this post was submitted on 26 Jan 2026
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A big city does not at all make neighbours out of everyone. The social dynamic is way different, because you see neighbours again and again for years, whereas you will never see that guy on the bus again in your life. There is fear about strangers in cities because if you do something horrible, like assaulting or robbing someone, you will likely never face any consequences. In a small town if you punch someone, word will get around and, even if you can't be dealt with by the authorities, you'll face negative consequences from society.
I've lived in several sized cities, from a few thousand people to over 10 million.
In my experience it's a bit of everything, both ways.
People are more keenly aware of were "your rights stop and mine start". They're more ok with smaller personal space and rights (otherwise they wouldn't be able to live pretty much piled out on top of each other) but will defend their own more strongly, the bigger and more denselly populated the city the more strongly they do it (after having moved to and lived in London for a while I thought I was quite a bit more short fused on those things than most ... and then I became friends with a New Yorker ...)
Then there's the whole social pressure thing: the bigger and more diverse the crowds you're used to the less you care about the opinions of strangers - you'll almost certainly never see them again, plus there are tons of people doing their own thing so why shouldn't you do your own thing.
Finally, the "I'll never see this person again" thing means that people who feel no qualms about taking advantage of others will also not fear reprisals if they do that to strangers, which in turn means that everybody else is far more suspicious of strangers since they're far more likely to be taken advantage of or know somebody who was taken advantage of than people in smaller places.
But yeah, I agree that most of those dynamics boil down to those in bigger places directly or indirectly not expecting to ever again cross paths with "random person on the street".
The same benefit you mentioned regarding small towns is also their biggest downside. In your example, it 100% matters who is doing the punching. From personal experience, if a girl is raped by the high school's star athlete, it is the girl who is ostracized by the town for going to the police. Small towns can be incredibly dangerous to outsiders (with outsider meaning any family without at least three generations worth of full-time residence)
Yep, the reason people developed police forces is to try and get away from what amounts to little more than mob justice.