“Stadtliche luft macht man frei” is an old German saying. City air makes you free. Life in a small town can be stifling. That close-knit family wants you to be just like them. God forbid you want to do or see anything new. The moving-to-a-big-city trope is as old as cinema, and has strong roots in reality.
In the middle-ages in at least in what is now Estonia, if you ecaped to the city and lived there for a year and a day you would be set free from your serfdom. “Linna õhk teeb vabaks” same frase was used for that.
“Stadtluft macht frei” but yes, everything else is spot on.
I agree with the sentiment, but Germans have a horrible track record on what makes you free.
Came here to try to make this joke. You did better than I could have, I was trying to create a Germanic folk hero named Arvid McFry
The prefix “Mc” or “Mac” is Celtic anyway, not Germanic, so you failed in that sense too.
And Arvid is Scandinavian. That’s why I didn’t do it.
Because movies like that belong on the “Lifetime TV” or “Hallmark Channel”. It’s been done. Maybe yet another “Can’t fix stupid” reductionist country wisdom beats city slicker smarts? Or make fun of city people who don’t know how to ride a horse?
That, or nobody wants to watch movies with people sitting around bonfires drinking cheap beer on your truck tailgate.
I grew up rural. It isn’t that exciting.
I grew up in a place that had more cows than people. Now it has more heroin than cows. I’d be dead if I didn’t get out. Real rural life where you’re working for a living eats people alive. What you want isn’t that, it’s this ideal where everything is simple and paid for and you’re distant from the things you don’t like about actually living in a community with people but all the amenities of that life are still immediately to hand. When someone you love dies because it takes an hour for an ambulance to get to your house, that is the rural life that’s actually out there to be had.
When someone you love dies because it takes an hour for an ambulance to get to your house, that is the rural life that’s actually out there to be had.
Or they don’t call an ambulance because they cannot afford the $5000 bill.
That’s also a very fair concern that isn’t limited to rural areas but tends to hit them extra hard.
Don’t forget your private jet to get back to civilization when you’d like some decent medical treatment, something other than satellite TV, or a dinner of better quality than whatever restaurant is next to the truck stop.
Yeah I was gonna say, the “city boy/girl goes to the country and finds themselves” trope is honestly way more overdone than the “country boy/girl goes to the city to find themselves” variety
Eh, my friend actually did that. I assumed that she had some sort of awful family she was running from, but actually they’re nice and she visits them on holidays. She just wanted to be in the big city so much that she was willing to rent a single room in a bad neighborhood and constantly look for odd jobs rather than live out in the countryside with her parents.
It’s a sense of adventure and wanting to try new things. I grew up in a very small town, lived in a couple large cities (not Chicago, but you would get robbed every once in awhile and hear some gun shots). I currently live in a medium size city a few states from where I grew up and it’s depressing to me than going home and seeing the people who have never even tried anything else.
I mean I can imagine the dating prospects are really terrible in the countryside, noone talked about that yet.
Dodging accidental incest is basically the most popular sport where I grew up.
Joking aside, where I grew up there were certain “clans” as we only somewhat jokingly refered to them. Basically large interconnected family units that were usually dominated by a single central family with smaller branch off families on the periphery. Dating someone within your clan wasn’t necissarily off limits because that person may not actually be related to you, but if you were in the same clan then you knew your families were very closely linked and you have to be careful. If you wanted to be safe though then you just date someone from outside your clan. Basically if you mention the last name of that central family and they don’t recognize it, then you’re usually good; if they do recognize it then you need to do some more digging.
in a bad neighborhood
If it’s not built after 2000, then the only reason it is bad is because people think it is.
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surrounded by weird people
Have you ever set foot in a city?
Yes, and I’ll tell ya what, I ain’t yet felt like if I stayed over too long the locals were gonna start raising some planks and rope like I do if I even look like I’ve so much as thought of walking into the gas station store to get a bottle of water out in the countryside.
Those rural folks want me dead just for existing and what I believe about the world ain’t doing many favors to that inclination.
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It’s probably not that extreme most of the time, but there are plenty of sundown towns in the rural US. If the other poster is a minority it can certainly get ugly just by them being there at any time. Just because it isn’t nighttime doesn’t mean that they will necessarily refrain from targeting them.
