# Do rural people understand urban people/issues better or vice versa? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [November 9, 2018, 3:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-rural-people-understand-urban-people-issues-better-or-vice-versa/824244 "2018-11-09T15:25:34Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![BrickBat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ac91a4/32.png) [@BrickBat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrickBat)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2018, 8:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-rural-people-understand-urban-people-issues-better-or-vice-versa/824244/61 "2018-11-14T20:55:09Z")
> [@HMS\_Irruncible](#): > > For urban people, our lifestyle is a fact of life, not bound up in our identity. We’re not waving a flag saying “I eat sushi, I am economically interdependent on others, worship my lifestyle.” > > As I see it, rural people see themselves as more virtuous just by not living in the city, and just by having hobbies like hunting or gun ownership or farming (yes, it’s a hobby, and a government-subsidized one at that). I’ve found this exact dynamic to be the case, based on my observations among those I work with. Our workplace is on the extreme outer edge of a medium size city’s metro area, with most living in the metro area, and others who live in exurbia and rural places…including those who run small farms. Anyway, I’ve never heard anybody, even 2nd or 3rd hand comments, bashing the rural areas or their people. No condescension whatsoever. No bragging by the metro area dwellers of the superiority of themselves or lifestyle. On the other hand, it’s from some of the rural dwellers you hear snide remarks bashing city ( suburban ) dwellers as less strong/healthy/wholesome/self-reliant than they are. They rarely go into the metro area, let alone downtown, and when they do they rail about what an unpleasant experience it will be. They see the city only as a necessary evil that supports the economic activity to the degree that provides their own employment. ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2018, 9:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-rural-people-understand-urban-people-issues-better-or-vice-versa/824244/62 "2018-11-14T21:03:45Z")
> [@HMS\_Irruncible](#): > > For urban people, our lifestyle is a fact of life, not bound up in our identity. We’re not waving a flag saying “I eat sushi, I am economically interdependent on others, worship my lifestyle.” > > **As I see it, rural people see themselves as more virtuous just by not living in the city** , and just by having hobbies like hunting or gun ownership or farming (yes, it’s a hobby, and a government-subsidized one at that). > … > Given how poorly rural people seem to appreciate their own situations, I don’t see how they could possibly have a claim on a superior understanding of someone else’s. Sounds to me like you’re saying you’re more virtuous just by not living in the country. ---
**Author:** ![Dangerosa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2018, 9:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-rural-people-understand-urban-people-issues-better-or-vice-versa/824244/63 "2018-11-14T21:30:00Z")
I’ve been both and both are equally clueless about how the other half lives. ---
**Author:** ![Omar\_Little](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/omar_little/32/269_2.png) [@Omar\_Little](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Omar_Little)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2018, 9:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-rural-people-understand-urban-people-issues-better-or-vice-versa/824244/64 "2018-11-14T21:34:00Z")
> [@Dangerosa](#): > > I’ve been both and both are equally clueless about how the other half lives. As evidenced by the opinions expressed in this thread. ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2018, 9:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-rural-people-understand-urban-people-issues-better-or-vice-versa/824244/65 "2018-11-14T21:42:18Z")
In about an hour, I can drive from our apartment on the NJ side of the Hudson River overlooking Manhattan to my inlaws at the PA/NJ border. It’s definitely rural Republican Trump country out there. Don’t get me wrong. It’s nice out there with all the trees and local farms and houses with yards and driveways and whatnot. There isn’t really much to do though. If we want to go out to eat, it’s at least 30 minutes to an Olive Garden or Outback Steakhouse. I hate going out there because I’m basically trapped in my wife’s parent’s house listening to Fox News in the background informing their stupid opinions on the world. My wife has it in her head that our kids have “more to do there” because they can run around the yard. But that doesn’t make sense to me because we have dozens of parks and playgrounds within walking distance. Plus the kids have friends here or at least other kids they can play with in the park. Not to mention we can be in Manhattan within 15 minutes. At my wife’s parent’s place, they just hang out with their elderly aunts and run around the yard. Maybe if we are lucky, someone makes another 45 minute trek for them to play with their cousins. > [@HMS\_Irruncible](#): > > For urban people, our lifestyle is a fact of life, not bound up in our identity. You have clearly never lived in Boston, New York, or any other of several large cities whose inhabitant’s tend to bind their identity to. > [@Rocky from Plano](#): > > What percentage of people living in large urban areas (like Dallas, Chicago, New York), own their own business? A very wild guess on my side would be less than 5%, maybe even less. Pick a smaller city (not a suburb to a larger city), what does the % go up to? 10%? Now pick a small farming community. Does your business owner go higher? Maybe 30%? > People working for a business have a different mindset and different concerns than the person that owns that business. I would think it is much higher than 5%. There are a lot of small businesses and sole proprietorships in any major city. ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2018, 10:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-rural-people-understand-urban-people-issues-better-or-vice-versa/824244/66 "2018-11-14T22:03:32Z")
