Another Hometree destroyed - Dale Farm eviction

[Human No More]

Of course they were white.

...oh, and here, they actually own the land - they were just evicting them from living on it without planning permission.

[Pa'li Makto]

I never knew that you could be evicted for doing such a thing. You learn something new everyday.

[txim_asawl]

Originally Posted by Pa'li Makto

I never knew that you could be evicted for doing such a thing. You learn something new everyday.

Oh, indeed, such things can happen... and getting a planning permit for land where people settle (even if there's already a house standing there) is not as easy as one might think... especially where travelling people are concerned, who put trailers onto such grounds. These are, by definition, not buildings, therefore not meant to live in them permanently and any attempt to get them put into a planning permit is futile.

You can buy or lease land - the latter with long-term contracts, lasting up to twenty years, for instance, but you're still subject to the municipal mercy of not throwing you off that land. As for travellers squatting unused land: OK, granted, it is against the law, but in a lot of cases, these people treat the land well, not leaving their trash there and trying to and succeeding in living in an environmentally friendly way (such as building alternative ways of human waste management... a composter toilet, for instance, where you'll get good and healthy fertilizer from the merry folk's poop). Most often, these people are mainly a thorn in the side of investors who wish to put some cash cow building onto such a place...


composter toilet tower...


an adventurously self-built shed (a bit unsafe, so we took it down ourselves later on)


one of the trailers standing on a squatted grassland site - in this case: my trailer.

In case of the site I personally know about (since I lived there for more than two years, before we were forced to move), a large and shiny car sales place was erected on a large piece of empty grassland, that had been vacant for more than twenty years...

So, while there are travelling people living on the fringe of society, a lot of those I have come to know personally and still visit at times are far more decent people than some of those so-called law-abiding members of the society we live in all together, as has been claimed. And about the bias when commenting on such things happening: yes, of course these comments are biased - by individual experience when dealing with such things, by experience with official boards and municipical administration, by experience when encountering general prejudice... I, having been among a group of "such people" living on the fringe of society am biased, too, and I share a lot of the feelings Aurora has shared with us.

My heart and good wishes go out the people of Dale Farm as well as all others who just try to live the way they wish without bothering others.

Wiggling bare tos,

~+Txim Asawl*~

[auroraglacialis]

Originally Posted by Human No More

While some are fine, they are generally law-abiding in general, and will use land that they own and have legitimately gained permission for its use, or else designated sites. It's people who will park up on someone else's land or a public space, damage it and leave rubbish everywhere, fly-tip in local rivers and steal anything that isn't nailed down who won't care about laws regarding planning.

I am confused - they are generally law abiding but also they are people who do not care about law??? What are you trying to say with this ^

You'd be surprised - even where planning permission has been breached, you can usually get it applied retroactively where there aren't specific laws governing what can be built in certain areas. Not ever caring to try, on the other hand...

Yeah not even trying would be stupid. Which is why these people have applied and re-applied and appealed and took every legal step to get retroactive planning permission to keep living on their owned land. But unlike in many other cases by "normal" people, their chances were not so great and in the end they lost and within a week (!) after the last decision by the judge they were forcefully evicted.

Originally Posted by txim_asawl

I, having been among a group of "such people" living on the fringe of society am biased, too, and I share a lot of the feelings Aurora has shared with us.

Thank you for sharing your experiences with us. I had similar experiences up to now, though I never lived myself in such a way, just knew people who did personally.

[Human No More]

Originally Posted by auroraglacialis

I am confused - they are generally law abiding but also they are people who do not care about law??? What are you trying to say with this ^

...that some follow all the various laws with regards to planing and similar, while some do not - and it is the latter who are more likely break other laws as well, by doing things like fly-tipping or stealing, while the former try to avoid causing problems since they know it will come back to them. Surely that isn't that hard to understand.

Yeah not even trying would be stupid. Which is why these people have applied and re-applied and appealed and took every legal step to get retroactive planning permission to keep living on their owned land. But unlike in many other cases by "normal" people, their chances were not so great and in the end they lost and within a week (!) after the last decision by the judge they were forcefully evicted.

Within 10 years, actually. The number of legal steps makes it complicated.

[redpaintednavi]

Maybe some of the roots of this problem is the idea of owning land, that an individual can buy a lot of land and then close it for all other people, putting up signs with no trespassing. A resource like land ought to be owned by everybody together, not by rich individuals. At least there should be a sort of law, or rule of public access to land as there is in Scandinavia (at least in Sweden).

You can be evicted from public land also in Scandinavia if you put up houses there, but at least you are free to walk, pick berries, and camp (you can camp for one day and night without the owners permission). That is a step in the right direction. Noone can put up a lot of fences on his land in order to stop other people from visiting it and enjoy the landscape and nature.

[Fkeu'itan]

I would agree with that, but one of the larger issues with landuse like that over here in the UK is that we simply do not have the vast expanses of land that places like Sweden, other scaninavian countries or even the US has. We have 94,060 squared miles to house almost 70 million people.

