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I live in a rabidly left-wing city in the US within two minutes of a supermarket, and I still have no idea what they're complaining about, other than their desire for the isolation of suburban/rural living so they don't have to interact with anyone that doesn't fit their template of
which, uh, if you want to be isolated and limit interactions with anyone different from you as much as possible, may I ask why you also want to live within the city borders of Seattle (or any other city for that matter)?
I'm not saying that I would prefer suburban or rural living; there are a lot of good things about living in cities and I prefer them. The people are, in general, polite and law-abiding. Suburban and rural areas have their own pathologies. The main thing I am incensed about is that cities could be so much better if policy decisions took into account the fact that behavior varies from person to person in predictable ways and some people are net negative for the rest of the city.
The fact that I referred to the hypothetical man as using "PMC vocabulary" suggests that I don't particularly identify with him. I'm happy to live next to people who are different, just not different in such a way that they will burglarize my house, drive recklessly, or harass my daughter on the street.
Others in this thread have shared contrary examples of walkable areas that don't have higher crime, because the police enforce the law and arrest or harass lawbreakers to keep them away. Where I live this happens much less often. The whole concept of incapacitation depends on statistical discrimination - that people who have a history of committing crimes are more likely to commit more crimes in the future. The discourse in leftist enclaves is focused on rehabilitation and compassion, not incapacitation, and the police are basically barred from incapacitating criminals.
In my area the response of urban lawmakers to the vast majority of the troublesome people being in the city is to make laws to try to make suburbs take their "fair share" of these people (e.g. with "affordable housing" requirements, which handily double as a way to increase Democratic representation in suburbs). And at the same time prevent the suburbs from treating them with any less deference than the cities do. Can't make the cities better, so try to make the suburbs worse.
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