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I say this as someone who grew up in a small rural area and now lives in a slightly-less-small suburban/rural mix (but not in Canada). All this does is overfund rural areas and underfund urban areas which are likely already underfunded - although my only experience is the US so maybe Canada is a little better about this.

Rural areas do not "have no voice" - they have exactly the representative power of their population, the same as urban centers. I'm not sure what makes people in or from rural areas thinks that once people live close together their voice should count for less. How is it "right" or "fair" to move to an urban center, take advantage of urban amenities and services, take advantage of that higher salary, and siphon some of that tax money away to rural areas because of nostalgia?

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>Rural areas do not "have no voice" - they have exactly the representative power of their population, the same as urban centers. I'm not sure what makes people in or from rural areas thinks that once people live close together their voice should count for less. How is it "right" or "fair" to move to an urban center, take advantage of urban amenities and services, take advantage of that higher salary, and siphon some of that tax money away to rural areas because of nostalgia?

2 wolves and sheep deciding on what's for dinner huh?

Have you considered that the key problem here is the lack of direct control that people have over their own lives, causing these sort of situations where you have groups of people who permanently have zero effective agency over their futures?

I agree, giving people more voting powers just because they live in a certain place isn't the right way to fix this. But the fact that there is a problem is undeniable, and the fact that this inequality in voting helps ameliorate this problem is true as well.

The right answer here is to remove power from the state and elected officials, and return it to where it belongs, those being asked to pay for it either directly, or by being affected by it.

There is nothing as democratic as everyone choosing for themselves.

In the same way we should not have a vote to decide what's for dinner, and the winner means we all eat the same thing, we should not have votes on local and personal matters.

Democracy isn't voting, it's agency over what rules you.

Lots to unpack here, and as I said I don't know much about Canada and next to nothing about Japan so this is strictly about the US.

> 2 wolves and sheep deciding on what's for dinner huh?

Tired analogy that doesn't actually make any point.

> groups of people who permanently have zero effective agency over their futures

This applies to approximately 0% of people in the US. Yes there is a small proportion of people who are so poor they can never move away from where they're born. Most of these people happen to live in urban areas, not rural.

> the fact that there is a problem is undeniable

For it being undeniable you haven't actually said what the problem is - only a strawman that rural Americans have no agency over their futures which is utter nonsense.

> return [power] to where it belongs, those being asked to pay for it either directly, or by being affected by it

If democracy is 2 wolves and a sheep deciding what's for dinner wouldn't you want more power in the state and elected officials, so they could protect the sheep?

The problem is everybody acts like they're the sheep being taken advantage of by big bad government when it's almost never actually the case.

>Tired analogy that doesn't actually make any point.

It does, but it seems you've missed.

Let me make it clear as day.

If there's a country with 3 people on it, where 2 of those people want to oppress the third, there is nothing that the third can do to prevent that oppression.

That is a perfectly legitimate outcome of a voting system, and one that occurs often.

>This applies to approximately 0% of people in the US. Yes there is a small proportion of people who are so poor they can never move away from where they're born. Most of these people happen to live in urban areas, not rural.

On the contrary.

If you've ever been affected by a law or regulation you're against, you've directly suffered from this in regards to that topic.

Indeed, the whole idea of "red states" and "blue states" that is common in US politics kind of shows it happening at a large scale.

For example I've recently seen news about parts of eastern Oregon wanting to secede and join Idaho, and the primary reason for that is that you have a minority (rural eastern Oregonians) who are permanently disenfranchised with effectively zero agency over the laws and regulations that rule over them, as a result of them being a minority in Oregon.

This is the problem.

>If democracy is 2 wolves and a sheep deciding what's for dinner wouldn't you want more power in the state and elected officials, so they could protect the sheep?

On the contrary, for it is that power that is being used to oppress.

> Indeed, the whole idea of "red states" and "blue states" that is common in US politics kind of shows it happening at a large scale.

> For example I've recently seen news about parts of eastern Oregon wanting to secede and join Idaho, and the primary reason for that is that you have a minority (rural eastern Oregonians) who are permanently disenfranchised with effectively zero agency over the laws and regulations that rule over them, as a result of them being a minority in Oregon.