Now, that's not to say that I think land should be held at a premium and only sold and allowed to the highest bidder, it just means that while it may be alright to simply pitch up in the wilderness in other countries, the wilderness we have is either so small that it needs special attention and care - thus, is very fragile should any 'invaders' draw up on it, it would lead to irreperable damages to the delicate ecosystems that remain - or the land is actually, genuinely needed for something. (More often than not, farming, for things like rubbish tips - as in the Dale Farm example - or for 'proper' housing.)

That said, maybe to a degree, you are right. If people collectively owned land, maybe it may instigate a sense of pride and duty to protect and enhance the land, a sense of community, instead of it feeling like you are wrestling it from the upper echelons of society. Unfortunately, people rarely think this way, instead ending up trying to claim such 'free land' as their own, and doing what they like with it... Which often ends in side effects like we have discussed.

[auroraglacialis]

HNM - I would not really deduce that people who violate zoning regulations and try by legal means for 10 years to solve that issue are thus more likely to also commit theft, robbery or whatever other criminal activity. The previous inhabitants of the house I am living in violated building regulations by building a balcony to the house without permission (not knowing they needed permission). I probably violated building codes by building a carport and a shed in the garden. Yet I assure you that I have not stolen any items or money from anyone, nor have I dumped trash on public land (actually I usually return with more trash than I went out there) and definitely I have not practiced extortion or fraud. And while I cannot say with certainty, I do not think the person who lived in my room before me was anything but a law abiding apprentice of a plumber who thought having a balcony would be a good idea.

Re land ownership in general - I think private land ownership is not really good idea. Private land use is a different thing - if someone builds a house, tends a garden or plants an orchard, she and her family should also benefit most from that, though I think especially land used for food production is much better put into the hands of the communality and commonly tended to. This actually works, even if economists want us to think otherwise claiming for a "tragedy of the commons". But actually for hundreds of years there was land that was used by a community in a way so that all members profited and everyone was interested in keeping that land in a good shape because ones own livelihood as well as ones families and grandchildrens depends on it. Its not something one needs to be a rocket scientist to figure it out. And of course if people trashed the land, took more than their share or tried to claim private ownership, the community dealt with that appropriately (and sometimes even harshly).
And guess what, it still is in place in some pockets. There are still cow farmers in Bavaria that have the right to use land that is "owned" by the community as a whole - they take care of that land and they need to resist the state which thinks that this model is no longer modern enough and wants that land to be owned by only one person or a company.

I think there is a fundamental difference between regarding land as a common property that belongs to all and one has the right to be on that land, use some things of that land and make a living with the land in a way that future generations can do the same - and claiming land is "free" in the sense that it is not owned by anyone, so anyone can just claim exclusive ownership and shut others out. A land that is "free" does not belong to anyone alone but belongs to all and should be treated that way. Not as "Its not mine so I dont care", but rather as "it is mine and everyone elses, too, so I DO care"

[Clarke]

Originally Posted by auroraglacialis

Re land ownership in general - I think private land ownership is not really good idea. Private land use is a different thing - if someone builds a house, tends a garden or plants an orchard, she and her family should also benefit most from that, though I think especially land used for food production is much better put into the hands of the communality and commonly tended to. This actually works, even if economists want us to think otherwise claiming for a "tragedy of the commons". But actually for hundreds of years there was land that was used by a community in a way so that all members profited and everyone was interested in keeping that land in a good shape because ones own livelihood as well as ones families and grandchildrens depends on it. Its not something one needs to be a rocket scientist to figure it out. And of course if people trashed the land, took more than their share or tried to claim private ownership, the community dealt with that appropriately (and sometimes even harshly).

As wonderful as it would be, humans don't work in the way you're implying. Small groups can manage commons areas, as mentioned, just fine, but the dynamics completely break apart for larger groups. This breakdown is also pretty much inevitable in today's society, because smaller groups are, in general, less effective at making wealth. (This is impotrant because the cost of living not zero for anyone, even the dirt poor.) For reasons I haven't seen an explanation for, cities make all of their citizens richer than the same amount of people spread out. Hence, this sort of mess.

[auroraglacialis]

Which is why I think what is NEEDED is to break down society into smaller bits. Allt he things that make humans comfortable get lost on a larger scale. This is completely logical because we as a species have come from a long history of smaller group sizes. That is the environment we do best in. If it is possible to keep the characteristics in larger groups, then that is fine, but what we see is that they break down very much to the detriment of the "inner" quality of life of the individuals. They may have more material wealth, but they loose immaterial wealth. The result is that while people in cities are more efficient, more productive, work more hours and accumulate more money and goods, they also are much more depressed, unhealthy, stressed, and suffering from physchological problems. There is a nonlinear connection between population density and crime (crime per capita goes up), drug abuse and sexual assault. People do not regard others as people anymore because there are too many. Instead they are treated like "others" that one can do stuff to that is not reflected back upon oneself.

