Best Of

Two or three generations ago our equivalents would perhaps have gone to the pub every evening to see the same dozen people - its still the world shown at the Queen Vic, Woolpack and Rovers Return - now we come here and talk to people from around the country.

Yes and I'm certainly not in the camp of those who believe all "change" is inherently bad. It can be unsettling, certainly, but it's often positive in time.

The technological changes outpace the cultural adaptations - we know that. There have also been huge societal changes over the past couple of hundred years, some of which happened very quickly and again adaptation is outpaced by the speed of that change.

When Mrs Stodge came to England from NZ in 1991, her communication with her family back in Kiwiland was either by letter or a short and expensive weekly phone call. 30+ years on, she can FaceTime her mother for free and it's like being in the room with her. In that sense, as you rightly say, technology has improved the quality of life for so many people who aren't in physical proximity - my parents and my maternal grandparents lived in neighbouring streets on the same estate in south east London in the 1960s.

The converse of that it has encouraged or driven what Gove calls "atomisation" (amongst other factors). We can be anywhere, we can be everywhere and we can be nowhere all at the same time.

I'm probably an extreme example - I grew up in cities in 3 different countries, worked in two others, and I've retired to a happy marriage in an Oxfordshire village. I don't feel particularly rooted anywhere, but I'm aware of multiple influences. People who say proudly that they've never lived anywhere but their home town sound increasingly unusual, and I can't see that ever being reversed. An effect of that is that lifelong friendships tend to be occasional encounters without losing all their essential quaity - I have a friend in California who I met last week for the first time in 60 years, and we rapidly tuned into each other.

Nonetheless, the trend increases the importance of electronic interaction, and in a way I know people on this forum better than I know my Calfornian friend. Couple that to the natural tendency to find idelogically and philosophically ttuned online groups, and you can see how the world becomes atomised and people come to think that nearly everyone agrees with their ideas, however odd. I used to know a Danish Supreme Court judge who deliberately read a hostile daily paper to counter that tendency, but few of us have the time or inclination for tht - I never look at the Mail, and shouldn't think that Marquee Mark spends much time studying the Guardian.

That does make forums with varying opinions like this quite important and refreshing. We may not agree with each other, but at least we become more aware that we exist!

I the bit in bold is partly your bubble talking. The 50 % of the population who go to Uni, move about for work etc will be like you, but there will be many, many others who grow up, live, work and retire in the same area. I know loads of them.

The bulk of both sides of my rather extended large family have lived most or all of their lives in Norfolk. Aside from Uni and 2 years in Essex ive been here for well over 50 years. My father lives in a house he bought in 1972, ive family who live in a house handed down in their direct line of the family since the early 20th century.
I agree with you, and im in no way unusual as ive childhood friends who are in the same situation.

In fact.... Just working this out....
In an hour from this sofa, on foot, I could walk past and end up at every house my grandparents and parents ever lived at from the start of WW2 to today

Edit - no im wrong, there was a brief period just before my birth my mum and dad were elsewhere but that brief period aside......

That's interesting, and I think more typical than me: I had one grandparent from each of London, Birmingham, Manchester and Edinburgh. A couple of generations before that and almost every region of the country is represented.

Is there anything to stop Farage's girlfriend selling the property and walking away with the money ?

If not then this story is going nowhere.

This is the bit I don’t understand about this story. If she owns all of the home, whether that money is gifted or not, isn’t that the end of it for tax purposes? (Waiting for someone very clever to correct me, and as always I am not a tax expert yadda yadda).

Optically, I can see it looks like an unusual arrangement and unusual arrangements always invite questions, though.

If she was gifted the money, wouldn't she be taxed on it as income? (Apologies for using 'she', I don't (e) know the lady's name.)

No - but the person giving the gift could be subject to the 7 year IHT rule

I expect that to go in Reeves statement in November

Doubt it. It would mean all gifts would be subject to tax, which would be a horrible admin burden. Even sending your friend a fiver by bank transfer for half a pint.

