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What is an absurdity that has been normalized by society?
(midwest.social)
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this post was submitted on 24 Aug 2023
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Cars. Fuck cars.
So tired of being here in the states where people think you need a car, like it's required to live. It's only needed because we allow our infrastructure to be so lacking that we depend on cars. There are places both built up and as rural as the states where they don't need cars, where driving for 3 hours for a road trip is considered ludicrous.
I use a car about 4 times a month. On those 4 occasions I need that car. When buying my house I considered some extra criteria like proximity to a bus stop, train station and a good cycleable connection to daily goods stores. Even 10 years ago that caused my house being 15 to 30% more expensive as houses in different areas.
I am lucky to be able to afford such a thing but now I don't own a car for about 4 years and the cost of owning and maintaining a car seems to be far more expensive than the extra I had to invest in my house. Cars have become a lot more expensive while inflation made it easier to do the downpayments on my house.
Yup in the same boat, and I'm baffled that you get a downvote for this very mild opinion lol, shows the weird car focused culture we have, that someone telling us how they like living without a car is worth downvoting.
I choose my home on walkability and ease of access. I'm "lucky" that in the states I have a coffee shop and a few restaurants that I can walk to, and a bus stop a block away. We aren't at the "No cars" yet unfortunately, I'm in Seattle and while it's easy to go a lot of places without a car, unfortunately the surrounding area is very car centric. But, we are moving towards being a one car household
It's not even a mild opinion, it's a reality that more and more of my friends are living in. I'm in my mid 40's so it's not that it has anything to do with strong opinions, it just makes sense. 9 years ago we bought an electrified cargo bike. That was the first step in realizing we don't really need a car. I just added it all up and it made sense.
Well good luck making them change that In the meantime, I'm using my car so it doesn't take 2 hours to walk to the grocery store and only bring back what I can carry.
No one is saying you can't if you don't have access, we're saying it's ridiculous that we don't have actual decent transit infrastructure. You should use your car if it's the only option, but it's ridiculous that it is the only option.
If you think about it, they're absurd. To go buy some groceries, someone has to use enough power to move a ton of metal, plastic and rubber around.
People don't notice the absurdity because gas is so incredibly cheap, but gas is only so incredibly cheap because we're not paying for the long-term consequences of burning it, only the short-term costs of getting it out of the ground and refining it.
If anybody has trouble seeing the absurdity of cars in cities, imagine a hockey game, except each player has a Zamboni instead of skates.