briar patch

[Josh]

Hon, I happen to live in America’s largest cities, the (former) home of Freddie Grey. We have frequent demonstrations. If we had those brownshirts here, we would have riots too.

Maybe you should leave your rural bubble.

J.M,

Hon, I was born in the inner city of Baltimore and lived in several large cities and worked downtown. I live in my rural bubble now because I left that mess behind.

Your constant references to Nazis is ridiculous and I grow tired of it. I have lost a lot of respect for you because of it. I no longer an interested in hearing your opinions since they are so biased and distorted. I pray for those you care for. I hope they experience a better side than you show here. Goodbye.

Than you should know the opinions I express are the norm here, and not an outlier.

J.M.

No offence intended to people in Baltimore, but most the rest of the country doesn’t want to have Baltimore’s crime problem or crooked, corrupt government. There are reasons the cities ended up so depopulated - when it’s too violent and too corrupt to run profitable businesses, the city just dies. I’m sorry to say I see that happening right now including in my beloved New York City. Most retail there is not reopening, compared to say, Ohio, where retail and restaurants are figuring out how to stay in business despite this pandemic.

[Ken]

Hon, I was born in the inner city of Baltimore and lived in several large cities and worked downtown. I live in my rural bubble now because I left that mess behind.

Your constant references to Nazis is ridiculous and I grow tired of it. I have lost a lot of respect for you because of it. I no longer an interested in hearing your opinions since they are so biased and distorted. I pray for those you care for. I hope they experience a better side than you show here. Goodbye.

Than you should know the opinions I express are the norm here, and not an outlier.

J.M.

No offence intended to people in Baltimore, but most the rest of the country doesn’t want to have Baltimore’s crime problem or crooked, corrupt government. There are reasons the cities ended up so depopulated - when it’s too violent and too corrupt to run profitable businesses, the city just dies. I’m sorry to say I see that happening right now including in my beloved New York City. Most retail there is not reopening, compared to say, Ohio, where retail and restaurants are figuring out how to stay in business despite this pandemic.

It's not cities that are depopulating in this country. It's rural areas.

[Josh]

If one counts distant suburbs as “cities”, sure. Cleveland and Detroit are significantly smaller than they used to be. New York City lost about 500,000 people this year.

[Ken]

If one counts distant suburbs as “cities”, sure. Cleveland and Detroit are significantly smaller than they used to be. New York City lost about 500,000 people this year.

Let's look at some actual data

https://carsey.unh.edu/publication/rural-depopulation

Depopulation occurs when an area experiences substantial population loss over a protracted period, resulting in significant population decline. How widespread is depopulation? In all, 746 counties representing 24 percent of all U.S. counties are depopulating, and nearly all of them—91 percent—are rural. Just 9 percent of urban counties are depopulating. Such depopulation is a clear indicator of a lack of demographic vitality in a significant part of rural America. Over one-third (35 percent) of all rural counties (676) are depopulating. Today, only 6.2 million residents remain in these depopulating rural counties, a third fewer than resided there in 1950.

The prevalence, timing, and magnitude of depopulation have unfolded unevenly across the geographic landscape of rural America. Depopulating rural counties are concentrated in the Great Plains and lie in a north-south band from the Dakotas through Nebraska, Kansas, and Oklahoma to central Texas. Clusters of depopulating rural counties are also evident in the northern Great Lakes, the interior of the Southeast, the Mississippi Delta, and the mining regions of West Virginia and Kentucky. In many cases, counties with less severe population losses are proximate to these depopulating counties, illuminating the spatial clustering of population loss in rural America. In contrast, most rural counties at peak populations are in the West, along the Atlantic or Pacific coasts, or proximate to metropolitan counties. There are exceptions to this general pattern, however, in high-amenity areas of the upper Great Lakes and Northern New England, as well as in the Ozarks and the Great Smoky Mountains.

What this all has to do with coronavirus, I'm not sure. But the hollowing out of rural America also has severe public heath consequences as rural hospitals continue to struggle and close. Especially in the southern states that have refused to expand Medicaid, and have therefore, intentionally choked off the largest potential income stream for their rural hospitals, driving them into bankruptcy and closure. Once a rural hospital closes it accelerates the economic decline in a community as many of the higher-paid and middle class professionals pack up and leave. Rural America is far less ready to deal with a long-term pandemic than it might have been, largely due to this population decline and subsequent collapse of the public health system.

[Ken]

One good thing about Trump. He always finds the best doctors:

A Houston doctor who praises hydroxychloroquine and says that face masks aren’t necessary to stop transmission of the highly contagious coronavirus has become a star on the right-wing internet, garnering tens of millions of views on Facebook on Monday alone. Donald Trump Jr. declared the video of Stella Immanuel a “must watch,” while Donald Trump himself retweeted the video.

Before Trump and his supporters embrace Immanuel’s medical expertise, though, they should consider other medical claims Immanuel has made—including those about alien DNA and the physical effects of having sex with witches and demons in your dreams.

Immanuel, a pediatrician and a religious minister, has a history of making bizarre claims about medical topics and other issues. She has often claimed that gynecological problems like cysts and endometriosis are in fact caused by people having sex in their dreams with demons and witches.

source: https://www.thedailybeast.com/stella-im ... e?ref=home

[Josh]

Ken,

Are you saying this is a good thing?

[Josh]

Rural America is doing fine. The worst coronavirus death rate was in NYC.

Why did 500,000 NYCers flee the city and go to places like Florida?

[Ken]

Ken,

Are you saying this is a good thing?

I guess I forgot to put the "I'm being facetious" emoji at the end.

[RZehr]

Hon, I

J.M,

Hon, I

Hon, I just want to say hon.
Hon, hon, hon, hon.

[ohio jones]

If one counts distant suburbs as “cities”, sure. Cleveland and Detroit are significantly smaller than they used to be. New York City lost about 500,000 people this year.

Let's look at some actual data

Let's look at even more actual data about cities vs. suburbs:



Also, the two paragraphs from the unh.edu article are not consecutive, as the quote makes them appear. This paragraph belongs between them:

Though rural depopulation is widespread, many rural counties are thriving and gaining population. Indeed, 35 percent (673) were at their peak population in 2010 and contained 24.8 million residents in 2016—54.5 percent of the rural total. Such growing rural counties often benefit from proximity to metropolitan areas or are centers of recreational and retirement activity that attract urban tourists, retirees, and businesses. The remaining 31 percent (599) of rural counties, which contain 14.6 million residents or 32 percent of the rural population, have had mixed periods of growth and decline, but their cumulative population losses have been far more modest than in the depopulating counties that have been in decline for many years.