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by kory 1407 days ago
The YIMBYs want to move to your neighborhood, so you and your neighbors are obligated to make as much space for them as needed. Oh, you like your neighborhood how it is?

Don't worry, you'll learn to love <relying on public transport instead of cars, no parking, increased traffic, blocked out sunlight, tiny and eventually no yards, large buildings next door>. Your way of living is bad because cars and sprawl are bad and YIMBYs don't like them, they think the walkable urban mixed use neighborhoods are superior, so we're going to remove the zoning to force change. Aren't those things what you want?

No? Well you'll learn to like them, because you shouldn't have power over what your neighbor can build on their property. You say your neighborhood overwhelmingly votes to keep it that way, not just you? Actually, your neighborhood shouldn't have power to vote for this zoning either, because we know what's best for your neighborhood, not you.

This is how every argument with a YIMBY goes.

4 comments

You and your neighbors aren't obligated to make as much space for them as needed, you just shouldn't have the power to stop people that would like to make space for them. Zoning changes don't obligate someone to sell their house and build a duplex, they just let someone do that if they want to.
Zoning laws make sure a community stays as the community desires. A community bans large apartment buildings for the same reason they ban power plants; construction benefits the property owner at the detriment of adjacent property owners.
The NIMBYs don't want to let me build what I want on my own land.
Then move somewhere that does let you build it. Your local community has made a decision to disallow whatever it is you want to construct.
Can I not, as part of my local community, advocate for my right to build what I want on my land? Can the person who wants to have only low density not move somewhere else if the community decides to allow density?
Yes. But clearly that isn’t what your community wants or they would have voted to ease zoning restrictions.
More or less, yes. They declare themselves to be the only authority on how land should be used, despite not owning any or living there at all.
You left out morality attacks and disregarding decades of legal contracts and legislation that created the value they often want to pillage.
I intentionally left out YIMBY moral grandstanding, because it's usually a shield to hide the real reason they feel zoning should be changed: "I can't afford your neighborhood and I want to live there"
There's no moral grandstanding. Some people just think you shouldn't be able to be so rich. The reason you are is because the masses allow you the privilege. You might as well be graceful about it.
At least be straightforward with the reasoning, then. If the mainstream YIMBY said "I want to live in your neighborhood and I can't afford it, therefore the zoning should be changed", or "you're too rich because of zoning so I want to remove it so we are more equal," I'd have more respect.

But usually it's something about how mixed use neighborhoods are better, or how someone on minimum wage can't afford to live on their own in a very expensive neighborhood. Ok, but those probably aren't the real reasons you're advocating for change. Just be direct.

Language that straightforward is surprisingly hard to find among the YIMBY croud.

Yes anarchy and mob rule are always an option in theory.
aka I want to use guilt, envy, and the legal system to extract value from your legal property.
That's just good business! If you don't like it, move.
Says the side typically on the losing side of the law and complaining to their activist friends in journalism.
We live in a highly competitive individualistic society where money and power buy all, including the ability to dip into playing zoning games using migration strategies. If people don't like that, they should move to a region which has a society more in accordance with their values.