You can give £3,000 away each year tax free

Isn't it that you can give away as much money as you want each year tax free, as long as you don't die within 7 years?

There are gifting limits outside of IHT
£3000 a year
£250 to unlimited people
Any amount out of disposable income

None would attract IHT regardless of when the donor dies

Two or three generations ago our equivalents would perhaps have gone to the pub every evening to see the same dozen people - its still the world shown at the Queen Vic, Woolpack and Rovers Return - now we come here and talk to people from around the country.

Yes and I'm certainly not in the camp of those who believe all "change" is inherently bad. It can be unsettling, certainly, but it's often positive in time.

The technological changes outpace the cultural adaptations - we know that. There have also been huge societal changes over the past couple of hundred years, some of which happened very quickly and again adaptation is outpaced by the speed of that change.

When Mrs Stodge came to England from NZ in 1991, her communication with her family back in Kiwiland was either by letter or a short and expensive weekly phone call. 30+ years on, she can FaceTime her mother for free and it's like being in the room with her. In that sense, as you rightly say, technology has improved the quality of life for so many people who aren't in physical proximity - my parents and my maternal grandparents lived in neighbouring streets on the same estate in south east London in the 1960s.

The converse of that it has encouraged or driven what Gove calls "atomisation" (amongst other factors). We can be anywhere, we can be everywhere and we can be nowhere all at the same time.

I'm probably an extreme example - I grew up in cities in 3 different countries, worked in two others, and I've retired to a happy marriage in an Oxfordshire village. I don't feel particularly rooted anywhere, but I'm aware of multiple influences. People who say proudly that they've never lived anywhere but their home town sound increasingly unusual, and I can't see that ever being reversed. An effect of that is that lifelong friendships tend to be occasional encounters without losing all their essential quaity - I have a friend in California who I met last week for the first time in 60 years, and we rapidly tuned into each other.

Nonetheless, the trend increases the importance of electronic interaction, and in a way I know people on this forum better than I know my Calfornian friend. Couple that to the natural tendency to find idelogically and philosophically ttuned online groups, and you can see how the world becomes atomised and people come to think that nearly everyone agrees with their ideas, however odd. I used to know a Danish Supreme Court judge who deliberately read a hostile daily paper to counter that tendency, but few of us have the time or inclination for tht - I never look at the Mail, and shouldn't think that Marquee Mark spends much time studying the Guardian.

That does make forums with varying opinions like this quite important and refreshing. We may not agree with each other, but at least we become more aware that we exist!

Agree with all that - though I think those of us on here may underestimate the number of people who will grow up and remain in their home town, knowing the same faces they've known all their lives. I'd be interested to see some stats but whenever it comes up I'm quite surprised by the extent to which this is still typical.

FWIW I'm sort of in the middle ground. I've moved around a bit, but never lived more than 80 miles from Manchester. I can draw quite an accurate blob around those places which could ever conceivably feel like 'home' (most, though not all, of the North of England, and a coterminous blob of Central/Southern Scotland) and those which could not (everywhere else).
I think it is Herdwick sheep which have an inbred tendency not to wander more than a few miles from where they were born. On a larger scale, I have a similar thing.

Two or three generations ago our equivalents would perhaps have gone to the pub every evening to see the same dozen people - its still the world shown at the Queen Vic, Woolpack and Rovers Return - now we come here and talk to people from around the country.

Yes and I'm certainly not in the camp of those who believe all "change" is inherently bad. It can be unsettling, certainly, but it's often positive in time.

The technological changes outpace the cultural adaptations - we know that. There have also been huge societal changes over the past couple of hundred years, some of which happened very quickly and again adaptation is outpaced by the speed of that change.

