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City residents live with mental illness at higher rates than general population

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Re: City residents live with mental illness at higher rates than general population

#51

Post by camjohnson26 »

magduf wrote: post #44
jackcosgrove wrote: post #21

Every time I visit my relatives in their rural area, I feel a sense of liberation. The air is cleaner, there is less noise, you can hear the breeze, and even the sky seems bigger. You can see the Milky Way at night. Coming from a city, it's a relief. However I also know the dark side of rural areas, mainly substance abuse triggered by boredom and lack of opportunity. There is always a trade-off.

That's not my experience with rural areas at all. Instead, it's usually pretty noisy because of all the neighbors with barking dogs (yes, there are neighbors in rural areas; most people can't afford 40 acres all to themselves, so they live in little clusters), and it stinks because of the cow and horse manure. Just hope you're not located close to a pig farm. And of course there's all the noisy trucks everyone drives…

I smell more sewage in the city I live in than cow manure or pig farms visiting the rural areas.

Re: City residents live with mental illness at higher rates than general population

#52

Post by CompanionCuuube »

magduf wrote: post #45
dsfyu404ed wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People will do all sorts of things that aren't good for their mental and/or physical health in order to make a decent living. I would wager that the overwhelming majority of people moving from rural to urban areas are doing it to better their bank accounts.

It's not to "better their bank accounts", it's to survive, because people need jobs to make money, and money to survive. Modern people can't support themselves on rural land any more, and even 100+ years ago ones who tried had short and unhappy lives (remember sharecropping?). There aren't enough jobs in rural areas to support the people there, so they leave.

That's another point for why universal basic income is needed. It reduces perverse incentives that make people unhealthier.

Re: City residents live with mental illness at higher rates than general population

#53

Post by logjammin »

magduf wrote: post #44
jackcosgrove wrote: post #21

Every time I visit my relatives in their rural area, I feel a sense of liberation. The air is cleaner, there is less noise, you can hear the breeze, and even the sky seems bigger. You can see the Milky Way at night. Coming from a city, it's a relief. However I also know the dark side of rural areas, mainly substance abuse triggered by boredom and lack of opportunity. There is always a trade-off.

That's not my experience with rural areas at all. Instead, it's usually pretty noisy because of all the neighbors with barking dogs (yes, there are neighbors in rural areas; most people can't afford 40 acres all to themselves, so they live in little clusters), and it stinks because of the cow and horse manure. Just hope you're not located close to a pig farm. And of course there's all the noisy trucks everyone drives…

It's a weird fetishization, isn't it? I think that's a really good point. Dovetails with political movements that idealize(d) the working man/class, as if poor people couldn't be as flawed and human as the rest of us.

It's pretty bold to be talking about cities and mental health when about five minutes in a small town will vividly show you the backstabbing, gossipy, popularity contest bullshit that comes with "closely knit communities" of all types. Like someone said, it's all a big trade-off. Human beings can go thoroughly nuts anywhere they lay their heads.

Re: City residents live with mental illness at higher rates than general population

#54

Post by esoterica »

sdegutis wrote: post #35
jackcosgrove wrote: post #21

Every time I visit my relatives in their rural area, I feel a sense of liberation. The air is cleaner, there is less noise, you can hear the breeze, and even the sky seems bigger. You can see the Milky Way at night. Coming from a city, it's a relief. However I also know the dark side of rural areas, mainly substance abuse triggered by boredom and lack of opportunity. There is always a trade-off.

That's not a trade-off. You have the exact same substance abuse in suburbs and cities. It's a universal problem.

The substance abuse epidemic is much worse in some places than others. Saying it’s exactly the same everywhere is disingenuous.

Re: City residents live with mental illness at higher rates than general population

#55

Post by esoterica »

dsfyu404ed wrote: post #34
jackcosgrove wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not direct evidence, but people continue to move away from rural areas and into cities all over the world, to better themselves.

People will do all sorts of things that aren't good for their mental and/or physical health in order to make a decent living. I would wager that the overwhelming majority of people moving from rural to urban areas are doing it to better their bank accounts.

Rural doctors get paid more than urban ones (even though their COL is far lower) because most doctors don’t want to live in rural areas. They choose to live in the cities despite the financial incentives, not because of them.

Re: City residents live with mental illness at higher rates than general population

#56

Post by sdegutis »

esoterica wrote: post #54
sdegutis wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not a trade-off. You have the exact same substance abuse in suburbs and cities. It's a universal problem.

The substance abuse epidemic is much worse in some places than others. Saying it’s exactly the same everywhere is disingenuous.

I'm not saying it's the same everywhere, but I'm also saying it's not worse in one type of area than in others. I've seen it to all degrees in all three types of areas.

Re: City residents live with mental illness at higher rates than general population

#57

Post by esoterica »

eslaught wrote: post #8
challenger22 wrote: post #3

>In fact, the Centre for Urban Design and Mental Health estimates that city dwellers face a nearly 40 percent higher risk of depression, 20 percent higher chance of anxiety, and double the risk of schizophrenia than people living in rural areas. >In their review, Meyer-Lindenberg and van den Bosch found that some potential threats had been examined more thoroughly than others. For some, including pollen, there wasn’t…

Consider: for pretty much any animal I'm aware of, there's a notion of the minimum amount of space it needs to live normally. Somehow for people we've convinced ourselves that there is no such minimum (or it's so small as to be absurd).

