re: fifty-plus cohousing
From: TR Ruddick (truddickearthlink.net)
Date: Mon, 17 Feb 2003 12:25:01 -0700 (MST)

We seem to keep having this broader discussion with a different cast of excludees.
 
At one point we discussed if it was "really" cohousing if the residents were all intentionally of one religion.
 
At another, we considered why cohousing wasn't as "racially" diverse as some of us might like it to be.  (I like to put "race" in quotes because it is, after all, an artificial social construct, not genetic).
 
I tend to think cohousing is primarily physical; it's an efficient use of resources that, when it works right, makes for greater personal prosperity, better social climate, more responsible use of resources.  The people will bring their diversity, even if they've got lots of surface similarities.
 
Diversity is one thing that we might welcome, but why is diversity defined only in terms of individual demographics?  What I mean is this: why should every cohousing community be made up of as disparate a group of residents as possible?
 
If there's one cohousing community that's devoted to seniors, another devoted to families with children, another with Methodists, and another full of Pagans--AND a good number that have no "theme" for membership--isn't that diversity in a different sense?  In that scenario, individuals could exercise greater choice in lifestyle and association.  Is that choice not a value for most of us?
 
 
____  _
  |  |_)           Thomas E. "TR" Ruddick
  |  | \             Nunquam Itum Agitabilum
 
____  _
    |     |_)             Thomas E. "TR" Ruddick
    |     |  \             Nunquam Itum Agitabilum
 

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