When Mrs Stodge came to England from NZ in 1991, her communication with her family back in Kiwiland was either by letter or a short and expensive weekly phone call. 30+ years on, she can FaceTime her mother for free and it's like being in the room with her. In that sense, as you rightly say, technology has improved the quality of life for so many people who aren't in physical proximity - my parents and my maternal grandparents lived in neighbouring streets on the same estate in south east London in the 1960s.

The converse of that it has encouraged or driven what Gove calls "atomisation" (amongst other factors). We can be anywhere, we can be everywhere and we can be nowhere all at the same time.

I'm probably an extreme example - I grew up in cities in 3 different countries, worked in two others, and I've retired to a happy marriage in an Oxfordshire village. I don't feel particularly rooted anywhere, but I'm aware of multiple influences. People who say proudly that they've never lived anywhere but their home town sound increasingly unusual, and I can't see that ever being reversed. An effect of that is that lifelong friendships tend to be occasional encounters without losing all their essential quaity - I have a friend in California who I met last week for the first time in 60 years, and we rapidly tuned into each other.

Nonetheless, the trend increases the importance of electronic interaction, and in a way I know people on this forum better than I know my Calfornian friend. Couple that to the natural tendency to find idelogically and philosophically ttuned online groups, and you can see how the world becomes atomised and people come to think that nearly everyone agrees with their ideas, however odd. I used to know a Danish Supreme Court judge who deliberately read a hostile daily paper to counter that tendency, but few of us have the time or inclination for tht - I never look at the Mail, and shouldn't think that Marquee Mark spends much time studying the Guardian.

That does make forums with varying opinions like this quite important and refreshing. We may not agree with each other, but at least we become more aware that we exist!

I the bit in bold is partly your bubble talking. The 50 % of the population who go to Uni, move about for work etc will be like you, but there will be many, many others who grow up, live, work and retire in the same area. I know loads of them.

The bulk of both sides of my rather extended large family have lived most or all of their lives in Norfolk. Aside from Uni and 2 years in Essex ive been here for well over 50 years. My father lives in a house he bought in 1972, ive family who live in a house handed down in their direct line of the family since the early 20th century.
I agree with you, and im in no way unusual as ive childhood friends who are in the same situation.

My father in law is the former head of the primary school my eldest two attend. I've been surprised at how many of their classmates' parents are people my father in law used to teach. My wife being one of them, of course - she has lived in two other countries since graduating*, but now lives 5 miles from her childhood home and her kids go to her old primary school.

*so not your (stereo)typical never left trajectory - and we met far from here; it was my job that brought us back to the area

It's interesting how often politicians who sounded rubbish when they were in office become sensible once they've left Government.

Lord Gove, who, apparently held several positions in the Conservative administrations from 2010-24 (it's too early), has told the Independent Commission on Community Cohesion (chaired jointly by Sadiq Javid and Jon Cruddas) the Cameron Government was wrong to remove or water down the ASBOs of the Blair Government just to satisfy civil libertarians.

Once we get past this mea culpa, we then get this piece of wisdom from the former MP for what is now the Liberal Democrat stronghold of Surrey Heath:

He also emphasised the need for civic participation, but said this would be “very, very difficult for the state or its agencies to encourage”.

“The more that lads and dads are going to football together. The more that people are going to places of worship and joining in the activities around that, the better overall.

“But you can’t make people love football, you can’t enforce good parenting, you can’t make people want to take part in a rich civic life if they don’t want to.

“And there are bigger social trends which are encouraging atomisation so that the 11-year-old who might have been going to watch QPR 20 or 30 years ago is now more likely to be playing Fifa at home.”

He said the “right mix” of shops on high streets was key to encouraging a sense of community, adding that “people feel that high streets that have, again, vape shops, Turkish barbers, charity shops and voids in particular are a problem”.

Our politics is a reflection of our life and the way we live and those who marched on the "Unite the Kingdom" protest weren't just a bunch of knuckleheaded racists (undoubtedly there were some) but people desperate to claim or reclaim a sense of identity, of belonging, even of purpose. When you don't recognise the place in which you live and you don't understand the world in which you're living, it's natural to become frustrated and angry.

