[closeparen]

> rejecting the complaints this mood inspires

It turns out that it's really hard to be against communities democratically controlling their own destinies and not look like a monster. Local governments and the policies they make to preserve their built environments are about as pure and non-corrupt as democracy gets.

Does any place in America have high-density market-rate construction because the community genuinely supports it? Far as I can tell, it's only possible to have a city in America when the government is sufficiently corrupt / community is sufficiently disempowered that developers can cram it through.

I'm grateful for these places. I'm happy to live in one. But you have to recognize that cities in America are only possible to the extent that America is corporatist and undemocratic. Any strengthening of our communities, our democracy, or local government has always and will always reinforce the overwhelming majority support for sprawl and "fuck you, I got mine."

[dionidium]

Yes, you’re right, it’s pretty difficult to develop a politics around this subject that isn’t awash in contradictions. But that’s because if you really drive down into what it is that people want, you’ll find that they want the impossible. They want to live in a quiet low-density neighborhood directly adjacent to a big, interesting, dynamic metropolis that never encroaches on their space. It’s not clear how an entire population who says they want that could ever actually get that.

I know what I sound like when I get deep enough into a rant about the way in which Americans fetishize local control. But I still think that what I am proposing would generate the best outcomes for the most number of people.

[closeparen]

Isn’t that the whole idea of “the community”? Acting in the narrow self-interest of incumbents and not caring about outcomes for the population in general is exactly what we fetishize when we fetishize community activism and local control.

[dionidium]

Sure. And I guess what I'm trying to say, in short, is that the wishes of incumbents can be both understandable, but best ignored. If that sounds like a contradiction, it's probably because it is. I think it's really hard to develop a coherent set of politics on this topic.