Two of my friends have said that they “just want some land and grow some vegetables” which also comes off as more than a bit misanthropic. It’s such a weird fantasy that suburban Americans have.
It is hard fucking work. On your knees for hours weeding, and picking off insects (everyone wants organic, free-range corn but has zero fucking idea how to grow a weed, let alone what it takes to keep the corn loopers at bay). Sunburnt. Dirty. Get used to bruised fruits, sub par yields, and on and on and on.
Not to mention, the real estate required to raise your family on all those organic veggies. A traditional suburban 60x120 lot might grow enough, if you’re really efficient. No row gardens, you’re doing square foot gardening or something like that.
It is a daydream, by the same fellas who drive their urban bro-dozer to the office for their 9-5 job in chinos. Fucking LARPers.
I think it comes from some type of yeoman farmer/farmstead idyll and white fear of cities. Just like the “I’ve gotta keep a weapon for protection in my gated community” it feels like it’s more of a power fantasy and wanting to more fully control their lives.
My dad has a cabin in Appalachia and I won’t lie being there by myself are some of my best memories. I think some of it is my life is very loud, I work retail so people are constantly screaming at me, my parents are narcissists who are constantly screaming at me, most of my partners were short tempered so they always screamed at me. Nobody screams at me in the woods. Maybe I am a bit of a misanthrope, I don’t know.
I’m not delusional about being able to live totally off the grid there though. If nothing else the soil sucks.
I had a couple paragraphs of what amounted to trauma-dumping that I’ll spare you, but it’s my inclination to believe that it’s not always misanthropy but just alienation from a hollow, cruel, and ugly collection of circumscribed commercial transactions and loneliness calling itself a society, leading to people just wanting space because they aren’t taught how to cope except by being an atom in the void. I understand this less with people who have friends, though.
There is a certain satisfaction which comes from doing work like cutting a fallen tree into logs, moving the logs, cutting them into firewood, and reaping the full fruits of your unalienated labor. Aside from whatever fantasies the suburban fascists have in their head about “living off the land” or achieving the platonic ideal of individualism.
Its that they want somewhere green and quiet, which our cities should be but aren’t. They dont want community because theyve never had it and dont know to want it. But they have been to a farm before, maybe for Christmas or Halloween
Two of my friends have said that they “just want some land and grow some vegetables” which also comes off as more than a bit misanthropic. It’s such a weird fantasy that suburban Americans have.
I used to work a farm back in my 20s.
It is hard fucking work. On your knees for hours weeding, and picking off insects (everyone wants organic, free-range corn but has zero fucking idea how to grow a weed, let alone what it takes to keep the corn loopers at bay). Sunburnt. Dirty. Get used to bruised fruits, sub par yields, and on and on and on.
Not to mention, the real estate required to raise your family on all those organic veggies. A traditional suburban 60x120 lot might grow enough, if you’re really efficient. No row gardens, you’re doing square foot gardening or something like that.
It is a daydream, by the same fellas who drive their urban bro-dozer to the office for their 9-5 job in chinos. Fucking LARPers.
Excuse YOU, I’m amazing at growing weeds! Pro tip for the newbs: let weeds come to seed, then mow them in frustration. Guaranteed huge yield
The problem I have is all the damn grass outcompetes and kills the clover in a lot of spots. I hate grass lawns so fucking much.
I think it comes from some type of yeoman farmer/farmstead idyll and white fear of cities. Just like the “I’ve gotta keep a weapon for protection in my gated community” it feels like it’s more of a power fantasy and wanting to more fully control their lives.
Ive met folks who moved to the country to do organic farming, they had one of the following:
-a focus on cash crops like lavender, saffron or oyster mushrooms
-a secret grow op
-a tech worker girlfriend
-rich parents
Farming is not profitable and only the government or shenanigans can make it a living
Like a tomato plant right?
Lol
My dad has a cabin in Appalachia and I won’t lie being there by myself are some of my best memories. I think some of it is my life is very loud, I work retail so people are constantly screaming at me, my parents are narcissists who are constantly screaming at me, most of my partners were short tempered so they always screamed at me. Nobody screams at me in the woods. Maybe I am a bit of a misanthrope, I don’t know.
I’m not delusional about being able to live totally off the grid there though. If nothing else the soil sucks.
they’re like that because of how other suburban americans are.
I had a couple paragraphs of what amounted to trauma-dumping that I’ll spare you, but it’s my inclination to believe that it’s not always misanthropy but just alienation from a hollow, cruel, and ugly collection of circumscribed commercial transactions and loneliness calling itself a society, leading to people just wanting space because they aren’t taught how to cope except by being an atom in the void. I understand this less with people who have friends, though.
I think about it a lot, although in my fantasy I spend 90% of my time cleaning and maintaining solar panels which is a skill I actually have.
Removed by mod
There is a certain satisfaction which comes from doing work like cutting a fallen tree into logs, moving the logs, cutting them into firewood, and reaping the full fruits of your unalienated labor. Aside from whatever fantasies the suburban fascists have in their head about “living off the land” or achieving the platonic ideal of individualism.
Its that they want somewhere green and quiet, which our cities should be but aren’t. They dont want community because theyve never had it and dont know to want it. But they have been to a farm before, maybe for Christmas or Halloween
Notably the spouses of these men reject the fantasy because of the physical isolation of rural living.
is it really that weird to fantasize about escaping the soul crushing doldrums of a desk job and a house in the suburbs? seems pretty reasonable to me
Not necessarily but at least anecdotally the people who say this type of stuff mention being away from people too.
Seems like a normal way to live, to me.