Modern life doesn’t work

You keep using the word 'rural', like you're talking about a country estate

Many many parts of the country have towns which do not have stations or useable bus routes.

For the bog standard terrace or semi, it much much more expensive to live closer into the town or city or near a station. Its literally what puts prices up.

A rural property is more expensive. You chose the option that works financially and logistically.

And when you can’t afford that in a walkable location…?

You're absolutely right. I had the same blinding epiphany when I was 24 (in the time of the financial crisis, which itself was so much less acute than the current cost of living hellscape), quit my corporate job and have modelled the rest of my life accordingly.

Small but beautiful rural cottage with no mortgage because we bought it in a right mess and have rebuilt it ourselves. Grow lots of our own food. Brilliant community of neighbours. Found a career that means I work my own hours and am always around for when school's out. Make very little money, spend very little money. Not the high-flying money trap life I was supposed to have when I left uni, but I wouldn't swap it. You can do it too - you've just got to let go of a lot of the ideas we've fed about what success means and what we're "supposed" to do with our time on this earth.

I know plenty, including me, that work full time in a graduate profession with no UC. It's not easy. Choices made about location to minimise housing costs, a lot of "no, sorry" to requests for things.

It is not a privilege to live in a 1 or 2 bed apartment but you do so because logistically it makes sense.

@Bargepole45 I think you make good points but you refer to a time when we had common land that we were entitled to grow food, gather food/ fuel/ building supplies from freely so whilst we would labour for it, there would be very clear personal reward for doing so.

The simplicity of it would also allow time to practice a 'trade' to make money for more. It also reflects a time of community where children and the elderly could be cared for and people could work together to provide for each other.

Allowing much more choice than our modern set up, post enclosures act where our common land was stolen by the rich (whose ancestors still hold it) and we were forced to compete and take waged jobs to buy back these resources..

Certainly not a perfect system but a more straight forward one. It's worth looking at Mexico where 52% of land is still under commons ownership. Not a perfect system but more fair in terms of access and ability to provide for one's own regardless of economic status.

You know you dont have to live 'rurally', aka in the countryside to be miles away from stations or to have no effective bus route

I live in a town. I walked to the chemist today. Its 2 miles into the centre of the town. Some of the road doesnt have pavement, I wouldnt do that walk with a child or buggy. If I had a round robin of errands to run, I wouldnt have walked it. Its a luxury to have the time and ability to walk around for errands.

The overcrowding makes everything worse. There are just too many people. In 1900 there were a billion human beings. By 1960 that had trebled to three billion. It’s now eight billion. All the villages near me are being ruined by endless house building, and the country lanes now have the kind of traffic you’d expect on a motorway. We didn’t evolve to live like this. Even driving to the shops is stressful and exhausting. I can’t even sleep because I’m woken up by idiots in souped up cars whose exhausts screech and backfire.

I went for a walk today and stood looking at some horses in a field. They moved so calmly and quietly and slowly that for a second I glimpsed how life used to be. Then it was back to the noisy, crowded hell of modern Britain.

They choose to live near a station so they can get to work easily. Same for nurseries or primaries, chemists.

Would be nice to have the choice to do that - sadly not affordable. Your privilege is showing here.

There are parents without cars or who only use them for longer routes. They manage because they organise their time meticulously. They choose to live near a station so they can get to work easily. Same for nurseries or primaries, chemists.

It was achieved by previous generations and is certainly doable now. Those who live in true rural countryside use their car because chemists, trains, schools are several miles away. That is understandable.

Realistically how many village or town dwellers cannot walk to some essential services.

This is misunderstood over and over and over again

Do you know who does the majority of those tiny short journeys (which is less than 3 miles, not 1 mile by the way)

Women

Do you know why?

Because they are burdened with the school drop off, then the nursery drop off, then the part time job on from there, then the nip to the chemist to get prescriptions, then the nip to the shop to top up for tea, then the nursery pick up, then the school pick up, the home, then the dance class, then the play date, then this, then that

Thats why there are a lot of journeys less than 3 miles because you couldnt fit all that in if you walked it or cycled it even. Thats even if it was safe enough to cycle it

https://www.michaelwayneplant.com/inequality-features-robert-reich/

Robert Reich (US professor, researches inequality) has a diagram to show this, it's from a documentary he made in the 00s. It shows how inequality has grown again since the 80s to reach the same level as the Great Depression. I think it's reached the same level as the Gilded Age now. It dropped due to progressive taxation and government's looking after the many instead of the rich few.