Why are you narcissistic enough to believe that your idea of the “minimum amount of space” is the canonically correct one, and that city dwellers are idiots who don’t know how to live their lives correctly?

Re: City residents live with mental illness at higher rates than general population

#58

Post by esoterica »

challenger22 wrote: post #3

>In fact, the Centre for Urban Design and Mental Health estimates that city dwellers face a nearly 40 percent higher risk of depression, 20 percent higher chance of anxiety, and double the risk of schizophrenia than people living in rural areas. >In their review, Meyer-Lindenberg and van den Bosch found that some potential threats had been examined more thoroughly than others. For some, including pollen, there wasn’t…

Just because you don’t like city living doesn’t mean living in a city is inherently stressful. You’re projecting your idiosyncratic preferences into everyone else and pretending you speak on behalf of the entire human race.

Re: City residents live with mental illness at higher rates than general population

#59

Post by esoterica »

nradov wrote: post #19
gumby wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But within a species (I'm thinking of human's naturally) there seem to be cultural variances.

Some cultures have learned to tolerate minimal personal space as a necessary evil. But when people from those cultures get wealthy they almost always choose to buy more space and privacy.

That is an untrue generalization. Every large city has several high income, high density neighborhoods where wealthy people live when they prefer shorter commutes and access to amenities to larger living spaces.

Re: City residents live with mental illness at higher rates than general population

#60

Post by crx07 »

magduf wrote: post #44
jackcosgrove wrote: post #21

Every time I visit my relatives in their rural area, I feel a sense of liberation. The air is cleaner, there is less noise, you can hear the breeze, and even the sky seems bigger. You can see the Milky Way at night. Coming from a city, it's a relief. However I also know the dark side of rural areas, mainly substance abuse triggered by boredom and lack of opportunity. There is always a trade-off.

That's not my experience with rural areas at all. Instead, it's usually pretty noisy because of all the neighbors with barking dogs (yes, there are neighbors in rural areas; most people can't afford 40 acres all to themselves, so they live in little clusters), and it stinks because of the cow and horse manure. Just hope you're not located close to a pig farm. And of course there's all the noisy trucks everyone drives…

Thank you so much for making the counterpoint. I grew up in a rural setting and would give just about anything to take back that loss of years of my life.

A few extras:

* You can't exercise, because dogs don't just bark but also chase you, and no one cares or thinks you're the asshole for complaining because you're in the country.

* Daily life is /very/ stressful. Forgot milk? Well, fuck you, buddy, because you're either doing without it or you're making a 50 minute round-trip that costs $8 extra in fuel. Want a pizza delivered? Nope. Chinese? Hahah. Need someone to come out and provide service? Oh, sorry, the first five places on Yelp don't serve your area. Grandma's calling? Sorry, but you're going to have to get used to repeating things not just once or twice but also a third and fourth time because that one bar of signal isn't going to cut it.

* Depression, drug use, and other adverse coping strategies are literally epidemic -- my entire neighborhood of stable working adults where I grew up all ended up on some combination of meth/oxycontin/xanax/antidepressants with alcohol use in excess of anything I ever see at 2 am throughout the nightlife districts of a top 10 US city.

* Oh, do you think you might need to get actual mental help? Well, those handful of upstanding people who aren't addicts are now going to be judging the hell out of you. Most conditions are just you being weak minded or morally inept. And don't even think about talking to someone or others about your thoughts, because that's not something you do. (And if it's sadness, fear, anxiety, or hallucinations, expect to have everyone suggest spurious religious interpretations instead of physical explanations, which, honestly, as a devout Christian, I now find really damaging both to peoples mental and spiritual health.)

* Friendships are forged as a practical proximal matter and not by choice. No one else benefits your mind or academic or professional achievement, and you probably won't share common interests -- you're buddies because Larry's the most likable dude on your block. In fact, even among friends, most people hold a majority of views that you find seriously revolting, and very few people appreciate any kind of artistic or intellectual activity of any kind. Romantic relationships are even less glamorous.

* Did we go over your essentials yet? Oh, wait, that'll be $70/mo for 1.5Mbps DSL that can't stream Netflix. The water bill will be double any reasonable amount and wastewater is processed in your back yard and at your own expense/peril. If you aren't lucky, you may even need your own well. You'll also have to burn trash or contract a company to come take it. Groceries and house supplies cost 30-50% more per quantity, and you have very little to no selection.

* Trash, everywhere. This alone makes me question anyone who thinks mental health is in any way better in a rural environment. It's sick having to look at collapsing, skirtless mobile homes and junk cars and scrap materials strewn across 15 peoples lawns on the way to the gas station. Any "green space" consists of trespassing behind barbed wire instead of a neatly maintained park.

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