Northern California is the same, with this proposal to solve it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jefferson_(proposed_Pacific_st...

This goes both ways. In Utah, the urban liberals feel like they are disenfranchised because the majority suburban/rural population of the state consistently votes conservative.

Anytime you have a majority (whether that is majority liberal urban in Oregon or majority conservative rural in Utah) you will have a minority that feel disenfranchised.

This is an interesting allegory, but it's doesn't seem to mesh with reality. After all, in US voting, n is much larger than 3, and 66% represents a super majority...

Can you put into concrete terms? How many times has Philadelphia and Pittsburgh bullied their way into something that the rest of the commonwealth of Pennsylvania was so against? I think you'll find that what usually happens is the rest of the commonwealth gets its way, regardless of what the big cities want (because they have the numbers in the state legislatures).

I mean I gave an example in Oregon but you seem to have skipped it.

If you'd like a more concrete example, how about we look at the effects that these minority/majority impacts have had on the delegates sent to the presidential college?

Here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_presiden...

As you can see you have several states that have always voted for the same party for decades.

For example, Alaska, Idaho, Kansas, Nebraska, North Dakota, Oklahoma, south Dakota, Utah and Wyoming... Have voted for the republican candidate every single year since 1964. How many Democrats live in those states? These are literally millions of people who by virtue of being a minority have had exactly zero agency in who will rule over them.

On a more local level, how many regulations are voted on by people in cities, but will inevitably affect rural people? Or heck, any people who did not want those regulations?

For people being oppressed, who have no actual way to prevent their oppression, does it really matter if the oppression is being done by a dictator or a vote?

I mean I gave an example in Oregon but you seem to have skipped it.

That's not an example of what you're saying. It appears to be in ongoing discussions. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

On a more local level, how many regulations are voted on by people in cities, but will inevitably affect rural people? Or heck, any people who did not want those regulations?

What level are you talking about? I mean, what locality spans city and rural areas? These are great hypothetical situations, but you gotta put real examples behind them to show that there is some conspiracy about oppressing people living in rural areas. Even at a state level, due to the nature of districting, urban areas don't have any more representation in state legislatures.

As you can see you have several states that have always voted for the same party for decades.

You're now changing your argument from urban-rural to D-R?

Not GP, but recent things off the top of my head: California's law to end single family zoning. Gun laws in most blue states. Washington's comprehensive sex ed law.

It's not really urban-rural or D-R as such. It's more "people who don't even live in your town are dictating how to run it".

Like the recent ruling with abortion: it made it not a federal concern. That's it. Why do people in California care so much about what e.g. Alabama is doing now? Do they get upset about abortion laws in Poland too?

Higher levels of government are needed to prevent conflicts (e.g. to deal with someone in Colorado polluting the river and screwing over everyone in Utah), but they end up getting used to enforce social norms. It would be better if we could push more regulation down to the county/municipal level. People wouldn't need to be so polarized because they could just agree to disagree, and live somewhere with like-minded people.

Want to live somewhere where there's strict credentials for teachers? Cool. Want to live somewhere where the lady down the street that homeschools her kids can also teach yours? Cool. It's a big country. There's room for everyone.

California's law to end single family zoning

Not sure how this fits in. It only had 25% nay votes in the assembly and 17.5% nay votes in the senate. Some nay votes came from a D from SF and someone form Huntington Beach, so the vote really wasn't on party or urban-rural lines. I also wonder how genuine you're being when you say a measure that gives someone more freedom (to build what they want on their property) is someone telling you how to live your life.

Gun laws in most blue states.

I'm not really sure laws what you mean. We have to recognize that nationwide, 63% of adults are dissatisfied with our current gun laws. In light of this, we have the SCOTUS striking down gun laws that most people want. This doesn't appear to be the win you think it is. https://news.gallup.com/poll/470588/dissatisfaction-gun-laws...

Washington's comprehensive sex ed law

I'm not sure what to say when you think direct democracy is bad with regards to state measures.

