The Problem with the Metropolis
I live in Los Angeles, one of the largest cities in the world. It’s not by choice - this is where my family planted itself about a century ago, after moving away from the farming life in rural Kansas, in search of better jobs and a better life.
More and more of the world is becoming urbanized, we’re told. More of the world is becoming like congested, smoggy Los Angeles.
There are plenty of great things about the city - plenty of choices for entertainment, dining, schools, etc. Contrast this with a small town, where the choices for entertainment are the local bar or the bowling alley, the choices for dining are Cafe #1 or Cafe #2, and where you only have one school to choose from, unless you want to drive out on the interstate 100 miles one-way.
Of course the main draw to the big city is the opportunity for jobs. As a result, rent is driven up and it forces single people to get together and share rent.
But what is the problem with the metropolis? It’s precisely the best and worst thing about the city: the fact that there’s so much choice. This is probably partly to blame for the high divorce rate in the US. Why stay together when you have literally millions of other options? This is also why it’s so easy to have an affair. If your spouse doesn’t satisfy you, all you have to do is leave your dwelling and confidently look for someone who WILL satisfy you.
I’ve always thought the metropolis was also harmful to organized religion. In the small rural town, the church would be the epicenter - the thing that brought everyone together. And you would have just one church. Contrast this with the big city - you have dozens of churches in your immediate area, and a lot more than that if you’re willing to drive a little farther. The free market capitalism that improves businesses in competition with each other in the city also affects churches. Why stay at this boring church, where the pastor rambles on and on and where the people are snobbish, when you can join a better church that’s a short distance away? In business, this prompts competition, but in terms of churches, this usually ends up in a mass exodus from one church to another, and the slow, eventual death of the former church.
In the small rural town, you were stuck with what you had. This was a bad thing, but this was also a good thing: if people have no other choice but to go to that church, then they might as well make the best of it and try to improve and contribute to that one church, to make it just a bit better.
The same with marriages: in a small rural town, there’s not a lot of selection for a spouse. If you are lucky enough to find one, you will bend over backwards to compromise and make the marriage work. Or you will simply be unsatisfied in a marriage, but will stay together for convenience, or for the children.
Nowadays, the city promotes the idea that if you’re unhappy with whatever you have, be it your job, your spouse, your church, your friends, etc, you can simply dispose of them and easily find new ones. How degrading, and how depressing to be a piece of human waste, used and then disposed of in favor of something else.
How can someone survive in such a hostile environment?