chucky

When the non car free come around here posting threads about all the obstacles they face to become car free, does anyone else get a sense that they've "made their bed and now have to lay in it"?

I mean often times I agree that it would be dauntingly difficult for some people to become car free, but I can't help but think that the only way for people to get into such predicaments is by layering years upon years of bad choices.

I guess their response might be, "I'm willing to make a minor effort, but to give up everything I have is unreasonable. I'm not going to toil and strive like a pauper to correct my mistakes because it's those around me along with future generations who will have to pay for it, not me." Fair enough, but isn't a sense of dignity worth more than a big house in the suburbs, a fat happy family, and a big screen TV? If future generations drag your name through the mud and spit on your grave then you're the one that's paying, not them. Or more optimistically, if future generations praise your resolve and persistence of character then doesn't that have more lasting value than anything else in the world (even health or a happy life)?

Bikepacker67

MMMMmmmm.... this should be good.

Wake

I agree. I grew up in a time that the two-car family was a rarity. We walked to school, the grocery, and the barber shop. For kids, bikes were the only transportation (or walking). After I was married we lived in Boston and walked everywhere or took the subway. Later I got a job requiring a car and moved out of town, but we always only had one car, so one of us had to cope when the other was away. You organized your life around the limitations of the time.

I understand it when people say it wouldn't be practical, given their current circumstances, to go CF, but I feel strongly the circumstances are due to conscious decisions people make, and they shouldn't be used as excuses.

I doubt I'll be CF again, but I plan on selling one of our cars when I retire next January, and making do under my chosen circumstances.

Midol_Mohawk

I'm not car-free but I would consider myself car-lite. I consider it a good weekend when I can drive to work M-F, park my truck at my house, then use my bike to get around all weekend, and get my truck from the same spot on Monday morning. I feel really good about myself (which in the past month has been just about every weekend). I am 23, single, live with my parents (only till June), so its a little easier for me than others, but its all about choices and busting through those mental roadblocks.

When I got up this morning to go to work, it was raining hard and I was second guessing riding to my other job all day. However once I dropped my truck off at home it had stopped raining and dried out. It turned out to be a great day/night for a ride!

I can't wait till I'm able to go fully car-free!

Smallwheels

Don't feel frustrated or annoyed at people making the effort to learn something. Think of the millions of people who aren't even considering using a bicycle and be glad that some people are looking towards alternate methods of living.

There are solutions to every problem facing the world. It just takes enough people willing to make the decision to adopt the solutions for the world to get better. Since the world is full of individuals with their own goals and realities, it takes a while for enough people to agree to embrace solutions.

Be glad that some people come here asking for advice.

It's easy to look at this as an us versus them situation since so many car drivers nearly kill us on a regular basis. Let's be nice and make this an us welcoming them into our fold by teaching them how to cope with a new lifestyle. It takes a while to adapt to new situations. Convincing someone to just move is difficult. It is also a huge undertaking for someone who owns a house and will need to sell it and find a new one closer to an ideal location.

DX-MAN

As long as you're breathing and self-ambulatory, it's not too late. It just may take more to extricate yourself from the old lifestyle, find new values and maxims to run your daily life by, when you're more deeply entrenched. And car-free doesn't mean you have to live like the Unabomber did, either.

I have a 4-bedroom house, 1700+ sq. ft., and my extended family in the house numbers 10. We're squeezed a bit, but we get by. My sister, her husband, and both adult daughters have cars, and they handle the whole grocery bit. (I proved a few years ago that grocerying by bike was no biggie, as I bought for and fed the 6 of us still local for two months by using the child trailer. 3 others at the time were out of town, preparing the way for the 4th and final.) Two months before this period, I junked my last car, said goodbye to the insurance company, rendered my plate down to hammered scrap, and gave away the accessories (jumper cables, etc.). It took going through 4 bikes, but I found one that could take what I dish out -- 3 years of hard miles, and it still looks and rides like a new one!

The day will come again when I use the trailer for groceries for the house. And, I will continue to do so as long as I am able to ride the bike.

It CAN be done -- it's just a matter of how bad do you want it? There is a wealth of help available out here; it's just up to the individual to decide how the life changes are going to happen. A little or a lot, it's for each to decide.