Like the recent ruling with abortion: it made it not a federal concern. That's it. Why do people in California care so much about what e.g. Alabama is doing now?

Well, this specific issue aside, this current trend of conservatives trying to legislate from the SCOTUS (people appointed for a lifetime) is largely undemocratic. If you don't want people who don't even live in your town dictating how to run it, you should be very opposed to SCOTUS doing just that, since they basically answer to no one.

You're really missing the point here. The entire point being made is that what the voters at the level of a state or the entire nation is irrelevant because it shouldn't be their decision to vote on.

Even if 75% of California residents want to ban single family zoning, if 75% of residents in Redding want to keep it in Redding, why should people in San Diego have any more than 0% influence on that decision? People 600 miles away should have exactly zero input into something like that.

It's not about whether the decisions being made are good. It's about who gets to make them/how broadly they apply. China could have the greatest ideas in the world, but it doesn't make sense to "democratically" vote with equal representation between US and Chinese citizens on what free speech laws in the US should be. They have 4x the population and nothing in common. Such a "democracy" would be a farce.

> Even if 75% of California residents want to ban single family zoning, if 75% of residents in Redding want to keep it in Redding, why should people in San Diego have any more than 0% influence on that decision?

Because Redding isn't an independent, self-supporting, sovereign entity, its an administrative subdivision of California whose existence as an entity and powers of government are delegated to it by the people of the State of California through the Constitution and laws of said State (in part directly, and in part indirectly through, e.g., Shasta County, a similar but higher-level subdivision within which Redding is nested), and which is funded in no small part by distribution of taxes set and collected by and from the State of California as a whole.

No one is discussing the legality of such things. The discussion is whether things like that are just. That's why e.g. eastern Oregon has a secession movement. The west side of the state can legally tell the east side to do what they want. The east side does not feel that being in a shared democracy with the west side is working.

> No one is discussing the legality of such things. The discussion is whether things like that are just.

That's what I was discussing, too.

If there was a Redding-separatist movement, we could discuss whether Reading separatism is just and whether that changes the justice of decision-making arrangements, but the justice of decision-making authority within the current context is not independent of the structure of that context aside from the particular decision-making question being examined, and where “Redding” fits into that structure.

(This is also a separate question from the justice of particular decisions; like it can be just for the people of California at large to be the decisive decision-making authority, and still be unjust for them to make a particular decision. But that wasn't the question.)

There is a secessionist movement in NorCal[0], but as has been said before:

> Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed.

The bar for injustice is quite a bit lower than secession-inducing. If you have broad agreement in place X that they would like to live one way, and agreement among places Y and Z (who have never even been to X and would be entirely unaffected by what X does for the decision at hand) that X should live another way, then I assert Y and Z imposing their will on X is unjust, regardless of how democratic the decision was, or whether some generations-old political structure says Y and Z can do that. The people of Y and Z should recognize that they shouldn't do that.

[0] https://www.sacbee.com/news/politics-government/capitol-aler...

>You're now changing your argument from urban-rural to D-R?

This tells me you missed the argument i was making.

The point isn't a specific urban-rural or Dem-Rep, it's the underlying concept of not having agency over what rules you.

The more powers you grant the state, the less powers you have, and the greater these issue become and the more important acquiring political power becomes.

If you're a solid blue city in a reliably Red state, that is in Region next to a blue State, I would have no problem with control of said region Changing hands. It would be best if there was a give and take though, especially if there is a rural community in that blue state that is solidly Red and hasn't felt represented by the blue state majority Cements communities that are in place but makes people happy

It's interesting that you bring up Pennsylvania - nearly every regulation, law, whatever that affects cities is either only enforced for "cities of the first class" or cities of the first class are specifically excluded. There's only one first class city in PA and I'll give you three guesses which one it is. So essentially you end up with three sets of laws - 1) applies to all Pennsylvanians and typically have nothing to do with cities or how they work 2) applies only to Philadelphia 3) doesn't apply to Philadelphia but applies everywhere else.

