A lot of the things we do on a daily or weekly basis have ways of doing them that can either be private or communal, some of these which we do not think to consider as having that characteristic.
For example, bathing in the Roman Empire used to be communal, but then Rome fell and citizens in the splinter countries began taking baths privately.
Receiving mail is another example. There are countries which don’t have mailboxes and everyone gets their mail at the post office in the PO boxes. It was the United States which pioneered the idea of the modern mail system, which is why we associate it as a private act.
There are activities as well which don’t have any history as jumping between one or the other that might benefit from it, for example I think towns might benefit if internet was free and freely accessible but only at the local library.
What’s a non-communal aspect of life you think should be communal?
Clothes being optional
Im not saying we should be nude all the time. Clothes have their purpose.I think we should have the option to be nude in public, without making it sexual
Nude beaches are nice places for exactly this reason. It’s like everyone tacitly agrees not to give a shit.
You can walk past people with your balls waving in the breeze and nobody even blinks - and more importantly, someone can walk past you with their tits akimbo and you don’t even blink. It’s not sexual, it’s not even interesting, it has no significance here. It’s like seeing someone breastfeeding: yes, boobs are still great, but we’re not doing that right now.
And that’s just a really nice headspace to be in. All of the unconscious monkey-politics games just go away, you don’t have to think of people in those terms, or concern yourself with where you stand relative to them, because we’re just not doing that.
Oh no, you’ll see unattractive naked people! Yep, most of them in fact. And honestly that’s kind of awesome. 85yo woman pottering around living her best life stark naked and not giving one single shit: you go girl. Fuck yeah. You know how people say they look forward to being old enough to just not give a fuck any more? You can have that yourself right now, right here, for free.
It’s funny, walking past clothed beaches afterwards, you realise just how sexualised many swimsuits really are. A bunch of naked people are honestly about as glamorous and exciting as a pile of dead sheep; fashion designers do one hell of a job creating drama and hype around it all.
Owning tools and equipment. I wish my neighborhood or town had a tool library.
Google your city name and “maker space” to see if there’s any near you. Not only does my local library district have them, there’s another local option with a monthly membership fee. They have large equipment like laser engravers, CNCs, drill presses, etc. They usually also have small stuff like drills that you can check out and bring home. Also a great way to meet other makers in your community
I tried looking for something like this in the UK and it turns out the nearest one for me got shut down during COVID, the rest are all an hour or two away at least. It’s a great idea but I guess it’s unsustainable without some sort of external funding cause the local one was already running at a loss before 2020 according to their website.
Sorry to hear that, TheWeirdestCunt
Cooking. 5 people working together can cook for 100 people easier, cheaper, and less wastefully than 100 people can cook for themselves/their families.
Unfortunately the current restaurant system in the US is incredibly wasteful, expensive, and pays fuckall.
Verified: group cooking is the way.
I have friends and family who live in a cohousing building. About 50 people in 30 units. Each apartment is complete but the kitchens are slightly smaller than typical.
Cohousing is mutual ownership of the building. About 20% of the building is common areas, like widened hallways with couches and bookshelves, or a games nook, music room, workshop, laundry, etc. It’s basically a tall village, and they are like roommates with privacy.
The giant kitchen and dining room is used six nights a week. One person is chef with a small crew, and dinner is for around 30 people. It costs $5 CDN per meal, though if you raid the leftovers later it’s pay what you want, usually $2. The cooking volunteer roster is optional and organized by a Slack channel. Food is usually awesome and everyone wins.
If you want you hardly ever have to cook dinner for yourself.
I think towns might benefit if internet was free and freely accessible but only at the local library.
Are you saying that private access to internet should be illegal?
Or that your libraries don’t offer internet access to its patrons?
The first one. Or perhaps it shouldn’t be illegal but rather discouraged in some way.
What possible argument could you have for that? That’s just absolutely ridiculous.
So my reasoning is for a few reasons. The internet is the largest source of knowledge. People use it for things such as research, homework, chatting, entertainment, expression, art, debate, and uploading content. We currently exist in a world where there are as many personal devices with internet as there are devices with clocks. For many, the internet is a form of escapism, and there’s a lot of escaping going on. That I think would be a good idea to channel so, one, its usage isn’t willy-nilly, two, misinformation and conflict doesn’t run amuck in the digital sphere, three, it would give social incentive, and four, it would give value to knowing things (as in, before the internet, you were considered learned if you knew something, but nowadays, it’s impossible for someone to know something everyone else already has the potential to know, since the knowledge is at everyone’s fingertips, which isn’t a bad thing on its own but takes away from any individual advantage of knowing things not easily learnable). There are places out there that want to ban the internet entirely, mostly authoritarian countries as well as some cults, and this I absolutely disagree with, especially as a librarian, and I also figure it might be a good middle ground to pacify urges to outright ban the internet, especially as society is getting numb, knowledge is taken for granted, and people are getting too carried away. It’s no different from proposing something such as us all living in communal housing.
Out of curiosity, why?
So my reasoning is for a few reasons. The internet is the largest source of knowledge. People use it for things such as research, homework, chatting, entertainment, expression, art, debate, and uploading content. We currently exist in a world where there are as many personal devices with internet as there are devices with clocks. For many, the internet is a form of escapism, and there’s a lot of escaping going on. That I think would be a good idea to channel so, one, its usage isn’t willy-nilly, two, misinformation and conflict doesn’t run amuck in the digital sphere, three, it would give social incentive, and four, it would give value to knowing things (as in, before the internet, you were considered learned if you knew something, but nowadays, it’s impossible for someone to know something everyone else already has the potential to know, since the knowledge is at everyone’s fingertips, which isn’t a bad thing on its own but takes away from any individual advantage of knowing things not easily learnable). There are places out there that want to ban the internet entirely, mostly authoritarian countries as well as some cults, and this I absolutely disagree with, especially as a librarian, and I also figure it might be a good middle ground to pacify urges to outright ban the internet, especially as society is getting numb, knowledge is taken for granted, and people are getting too carried away. It’s no different from proposing something such as us all living in communal housing.
Oh interesting! I see where you’re coming from now. Thanks for the writeup, it’s very informative.
This is very close to your mail example but can we please move on from delivering items directly to houses? Just give me a destribution center or box at a 10-15 min walking distance and I’ll gladly pick up everything from there when it’s actually convenient. We can still keep the other model for special cases.
What if we work backwards on this?
-
Introduce community boxes at junction points where USPS already delivers, and/or next to a parks so you can say hi to your neighbors and stuff. Ensure any box is within a tolerable walking distance for the average community member served. (Best figure five minutes here folks.)
-
Allow residents with mail being delivered to their physical addresses to opt in to delivery at their associated neighborhood box.
-
Market the boxes as happy medium between visiting a staffed post office at the center of a city and risky doorstep delivery. Locked boxes large enough to accommodate everyday parcels basically nix those pesky pilfering porch pirates.
-
Continue regularly scheduled deliveries to individual addresses because the route will continue to exist at some level of specificity anyway no matter how many or how few community boxes materialize. Carriers essentially keep the same routes but get to drop mad loads of
malemail into a bunch of ready and willing local slots near you, driving efficiency up and logistics strategists wild. -
Promote additional box patronage by offering a slight discount whenever postage/shipping is purchased for a specific physical address utilizing delivery to a community box. Immediate and total coverage of community boxes across America is neither expected nor necessary, but hell, reward those who lighten that load for others.
Thank you for coming to my TED talk!
sincerely, louise dajoy
Edit: got high while writing and it took a turn for the weird
-