Platy

When someone posts "I can't be car free because of X, Y and Z" my inclination is to politely agree with them. Sometimes I might add that car-light living is a worthwhile alternate goal, or that one can always be prepared to seize occasional future opportunities to reduce car dependency.

Robert Foster

You can only answer that question if you have a high paying job and a big house. Once you have it then you can compare it to a life without it. As far as caring how future generations feel about you after you are dead? The dead don’t know who spit at them or who cheered about them. They are dead. At one point the Chinese lived mostly a car free life as did the people of India. Both countries now have started into the car culture and at the end of last year the Chinese bought more cars than the US did. I am not sure dignity trumps prosperity very often. There are far more people trying to get into the US to enjoy the lifestyle that some condemn than there are trying to migrate into countries with dignity, small houses and no TV.
If you are a parent and you have a choice to provide comfort and an easy life for your children it is a lot harder when you have the opportunity to take that job, buy that house and yes get the big TV than it is to deny those comforts when your children look you in the face. You aren’t thinking about things after you die only what you can do today. Bill Gates doesn’t feel guilty when he gives millions to charity or because he has changed communication forever. I am pretty sure he feels dignified as well.
What you have really asked is why everyone doesn’t see the world as you do? The answer is simple, because there are more than two people and everyone thinks their way is the best.

Ask yourself this. How many rich people wish they were poor? Now ask how many poor people wish they were rich. Even substitute poor for working class or middle class and see if they would rather be rich. Idealism is good. Realism is harder to understand. IMHO

chucky

Some great responses above, including (perhaps especially) the ones which contrast my own.

+1 to Smallwheels in particular.

For me personally it's not worthwhile enough. There are many reasons why I am car free and for some of them being car-light is the worst of both worlds.

But of course I understand that sometimes you have to step back before you can push forward and those prudent enough to do so in order to seize future opportunities should certainly be commended.

Arcanum

The OP is emitting truly toxic levels of Smug.

Nobody will care how you got around after you're dead. Nobody will spit on your grave for it, nobody will curse your name over it. The worst you'll get is having been part of an unfortunate time in history, but you're going to get that even if you're the exception rather than the norm.

The suggestion that being car-free implies some kind of austere life is just silly. I'm car free not because I can't afford one, but because I'd rather have more disposable income, which is the very opposite of wanting to live some kind of austere life.

As far as dignity goes, just because you think their life lacks dignity doesn't mean they or anyone else thinks that. Many would probably think your life lacks dignity. It's entirely subjective.

Frankly, the arrogance is detrimental to the broad goal of getting people to take cycling seriously outside of fitness and recreation. It just confirms any impression people may have of car-free people and utility cyclists being weirdos.

chucky

I think you're confusing things here. This is not about idealism or the question of "why don't people see things the way I do?"

You can't apply the same standard to America and China because their circumstances are different. In my opinion there's no mystery at all to the fact that Chinese and Indian nationals seek to live like American nationals and not vice versa. It's not prosperity vs dignity, but the holy pursuit of choice/autonomy. Being poor is not dignified (quite the opposite actually because the poor have no choice), but choosing to spend your wealth/resources on what you believe is good is dignified. For the Chinese you might argue that auto ownership is freeing, but for Americans it is clearly enslaving. That's why it is wise for the Chinese to pursue it, but foolish for the Americans.

Frankly I think your perspective is rather shallow. The problems of the world don't always boil down to a battle of different worldviews. Sometimes people make mistakes and violate their own desires and worldviews. That's what I'm lamenting here: that the car culture has and is robbing Americans of what they want and many of them will tragically never be able to make up for the loss.

chucky

Fair enough, but you can't deny that if you fight to make the world a better place you'll more likely be praised for helping pull the world out of such unfortunate times. Look at Abraham Lincoln, Martin Luther King Jr, Gandhi, and countless others. Don't think so? Then maybe you should learn something from reformed ex-con and pro wrestler MVP who said, "If people don't laugh at you when you tell them your dreams, then you're not dreaming big enough."

Nope, try again. Didn't imply that. What I implied was that most people who have spent years upon years working towards a car dependent lifestyle will need to adopt an austere life in order to muster the resources to work themselves back out of it.

No it's not. Nobody thinks that being enslaved and forced to do what you don't want to do is dignified.

