. Otherwise they are just dismissed as city people who don't understand the ways and lives of people in the countryside.

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LeRoc

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quote:
piglet: To an Orcadian, it matters little whether that central government is based in Edinburgh, London or Timbuktu.
I get that. Something similar happens in the Dutch province of Fryslân, which has a strong identity, in large part due to having an own language. It has a couple of islands who don't seem to share in this identity that much. Islanders are loyal in the first place to their island.

quote:
Marvin the Martian: For me, it's how impersonal they are. The sheer number of people reduces everyone to the status of "face in a crowd", or at best "member of a specific demographic".
At least in the Netherlands, people from the capital recognize 'provincials' (including me) easily by their accent.

quote:
piglet: You may be right (possibly in the sense that there are some "city types" who like to hear the sound of their own voice), but I think it depends on the situation.
You're right, I was thinking about 'talkative' in this sense.

quote:
Lucia: Perhaps progressive politicians need to engage more with those in rural areas to hear their concerns and show that they have policies that will address those concerns.
Exactly. I'd like very much for this to happen. I don't even think it's that hard.


Speaking for myself, I think I've incorporated a bit of 'urban' mentality over the years in that I've learned to assert myself better. I'm not sure if that's a good or a bad thing.

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I know why God made the rhinoceros, it's because He couldn't see the rhinoceros, so He made the rhinoceros to be able to see it. (Clarice Lispector)

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Gwai
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# 11076

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quote:
Originally posted by LeRoc:
quote:
Lucia: Perhaps progressive politicians need to engage more with those in rural areas to hear their concerns and show that they have policies that will address those concerns.
Exactly. I'd like very much for this to happen. I don't even think it's that hard.
I think part of the problem is that there are too many issues where it becomes rural versus urban. For instance, would we get a decent transportation system in Chicago OR would downstate get whatever it was they got. Politicians have to vote with their region or they won't get re-elected, of course, so they are then labeled as against the other guys even if their politics are moderate.

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A master of men was the Goodly Fere,
A mate of the wind and sea.
If they think they ha’ slain our Goodly Fere
They are fools eternally.


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LeRoc

Famous Dutch pirate
# 3216

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quote:
Gwai: I think part of the problem is that there are too many issues where it becomes rural versus urban. For instance, would we get a decent transportation system in Chicago OR would downstate get whatever it was they got. Politicians have to vote with their region or they won't get re-elected, of course, so they are then labeled as against the other guys even if their politics are moderate.
Ah yes, the distribution of funding between rural and urban areas can be a problem. And I guess this can be exacerbated in a districtal voting system.

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I know why God made the rhinoceros, it's because He couldn't see the rhinoceros, so He made the rhinoceros to be able to see it. (Clarice Lispector)

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Palimpsest
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# 16772

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I once had a discussion with a friend who had grown up in rural Montana before moving to Seattle. He commented that where he grew up, when you were walking and saw someone, stranger or not, you slowed down to say Hello. In the city people instead speed up to get past the stranger. My response was that this is crowd dynamics in the big city. If you and someone else are going past each other, you usually speed up to eliminate a possible traffic bottleneck. It's also true that most cities have a tempo for negotiating a crowd and usually the bigger the city, the faster the tempo. I had to learn to slow down walking in Seattle even though I'm completely unathletic.

The other observation is a New York one. I've heard a number of visitors talk about how they got lost and asked for help and were surprised about how friendly and helpful the locals are. In general, I think people are aloof by default in order to construct a small village around themselves. If you're a random passerby you get ignored. If you actually start a conversation, people notice that you are in their village. It's related to the fact that despite there being 10,000 restaurants in New York, people who live their usually have a habitual 10 or 20 that they go to most of the time and where they may know the staff. It's another aspect of constructing a small personal village in the midst of the megalopolis.

I suspect that for rural folk, the internet may provide a way to do the reverse. [Smile]

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Pomona
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I think in England at least, the 'rude city types' varies according to a North-and-Midlands/South divide. Certainly I've found Manchester and Leeds to be extremely friendly, for instance, also Birmingham and Leicester. London, less so, but I think the stereotype of rude Londoners is overstated and is more about rudeness towards tourists.

I'm from Coventry, so in a city environment in striking distance from other cities. However my grandparents and parents were/are Caravan and Camping Club members, and we went away in the caravan several times a year to proper rural areas (not the really touristy bits as we were mostly on very basic district association rally sites). I loved it, I just couldn't live there. I love having museums, shops, coffee shops and cafes local and especially value good public transport since I can't drive. I also appreciate having a cathedral available, and a botanical garden or very good park. As an introvert I definitely make use of museums and cultural spaces as a 'time out' resource.

