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So I agree with like 70% of these podcasts. I learn something new and have my mind changed by like 29% of these podcasts. And I think Katie and Jesse are elitist Coaster a-holes in 1% of these podcasts.

Like talking about 15 minute cities. Yeah, urban planning is awesome and if I could afford a home in a 15 minute city that wasn't full of filth and tents lining the streets, it would be amazing. But it also doesn't account for the reality of the vast majority of the physical area of this country that houses the farms and manufacturing and energy facilities that make the high density coastal cities run.

There is a significant amount of infrastructure that needs to be put in place before the whole world can live in these types of cities and who is going to pay for that to make it fair for everyone? My husband and I just moved from Seattle because I am an electrical engineer, my husband is retired, we were carless, and we could barely afford our rent for our tiny apartment in downtown. I watched the tent cities grow on a daily basis on my walk to work. How does homelessness fit into a 15 minute city?

And seriously, is Marin County going to make itself a 15 minute city? Not a chance. Are millionaires and billionaires going to give up there New Zealand emergency bunkers. No. This is a program to separate classes. It's like toll roads, reduce congestion for the people who can afford it. It's divisive. It's watching private jets go to Davos while we are told we shouldn't use our cars.

Yes there is some far out coverage, but the Great Reset, when you stop and really look at it, is pretty freaking weird and dystopian without a real plan to address the issues that are detracting from the existing 15 minute cities.

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founding
Feb 24, 2023Liked by Lexer

I'm sure I'm front running the next episode with this, but at the event last night, Jesse was circulating among attendees and came over to where I was sitting and he approached a young mom who was holding up her toddler son while she introduced herself and him to Jesse. Jesse said hello and something like, Do you know what a podcaster is?

And the boy started crying.

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I couldn't help but groan when Jesse corrected Katie for using "he" in reference to Sam Brinton, as she's talking about how he ("allegedly") targeted a Tanzanian fashion designer's to steal her luggage, stole said luggage, stole her custom fashions which were her in part a source of livelihood, and in an act of shameless testicle-swinging wore those stolen custom made fashions at public events.

Why does Katie have to respect an "alleged" criminal's preferred pronouns when after it came out that the "alleged" Club Q shooter is non-binary a large chunk of the Gender Stasi on Twitter denied the guy is "really" non-binary and didn't feel obligated to play along? (It's not about the severity of the crime because when men kill and/or rape women, and go on to say they're "women" to go to women's prisons, the media & the activists — when they exist as separate entities — insist on honoring the pronoun rules.

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The opposition to 15 min cities is part of a general anti-urbanism that’s increased on the right in the last few years.

I’m pro- the idea, if anything, but the simple truth is lots of mainstream politcians did say during lockdowns that we could expect more of these in the future as climate change bit, and they were dry runs. Lockdowns really did happen in the Uk as elsewhere, and really were characterised by a lot of petty tyranny and senseless cruelty, I think you have to start off by admitting that’s another true fact and that gives substance to peoples paranoia

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Feb 24, 2023·edited Feb 24, 2023

It seems like activist journalists have a paternalistic, condescending view of what journalism should be: we are right, we tell you what to believe and you will believe it. If readers come to different conclusions it just means that they need to be told the right way to think even harder. If someone never comes around to agreement it is because they are stupid or evil, and their disagreement is an existential threat.

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You missed the class politics of LTNs.

If I am middle class (white collar) on a leafy side-street that is now blocked to through-traffic, that is a win for me. But it is a loss to the poorer residents living on the main road who will now get the extra diverted traffic and pollution. Search “London LTN” on Twitter to see videos made by residents who are suffering from the extra traffic diverted down their roads.

If I work from home at my coding job, I am unlikely to use my 100 permitted car journeys through the controlled checkpoints. If I am a warehouse worker who had to schlep myself to work every morning, my journey time will be increased or I will get fined.

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Feb 24, 2023·edited Feb 24, 2023

You two need to stop worrying about "butchering" people's names, it's not offensive, at least it shouldn't be. If a French or German or Nigerian person pronounces your boring American names wrong, would you care? No. You can't possibly be expected to pronounce all the foreign names of the world.

And if someone has an unusual name that is commonly mispronounced even in their own home country, that is their parent's fault, not anyone else's. Baby naming 101.

Although, to be fair, Katie can't pronounce the name Leah correctly.

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So on the whole Great Reset and 15 minute cities. Two points.

1. I read The Fourth Industrial Revolution by Klaus Schwab, the originator of the "Great Reset", a long time ago and have followed his writing since. His writing and ideas are very creepy in its techno utopianism. You really don't have to be very conspiratorial to find his ideas and their popularity to very very worrisome. The conspiracy theorists are off in many of their criticisms, but they are probably not as off as we would hope. No satanic cult, but those who subscribe to his world view see non-elites as widgets to be manipulated and controlled. It is very explicit.