Not a problem for me. Most of the great men and women of history were weirdos. An aversion to weirdness is an affinity to mediocrity which is a perverse force if there ever was one.

I have no goal of getting more people to cycle just so they can be part of the club. I'm actually interested in their well being as individuals and realistically assessing the extent to which cycling can help them.

chucky

Why are some people so offended by passion and hard work?

Arguments like "everyone doesn't see the world as you do" and "it's entirely subjective" are really arguments against anyone having an opinion at all. You guys don't really believe that people shouldn't have opinions do you?

Robert Foster

In all due respect I say piffle. Here is where we disagree. It is the same thing no matter who embraces it Chinese or American or Martian. Nobility and dignity is what you do today for your fellow man. Whole generations get lumped into a group even when someone in that group does good or bad. The WW2 generation is called the great generation. The 60s are the hippy generation. The 70s were the disco generation and the 80s were the me generation. Doesn’t matter if there were some dignified people in that generation or not history will view them all the same. To say the Chinese or the Indian people are “different’ is almost or at least can be considered, condescending and even a bit racist. They have the same desires and drives as the rest of us or as the old Beatles song said, they love their children too.
Tell us what you have done directly for your fellow man. Have to gone to an under privileged nation and helped build a school or tried to help dig a well? Are you more dignified by doing your thing than someone that hauls 2 tons of food in their old F-250 to a Mexican orphanage? How about if that person has a car and a big screen TV? Only the people that touch other people directly will be remembered for what they did, good or bad because someone will know what they did personally.
I know people that work hard 10 months a year to spend their own rat race money to go to places like Africa, Haiti, or South America and burn tons of Jet fuel or take fuel burning ships to do so just to make a difference in some less fortunate person’s life. That to me is dignity what would you call it?

Platy

Guess you were right! Pass the popcorn.

Arcanum

You misunderstand me. I'm not arguing that you shouldn't have an opinion. I'm arguing that your inability or unwillingness to understand the opinions of others and the reasons behind them, along with your arrogance about your opinion, are entirely opposed to your goals and the goals of the cycling community.

Robert Foster

Good point. I just decided to join our local green coalition to help promote more bike paths in our city. Some are car free some are not but all are working on lowering their carbon footprint. The only reason this works is because they are accepting of the efforts everyone in making whatever their condition and do not judge how a person got where they are or if they wanted to give up their TV. Because of the willingness to accept whatever effort a person was willing to make without lording over the ones just starting to move in that direction I believe they will accomplish much. Not all of them were into cycling either.

chucky

How can it be condescending or racist? The fact of the matter is that the economic circumstances of China and India are most definitely different from the United States. If you disagree with that then, quite frankly, you're either ignorant or insane. But I guess that shouldn't be surprising coming from a guy who presumably thinks that history books don't contain any names of individuals.

As per your friends, yes I would call it dignified. Although in my opinion it might also be a bit misguided and inefficient. After all, there are still many underprivileged people in privileged nations as there are privileged people in underprivileged nations who are willing to help on the behalf of charitable individuals. But to be clear that certainly doesn't make it any less dignified than what I do (and I wonder why you'd even suggest that I think it).

As to what I do I'll leave that for your imagination for two reasons:
1. It's rude for me to say and in my experience generally just provokes further bitterness and accusations of "smugness" from people with chips on their shoulders like yourself.
2. It can be a personal test of character for you to see if you automatically assume I'm a scoundrel just for being a human being with an opinion. This is also rude of me to say, but I don't mind because, quite frankly, I don't like you.

And what sort of arrogance on your part would spur you to assume that I have an inability or an unwillingness to understand the opinions of others and the reasons behind them? Also what, may I ask, exactly makes my opinion arrogant apart from the fact that I expressed it?

If you're opposed to people expressing their opinions then I think your decision to participate in an internet message forum is a terrible terrible mistake.

So I take it you're goal is to compromise the effort? Because if the key to success is that the members be nonjudgmental and you're joining...

Just saying, brazenly demanding people to tell you what they have done for their fellow man while accusing them of being racist idealists doesn't really fit your prescription.

