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Why is it so hard to get families to live in community houses?

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Re: Why is it so hard to get families to live in community houses?

#2
> Why is it so hard...

1) The article's portrayal of community living is rather idyllic.

2) To the Global Capitalist Profit Maximizer, community living is seriously sub-optimal. Ditto to aspiring members of the 0.01%, who can afford (or imagine) a "feudal lord" lifestyle - just themself and Mr./Mrs. Right, with a "community" of servants and servant-like outsourced labor services at their beck and call.

Re: Why is it so hard to get families to live in community houses?

#3
My parents had to share a house with a couple when I was a small child. It was not ideal. Shared kitchen. Other shared spaces. Unless you are all on the same page about things, you are basically taking on extra parents. Other people telling you how to do such and such in raising your child which may be ideas that you're not on par with. When you have your own home, you can amicably disagree and go to the privacy of your own house. When you live with these folks, the disagreement may not be as amicable especially if they see that you're not implementing their ideas of what they think is best for your child.

Then there is the whole issue of cleanliness. What one person thinks is clean could be light years away from what you think is clean and tidy. This would cause untold levels of stress and discomfort on both ends. I'd rather have my own domain even if its only a travel trailer, than share living space with a bunch of people continuously giving their "advice" on what they think is best.

Re: Why is it so hard to get families to live in community houses?

#5

My parents had to share a house with a couple when I was a small child. It was not ideal. Shared kitchen. Other shared spaces. Unless you are all on the same page about things, you are basically taking on extra parents. Other people telling you how to do such and such in raising your child which may be ideas that you're not on par with. When you have your own home, you can amicably disagree and go to the privacy of y…

Yup. Disagreements over tidiness, food, kitchen usage, what is appropriate for children, the list goes on and on. Different families come from different cultures, have different values, etc. It's incredibly difficult to find a bunch of other families you're "on the same page with" where you actually want to be co-parenting with and hanging out with all the time.

It's one thing when you all grow up together. There's a baseline level of compatibility and trust that can make it all work. But in today's world where you often have to move every five years for a job, or for a better school, etc., spontaneously joining groups of families and having it "just work" is a tall order.

Re: Why is it so hard to get families to live in community houses?

#6

My parents had to share a house with a couple when I was a small child. It was not ideal. Shared kitchen. Other shared spaces. Unless you are all on the same page about things, you are basically taking on extra parents. Other people telling you how to do such and such in raising your child which may be ideas that you're not on par with. When you have your own home, you can amicably disagree and go to the privacy of y…

Yup. Disagreements over tidiness, food, kitchen usage, what is appropriate for children, the list goes on and on. Different families come from different cultures, have different values, etc. It's incredibly difficult to find a bunch of other families you're "on the same page with" where you actually want to be co-parenting with and hanging out with all the time. It's one thing when you all grow up together. There's a…

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Re: Why is it so hard to get families to live in community houses?

#9
> And yet very few people raise their kids in community. In the US, 71% of children grow up in single family homes.

This is the fundamental misconception of the article. Living with your own family does not equate to being raised outside a community. Church, school, little league, etc. are all community networks that huge swaths of society participate in regularly.

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