Small town folk

[SunriseChampion]

nowhere near nunavut holy fuck is that crazy where nunavuts at. 800 per 100000. Thats 8/1000 or almost 1/100. Thats way too high.

Yeah, I kinda tripped when you brought it up...if it was similar, it'd be a new development.

Still, double the provincial average is kinda fucked. (Saying something is "kinda fucked" always makes me think of Bubbles telling Ray: "Raaaay! Ripping out your plumbing for liquor money is kinda fucked!" )


Without getting into specifics about where you are (you've told me before), what do you think the reason for this is?

I can't say that meth has come back in the same way here. It's not like it was 15 years ago.

 

[Deru]

I grew up lucky though, lived 15min outside a very progressive liberal drug friendly town. So it was small town life with big city drugs.

You definitely got lucky. My experience was the exact opposite. I pretty much refuse to even go visit where I grew up, it takes a pretty big event for me to go back, and even then it's very difficult for me mentally and emotionally.

I find the city to be my home. It's where I finally learned who I was, where I found peace. It has everything I could ever want. I feel at peace here, not just externally but internally as well, and can't ever imagine it any other way.

 

[SunriseChampion]

I kind of reckon that those who, like me, grew up in big cities now look at small towns as the ideal and those who grew up in small towns view big cities as the ideal.

It's an interesting study in human psychology.

 

[Deru]

You may very well be onto something there. Especially for people like me who have negative associations from where we grew up, I pretty much would be perfectly content if I never stumbled into a small town for the rest of my life.

 

[Joey]

Yeah, I kinda tripped when you brought it up...if it was similar, it'd be a new development.

Still, double the provincial average is kinda fucked. (Saying something is "kinda fucked" always makes me think of Bubbles telling Ray: "Raaaay! Ripping out your plumbing for liquor money is kinda fucked!" )


Without getting into specifics about where you are (you've told me before), what do you think the reason for this is?

I can't say that meth has come back in the same way here. It's not like it was 15 years ago.

Meth is HUGE in my area. That and being in the middle of nowhere. Theres a culture thats pretty ass backward too. Its more right wing than usual and kinda stuck in the 80s so people are judged more and people are more likely to be closeted in some way like repressed. Not just talking about being gay I mean anything “different”.

on another topic, for the same reason, the few who do practice good self expression here, theres some amazing musicians and artists around to the point its astonishing for the low population we have.

 

[SunriseChampion]

You may very well be onto something there. Especially for people like me who have negative associations from where we grew up, I pretty much would be perfectly content if I never stumbled into a small town for the rest of my life.

I feel the same way about where I grew up. It was dying as a middle class neighbourhood in the 90s and we grew up poor, children of refugees. I don't live in the neighbourhood where I grew up anymore but some of my mates do and I don't like going there much anymore because it's only gotten more poor and the violent crime rate has gone through the roof since when I lived there.

We probably have entirely different negative associations with where we grew up but the aversion is similar.

 

[SunriseChampion]

Meth is HUGE in my area. That and being in the middle of nowhere. Theres a culture thats pretty ass backward too. Its more right wing than usual and kinda stuck in the 80s so people are judged more and people are more likely to be closeted in some way like repressed. Not just talking about being gay I mean anything “different”.

Yeah, I remember this from visiting both an ex-gf and bf who lived in the same town in SW Ontario. It was a bit jarring in a lot of ways at the time, but I felt comfortable....then again, I'm a fucking chameleon in some ways so I may be a bad example.

on another topic, for the same reason, the few who do practice good self expression here, theres some amazing musicians and artists around to the point its astonishing for the low population we have.

As an outsider, I find that small towns around here have a more vibrant artistic and entrepreneurial community than they did even ten years ago. Do you find this to be true?

 

[Joey]

Yeah, I remember this from visiting both an ex-gf and bf who lived in the same town in SW Ontario. It was a bit jarring in a lot of ways at the time, but I felt comfortable....then again, I'm a fucking chameleon in some ways so I may be a bad example.


As an outsider, I find that small towns around here have a more vibrant artistic and entrepreneurial community than they did even ten years ago. Do you find this to be true?

With the advent of social media exploding to a level that's even bigger than it was 10 years ago, I'd say yeah.

 

[SunriseChampion]

With the advent of social media exploding to a level that's even bigger than it was 10 years ago, I'd say yeah.

So, has that at all helped to shift the economic base, which is what I imagine the social problems are mostly caused by?

 

[Joey]

So, has that at all helped to shift the economic base, which is what I imagine the social problems are mostly caused by?

Tough question to answer. Can you expand on that?

 

[SunriseChampion]

Tough question to answer. Can you expand on that?

Well, SW Ontario's economy was mostly based on agriculture (which it still is) and manufacturing, but with the decline in manufacturing, I'm wondering if the increase in the arts and local entrepreneurship is helping recover the economy. Or was, before the plague hit, which is an anamolous set of circumstances anyway and hopefully has no bearing on the trend.

