Four Reasons Why You Should Stay In or Near the City

Tim has already covered some reasons why advising people to pull up and move to the country isn’t always a good choice:

I wanted to add some reasons why, as a “green living” (yecch) kind of guy, I choose to live in a major metropolitan area with something like 3 million residents (if you include the outlying suburbs).

1. Cities are diverse.

Even in a city like Seattle, which has severe issues with racial disparity and economic and racial segregation, it’s possible to go for a walk in my zip code and overhear conversations in English, Spanish, Somali, Tagalog, Vietnamese, Cantonese, Japanese, etc., etc., etc. Not only will my son have exposure to this amazing variety of cultures, he’ll also be able to eat cuisine from other places, experience art and music from around the world, and learn that getting along with other people who are very different than he is, is an awesome skill to have.

Cities are also artistically diverse. From cool indie radio stations to libraries to bookstores to art museums to amazing sushi restaurants, there is an entire spectrum of experience the city offers, even if you don’t have a lot of money.

They’re also diverse as far as modes of living are concerned. I have a 0.2 acre lot with a small house on the outskirts of town, which is just enough for our small family and everything we want to grow. Somebody else who doesn’t want to garden doesn’t have to; after all, not everyone should grow his or her own food:

Diversity isn’t just a “buzzword.” It’s a valuable trait that exists when edges are increased, whether they’re cultural edges, social edges, or the edges that exist where we’ve typically erected fences but can, and maybe should, start tearing them down. Unless we’re growing vines on them.

2. Cities need help, and so do you.

The way it’s described in the original article (linked above), moving to the country seems like the ultimate selfish act, a way to flee from the terrible vagaries of urbanity and solve all of your problems via an almost ascetic rejection of the city. However, if you’re the kind of person who finds value in offering something to others, your opportunities in the urban setting are profoundly more vast than if you’re on your own in the middle of nowhere.

And, as Tim mentions, if you’re not wealthy or skilled or lucky enough to drop everything and move to the country and become “self-sufficient,” where will you work? How will you generate enough money to feed yourself/your family? The suggestion that one should just “up and move” to the country comes from a very serious place of privilege.

As for me, I want to help cities and their immediate surroundings to become more generative, to help people interact more with their landscapes, and to grow more food where more food can be grown. I have way more opportunities to do this in a city than I could possibly in the country.

3. Cities are here to stay.

Climate conflicts have already begun (vide Syria: http://www.unilad.co.uk/articles/this-cartoon-succinctly-explains-the-background-to-the-syrian-conflict/). When those farmers victimized by the tragedies of the Syrian drought were finally forced out of business — and water! — by the oligarch class, they had no “country” to move to. Instead, they moved into the cities. This is because cities respresent potential resources.

According to the U.N., more people live in cities now than ever before, and the number is only increasing:

When the heifer hits the wire, the whole idea of “self-sufficiency” is a myth developed by people who are trying to sell you dehydrated ready-to-eat mashed potatoes in foil packets. Even that guy in Alaska in the black-and-white films on PBS needed an occasional supply drop from an ice-plane, and was pretty fucking excited when he saw it coming in.

If the “big one” hits, I’d far rather be in a city, with firefighters, doctors, and yes, police, than in the middle of the country with the nearest medical help miles away.

A city is a natural conurbation of humanity; to suggest they are somehow “unnatural,” or “evil,” or “unhealthful” is to ignore almost all of human history. Cities rise and cities fall, but The City as a collection of individuals has been around, and will be around, for as long as there are at least ten humans who live in close quarters with one another. Which brings me to my final point, which is….

4. There is no difference between the City and the Country except the concentration of people.

The whole “City versus Country” argument is ridiculous anyhow; it suggests there is a hard difference between these two states, when in actuality they’re two points on a very long spectrum. As it stands, I can go foraging for wild greens in my city. I can plant a garden and provide a substantial amount of food for my family. If I didn’t have a yard, I could grow my food in one of many local community gardens. I can go for a walk in the woods.

Heck, the other day I stumbled across an amazing forest of hawthorn trees surrounded by the dry suserration of dessicated poison hemlock stalks, all within walking distance of a major bus line.

Granted, not everyone in an urban situation is as lucky as I; however, suggesting that everyone just up and move to the country assumes a quantitative difference between two very abstract and malleable intersections of entities in place and time.

So, I don’t know, man. Maybe it is best for you to move to the country, if you’re so rabidly opposed to urbanity that you get the shakes. Maybe you can find a middle ground in a small town, or suburb. Personally, though, considering all of the other factors, I think there’s great value in the prospect of transforming cities, instead, and being able to eat some delicious sushi while you’re doing it.