Dearest readers, you may have noticed by now that I have a unique mind. I like to talk to people, listen to podcasts, consume other content and then think about it alone, by myself, and then choose topics to put down on the digital page. Recently, I saw a new movie on Netflix called Where the Crawdads sing. Before you run away, gentlemen (because it is a chick flick of sorts and many of you run away when those come up haha), remember that I latch onto unusual topics and different angles from what you would expect, and that I would not bring this topic to you if I did not have an enticing idea to share. So, as it happens, out of all the different themes throughout the movie, I latched onto a theme most of the target demographic for this movie would not even notice- a theme that concerns us all in 2022 and beyond- housing! How? What? Why? Well, read on and you will find out :)
The movie begins with a family- mom, dad and a few kids- the youngest of which is Kya, our protagonist. They live in a house on a large property in North Carolina's coastal marshland. They could have had a happy life, except the father had some pretty bad PTSD from serving in WW2 and, having been taught to bottle it up, his mental state devolved into alcoholism, anger and domestic violence. The violence was so bad that his wife left him, and then all kids but Kya left one by one before they even hit 18! Rough times back then, though I am sure this happens today as well :( Kya spends some time with her dad and learns to live with him, he calms down for a while, but then a letter from his estranged wife makes him break down, he freaks out and eventually leaves. Kya, barely an adolescent, is left alone in the family home on her family land. Luckily, she is smart and has some skills to start fending for herself, selling crabs to a local store where the family who operates it looks in on her from time to time and hides the fact she lives alone from social services and the like.
Now, you may ask what this has to do with Canada and USA- I guess- in 2022 and beyond. What did I latch onto early on in the movie? Well, this will blow your mind- I hope. Kya, barely an adolescent, has managed to live alone, make some money, and raise herself into a fine young lady because she had one thing most of us do not in 2022- A FREE/PAID OFF ROOF OVER HER HEAD!!! So I am sitting there, watching the damn movie, and I am like so wait, if you do not have to pay mortgage or rent, even an adolescent living by herself in 1960's North Carolina can potentially make it! Then, I look at what is goddamn happening in North America. Rising home prices; rising rents; Canadian municipalities near big cities with tons of land not allowing smaller houses to be built; ultimate despair and disbelief now, homelessness in old age as many people's RRSP/401K contributions are instead going into housing costs. So, with practically free housing, even a little girl can make it. With insane rents and mortgages, even adult well educated people end up struggling their entire lives.
Now, I am not advocating for free housing or housing as a human right- I am obviously not qualified nor do I want to talk about the pros and cons of that. What I do want to talk about is how dangerous it is to put people's shelter under question- many people's shelter, in fact. I have people tell me interesting things. I have a friend who has been saying for years that she would rather have zero amenities in her condo building if it meant lower rent. I have people who live in the suburbs and say they would take a dilapidated old bungalow over their home if all they had to pay was home insurance, property tax and utilities. Tiktok, for all its faults, is (informatively) full of memes where people are saying how they thought they would have it all by the age of 30 and then they cry laugh at the thought.
What I believe is the worst thing about this is the fact that it is making our society become too competitive. Is competition not a good thing? Is it not the fountain of progress and all these other good things? Well, not after a certain point. The more you are pushed to compete, the more you sharpen your skills. When skills are no longer enough, you sharpen your claws and you do everything and anything under the sun to make it happen, you push people behind you so they fall off a cliff that is constantly eroding behind all of our backs.
There are increasingly prominent voices out there that tell us the methods many of us are now choosing to stay ahead of the erosion are the result of our society's moral decline and so on. Onlyfans, sugar babies, crypto scams, stock pump and dumps, dropshipping pump and dumps, social media shills... some people say all of these things are signs of morally bankrupt times. I beg to differ. When the middle class starts shrinking, many people adopt the Moon or bust mentality, whereas previously they would have chosen the middle path. Who is responsible for keeping the middle path alive? Those in charge, I think.
So tell me, what would you do if your rent or mortgage payment was 50 percent lower than what it is right now? Or, what would you do if you only had to pay home insurance, property tax and utilities?
The movie begins with a family- mom, dad and a few kids- the youngest of which is Kya, our protagonist. They live in a house on a large property in North Carolina's coastal marshland. They could have had a happy life, except the father had some pretty bad PTSD from serving in WW2 and, having been taught to bottle it up, his mental state devolved into alcoholism, anger and domestic violence. The violence was so bad that his wife left him, and then all kids but Kya left one by one before they even hit 18! Rough times back then, though I am sure this happens today as well :( Kya spends some time with her dad and learns to live with him, he calms down for a while, but then a letter from his estranged wife makes him break down, he freaks out and eventually leaves. Kya, barely an adolescent, is left alone in the family home on her family land. Luckily, she is smart and has some skills to start fending for herself, selling crabs to a local store where the family who operates it looks in on her from time to time and hides the fact she lives alone from social services and the like.
Now, you may ask what this has to do with Canada and USA- I guess- in 2022 and beyond. What did I latch onto early on in the movie? Well, this will blow your mind- I hope. Kya, barely an adolescent, has managed to live alone, make some money, and raise herself into a fine young lady because she had one thing most of us do not in 2022- A FREE/PAID OFF ROOF OVER HER HEAD!!! So I am sitting there, watching the damn movie, and I am like so wait, if you do not have to pay mortgage or rent, even an adolescent living by herself in 1960's North Carolina can potentially make it! Then, I look at what is goddamn happening in North America. Rising home prices; rising rents; Canadian municipalities near big cities with tons of land not allowing smaller houses to be built; ultimate despair and disbelief now, homelessness in old age as many people's RRSP/401K contributions are instead going into housing costs. So, with practically free housing, even a little girl can make it. With insane rents and mortgages, even adult well educated people end up struggling their entire lives.
Now, I am not advocating for free housing or housing as a human right- I am obviously not qualified nor do I want to talk about the pros and cons of that. What I do want to talk about is how dangerous it is to put people's shelter under question- many people's shelter, in fact. I have people tell me interesting things. I have a friend who has been saying for years that she would rather have zero amenities in her condo building if it meant lower rent. I have people who live in the suburbs and say they would take a dilapidated old bungalow over their home if all they had to pay was home insurance, property tax and utilities. Tiktok, for all its faults, is (informatively) full of memes where people are saying how they thought they would have it all by the age of 30 and then they cry laugh at the thought.
What I believe is the worst thing about this is the fact that it is making our society become too competitive. Is competition not a good thing? Is it not the fountain of progress and all these other good things? Well, not after a certain point. The more you are pushed to compete, the more you sharpen your skills. When skills are no longer enough, you sharpen your claws and you do everything and anything under the sun to make it happen, you push people behind you so they fall off a cliff that is constantly eroding behind all of our backs.
There are increasingly prominent voices out there that tell us the methods many of us are now choosing to stay ahead of the erosion are the result of our society's moral decline and so on. Onlyfans, sugar babies, crypto scams, stock pump and dumps, dropshipping pump and dumps, social media shills... some people say all of these things are signs of morally bankrupt times. I beg to differ. When the middle class starts shrinking, many people adopt the Moon or bust mentality, whereas previously they would have chosen the middle path. Who is responsible for keeping the middle path alive? Those in charge, I think.
So tell me, what would you do if your rent or mortgage payment was 50 percent lower than what it is right now? Or, what would you do if you only had to pay home insurance, property tax and utilities?