You might argue (and I'd have some sympathy) an element of this is romanticised nostalgia much as "back to basics" was 30+ years go but the truth is people need to feel comfortable with the world and their place in it. Rapid technological and socio-economic change has happened before and people have protested against it (often violently) and this is another phase. We can't uninvent mobile phones, the Internet, supermarkets or online gaming any more than we can the internal combustion engine - it's about how people, society and politics adapt to change rather than trying to turn the clock back.

To pick up on a very minor point, I don't think charity shops are a problem. They can be hubs of community volunteering, and they offer cheap goods for those affected by the cost of living.

It's not really that they're a problem in themselves - just that they are among the very few legitimate retailers who can continue on provincial high streets without going bust, as they're subsidised retail.

Them, and the odd fast food outlet, which is missing from Gove's list.

A mental stroll down an actual local street gives me ...vape shops, Turkish barbers, small newsagents (any of which are not entirely unlikely to be money laundering fronts), fast food outlets, charity shops, and voids.

Charity shops are not so much subsidised retail as the tax and other costs are reduced to the point they can survive.

If you want high street shops, then the costs and tax need to be reduced to match.

By the way, several of the big charity shop chains do the following - the managers are given targets to get volunteers in to reduce the number of paid hours. In some cases, workers show up for a paid shift to be told that enough volunteers have signed up, so they are sent home. Not very charitable sounding, is it?

Our town has a number of empty shops. at least one of which has been empty since pre 2020. The owner cannot be making money out of it, yet is seemingly happy to have it vacant. Surely any income is better than none?

Some shops are owned by property funds that would sooner leave a unit empty than break their rule of upwards only rents, in case it starts a precedent for their other renters.

Easiest way of destroying the value of your property fund - reduce the rent on a property as everyone else in the centre will insist on the same deal come renewal.

And yes I know its exactly what Fairliered is saying but reality is until a shopping centre is virtually empty even a site with 1 or 2 occupied units can look far healthier to the fund than a full centre where the rents are low.

It's why forcing empty sites to be rented via an open auction is the best ways of filling our town centres up with shops, no fund is going to willingly admit their paper valuation for a centre is a work of fiction.

Two or three generations ago our equivalents would perhaps have gone to the pub every evening to see the same dozen people - its still the world shown at the Queen Vic, Woolpack and Rovers Return - now we come here and talk to people from around the country.

Yes and I'm certainly not in the camp of those who believe all "change" is inherently bad. It can be unsettling, certainly, but it's often positive in time.

The technological changes outpace the cultural adaptations - we know that. There have also been huge societal changes over the past couple of hundred years, some of which happened very quickly and again adaptation is outpaced by the speed of that change.

When Mrs Stodge came to England from NZ in 1991, her communication with her family back in Kiwiland was either by letter or a short and expensive weekly phone call. 30+ years on, she can FaceTime her mother for free and it's like being in the room with her. In that sense, as you rightly say, technology has improved the quality of life for so many people who aren't in physical proximity - my parents and my maternal grandparents lived in neighbouring streets on the same estate in south east London in the 1960s.

The converse of that it has encouraged or driven what Gove calls "atomisation" (amongst other factors). We can be anywhere, we can be everywhere and we can be nowhere all at the same time.

I'm probably an extreme example - I grew up in cities in 3 different countries, worked in two others, and I've retired to a happy marriage in an Oxfordshire village. I don't feel particularly rooted anywhere, but I'm aware of multiple influences. People who say proudly that they've never lived anywhere but their home town sound increasingly unusual, and I can't see that ever being reversed. An effect of that is that lifelong friendships tend to be occasional encounters without losing all their essential quaity - I have a friend in California who I met last week for the first time in 60 years, and we rapidly tuned into each other.