> [@msmith537](#): > > I would think it is much higher than 5%. There are a lot of small businesses and sole proprietorships in any major city. Presumably, number of businesses divided by number of people would give a rough estimate for the percentage of people who own businesses. (Rough, because a business could have more than one co-owner, or it might not be owned by anybody who actually lives in the city, while the same person could own more than one business.) A bit of googling turned up [this site](http://www.governing.com/gov-data/economy-finance/business-ownership-statistics-minority-owned-companies-by-city.html) which, if I’m reading it correctly, says there were 497,999 businesses in Los Angeles in 2012. The population of LA in 2012 was about 3.859 million (according to Google). So the number of businesses is about 12.9% the number of people. Is my analysis at all reasonable? ---
**Author:** ![Isamu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/7c8e57/32.png) [@Isamu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Isamu)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2018, 2:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-rural-people-understand-urban-people-issues-better-or-vice-versa/824244/67 "2018-11-15T02:39:46Z")
Agree that rural people are provided with a pretty accurate range of city/suburban lifestyles in daily media. Not so true the other way around. I have a poor understanding of what life would be like in a snowy region, an isolated region, in a subsistance lifestyle or on a farm/ranch. ---
**Author:** ![black\_rabbit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/f19dbf/32.png) [@black\_rabbit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/black_rabbit)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2018, 3:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-rural-people-understand-urban-people-issues-better-or-vice-versa/824244/68 "2018-11-15T03:27:16Z")
> [@control-z](#): > > The upside is the 30 miles would take 30 minutes on rural roads and might be quite scenic and relaxing. That 30 minutes would be a predictable time pretty much every time because traffic is almost never a factor. > > I have friends that live in a nice neighborhood in a big city. They are surrounded by houses on all sides. It can easily take 30 minutes of stop/start driving through neighborhoods and traffic for them to reach the nearest grocery store, they have to hunt for a parking spot, wait in long checkout lines, etc. > > OTOH I live in the woods with only one other house in sight and I can drive 20 minutes to a grocery store and it’s not crowded. I live in a nicer adjunct to a former industrial suburb that was annexed by the city a century ago, declined precipitously starting in the 60s, and has been slowly gentrifying for the last 10 years or so. We have a Nepalese joint and a sushi place. I’m a 12 minute drive from a Kroger that literally carries at least 10x the SKUs of any Walmart in America, partially through a 1500-acre city park, and partially down the main drag of the old neighborhood surrounded by former factory buildings that have a certain picturesque charm. My house is on a half acre that’s half woods. We’ve got a herd of deer, a family of groundhogs, and the occasional coyote. My maximum checkout wait at 11AM on the first Saturday of the month is about 5 minutes. Your friends need to find a better neighborhood. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2018, 3:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-rural-people-understand-urban-people-issues-better-or-vice-versa/824244/69 "2018-11-15T03:35:04Z")
People who live near and interact with a lot of rural people understand rural issues better than people who live near and interact with only a few rural people. And the place where people live near and interact with the most rural people are cities. There are more rural people in cities than rural areas, just because there’s more of everyone in cities. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2018, 4:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-rural-people-understand-urban-people-issues-better-or-vice-versa/824244/70 "2018-11-15T04:28:35Z")
> [@Balthisar](#): > > We’re certainly much, much more suburban in the sense that we don’t live like rats in high rises or row houses. Bless your heart, darling! ---
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2018, 3:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-rural-people-understand-urban-people-issues-better-or-vice-versa/824244/71 "2018-11-15T15:17:27Z")
> [@control-z](#): > > The upside is the 30 miles would take 30 minutes on rural roads and might be quite scenic and relaxing. That 30 minutes would be a predictable time pretty much every time because traffic is almost never a factor. > > I have friends that live in a nice neighborhood in a big city. They are surrounded by houses on all sides. It can easily take 30 minutes of stop/start driving through neighborhoods and traffic for them to reach the nearest grocery store, they have to hunt for a parking spot, wait in long checkout lines, etc. > > OTOH I live in the woods with only one other house in sight and I can drive 20 minutes to a grocery store and it’s not crowded. 30 minutes to a grocery store IN a city? That’s absurd. Even if I drove from my workplace in downtown Dallas in five o’clock traffic, I could be home in 30 minutes and have driven by no less than EIGHT supermarkets on the way. I suppose if we wanted to cherry pick, it’s possible to come up with somewhere that’s probably 10-15 minutes from a grocery store without traffic, and come up with a situation where traffic might make it take twice as long, but that’s by FAR the exception than the rule. In most cases, people live within probably 5-10 minutes of a supermarket- not necessarily walking distance, but very short driving distance. It’s just not an inconvenience at all. Where I live (NE Dallas), I’m within a 15 minute drive of two Krogers, two Wal-Marts, a Trader Joe’s, a HEB Central Market, four Tom Thumbs (Randalls in Houston), two Whole Foods, a Sprouts, a Fiesta, two La Michoacana Meat Markets, a couple of Asian markets, a Sam’s Club, a Costco and a couple of Aldis. One of the Krogers, one of the Wal-Marts, and one of the Tom Thumbs are within 5-6 minutes. ---
