Hacker News Reader

Comment by whitemary | Hacker News Reader

> As a country, we still remember all the horrible crap that was built in the 1950's and 60's

Nonsense. As a country, Americans know practically nothing about our history at all. Furthermore, Americans know practically nothing about the alternatives that exist elsewhere. This is glaringly obvious to virtually everyone who interacts with even small aggregate samples of average Americans. I wish you were right, but I'm afraid your thesis just falls flat on its' face.

I will gladly get in line to trash talk American post-war urban development, but even if average Americans shared our disposition, it's pretty naive to think average Americans' opinions would have any meaningful influence politically.

View on HN

Exactly. The Americans who trash-talk American post-war urban development are not normal Americans; they're well-educated and well-traveled Americans. Most Americans actually like things that way and can't really imagine living any other way. Things aren't the way they are because of a few "evil developers"; it's because that's how most Americans really want things, and they vote for it.

> Most Americans actually like things that way and can't really imagine living any other way.

If people cannot imagine anything but one way of living, then it isn't really reasonable to describe whether they like it or at least to use the supposed liking as evidence of anything.

Having people imagine alternatives is a prerequisite to evaluating anything meaningful about what people like.

There are alternatives, right in America. Americans aren't completely clueless about places where cars aren't necessary to live. NYC is the poster child for that inside America, and other big cities have downtown areas where some people live car-free: Chicago, DC, etc.

The vast majority of Americans don't want to live in those places. They complain that they can't park their cars, that it's too dense, too expensive, etc. They deride these places and the people who live in them as latte and avocado toast eaters, while they make their huge monthly payments on their $50k-$100k SUV or pickup truck.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com