Cohousing-L Mailing List: Diversity, what diversity?

[Tony G. Rocco (tgr]

Greetings, cohousers:

I just wanted to relay an interesting experience I had 
last night talking to the hopeful founder of a new 
cohousing community in San Francisco. I thought my 
experience might be interesting in light of the recent 
discussion regarding diversity, or the lack thereof, in 
the cohousing world. (Every word is true, I swear.)

The person I spoke with, who will remain nameless 
here, is hoping to purchase two buildings in San 
Francisco to turn into a cohousing community. The 
units in these buildings are now occupied and the 
current tenants will be *evicted* to make room for 
the new cohousers.

Here are some of the conditions being considered for 
the cohousing community:

* A committment to not having any children, ever.

* Veganism for all community meals.

This goes along with a generally negative attitude 
toward anyone who does not conform to a vegan diet 
in the privacy of their own homes. I was told that 
some people would not even associate with a person 
whom they knew ate meat. A crime akin to child 
molestation to some, I was told, or abortion.

* No dogs, or at least no large dogs, on the *moral* 
grounds that having dogs in the city is wrong.

* No breeding of dogs, as the breeding of dogs is 
immoral.

Let's get this straight: it's OK to evict tenants from 
their homes so you can move in, but it's tantamount 
to child molestation to eat an occasional piece of meat 
or cheese? Kids are nasty and keeping or breeding 
canines is immoral.

Does anyone get the impression that some people 
involved in cohousing are, for lack of a more gentile 
term, *wacks*? Doesn't enforcing agreement on 
specific points like those mentioned above go well 
beyond looking for general philosophic similarities 
and verge on dictating highly personal choices where 
there is no clear right or wrong? Or at least where 
there is room for disagreement among reasonable 
people?

I would greatly encourage discussion of this issue. 
Thanks.

- Tony