2. There is a bit of a feedback loop where you implement these kind of ill-advised policies. First there is the bad policy, then there is an over the top pushback, and then the defenders embrace the over the top version of the idea. This leads to the critics going ever further in their criticism until you reach very absurd places. This happened with a lot of covid policies and seems to become a bigger and bigger part of public policy. Both the left and the right can be on either side. It is all just tribalism, but it is really damaging to the polity and the possibility of good policy.

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The Brinton story is the most literal case of cultural appropriation I've ever heard of.

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So I live in a very walkable city in a country with great public transit IMO (Israel). The way they have achieved this is mostly by taxing the crap out of cars and pouring money into public transit. It makes some sense for our country because we have a very high population density, and it would not have made sense in the semi-suburban area of the US we lived in before.

I love being able to walk my kids to school, but it's annoying that even on days when I feel crappy I still have to. I love having a bunch of family-owned shops within a ten blocks of my apartment where I can find all manner of grocery items, small home improvement knicknacks, toys, clothed, books, baked goods, etc. It is not so nice that I have to shlep those things home on foot. It's very nice that the garbage collectors come every day. It's not as nice that I have to walk my trash to a dumpster one block away from my apartment (and that there are tons of street cats living in dumpsters). It's very nice that I can walk to tons of parks and have one literally right outside my building, but it's not nice that I don't have a backyard.

Ideally, places with lots of population density would look like where I live and places that don't wouldn't, and people could choose where they want to live. Unfortunately, a lot of cities in the US (and maybe the rest of the world?) Just don't function like this. I was very lucky to grow up in an American city where we had parks to go to, stores and schools within walking distance, and a small backyard. But the public transportation sucked and the traffic and parking situation was really bad.

I have no idea what the solution is, but I'm with Katie that carrots work better than sticks. I also personally don't think any of this will have a huge impact on climate change.

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Another piece of context that might be missing is that COVID lockdowns in the UK were crazy: I recall a story that was circulating about a guy that was fined for walking his dog out in the middle of nowhere. So it might seem like less of a stretch that you’d be restricted from leaving your home after you’d gone through that. https://www.businessinsider.com/coronavirus-uk-police-are-using-drones-to-lockdown-shame-walkers-2020-3?amp

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My dad grew up in a 15 minute city in Ohio - my mom affectionately called it a town with "1-stop light and a Dairy Queen."

I think my issue with the 15 minute city is how do you deal with the issue of class stratification. In the US not everybody lives in the same type of neighborhood - a lot of people travel (by car) to go to parts of the city where the nicer lakes/parks/music venues are located. A 15 minute city seems like a way to have a semi-gated neighborhood. You may not be able to keep everybody out, but you can significantly reduce bridge and tunnel riff raff from taking up parking.

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I sure hope that Tanzanian lady is real, because if real, she is INSANELY TALENTED and I want to take out a loan to buy that red dress.

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15 Min cities discussion - The Elites are a dysfunctional group that fights among themselves a lot yes...but they all have the same goals of gaining/maintaining their power over the masses and they all agree that workers are dumb sheep that they are entitled to rule over. They all agree that workers are trash and that we need to be oppressed for our own good. They all agree that we are trash.

They don't need to have a conspiracy when they all have the exact same goals, desires and fears. Did all the media get together in a smoke filled room and decide they were all going to work together to help Hillary Clinton win the 2016 primary? Or was it simply that all the media corporations are owned by rich douchebags who all independently hated Bernie Sanders and independently used their power and influence to harm his campaign?

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Feb 24, 2023·edited Feb 24, 2023

Katie being high on the podcast is why teen girls are unhappy.

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The actual facts around what Oxford City Council & Oxfordshire County Council are proposing can be found here: https://news.oxfordshire.gov.uk/joint-statement-from-oxfordshire-county-council-and-oxford-city-council-on-oxfords-traffic-filters/#

As I suspected, they’re nowhere near as restrictive as some parties have made them out to be.

It may also be worth remembering that Oxford is one of the most commutable & cycle-friendly cities in the UK and, as it dates back to medieval times, the city centre is *already* one of the least traffic friendly places in Europe. This may be why it has been one of the first to look into this...?

It’s clear that, as a concept, the notion of the 15-Minute City is probably *much* less suited to cities in the US where it would have to be dramatically remodelled from the Oxford scheme, but here in Europe, I do find it baffling that THIS is the new thing that the Piers Corbyns of the world have latched on to... It’s town-planning, ffs! If it doesn’t work, go to the council meetings and complain. It’s so Alan Partridge. (Leaving aside Jimmy Concepts, who at this point is a hair’s width away from arguing with fire hydrants and tweeting that breadbins are a Marxist plot.)

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