The inevitability of this happening, you speak of, Clarke is only then an inevitability if people see efficiency at making wealth (which usually is just an euphemism of extracting wealth from others that are less efficient or able) as their prime objective. I think that paradigm is not holding up because people actually start to think again about what they really want in life and no second car replaces a good friend, no elaborate safety system with CCTV and panic room or even a guarded community replaces living in a community that is open and free but still not prone to crime.
So again it is a matter of what is primary and what is the priority - cities, economic growth, rapid development, material wealth, gadgets, new cellphones, 50 pairs of shoes and a second car - or a healthy natural world with wild places, people that know and trust each other, low or nonexistent rates of crime, rape and "screwing people over", houses that do not need to be locked. In many aspects these are incompatible. Some things go along well if the society is striving actively to do so but most just are not. The first impulse of people seems to be to want the former - but only because they think they can somehow manage to keep or regain all that is lost in the process later (by improvements, restoration, rebuilding) - only once they become aware that this is not possible they realize that they actually have to make a choice (or that they actually already made a bad choice). So I think it is of vital importance to humans and the natural world for people to realize that this is a choice. It is either or and one cannot simply have both.

Smaller communities does not by default mean living in straw huts. It could conceivably also work in some cities that are not too dense for actually forming neighborhoods. Though certainly I think cities with millions of people and neighborhoods with thousands of people will keep showing the characteristics that we see now in cities...

Clarke - I bet you will argue again that one solution to that predicament is your transhumanist dream that we somehow will be able to engineer humans or whatever that will be able to deal with high population densities just fine. I will not reply to that as I cannot even begin to describe the mountain of problems (ethical, practical and philosophical) with that.

[iron_jones]

Originally Posted by auroraglacialis

Allt he things that make humans comfortable get lost on a larger scale. This is completely logical because we as a species have come from a long history of smaller group sizes. That is the environment we do best in.

I'm calling bull****. I'm sure there are a lot of people who prefer living in large communities. In fact, I'm more comfortable in a large city. And that is the environment I do best it.

[Human No More]

Originally Posted by iron_jones

I'm calling bull****. I'm sure there are a lot of people who prefer living in large communities. In fact, I'm more comfortable in a large city. And that is the environment I do best it.

Exactly.

If I was isolated, I would rapidly turn completely insane - the irony is that I'm definitely not a 'people person' by such traditional standards, but I still need to be somewhere to feel happy.

[txim_asawl]

Originally Posted by iron_jones

I'm calling bull****. I'm sure there are a lot of people who prefer living in large communities. In fact, I'm more comfortable in a large city. And that is the environment I do best it.

Originally Posted by Human No More

Exactly.

If I was isolated, I would rapidly turn completely insane - the irony is that I'm definitely not a 'people person' by such traditional standards, but I still need to be somewhere to feel happy.

Well, so not everyone is built to be a "small tribes" person - however, I've come to experience alternative living and, indeed, a smaller, somewhat tribal-oriented group works best, considering group dynamics processes.

Wiggling bare toes,

~*Txim Asawl*~

[auroraglacialis]

Originally Posted by Human No More

If I was isolated, I would rapidly turn completely insane

I was not talking about isolation.
I was talking about small groups of people.
Imagine living together with friends rather than live alone.
In fact the paradox in a city is that it at the same time has massive amounts of people - but also people in fact are isolated. The remedy is then to visit friends or go to a club. So one shuts itself off from what makes a city - one does not interact with 99.9% of the people living there - does it still have a benefit for ones own well being to have all of them around? Or would it not be more rewarding to only have to deal with people one knows and not needing to ignore the others in the subway or street?

Certainly isolation is not good - most humans would go insane if they have to be completely alone and isolated. But I say that having too many people around is also damaging - in two ways, one is because one has to ignore these masses of people - you cannot say "hello, how are you" to every person you meet on the street - and the other is because this in fact leads to a certain isolation with people spending wuite some time sitting in their flats alone with a TV or computer.

As you peobably have the image now of me calling for people sitting around the campfire with no computers and no warm water, let me say that this is merely one option for this particular issue. There are plenty of "intentional communities" of all sorts - from co-housing to rural villages and in some of them people have their own house or flat, use computers all the time and watch TV. In addition they cook food together, have evenings around the campfire, work together to improve their community, maybe grow food together, take care of each others kids or pets and have weekly movie sessions with a video beamer.

Originally Posted by txim_asawl

indeed, a smaller, somewhat tribal-oriented group works best, considering group dynamics processes.

Thius has been said quite frequently here, that the ideals I advocate - more egalitarian, democratic, socially controlled structures in which each person has a meaningful task and place and is respected for what he does - that all this works only on a small scale and cannot be applied to mass society. The argument is then made that mass society is a given and that thus these ideals are impossible to be reached. Now what if mass society was not a given? I think it does not have to be and in fact it cannot be. It has to go because it causes so many problems. That does not by definition mean that people have to become trapped in tribal groups they do not like, that the only acceptable housing would be log huts and that people cannot have laptops - it just means that the immediate social vicinity of each person is overseeable. That a person can know his environment, the physical locality as well as the human and nonhuman beings living there. It does not mean he can not also travel, go someplace else, build new relationships or whatever - it just means that it makes much more sense to break down a mass society into smaller, cooperative pieces that in itself can show these otherwise idealistic or utopian properties of democracy, freedom, social support and relationship.