Hell, even being a white man who doesn’t look like a local can get nasty looks and unwanted attention. I’d say it’s risky to be there for anyone who doesn’t have a local traveling with them.
No, but things can totally get ugly
Countryside has more weird people per capita.
Can confirm. Grew up in the hellhole that is rural America. Will never go back.
Like you don’t find tons of weird people in Cities.
Being clear, living in the sticks for 42 years of my life wasn’t ideal. That is unless you like living in a dry county surrounded by narrow-minded, puritanical shitbirds that were working OT to make sure people either went to church, or publicly shame them if they weren’t. There was also the in crowds that held people back or elevated them, depending on which family you were related to.
I do miss the hunting and fishing, though I can head back any time I want to do that. Meanwhile, I’ll stay where I can maintain my chill by having copious resources readily available when I want them, and enough anonymity to enjoy them without anyone asking me where I was last Sunday.
Your spiel reminds me of Dylan Moran’s stand-up bit about country life.
She had 275 siblings. Getting away from that farm was the smartest thing she’s ever done. She has no hope of any kind of meaningful inheritance. I’m honestly surprised a farm could support that many rabbits and still turn any kind of profit. It must have been subsidized out the wazoo. The last thing it needs is her hanging around, getting hitched to some redneck just out of high school, popping out a couple hundred hungry mouths of her own right before the inevitable foreclosure and declaration of martial law as the farmpocalypse occurs when her parents finally kick it and the tens-of-thousands of children, grandchildren, and great grandchildren raze the countryside in search of fodder. Just ask an Australian what rabbits are capable of.
Why do we accept that urban life is worse than rural life?
Ignorance plain and simple. Most people nowadays live their whole lives in big urban centers, they have an idealistic view of country life and take the conveniences of city life for granted. City life can suck, I won’t deny it, but living in bumfuck nowhere also has it’s major drawbacks.
In some cases it is.
I live on an acre about 100 miles from the nearest sizable city. I’ve got a workshop, pecan trees, a pool, a smoker trailer, a bonfire pit fifteen feet across, and lots of peace and quiet. No HOA, no city ordinances, no traffic, and the only loud neighbor is a donkey that brays a few times a day.
That would cost me at least half a million in the city. The little apartment I used to rent Pre-COVID cost me nearly as much as the house payment I pay now.
Is it for everyone? No. There’s no excitement, limited shopping and dining options, and anywhere I want to go is at least a twenty minute drive. But it’s great for me. My job sends me all over the world so I get my fill of the city while living in hotels. Going home is a breath of fresh air.
Because these characters are usually young and cities are exciting. Wanting to get away from people tends to happen later in life. That said, I know plenty of people in their 40s/50s who love city living.
Yeah people want excitement from movies and TV and country life is usually quiet and might be considered boring for movies or TV programs or just wouldn’t be considered interesting by most younger people.
It’s not even that complicated… the vast majority of people that make up the consumer market live in urban environments.
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Wow, good call. The highlight there is:
Urban consumers (may) spend more money.
Her dream was to be a cop. Having it be a low paying career, living in a small apartment, and being away from friends and family are things we call sacrifices.
She wasn’t bigoted enough to become a small town cop so she had to become a city cop.
Despite that most incidents of racial profiling occur within the city where a multi-racial ecosystem is more prevalent and the cops don’t even live in the city they police. But sure.
Lives my ideal life
Ftfy
I’ve lived in high urban, low urban, suburban, and rural. They all have pros and cons.
If you’re dating tho, the city is way better, but good luck finding practice space - if you’re into that sort of thing.
You know, after leaving the country: I really don’t mind losing connection with my racist family members joking about how “dropped nickels stay on the ground since picking them up is worthless.”
And I certainly don’t miss them and others bashing my gay friends for being different.
The open country has a lot of potential, but unfortunately a lot of people outside of the metropolitan are dumb and shit and stay prejudiced out of comfort and having no reason to learn.
Into the Wild was kind of the inverse of this. Obviously it didn’t work out for the guy, but why does it have to? He had an idea he wanted to achieve and followed his dreams