Nonetheless, the trend increases the importance of electronic interaction, and in a way I know people on this forum better than I know my Calfornian friend. Couple that to the natural tendency to find idelogically and philosophically ttuned online groups, and you can see how the world becomes atomised and people come to think that nearly everyone agrees with their ideas, however odd. I used to know a Danish Supreme Court judge who deliberately read a hostile daily paper to counter that tendency, but few of us have the time or inclination for tht - I never look at the Mail, and shouldn't think that Marquee Mark spends much time studying the Guardian.

That does make forums with varying opinions like this quite important and refreshing. We may not agree with each other, but at least we become more aware that we exist!

Interesting. Just to qualify one point. In Cumberland (non lake district part) it is completely normal for people of all ages never to have lived anywhere else but their home town/village and immediate locality. I suspect this is true of a number of not much noticed parts of the country.

There is a also a substantial younger group of people for who this is true except for the years 18-21 approx away at HE of some sort.

Another feather in Clarkson's Farm's cap is that it introduced Caleb, and the fact that there are many, many Calebs, to the sneering metropolitan elite. Notwithstanding he is now a celeb with a book deal, speaking tour, and whatnot, at the time he was clear that he had likely not travelled further than Chipping Norton his whole life.

Two or three generations ago our equivalents would perhaps have gone to the pub every evening to see the same dozen people - its still the world shown at the Queen Vic, Woolpack and Rovers Return - now we come here and talk to people from around the country.

Yes and I'm certainly not in the camp of those who believe all "change" is inherently bad. It can be unsettling, certainly, but it's often positive in time.

The technological changes outpace the cultural adaptations - we know that. There have also been huge societal changes over the past couple of hundred years, some of which happened very quickly and again adaptation is outpaced by the speed of that change.

When Mrs Stodge came to England from NZ in 1991, her communication with her family back in Kiwiland was either by letter or a short and expensive weekly phone call. 30+ years on, she can FaceTime her mother for free and it's like being in the room with her. In that sense, as you rightly say, technology has improved the quality of life for so many people who aren't in physical proximity - my parents and my maternal grandparents lived in neighbouring streets on the same estate in south east London in the 1960s.

The converse of that it has encouraged or driven what Gove calls "atomisation" (amongst other factors). We can be anywhere, we can be everywhere and we can be nowhere all at the same time.

I'm probably an extreme example - I grew up in cities in 3 different countries, worked in two others, and I've retired to a happy marriage in an Oxfordshire village. I don't feel particularly rooted anywhere, but I'm aware of multiple influences. People who say proudly that they've never lived anywhere but their home town sound increasingly unusual, and I can't see that ever being reversed. An effect of that is that lifelong friendships tend to be occasional encounters without losing all their essential quaity - I have a friend in California who I met last week for the first time in 60 years, and we rapidly tuned into each other.

Nonetheless, the trend increases the importance of electronic interaction, and in a way I know people on this forum better than I know my Calfornian friend. Couple that to the natural tendency to find idelogically and philosophically ttuned online groups, and you can see how the world becomes atomised and people come to think that nearly everyone agrees with their ideas, however odd. I used to know a Danish Supreme Court judge who deliberately read a hostile daily paper to counter that tendency, but few of us have the time or inclination for tht - I never look at the Mail, and shouldn't think that Marquee Mark spends much time studying the Guardian.

That does make forums with varying opinions like this quite important and refreshing. We may not agree with each other, but at least we become more aware that we exist!

I the bit in bold is partly your bubble talking. The 50 % of the population who go to Uni, move about for work etc will be like you, but there will be many, many others who grow up, live, work and retire in the same area. I know loads of them.

The bulk of both sides of my rather extended large family have lived most or all of their lives in Norfolk. Aside from Uni and 2 years in Essex ive been here for well over 50 years. My father lives in a house he bought in 1972, ive family who live in a house handed down in their direct line of the family since the early 20th century.
I agree with you, and im in no way unusual as ive childhood friends who are in the same situation.

