Parker Palmer defined community as "that place where the person you least want to live with lives" with corollary "and when that person leaves, someone else replaces them and their role in the community," or something like that. Thank you for helping to disabuse folks of community being a warm, fuzzy, idyllic, pastoral place. The sooner folks understand that, the sooner a critical mass gets busy with making a viable community.
I appreciate this piece for both its openness and focus on a fundamental fact of existence - a person is dependent on, part of and should participate and act responsibly in the ecosystem they survive off of.
They don’t. I suspect most will soon learn.
Anyway, good article and sorry you had to learn so much so quickly at such a young age - it really ought not be that way.
just like you, i burnt out after years of “community building” and have not been active for many years. and exactly as you described, when you are busy “building community” it becomes painfully obvious, almost immediately, how few people are willing to do → literally anything ← to help keep the “community” they think they are apart of afloat.
as i like to say, pessimists are optimists in full possession of the facts, and the facts are such that i am no longer interested in sacrificing my soul to try and build something others take advantage of.
i don’t want to come off as 100% negative but nowadays i am 100% focused on my needs, my immediate family’s needs, and doing whatever it takes to keep my small bike shop afloat in an increasingly difficult business environment.
i don’t feel like i have a lot left - other than just trying to be that which i wish the world around me to be.
This is easily the best summation I’ve read on this subject. I’ve always thought “community” was just another word for society without the politics, because no one likes politics. But wherever you go, there they are.
Finally someone willing to publicly admit how exhausting and thankless building and being in community can be. Not to mention how too many "communities" turn into cults or cultish experiences. Communities seem to run on the same ratio as everything else 20% of the people do 80% percent of the work, and of course 20% of the people cause 80% of the problems. For the past several years I've claimed that I am no longer interested in any type of community. But I will be a villager. For me the difference is a villager is based on physical proximity, we're all here together so we will play our role in the village. Making it secured, neighborly and thriving and when SHTF we will work together for mutual benefit. But we don't need to be friends nor spend copious amounts of time together.
Good stuff. “Building Community” feels a bit like AI futurists casually saying capitalism will continue to function thanks to “Universal Income.” It’s putting forth an answer to a potential problem without explaining how the answer actually works or whether it’s even feasible. As your examples in the essay point out, community building is a challenge in a society that is fully functional. In one that’s rapidly degrading, does it go from challenging to borderline impossible? Or worse, does it represent time that would have been better spent elsewhere?
As far as what’s good/helpful advice and what’s not, I really don’t think it’s possible to know that yet. The future will determine what was helpful, what should have been said, what saved lives and what cost lives.
I’m not saying you shouldn’t advocate for what you believe. Letting uncertainty cripple us serves no purpose. But I do think it’s worth occasionally checking our assumptions about how things will play out and running a bit of risk analysis on them. In risk analysis, the more catastrophic a potential outcome is, the more weight it gets.
This is so good!!!!
Being a 'community organizer' is not just when its fun or doesn't require work, which is probably news to a lot who have given themselves that title.
Amen! It felt like an important piece to add to the conversation.
Parker Palmer defined community as "that place where the person you least want to live with lives" with corollary "and when that person leaves, someone else replaces them and their role in the community," or something like that. Thank you for helping to disabuse folks of community being a warm, fuzzy, idyllic, pastoral place. The sooner folks understand that, the sooner a critical mass gets busy with making a viable community.
Write on! Thanks for putting voice to my own misgivings about the word “community.”
I appreciate this piece for both its openness and focus on a fundamental fact of existence - a person is dependent on, part of and should participate and act responsibly in the ecosystem they survive off of.
They don’t. I suspect most will soon learn.
Anyway, good article and sorry you had to learn so much so quickly at such a young age - it really ought not be that way.
just like you, i burnt out after years of “community building” and have not been active for many years. and exactly as you described, when you are busy “building community” it becomes painfully obvious, almost immediately, how few people are willing to do → literally anything ← to help keep the “community” they think they are apart of afloat.
as i like to say, pessimists are optimists in full possession of the facts, and the facts are such that i am no longer interested in sacrificing my soul to try and build something others take advantage of.
i don’t want to come off as 100% negative but nowadays i am 100% focused on my needs, my immediate family’s needs, and doing whatever it takes to keep my small bike shop afloat in an increasingly difficult business environment.
i don’t feel like i have a lot left - other than just trying to be that which i wish the world around me to be.
This is easily the best summation I’ve read on this subject. I’ve always thought “community” was just another word for society without the politics, because no one likes politics. But wherever you go, there they are.
Ooof. Yes. And thank you for being so real.
Thank you.
Finally someone willing to publicly admit how exhausting and thankless building and being in community can be. Not to mention how too many "communities" turn into cults or cultish experiences. Communities seem to run on the same ratio as everything else 20% of the people do 80% percent of the work, and of course 20% of the people cause 80% of the problems. For the past several years I've claimed that I am no longer interested in any type of community. But I will be a villager. For me the difference is a villager is based on physical proximity, we're all here together so we will play our role in the village. Making it secured, neighborly and thriving and when SHTF we will work together for mutual benefit. But we don't need to be friends nor spend copious amounts of time together.
Good stuff. “Building Community” feels a bit like AI futurists casually saying capitalism will continue to function thanks to “Universal Income.” It’s putting forth an answer to a potential problem without explaining how the answer actually works or whether it’s even feasible. As your examples in the essay point out, community building is a challenge in a society that is fully functional. In one that’s rapidly degrading, does it go from challenging to borderline impossible? Or worse, does it represent time that would have been better spent elsewhere?
As far as what’s good/helpful advice and what’s not, I really don’t think it’s possible to know that yet. The future will determine what was helpful, what should have been said, what saved lives and what cost lives.
I’m not saying you shouldn’t advocate for what you believe. Letting uncertainty cripple us serves no purpose. But I do think it’s worth occasionally checking our assumptions about how things will play out and running a bit of risk analysis on them. In risk analysis, the more catastrophic a potential outcome is, the more weight it gets.