Robert Foster

It is simply because you make it so easy. Idealism and realism are two differnt things. Saying you are dignified is one thing. Showing your relationship to your fellow man is another. If an American is trying to come up from poverty they are just like a Chinese person working to move up. One is no more or no less noble. Unless you are trying to say they are different for other reasons.

chucky

What is it? Is it the reason you're being a jerk? Because in your ignorance of my life you are so overwhelmingly convinced that I am full of hot air? Doesn't take much for you to eagerly point the finger and heap insults in your relationships with your fellow man, does it?

While it's correct that there is no consequential difference between the individuals, the topic (which you introduced) was the Chinese as a whole vs the Americans as a whole. Towards this end we can draw the clear distinction that, as a whole, the Chinese nationals exhibit more poverty compared to the American nationals and, thus, our expectations and recommendations for the two groups as a whole should naturally differ in accordance with our expectations and recommendations for poorer individuals vs wealthier individuals.

In particular it is my personal belief that poorer individuals should seek to enhance their ability to make choices by increasing their wealth because without the ability to chose it is not possible for the individual to exercise morality. Wealthier individuals, on the other hand, have the ability to make choices and should thus, in my opinion, be implored (but not forced, less their autonomy be violated) to use those choices to enhance the autonomy of the poorer. Of course since wealth and poverty is relative this is all by matter of degree.

This is what I feel is noble and the reality of capitalism is that if anyone disagrees with me (and I'm sure there are many) I have a right to wrench it from their hands by hard work, efficiency, austerity, general cleverness, and similarly peaceful measures so that I may choose to pursue my own personal view of what is worthwhile in life (to have my chance to exercise what I think is moral regardless of what Robert Foster or anyone else thinks) and I want the same for everyone else (which is why I am upset at people, such as many Americans, losing this opportunity by the trap that is the car culture...even though they certainly have a right to choose it if they think it's worthwhile).

Capisce?

BarracksSi

Sadly, +1. The rest of his posts are only confirming his arrogance, too.

One of the guys at work would like to ride, but he lives something like 15 miles from the nearest Metro station (no buses in his area), and if he decided to skip the subway (folders only during rush hour) he'd be doing more than a metric century every day. Now, maybe it would be best for him since he's become a ******, but if he commuted by bike, he'd have zero time for his family.

I'd have a hell of a time choosing anything over my own family. That's just selfish.

I-Like-To-Bike

What it is: OP=Poster Boy/Spokeman for BF brand Living Car Free Miasma.

Arcanum

No arrogance, just observation. Statements like "No it's not. Nobody thinks that being enslaved and forced to do what you don't want to do is dignified" and "So I take it you're goal is to compromise the effort? Because if the key to success is that the members be nonjudgmental and you're joining..." show that you can't comprehend the possibility that someone might have an opinion that is different from your but still valid.

Ahh, the Internet Ideologue Persecution Complex. Clearly if someone suggests that your opinion is not the only valid one, that you should try to understand the opinions of others, and the extremity of your rhetoric is detrimental to your own goals, that must mean that someone is opposed to you expressing your opinions. They're just working for The Man, trying to keep you Down.

I-Like-To-Bike

It is about that time for the OP and like-minded Dudes/Dudettes to play the the "troll" or "personal attack" card.

Robert Foster

Building a straw man and poisoning the well doesn’t work unless your argument is convincing as well. The original post asked a hypothetical question that was supposed to draw and expected result. That didn’t happen so the assumption was made that the original post was simply an opinion and the poster was being attacked. None of that was true an alternative opinion was offered and a reasoning for that opinion. The alternate opinion is that we owe more to society than words. We should try to add a benefit to society in what we do not simply take a free ride. There is nothing wrong with working hard to try and build a future for your family or leave a physical inheritance for your children. I didn’t offer my opinion as the only standard but as an example of real dignity. If that opinion makes me a jerk I’ll accept that. But it seems as if I am more willing to learn from this forum than some.
Not long ago I was in a debate with someone in these forums and I had a more absolute concept of car free and green. After several pointed posts I realized that the whole idea is a movement towards a goal and not an absolute. My original opinion had to be modified because the reasoning of the opposing posted was sound. It is a concept of trying to understand the other person’s position and see the merits of their reasoning.
An attitude of self righteousness will always draw some alternative comments even if there is a grain of truth in it. But to declare yourself dignified and say others not doing as you do are not? What did you expect?