In fact.... Just working this out....
In an hour from this sofa, on foot, I coukd walk past and end up at every house my grandparents and parents ever lived at from the start of WW2 to today

Can you count them on the six fingers of one hand?

Two or three generations ago our equivalents would perhaps have gone to the pub every evening to see the same dozen people - its still the world shown at the Queen Vic, Woolpack and Rovers Return - now we come here and talk to people from around the country.

Yes and I'm certainly not in the camp of those who believe all "change" is inherently bad. It can be unsettling, certainly, but it's often positive in time.

The technological changes outpace the cultural adaptations - we know that. There have also been huge societal changes over the past couple of hundred years, some of which happened very quickly and again adaptation is outpaced by the speed of that change.

When Mrs Stodge came to England from NZ in 1991, her communication with her family back in Kiwiland was either by letter or a short and expensive weekly phone call. 30+ years on, she can FaceTime her mother for free and it's like being in the room with her. In that sense, as you rightly say, technology has improved the quality of life for so many people who aren't in physical proximity - my parents and my maternal grandparents lived in neighbouring streets on the same estate in south east London in the 1960s.

The converse of that it has encouraged or driven what Gove calls "atomisation" (amongst other factors). We can be anywhere, we can be everywhere and we can be nowhere all at the same time.

I'm probably an extreme example - I grew up in cities in 3 different countries, worked in two others, and I've retired to a happy marriage in an Oxfordshire village. I don't feel particularly rooted anywhere, but I'm aware of multiple influences. People who say proudly that they've never lived anywhere but their home town sound increasingly unusual, and I can't see that ever being reversed. An effect of that is that lifelong friendships tend to be occasional encounters without losing all their essential quaity - I have a friend in California who I met last week for the first time in 60 years, and we rapidly tuned into each other.

Nonetheless, the trend increases the importance of electronic interaction, and in a way I know people on this forum better than I know my Calfornian friend. Couple that to the natural tendency to find idelogically and philosophically ttuned online groups, and you can see how the world becomes atomised and people come to think that nearly everyone agrees with their ideas, however odd. I used to know a Danish Supreme Court judge who deliberately read a hostile daily paper to counter that tendency, but few of us have the time or inclination for tht - I never look at the Mail, and shouldn't think that Marquee Mark spends much time studying the Guardian.

That does make forums with varying opinions like this quite important and refreshing. We may not agree with each other, but at least we become more aware that we exist!

Agree with all that - though I think those of us on here may underestimate the number of people who will grow up and remain in their home town, knowing the same faces they've known all their lives. I'd be interested to see some stats but whenever it comes up I'm quite surprised by the extent to which this is still typical.

FWIW I'm sort of in the middle ground. I've moved around a bit, but never lived more than 80 miles from Manchester. I can draw quite an accurate blob around those places which could ever conceivably feel like 'home' (most, though not all, of the North of England, and a coterminous blob of Central/Southern Scotland) and those which could not (everywhere else).
I think it is Herdwick sheep which have an inbred tendency not to wander more than a few miles from where they were born. On a larger scale, I have a similar thing.

I am living in (part of, we split it) the house I grew up in as a teenager, a short distance from the one I was in as a younger child. But this is in north London, so the faces around me have nearly all changed!

One for @Leon, if the maggots haven't done for him...


(((Dan Hodges)))
@DPJHodges

Slightly long post. But there's a lot of concern on the moderate Left today about the Robinson event. Fine. But if you actually want to do something about it you have to understand four things:

1) To deal with the underlaying causes requires hard policy proscriptions on areas like immigration. And you will have to endorse positions that make you instinctively uncomfortable. But they are unavoidable.