Part of the postwar drive towards the betterment of the working man/ woman (and also before the war) was the idea that peoples lives would be better if they could access adult education easily and cheaply.
When I was a kid in the 1980s my parents both went often to various adult classes. Loads of people did. They were in every community centre, school, local college.
Almost all gone now. The enrichment of society isn’t just about cash.
Also, Margo, years ago when I was briefly a lone parent claiming benefits the money had to cover my rent.
The housing allowance was about 500 a month, my rent was 600 (small house, cheap area)
So no, benefits dont cover bills really, its usual to have to take from the money allotted for bills and food to pay the rent (unless in council owned as the rent is cheaper).

It's an increasing issue.
I am glad that I am alive during this age. However I really wish my DC could have experienced the carefree childhood I had growing up in the late 70s/80s. There was much more of a community feel and you didn't have to work all the hours just for the basics.

Two main problems are social media/ads encouraging people to spend on things they don't need and painting a picture of what they feel success and happiness look like.

Second is the lack of good politicians who truly want to make society better but not feather the pockets of their backers.

It takes real resilience to step back and say I do not need this and to ignore the voices of condemnation, in order to live your life the way you want to.

If the IMF is called in and benefits stopped for a period of time, many people would have no choice but to be resilient whether that be get any job going or be self sufficient. This would be a throwback to previous generations and a lesson of how people cope when it is a necessity.

No, but I was once an 11 year old with a serious childhood illness that nearly killed me and rendered me unable to go to school for a long time. Back then there was no phones, social media, texting, internet…
All my friends were at school, moving on without me. I couldn’t contact them bar a 5 minute chat every so often on the landline. I was in and out of hospital. Lonely and desperately ill.
So yeh, I do think I have a pretty good insight into just how crap things can be for some kids.
The Covid lockdowns would have been a bloody holiday compared to what I went through. Sorry.

@MistressoftheDarkSide I understand that you can be fat and also nutrient deficient. However, that suggests that the problem is not a lack of food. Personally, I would like to see cookery and home economics as a compulsory subject in schools.

I'm not sure what your point is about the institutions that were put in place after WW2.

You originally said "The systems built since the end of WW2 are falling apart due to greed and indifference from those at the top towards those at the bottom."

I countered that by saying that I don't think that is the case and gave my reasons. You have now said that the post-war institutions were put in place for dubious reasons (not altruism), to prevent unrest and ensure a fit and healthy army and increase the number of white collar workers.

So, what is your argument? Do you think those post-war institutions should exist or not? I'm not sure I'm understanding you.

Childhood obesity is in large part influenced by poor nutrition. You can be "fat" but still nutritionally deficient.

Do you not see the irony of the state "supporting" more people than ever before because apparently the economy doesn't and those being thus supported being one step away from destitution and miles away from progress, which is the reality for a growing number?

And bear in mind, the post WW2 rebuild including health and welfare and education provosion wasn't altruism? It was to avoid civil unrest / revolution, and provide a fitter and better educated army if we needed it, and people better suited to the industrial landscape and growing white collar industries.

The real question should be why the relatively easy for the majority to achieve basics are slipping from the grasp of people who are doing all the "right" things. The systems built since the end of WW2 are falling apart due to greed and indifference from those at the top towards those at the bottom

Yep

Previous generations didn't have a choice. They had to be resilient whatever their background. Privilege was not a reason and lack of it would not be used as an excuse.

you are on a wind up, no one can be that naive and I am polite.

I call privilege being in such a luxury situation you refuse to consider for 1 minute that it's not about "resilience", it's about people having to go through really hard situations and suffering bad consequences from the lockdown.

"They had Netflix, they were all right" what on earth are you on about?

It has nothing to do, but absolutely nothing to do with perseverance, and all to do with being in a position of luxury and enjoy chilled days and playing video games in a jolly atmosphere while mummy and daddy are baking banana bread and tending to the tomatoes in the garden.

Your vision of the lockdown might be your own memories, good for you, but it's utterly ridiculous to pretend it has anything to do with what people went through.

@MistressoftheDarkSide say what? The state supports more people today than it ever has done. Why would you think that the systems put in place after WW2, which I'm guessing you mean the NHS, free education etc are being dismantled. My father who was born just before the start of WW2 said he spent most of his childhood being hungry!!!! Nowadays we have a childhood obesity epidemic. There are more overweight children than ever before.

Do you really think that the aristos in the pre-war era had the best interests of the working man in their hearts?

And while itmight not be starvation,malnutrition is a real and rising problem. Hypothermia is maybe not a thing, but persistent lack of warmth combined with poor nutrition leads to poorer health overall and exacerbates long term health conditions.

The real question should be why the relatively easy for the majority to achieve basics are slipping from the grasp of people who are doing all the "right" things. The systems built since the end of WW2 are falling apart due to greed and indifference from those at the top towards those at the bottom.

There have been appalling threads on here with commenters espousing eugenics adjacent mind sets in the name of rationing wealth. Opinions that were supposed to have been made unacceptable by the lessons of history. Dehumanisation and othering is becoming scarily commonplace.