**Author:** ![senoy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/dbc845/32.png) [@senoy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/senoy)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2018, 3:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-rural-people-understand-urban-people-issues-better-or-vice-versa/824244/72 "2018-11-15T15:35:41Z")
My 15 minute radius for groceries is 3 Kroger’s, 2 Walmarts, 2 Giant Eagles, 2 Aldis, Savalot, Sam’s Club, a Price Cutter, 3 Asian Markets, 2 Hispanic Markets and a food co-op. My 5 minute radius is 2 Krogers, the Co-op, the Giant Eagle, the Savalot, the Aldi, 1 Hispanic Grocer and 1 Asian Grocer. I live in a medium-sized town in what I think most people would consider a ‘rural’ area. ---
**Author:** ![doreen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/858c86/32.png) [@doreen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/doreen)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2018, 3:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-rural-people-understand-urban-people-issues-better-or-vice-versa/824244/73 "2018-11-15T15:37:58Z")
> [@bump](#): > > 30 minutes to a grocery store IN a city? That’s absurd. Even if I drove from my workplace in downtown Dallas in five o’clock traffic, I could be home in 30 minutes and have driven by no less than EIGHT supermarkets on the way. > > I suppose if we wanted to cherry pick, it’s possible to come up with somewhere that’s probably 10-15 minutes from a grocery store without traffic, and come up with a situation where traffic might make it take twice as long, but that’s by FAR the exception than the rule. > > In most cases, people live within probably 5-10 minutes of a supermarket- not necessarily walking distance, but very short driving distance. It’s just not an inconvenience at all. > > Where I live (NE Dallas), I’m within a 15 minute drive of two Krogers, two Wal-Marts, a Trader Joe’s, a HEB Central Market, four Tom Thumbs (Randalls in Houston), two Whole Foods, a Sprouts, a Fiesta, two La Michoacana Meat Markets, a couple of Asian markets, a Sam’s Club, a Costco and a couple of Aldis. One of the Krogers, one of the Wal-Marts, and one of the Tom Thumbs are within 5-6 minutes. I would love to know which neighborhood in which big city - because a 30 minute drive to a supermarket sounds like we are either talking about a suburb or that there is a very restricted definition of “grocery store” in play. It would absolutely take me 30 minutes to drive to a Walmart - but I would pass at least four supermarkets on my way to the highway to get to that Walmart and who knows how many more while I am on the highway. ---
**Author:** ![control-z](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/eada6e/32.png) [@control-z](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/control-z)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2018, 6:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-rural-people-understand-urban-people-issues-better-or-vice-versa/824244/74 "2018-11-15T18:11:28Z")
It was Newport News, Virginia. Especially on weekends and of course during rush hour getting around was quite difficult because of traffic. Northern Virginia is a lot like that too. ---
**Author:** ![epbrown01](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7ba0ec/32.png) [@epbrown01](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/epbrown01)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2018, 1:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-rural-people-understand-urban-people-issues-better-or-vice-versa/824244/75 "2018-11-16T13:56:33Z")
> [@bump](#): > > Another thing that I think rural people don’t quite understand is that crime in big cities is not evenly distributed; it’s concentrated in a relatively few, usually lower income areas, and really doesn’t even spill into adjacent middle/upper income neighborhoods. This, big time. My family in KY got WGN news and frequently called me in Chicago about shootings or other crime they saw there, and I had to repeatedly explain that sort of thing was happening nowhere near where I lived the 30 years I was there. Here in KY, asked about what violent crime I experienced, when I say “None” the listener makes it clear they think I’m lying for some inexplicable reason. They’re _that_ certain crime is rampant - it can’t be that it didn’t happen, or I was just lucky; it had to have happened, and I’m lying. ---
**Author:** ![DesertDog](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/desertdog/32/11503_2.png) [@DesertDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DesertDog)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2018, 4:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-rural-people-understand-urban-people-issues-better-or-vice-versa/824244/76 "2018-11-16T16:04:55Z")
> [@control-z](#): > > It was Newport News, Virginia. Especially on weekends and of course during rush hour getting around was quite difficult because of traffic. Northern Virginia is a lot like that too. I lived in Carson City for a while which isn’t exactly rural but its pretty dinky. It was away from the city-proper which made it even more secluded; it was a seven mile drive to the city-center. Anyway, when my brother was visiting we went to town one afternoon. Coming over a hill we were looking down on a 4 stop sign intersection and there were three cars at it in various directions. “Oh, God,” I said. “We’re in the middle of rush hour.” I’m not sure he found it funny. ---