You're actually making a good argument in favor of jdasdf's point. Just try to get a concealed carry permit in Potter County, and one in Philadelphia County, and see how different they are. Both completely legal because there's totally different laws in play for the same process.

The premise was that big cities, like Philadelphia & PGH would somehow undemocratically impose their will on the rural parts of the state. Like you say, that isn't happening. Philadelphia's regulations aren't being imposed in Potter County.

Isn't this also the case of blue cities in red states? I believe e.g. there's a big hullabaloo in Virginia at the moment where the bluer school district close to DC is resisting anti-transgender top-down demands from the state. If we want to argue about rural people being disenfranchised, by number, way more people in cities are disenfranchised simply because cities are more populated.

>Isn't this also the case of blue cities in red states? I believe e.g. there's a big hullabaloo in Virginia at the moment where the bluer school district close to DC is resisting anti-transgender top-down demands from the state. If we want to argue about rural people being disenfranchised, by number, way more people in cities are disenfranchised simply because cities are more populated.

Absolutely, and my point isn't about a "rural vs urban divide" at all.

It is a general argument and principle that can be applied to every action of government.

It doesn't matter if oppression is done by a dictator or by a Majority.

The problem is too much state power.

I don't know, let me know if this is slippery sloping or something, but I don't see why the issue is the state has too much power. You will always have a disenfranchised political minority unable to force the majority to follow whatever political position they want. There's conservatives in my city who feel disenfranchised about crime; does the city have too much power, then? What if I feel disenfranchised about no one believing me in an Among Us game?

You're missing the point.

Being enfranchised in driving the state is only important if the state has a significant impact in your life.

The lower the impact (read, the power) of the state, the lower the need to be enfranchised.

For your example: If the state didn't have law enforcing powers, the states policy on crime wouldn't matter much. You could just hire your own private police to protect your interests.

> For your example: If the state didn't have law enforcing powers,

Then its not the state [0], whatever it calls itself, in the same way that Emporer Norton, despite his claimed title, was not the head of state of the United States.

[0] though it may be part of a larger structure involving elements formally outside of its bounds that together constitutes an effective state.

>Then its not the state [0], whatever it calls itself, in the same way that Emporer Norton, despite his claimed title, was not the head of state of the United States.

Plenty of states didn't have law enforcement powers, including the early US. Police is something that only really started showing up in the later half of the 1800s and even then only in certain places.

So you agree that this is a problem then, and we should work to increase agency and reduce disenfranchisement by moving more power to local communities?

Being subject to a law or regulation you're against is not oppression, and you're not suffering. It can be, but that's not true by definition.

Having to do something you don't want to do, or not being allowed to do whatever you want, is not oppression.

Define oppression then.

Because I fail to see any conceptual difference here.

By your definition (as far as I can tell), all laws are oppression. Is there any law to which there won't be any opposition by some person out there? No, certainly not. So we must have laws and the debate must be whether particular laws are too restrictive or not.

If democracy is 2 wolves and a sheep deciding what's for dinner wouldn't you want more power in the state and elected officials, so they could protect the sheep?

it would be better to give more independence to the sheep so that deciding what's for dinner doesn't need a majority vote of all of them. if we ignore the obvious outcome that the wolves want to eat the sheep, but simply look at the fact that wolves want meat and sheep want grass, it simply doesn't make sense that the majority here gets to dictate what everyone should eat, instead each group should be able to make their own choice.

that means localizing decisions where that makes sense. and not allowing the majority to control resources that a minority depends on. among other things.

Curiously, rural regions of the US have a fair amount of power due to how electoral seats are distributed. I'm not sure if this is also true in Canada, so it is possible that the GP's situation differs from your own experiences.

You're 100% right, the more rural your state the more power your state holds in Presidential elections, and indirectly in the Senate, but not much beyond that. I don't think there's a corollary in Canada but I could certainly be wrong.

This is about suburbs, not rural areas, but Canadian politics provides an interesting history in suburbanites wresting power from city dwellers. Among other concrete impacts it means more parking, shifting funds away from public transport (which is less useful to suburbanites), etc.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amalgamation_of_Toronto

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KkO-DttA9ew&t=35s

They're also heavily subsidized to make them "work", a considerable piece of rural America would already be gone if there wasn't a large amount of government funds being diverted to keep it alive and we will spend even more as it becomes less and less desirable to live there.

