Frick. I moved into a house from being in apartments for many years and I have to say, lawn and Garden work, suuuuucccckkksss.
I hate it. I have too much to do to deal with your… Growth.
Can I replace my lawn with an emo lawn so it cuts itself?
Large grass lawns were a sign of wealth and power for the aristocracy and gentry from the feudal system. When they had large numbers of serfs working their small plots of land and paid a tithe to the landowners it meant that their land could be turned over from agriculture to pleasure.
Growing a big, unproductive, biologically inactive lawn is basically saying “I have so many peasants I don’t need to grow vegetables” and then morphed into the quasi status symbol we have today for suburbanites to complain about each other’s while the planet dies around them.
I was walking across some grass recently and noticed I liked how it was soft and spongy. So I look up how to achieve that for the grass sitting area in my garden. Turns out every lawncare guide says this is terrible and you need to fix it.
Why? Soft and spongy grass sounds like a dream!
The lawncare guides tell me that I need to spend 3 figure sums on machinery to remove it. I tell them to go fuck themselves.
You think that’s bad? Allow me to introduce you to rock yards. I’m slowly getting rid of mine but removing several dump truck loads of gravel is hard work.
Ugh we have people doing that in our neighborhood and it’s godawful. I think they think they’re “xeriscaping” but this is Arkansas and the incredibly hot sun makes those rocks too hot to touch or stand on (for my doggo), kills the plants that are planted near it, etc. But they aren’t going to admit their mistake and undo it.
Mine was fully concrete paved when I moved in. I know the pain of moving a shitload of rubble.
I got a nasty letter from an anonymous coward complaining about how I keep my lawn.
I dont give two shits about the grass. Bare minimum is all it gets. I also did a round of overseeding with microclover. All the retired boomers in my neighborhood have nothing better to do than dick around with their lawns.
I have every intention of making mine into a meadow or something. Need to figure out what I can get away with.
In the meantime, I will be making a Halloween display that will feature skeletons sitting on top of some pallets (letter writer was mad that I had one leaning against my trash can for a week) with trash cans and a whole bunch of weeds and crap. I also have a spare tire that was used to secure a transmission I bought down to the pallet. I also still have the broken transmission.
The whole mess will be going into the front yard, skeletons will get trucker hats, beer bottles and maybe a banjo.
I can’t wait!
One of the things that bothers me more than it should is people responding to actual problems with “but i like it”.
You say something like “a ‘basic’ lawn like that is bad for the environment in many ways, in addition to being labor intensive.”
They respond with something that amounts to, “But I like it.”
That wasn’t the question! If someone likes murder that doesn’t justify it, right? Because if so this conversation would take a very abrupt turn. So we can infer that there must be some other justification. Probably, “I don’t care about other people”, which remains an insufficient justification for murdering a whining selfish prick.
This is also very easily flipped though.
If you are rewilding your lawn “because you like it” but signed an agreement to maintain the lawn and house to a certain specification, then complain about enforcement when you don’t keep up your end, YTA.
With respect to murdering, there is a social contract or a legal “contract” that says you absolutely can’t, so this argument obviously doesn’t work. “Because I like it” only holds up when there’s no contact at all and then it goes both ways. “Actual problem” has to be agreed in advance of complaining about taking action or not.
I imagine most people who are rewilding their lawn are doing so for environmental reasons, which I consider more valid than mere personal preference. If someone was doing so for mere aesthetics, maybe.
With respect to murdering, there is a social contract or a legal “contract” that says you absolutely can’t, so this argument obviously doesn’t work.
That’s kind of the point. The reason why you don’t murder isn’t merely because you like it. There are actual reasons. Personal preference alone is not sufficient to override reasons like social contracts and laws and stuff. So if one side of the argument is “this is good for the environment”, the other side saying “but I like it” should not be compelling.
It is compelling to some people when they consider stuff like the environment non-issues on the same level as personal preferences. Those people are assholes.
All well and good I suppose, but you realize you’re also projecting your value system onto other people, right?
Are you a vegan?
Do you have a car?
Have you voted in every possible election?
Ever bought Nestle products? Or something that was available locally but you got it from a super chain instead?
Etc etc.
Why?
If any of your answers are “because it is or isn’t convenient, or you just like it or want to” you’ve stepped into the same situation you’re arguing against. One side of each of those is that is is (or isn’t) good for the environment, for society, for community, or similar. Everybody does at least one thing that either isn’t good because of our priorities which are generally “things we want” when there are good reasons to do something else. If the worst thing someone does is has a lawn, well, the infractions could be much worse. Like killing others, to beat a dead zebra.
Sure it seems wonky when you spotlight it in isolation, but we are all fighting our “biggest issue” and rewilding doesn’t have to be that issue unilaterally.
I will admit when doing something like buying from an evil corporation that I’m making a trade off. I won’t pretend it’s fine. I try to acknowledge it.
It’s impossible to live in the modern world without participating in exploitation. This phone was probably made in ways that hurt the environment and labor. But I need a phone to participate in modern life. So I got one, and try to hold onto it as long as possible.
I think there’s a big difference between trying, and acknowledging tradeoffs and shortcomings, and just refusing to engage. “But I like it” is refusing to engage. I would respect “I know this milk comes from cruelty to cows, but I don’t care about cows” more. At least it’s honest.
And these people that “like it” also really like telling you how you need to manage yours because you are not spending enough on bullshit lawn treatments.
“Oh my god having a lawn isn’t murder you’re being dramatic!” - some small-minded buffoon who doesn’t understand analogies.
They probably couldn’t even explain why they like it, and about the only truly valid reason that isn’t just social conditioning is “I like do yardwork” but then wouldn’t a big nice garden be 1000x bettee for that? Oh, right, you can’t just sit on a big lawnmower and pretend like you’re doing real work.
“Oh my god having a lawn isn’t murder you’re being dramatic!” - some small-minded buffoon who doesn’t understand analogies.
So many people seem to really struggle with analogies. Sometimes I think they’re just responding to the emotional content, and not following the reasoning at all
Pumpkins
I know this meme comm, but anyone have good resources on how to not be a part of this statistic?
r/nolawns
c/nolawns
Joey Santore’s got you!
Crime Pays But Botany Doesn’t. One of the best YouTube channels
I appreciate the call out that a natural replacement of local plants is low maintenance, not NO maintenance. The front of your house doesn’t have to look like you died in the bathtub the winter before.
I bet our Lemmy comrades on https://slrpnk.net/ have a handle on it
https://xerces.org/ may have info you are looking for. Depending on where you live you may be able to find seeds of local flowering plants that do well as a lawn replacement, for example: https://northwestmeadowscapes.com/
Shout-out to Native American Seed Company in Junction, TX for all your native grass and wildflower needs in the south and southwest
What? You don’t like glyphosate in your everything?
My heart says no but the microplastics in my brain say glifos ate.
