• I can’t recall the source, but I remember hearing that the Amazon, generations ago, was farmed. The trees aren’t distributed naturally, or something like that, we see signs of intentional crop management. However, it was done in a symbiotic way with nature so that it almost looks natural, until you look closer. With lots of fruit trees and food sources so that food was an abundant free resource.

    Wish I could remember the source for this, sounds like heaven on earth, working with nature is all we need to rediscover freedom.

  • The town I grew up in had several public apple trees. I have fond memories of climbing the trees with my friends to get apples.

    Maintenance is a thing, though. If not properly maintained, the apples will often grow too densely, yielding only small and sour apples. I would never consider the apples in my home town to be filling food - at best it would be a small snack. It would require a lot of labour to maintain a tree to the point where it would feed people in need.

  • Lol lmao. The right to the fruit of something is literally one of the kinds of Roman property law that informs European ideas of property rights.

    Fruit trees are mostly just expensive to grow vs other kinds and can be unappealing if fruit spoils or attracts other animals. E.g. you probably wouldn’t want to play on the grass underneath an orange tree on all the little bits of orange after possums have at it.

  • I’ve been told that this is a no-go for city planners because the sheer quantity of fallen fruit can be a walking hazard, and no one wants the legal liability. What it comes down to is that “free” fruit trees would require additional ongoing maintenance costs. Nothing nefarious, just logistical issues.

  •  4am   ( @4am@lemm.ee ) 
    link
    fedilink
    1410 hours ago

    I mean cmon though - in a capitalist country someone would take ALL the fruit and then sell it to people. “It was public but then it became MINE and if you want it you need to enrich MY wealth with a piece of YOUR value”

  • I remember when I was young I got ticketed for trespassing on public property. I was so offended. Yet that’s the society we live in. Public resources aren’t for use by the public, they are for use by the small fraction of the public who control them.

      • And if you actually read the Wikipedia article you linked:

        The work of Elinor Ostrom, who received the Nobel Prize in Economics is seen by some economists as having refuted Hardin’s claims.[1] Hardin’s views on over-population have been criticised as simplistic[2] and racist. [3]

        Hardin’s work is criticised as historically inaccurate in failing to account for the demographic transition,[191] and for failing to distinguish between common property and open access resources.[192][193] Environmentalist Derrick Jensen claims the tragedy of the commons is used as propaganda for private ownership.[194][195] He says it has been used by the political right wing to hasten the final enclosure of the “common resources” of third world and indigenous people worldwide, as a part of the Washington Consensus.[196]

        Other criticisms have focused on Hardin’s racist and eugenicist views, claiming that his arguments are directed towards forcible population control, particularly for people of color.[210][211]

        The “tragedy of the commons” is one of those things that’s very Intuitive, but doesn’t actually hold up to much scrutiny.

        • So the BLM lied about the (Cliven and sons) Bundy cattle degrading US property? No, I don’t sympathize with them, just saying the answer may be somewhere between each extreme. Key word: “may,” because I’m not a conservation scientist and people are people.