Mr. Moderate

The main thing that people get out of living in a close-knit community is an increased sense of security. If you live as a nuclear family, you necessarily fear that at any moment disaster could strike and devastate literally everything important to you. But if you have invested in a community, you know that you can count on support from that community should disaster ever strike your family. It is like an emotional insurance policy. And it is a key element of mental health.

Another aspect of security is old-age security. If you live as a nuclear family, and you and your spouse get old, sooner or later you will become incapable of taking care of yourself as an independent household. If you live in a close-knit sharing community, you know that the community members are there to help you live without needing to be warehoused away in an old age home. Your everyday home becomes your old age home through the care felt for your well being by the community you chose to live within.

Most importantly, lets think of the security of our children. In a nuclear family, only the actual parent(s) feel any sense of responsibility for their kids. In a close-knit community, any adult will feel free to stop a kid from doing something bad, or to protect any kid from danger. One of the big reasons we have retreated to the interiors of our dwellings as members of nuclear families is fear of what lies outside of our door. Living within a close-knit community eliminates that fear, as we know that everybody is watching everything and that nobody needs to fear anyone because we’ve all been screened by each other and the personal relationships we’ve established.

Of course, it can always be the case that a child molester can sneak in somehow, but with everybody watching out for all the kids, how long will it be before such a person is detected and expelled from the community? And perhaps even sent to jail for their actions?

Keeping out drug addicts and pushers will be another element of community security. And we will not allow strangers to just wander in and out unescorted, either. The idea of a “close-knit” community also implies a certain amount of exclusion for strangers. But only a certain amount, as we will all wish to have outside friends and family members over to visit.

And a final element of security will be better quality construction. People who live on the low end of the economic scale must generally accept poor quality construction (think “manufactured housing”), which is very unsafe in severe weather or other disaster situations. Commercial buildings are generally built to much higher standards, and withstand a lot more than what standard construction can withstand. Thus, the occupants of our community, through shared investment in higher-quality construction, will be much safer than would an equivalent number of people in an equivalent community of “affordable” houses.