I currently live between Basingstoke and Reading (just inside the Hampshire side of the Hants/Berks border - the 'welcome to Berkshire' sign is in walking distance from my house) and they both seem a bit characterless compared to Birmingham/Manchester/Leeds etc - maybe a Southern thing?

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Consider the work of God: Who is able to straighten what he has bent? [Ecclesiastes 7:13]

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Leorning Cniht
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# 17564

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quote:
Originally posted by Lucia:

Is it to do with attitudes, or wealth, or more self sufficient communities?

Could be. I grew up in farming country, and whilst we were not farmers, many of my friends were. Farmers - or at least, the ones I grew up around - did everything for themselves. It was rare that anyone would hire a tradesman, for example.

I think this kind of independent, self-reliant attitude tends to correlate with a desire for a more limited, less interventionist government that the political right claims to offer.

Of course, these farmers were also happily claiming government subsidies, and there are definite parallels with the "Get your government hands off my Medicare" signs...

[ 25. September 2014, 19:40: Message edited by: Leorning Cniht ]

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John Holding

Coffee and Cognac
# 158

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quote:
Originally posted by LeRoc:
I've learned in basic sociology class is that farmers are naturally conservative because they perceive progressiveness as risk-taking. They always need the security of their next harvest, so they prefer to keep things the way they are. More generally, their connection to the land they inherited from their forefathers makes them more traditional than city-folk who might live in a rented house.

[tangent] Just remember, LeRoc, that on the Canadian prairies (which is what SPK was talking about) few of those farmers were on land they inherited from their forefathers. At most, their fathers. Because most of the land in question only went under plough in the 1880s and 1890s at the earliest. My own grandparents took over a farm on the Manitoba Saskatchewan border in 1932-3 because the owner couldn't pay his bills, the largest of which was owed to his blacksmith (my gf and his brother). The farmer, I think, had the farm from his father who had taken the land on a grant and was the first to plough. (My grandfather hadn't a clue how to farm but was blessed with a wife and an oldest son who had a clue.)

[/tangent]

John

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Sober Preacher's Kid

Presbymethegationalist
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In the case of the Prairie Provinces, "progressive" politics was all about risk-hedging, i.e. farm security, regulation of lenders, provision of crop insurance at accessible prices, and public medicare to take care of accident & sickness in an already financially strained farm family.

While the idea of the inherited family farm has more traction in Ontario which has been settled longer, even here it is getting more rare as farm families sell.

In North America farms are often rented out to other farmers if the owner can't or doesn't want to work his land for a time, and farm loans are ubiquitous. The idea of a self-sufficient farm family is a quaint idea that was never true even at the best of times.

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NDP Federal Convention Ottawa 2018: A random assortment of Prots and Trots.

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no prophet's flag is set so...

Proceed to see sea
# 15560

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quote:
Originally posted by Sober Preacher's Kid:
The idea of a self-sufficient farm family is a quaint idea that was never true even at the best of times.

The suggestion is that this worked until 1930 with the terrible drought of the Dirty Thirties. One of my grandmothers-in-law was a Barr Colonist (Lloydminster, Northwest Territories: farm in what's now Alberta, house 14 feet inside what's now Saskatchewan). They actually hung on until 1940 when the second war came.
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LeRoc

Famous Dutch pirate
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quote:
John Holding: Just remember, LeRoc, that on the Canadian prairies (which is what SPK was talking about) few of those farmers were on land they inherited from their forefathers.
D'oh! Yes of course, thanks for reminding me. The history of emigrant farmers is fascinating (I'm not only saying this because a lot of them are Dutch), and it would be interesting to see if their mentality is different than those who've stayed on the same land for generations.

quote:
Sober Preacher's Kid: The idea of a self-sufficient farm family is a quaint idea that was never true even at the best of times.
With this, I agree.

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I know why God made the rhinoceros, it's because He couldn't see the rhinoceros, so He made the rhinoceros to be able to see it. (Clarice Lispector)

Posts: 9474 | From: Brazil / Africa | Registered: Aug 2002  |  IP: Logged
Arabella Purity Winterbottom

Trumpeting hope
# 3434

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quote:
Originally posted by Jade Constable:
it's easy to be anonymous in a big city, which I appreciate. The kind of place where everyone knows each other (whether a town or a village) would be really stressful to me.

That part of it was certainly hellish growing up! I would go for a ride on my bicycle, and my mother would be able to track me by the phone calls my aunts made to tell her they'd seen me.

My partner and I are thinking about moving to where I grew up, partly because its soooooo much cheaper to live there (property is about half the cost it is in Wellington, and because there is so much primary industry food is also considerably less expensive), but also because that's where we can connect in with family for our old age. All 1500 of them.

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Hell is full of the talented and Heaven is full of the energetic. St Jane Frances de Chantal

Posts: 3702 | From: Aotearoa, New Zealand | Registered: Oct 2002  |  IP: Logged



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