2) The Blue Sky experiment has failed. You may hate Musk. But this is the most influential platform on the globe. If you abandon it to Robinson and his allies you have already lost.

https://x.com/DPJHodges/status/1967502268833403136

I've been convinced for ages that labelling people with different opinions as hard right is dangerous. They get used to the epithet and eventually it becomes a badge of honour, which makes those who really are hard right seem attractive to them.

It's the same as diluting the charge of racism. When it's used against people who have a mountain of historical facts on their side and who point out Cleopatra wasn't black, it becomes effectively meaningless.

But throwing a slur of bigotry (including being far left/right) can be convenient because it means that an argument doesn't have to be made against the beliefs of that person. Instead, you just stamp "bigot" on their forehead, point at them, and remark how wrong they are.

The downside, as we also saw with the EU referendum, is that never making an argument to back up your beliefs or counter those of opponents means politicians, and others, can get rather rusty at both promoting the advantages of their own perspective and pointing out the weaknesses of others.

Two or three generations ago our equivalents would perhaps have gone to the pub every evening to see the same dozen people - its still the world shown at the Queen Vic, Woolpack and Rovers Return - now we come here and talk to people from around the country.

Yes and I'm certainly not in the camp of those who believe all "change" is inherently bad. It can be unsettling, certainly, but it's often positive in time.

The technological changes outpace the cultural adaptations - we know that. There have also been huge societal changes over the past couple of hundred years, some of which happened very quickly and again adaptation is outpaced by the speed of that change.

When Mrs Stodge came to England from NZ in 1991, her communication with her family back in Kiwiland was either by letter or a short and expensive weekly phone call. 30+ years on, she can FaceTime her mother for free and it's like being in the room with her. In that sense, as you rightly say, technology has improved the quality of life for so many people who aren't in physical proximity - my parents and my maternal grandparents lived in neighbouring streets on the same estate in south east London in the 1960s.

The converse of that it has encouraged or driven what Gove calls "atomisation" (amongst other factors). We can be anywhere, we can be everywhere and we can be nowhere all at the same time.

I'm probably an extreme example - I grew up in cities in 3 different countries, worked in two others, and I've retired to a happy marriage in an Oxfordshire village. I don't feel particularly rooted anywhere, but I'm aware of multiple influences. People who say proudly that they've never lived anywhere but their home town sound increasingly unusual, and I can't see that ever being reversed. An effect of that is that lifelong friendships tend to be occasional encounters without losing all their essential quaity - I have a friend in California who I met last week for the first time in 60 years, and we rapidly tuned into each other.

Nonetheless, the trend increases the importance of electronic interaction, and in a way I know people on this forum better than I know my Calfornian friend. Couple that to the natural tendency to find idelogically and philosophically ttuned online groups, and you can see how the world becomes atomised and people come to think that nearly everyone agrees with their ideas, however odd. I used to know a Danish Supreme Court judge who deliberately read a hostile daily paper to counter that tendency, but few of us have the time or inclination for tht - I never look at the Mail, and shouldn't think that Marquee Mark spends much time studying the Guardian.

That does make forums with varying opinions like this quite important and refreshing. We may not agree with each other, but at least we become more aware that we exist!

I the bit in bold is partly your bubble talking. The 50 % of the population who go to Uni, move about for work etc will be like you, but there will be many, many others who grow up, live, work and retire in the same area. I know loads of them.

The bulk of both sides of my rather extended large family have lived most or all of their lives in Norfolk. Aside from Uni and 2 years in Essex ive been here for well over 50 years. My father lives in a house he bought in 1972, ive family who live in a house handed down in their direct line of the family since the early 20th century.
I agree with you, and im in no way unusual as ive childhood friends who are in the same situation.

In fact.... Just working this out....
In an hour from this sofa, on foot, I could walk past and end up at every house my grandparents and parents ever lived at from the start of WW2 to today

Edit - no im wrong, there was a brief period just before my birth my mum and dad were elsewhere but that brief period aside......