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2018, 5:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-rural-people-understand-urban-people-issues-better-or-vice-versa/824244/77 "2018-11-16T17:28:08Z")
> [@epbrown01](#): > > This, big time. My family in KY got WGN news and frequently called me in Chicago about shootings or other crime they saw there, and I had to repeatedly explain that sort of thing was happening nowhere near where I lived the 30 years I was there. > > Here in KY, asked about what violent crime I experienced, when I say “None” the listener makes it clear they think I’m lying for some inexplicable reason. They’re _that_ certain crime is rampant - it can’t be that it didn’t happen, or I was just lucky; it had to have happened, and I’m lying. Around here, it’s interesting, in that apparently a lot of the crime near me is concentrated in apartment complexes, primarily has low income residents (often immigrants) as victims, and most interestingly, is perpetrated by people from elsewhere who come TO the area to do their criminal shit. I heard this at a neighborhood association meeting where the head of the Justice Dept. task force (a Federal prosecutor) for our area gave a talk. But people hear NE Dallas and crime, and assume that if I live near it, it must happen there too, which doesn’t seem to the be case so far, and I’ve lived in my house for 11 years now. ---
**Author:** ![doreen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/858c86/32.png) [@doreen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/doreen)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2018, 5:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-rural-people-understand-urban-people-issues-better-or-vice-versa/824244/78 "2018-11-16T17:54:49Z")
> [@control-z](#): > > It was Newport News, Virginia. Especially on weekends and of course during rush hour getting around was quite difficult because of traffic. Northern Virginia is a lot like that too. I’m not going to say Newport News isn’t a city - but with a population density of 2,623/sq mi. I wouldn’t call it a “big city” . My residential neighborhood of mostly one and two family houses in a city has a density of 66.4 people per acre, which equates to about 42,500/sq mi. How long it takes your friends to get to a grocery store isn’t just related to traffic- it’s also related to the distance between grocery stores which is related to the density. I said earlier that I would pass at least 4 supermarkets on my way to the highway but what I didn’t mention is that nearly everyone in my neighborhood lives within walking distance of a supermarket. ---
**Author:** ![Kimera757](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kimera757/32/3765_2.png) [@Kimera757](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimera757)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2018, 9:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-rural-people-understand-urban-people-issues-better-or-vice-versa/824244/79 "2018-11-17T21:00:22Z")
I voted: Rural people understand urban people/issues better (if only because they can learn “facts” about urban life from TV more easily than urban people can learn “facts” about rural life from TV). > [@Richard\_Parker](#): > > I wouldn’t conflate rural and agricultural. Most people living in rural areas aren’t in the agriculture sector and are not especially affected by it. > > At least in political terms, rural issues are mostly cultural. I’m confident that the typical urban dweller understands christian identity politics better than the typical rural dweller understands, say, anti-racism. Though in both cases there are huge empathy and knowledge deficits, to say the least. I simply did not (and do not) understand how there can be so many rural dwellers, when there are so few farmers. Beyond farming, I just know of a few primary industries (mining, logging, etc) and, apparently, some factories. My quick Google search brought this up: [What is Rural America?](https://www.census.gov/library/stories/2017/08/rural-america.html) > [@](#): > > Urban areas make up only 3 percent of the entire land area of the country but are home to more than 80 percent of the population. Conversely, 97 percent of the country’s land mass is rural but only 19.3 percent of the population lives there. ---
**Author:** ![Balthisar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/balthisar/32/2825_2.png) [@Balthisar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Balthisar)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2018, 9:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-rural-people-understand-urban-people-issues-better-or-vice-versa/824244/80 "2018-11-17T21:55:58Z")
Maybe we need another tack: what are “urban issues” and “rural issues”? I’m urban by most definitions, and one thing that’s a frequent topic is public transit. I’ve got a car, and everyone I know has a car, but for some reason it’s a hot button issue. I would assume that rural people are as ignorant of the real need as I am. Going the other way, city people probably don’t pay a whole lot of attention to, say, how clean water rules might apply to farming runoff. Are we talking differences in dating here, or what exactly? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-rural-people-understand-urban-people-issues-better-or-vice-versa/824244.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-rural-people-understand-urban-people-issues-better-or-vice-versa/824244.md?page=5)