Destroying the Aussie Backyard

Destroying the Aussie Backyard

A few days ago I was out delivering my political pamphlets when only a street away from my house I saw a development planning permit sign on a front lawn. I stopped to read it and it stated that planning permission had been sort to demolish the present house on the site and to build 6 double story units in it's place. Now the current house is no great shakes and in fact is quite unattractive. The 6 units will quite possibly be an improvement, visually. But I am against this "development".

Melbourne where I live is in many respects two cities, the old inner city suburbs are very much like a European city and the post war suburbs which are much more "American". By "American", I mean suburban like you see on American TV shows. A single house on a single block of land, surrounded by other houses on their own block of land. And much more car dependent than the inner city suburbs. One difference with America is it's quite rare for a house not to have a fence around it here.

Every suburb I have lived in has been a post war suburb, with good sized houses and big blocks of land, quarter acre blocks were the standard size on which post war houses were built. The house was big enough but certainly not "McMansions", but the back yards were huge. The people who lived in these suburban houses were families, a Father, a Mother and their children and pets, there were always pets around. It was in many respects the perfect environment in which to raise a family and to enjoy family life. I remember my Step-Father was quite a greenthumb and he would plant vegetables and my brother and I were paid a bounty for each moth we caught, to protect the vegetables. The lawn had fruit trees and when I was young we had ducks and chickens. I didn't live in the country but in an ordinary Australian working class suburban home. All around me were pleasant surroundings and some outstanding houses and gardens. Many of them are still around, in fact when I go delivering my pamphlets I see parts of my current suburb that are very nice.

But I wonder and worry about the future because the pressures on these houses and their backyards is increasing all the time. I have noticed a lot less pets than there used to be. Families have pets, families that do not struggle from week to week just to survive. Does the lack of pets mean that there are no families? Or does it mean that the families are gone and the parents are now older? Or does it mean that immigrants are now living there? In my experience immigrants for whatever reason don't have many pets, of course there are exceptions. I suspect that all of these things are happening.

Another thing I have noticed is just how many of the post war houses are gone, having been replaced by units. Once upon a time they were called flats, but now they are nearly always called units or townhouses. Normally individual houses built on a single block of land with no fences dividing them and a common driveway. All of the disadvantages of inner city living with all of the disadvantages of outer suburban living. As with the above example a single family home with a backyard for children and animals to play in are destroyed and replaced by 6 units. The units are great places for single people, lots of room, still good for a couple, but once you have children you might as well live in a high rise as in the suburbs. Housing that is designed to increase loneliness and to discourage families.

Of course the reason isn't that people demand it as the various levels of Government insist, and that the builders and developers say. The reason is because of failed social policies and money. The political parties push policies that encourage being alone, divorce and other failed marriage policies, feminism and other policies that encourage men and women to compete against each other. People find it hard to find a partner or to hang on to one. They don't demand smaller houses, instead they are left with no other option as they cannot afford to maintain a house and backyard by themselves. Then add to the mix immigration, wave after wave with no end in sight pushing up prices and making it harder to get either a rental property or to buy a home. Constant competition in every area of life. Then we have those who make money off of this misery, they claim they are simply doing what people want, they claim they are "developers", they claim that they are simple businessmen, big and small, who if they didn't do the job someone else would, maybe.

At every level money is pushing the pressure on housing, buy a single house, bulldozer it and sell 6 on the same land, how can you fail to make money? You might not get as much for each unit but in total you've made a killing. Not much to discourage this, smaller families, mean more money, no families just single people, means more money, then add immigration to the mix, wow how the money just makes it's self. Of course putting one family into a house is how the suburb was designed to function, but now 6 different households live on the same amount of land. Instead of one, maybe two family cars, you have closer to 6 cars. Now thats not a problem once or twice, but there is no sign of this ever stopping. All around here more family homes are destroyed and more units are built. The roads are not getting any wider, but the traffic is getting worse. Now multiply that by every suburb in Melbourne and you start to see just how insane this all is. Because of course this is not just happening a few streets away from me, but everywhere. The policies of Right Liberalism, that nothing should be allowed to get in the way of making money has joined hands with the social chaos of Left Liberalism to create more "freedom through loneliness".

Destroying the Aussie backyard is the symbol of a dying world, one I grew up in. The family that was once strong is destroyed. The working class that was once strong is destroyed. White Australia that was once strong is destroyed with it. The destruction is about more than just a backyard.


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