 

[Gormur]

No not nearly to Nunavuts level. I think I was misinformed too the suicide rate here in official statistics is actually just shy of double the provincial average. Read the 2019 report for my county. It is the leading cause of death for 15-24 and 25-44 age groups though.

nowhere near nunavut holy fuck is that crazy where nunavuts at. 800 per 100000. Thats 8/1000 or almost 1/100. Thats way too high.

I think Labrador has the highest rate of suicide but it was a while ago when I heard that on CBC. Well if wikipedia is right, then that couldn't be true and Nunavut has the highest; unless including NL skews the numbers in Labrador

 

[Joey]

Well, SW Ontario's economy was mostly based on agriculture (which it still is) and manufacturing, but with the decline in manufacturing, I'm wondering if the increase in the arts and local entrepreneurship is helping recover the economy. Or was, before the plague hit, which is an anamolous set of circumstances anyway and hopefully has no bearing on the trend.

I might not be the best person to answer this, but I’d say the economy precovid was depressed compared to a decade ago. Its a dead end here.

 

[Burnt Offerings]

Nunavut's suicide phenomena isn't at all unique when compared to other regions in the circumpolar north...for example, you can find similarly high rates of suicide in Alaska, Greenland etc.

I was friends with a guy up here (Alaska) who's father and best friend both committed suicide...his best friend with a shotgun, right in front of him! Life in the rural north gets rough sometimes.

 

[SunriseChampion]

Nunavut's suicide phenomena isn't at all unique when compared to other regions in the circumpolar north...for example, you can find similarly high rates of suicide in Alaska, Greenland etc.

Yeah, I know it's an arctic problem in general. Since you're up there, what do you think most contributes to it? The isolation? The lack of sun for large parts of the year?

 

[Burnt Offerings]

Yeah, I know it's an arctic problem in general. Since you're up there, what do you think most contributes to it? The isolation? The lack of sun for large parts of the year?

First off, let me just issue the disclaimer that I only have experience in Alaska, so anything said shouldn't necessarily be assumed to be true in Nunavut, Greenland, Siberia etc...other than to just say that the similarly high rates of suicide in many parts of the circumpolar north is an interesting phenomena

Alaska has some fairly serious social problems, suicide being one of them...but also high rates of rape, assault, domestic violence etc. It's routinely ranked among the most violent states in the USA. State and federal officials here frequently campaign on the issue of reducing Alaska's sky-high rate of sexual violence.

It frustrates me because I love this state and the people who live here, but those are difficult facts.

As far as why the situation exists, I think the answer is complex. Part of it is indeed environmental, I have no doubt about that...from my own perspective and experience, human beings were not meant to exist in long-term total darkness and be 100% mentally OK. Also, like you said, some of it has to do with isolation-induced "cabin fever" kinda stuff...the despair or angst that would lead someone to commit terrible acts of violence against themselves or others can't be entirely explained by as just a consequence of Alaska's extreme setting, though, IMO.

 

[Burnt Offerings]

Needless to say now, but yeah, I grew up in a small town. Like, hour-drive-down-a-dirt-road kinda small "town"

There's pros and cons with small towns, like with anything. For me, one of the big pros is the fact that there's just less people. LOL. It's as simple as that for me.

 

[SunriseChampion]

As far as why the situation exists, I think the answer is complex. Part of it is indeed environmental, I have no doubt about that...from my own perspective and experience, human beings were not meant to exist in long-term total darkness and be 100% mentally OK.

I don't know, as far as we know, the Inuit have lived there for thousands of years without these issues until the last century or less. Whether or not the problem was there but not documented, I don't know.

Anyway, any small-towners want to trade places with me for a year, I'm down!

 

[December Flower]

Moving from a small village to an even smaller village was a big transaction for me.

The first thing you learn is: There's more cows than humans now, instead of a healthy 50/50 rate.

The second thing is: Now you have to walk 30 minutes to reach a gas station instead of 20 minutes, but don't you think it's open 24hours a day like in a town, it's closed at 9PM instead of 10PM now and closed on Sat & Sunday.

The third thing is: If you listened to loud music yesterday evening, the baker will know, and he will hate you for it. Also everyone else will know, and unless you're playing Bavarian folk music, they do not like it.

The fourth thing: You think you're in Germany, so trains will run super scheduled. Well ..they don't. Especially in the winter the train can and will be up to 3 hours late, so plan carefully. There's a bus 2 times a day that can lead you to civilization. This is the only reliable means of transportation. Do not miss the bus.

The fifth thing: If you get milk from the farm, and don't put 2€ in the money-bin, the farmer will know. There's no way to rationally explain it, there's no cameras in the room, the farmer doesn't even know what a camera is. But he will know. He has a sixth sense for milk-thievery.

And last but not least: Make your shopping before the weekend or you will not be able to get any food, and have to get it delivered from the next town over(that is not a 10-house village) which is 30 minutes by car and costs like 40 bucks for a pizza and a coke.

 

[SunriseChampion]

^^^That's sounds fucking awesome.

I'm telling you guys, trade any time. I will trade this human zoo for whatever "boring" and quiet paradise you speak of.