As soon as WFH became an option people flocked away from cities. NYC lost 200k people over two years; SF lost 60k. I would say there is a large population of city folk who desire to move to more rural areas.

If you listen to the news, they're all moving to other cities, like Austin, TX, not to rural areas.

Yes. Other/smaller cities, college towns, etc. I'm sure some have taken the opportunity to move somewhere that looks more like rural--but I have to believe the lifestyle shift would be a bridge too far for most.

They're moving to suburbs near big cities or cheap big cities in less populated states, not rural areas.

>suburbs near big cities

It's not really true of the Bay Area--and it's at least complicated around Manhattan. But a lot of cities like Boston an hour or an hour and a bit drive in reverse commute, much less weekend, traffic can bring you to a lot cheaper housing. There are expensive suburbs too. However, it's pretty easy to find suburban or exurban towns that are accessible to Boston for an evening event that have relatively modest home prices. Not Midwest cheap but reasonable. (Of course there are very expensive towns as well.)

Sure but what would that have to do with subsidization?

What’s the GDP of New York City versus upstate?

As an aside this silly concept of “rural/urban divide” is just that.

Silly.

We need farms and farmers to feed us, it’s ok to subsidize some of these places so that happens.

It’s also ok for the people doing the subsidization to ask the rural people to stop complaining about “socialism” or other nonsense when they’re the primary benefactors of handouts.

What would the GDP of NYC be, if NYC didn't have a near monopoly on the proximity to high paying jobs in NY State? If every NYC job (aside from those that absolutely required people to work on-site) allowed full time WFH, my bet is that it would be significantly lower. And people with high paying wages would be more scattered around the state, requiring less subsidizing. It would also mean that not every highly educated person moves away to the city. Part of the reason urban and rural politics is so divided is that every smart kid from a small town goes away to college and never comes back. Some because they have no desire, but others because the job they want doesn't exist outside a metro.

Idk, but you're intentionally responding as though you missed the point so I don't have much else to say here.

There may be some element of truth to that, but jobs aren’t the only reason why highly employable young people tend to move to urban areas. There’s other big reasons, like there being a lot more to things to do and a vastly wider variety of large hobby/interest communities and cultures in urban areas.

This is why the bulk of people moving away from city centers during the pandemic moved to cheaper cities or the suburban metros surrounding cities rather than small towns, and unless small towns stop being small towns it’s not going to change.

Well yes, when an area is heavily subsidized it can be attractive to live there.

Nominally, it's also true in Canada. Due to lower populated rural ridings, one rural vote can be worth up to 4X an urban vote.

But in current conditions, votes in rural Western Canadian ridings are basically worthless. They're ultra-safe Conservative seats, so they can be and are ignored.

But it wasn't very long ago that they were highly competitive ridings split between two right wing parties. Because Canada doesn't quite have the same 2 party system as the US does, the situation isn't as static.

That’s true of states that are as a whole relatively rural (think Wyoming) but not, say, upstate NY.

I'm guessing New York farmers don't have as much power as their Montana cousins.

Rural and low population _states_ have a fair amount of power due to having a fixed number of senators per state, but rural areas in an otherwise non-rural state may find themselves outvoted and thus mostly irrelevant.

The opposite situation, city slickers outvoted by country bumpkins, is of course possible in rural states.

This obviously varies by state, but tends to not be accurate at the state level either due to the way state legislatures are elected.

For example, in my state the majority of residents live in the largest metro area. But the smaller towns & rural areas are able to more or less permanently control the legislature (because legislators have geographic districts). As a result, our laws are frequently written in ways that are openly hostile to our major city, while favoring more rural areas.

Major urban cores of Canada are not underfunded Toronto, Montreal and Vancouver do not need more of a political voice. They do not need more love and attention they have too much focus already.

More, even, since ridings don’t all have to have the same population, unlike Congressional districts.

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