Our pal Hank Green joins Dimension 20 for Mentopolis (premiering Aug. 9th on Dropout) and will be bringing you lots of science facts - but here are the facts you WON’T hear during the show
can you imagine chuckling at none pizza with left beef and then living through the death of humanity and resurrecting a chunk of it and becoming a god figure to the new society you create and then 10,000 years later referencing it in conversation to a horribly traumatized teenager who has no possible frame of reference for this ancient meme that no one else alive has ever heard of
i assume this is a reference to something but choose to believe it is simply a creative exercise that tumblr user spleen9000 is inviting me to participate in. like yes. yes im imagining it
We need HOAs or some idiots will paint their house purple or put tractor tires in their front yard. If you want tractor tires, don’t move to a HOA neighborhood.
I couldn’t even fathom how horrifying it must be to live somewhere there are…purple houses and and yucky stuff in people’s yards. Thank God I don’t have any real problems like that.
listen my Nonna and Nonno live right by a purple house (it’s a nice lilac) and as a kid I was fucking obsessed with it because purple is my favorite color. I’d go nuts whenever we passed by it. Also it had a purple mailbox to match and it blew my mind.
No more HOAs. More purple houses.
imagine trying to control what someone else can do with or on their own property just because you don’t agree with their taste in decor
NO MORE HOAs MORE PURPLE HOUSES
Related, becuase I just had to move: “just don’t move into an HOA” Do you know what a PAIN IN THE ASS it is to find NON-HOA Housing? Very nearly everything in the CO front range that isn’t a rental has an HOA these days!
Short list of the Shit the HOA at my pervious house tried to pull:
Banning personal and community food gardens (The reason the tag for my garden is “The garden of earthly HOA violations”)
Banning people from using thier personal yards as Native Plant Restoration microzones, something that looks gorgeous and is extremely helpful to the local ecology
trying to get the city council to remove protections on adjacent city Open Space/Native Plant restoration zone so they could mow it.
mandating the use of ONE landscaping company in the neighborhood, coinicdentally owned by the HOA president’s son
Mandating the use of an unecessary water purification company on all properties.
suing city animal control for collecting lose dogs and cats and returning them to the addresses on thier collars. You know. that thing animal control does so the animals don’t get run over or disemboweled by the coyotes or catch and spread rabies. The thing that’s illegal to let your pet do out here for those reasons Karen.
Suing the city council to remove a city bus stop in the neighborhood that was heavily used by many residents. They damn near got away with it becuase the HOA meetings were always in the middle of the day on a weekday. You know, when the residents that use that stop are working.
Sending people letters threatening to fine them for having “Out Of Season” holiday decor. Specifically targeting my Indian neighbors who were celebrating Diwali, not Christmas and the Jews with visible Menorahs.
Fining people for doing thier own appliance and car repair on thier own personal property
Fining people for operating a business out of thier house, specifically targeting a disabled neighbor that does comission tailoring and garment repair out of her home. never bothered a soul except the one snoopy bitch who didn’t like that her clients were allowed to park in the tailor’s designated and otherwise unused parking space.
Trying to fine a neighbor for flying a Pride Flag
HOAs are invasive, bigoted, corrupt and cruel institutions that should never have been allowed to be created. If you live in and HOA area, showing up at the meetings to tell people what the fuck is wrong with them, Joining your HOA board to protect your neighbors and possibly organize the dissolution of the HOA is one of the best things you can do to protect the marginalized members of your community.
FUCK HOAs AND LONG LIVE THE PURPLE HOUSES AND TRACTOR-TIRE GARDENS OF THE WORLD.
Are y'all telling me this shit is actually LEGAL?
Here’s how to get an HOA to leave you and your purple house tf alone
cant stop thinking about this post. 😔
direct action
HOAs, IN THEORY, could be such a force for public good, and that’s what’s maddening. Imagine if an HOA was like “well we’ve got all these houses and this one empty lot, pay your HOA dues and we can install a community food garden!” or “leave your contact information on the HOA residents-only webpage if you’re willing to be an after-school dropoff for children in our community who may not have a parent at home” or “hi, Sally, we’ve noticed your yard’s gone rather hogwild and things weren’t like that before your husband passed last year, do you need some help? We have some folks in the HOA who can help you with maintenance, no charge.”
Instead they choose isolation over community in the name of a unity that’s in image only, and that’s really, really sad.
Friend of mine bought a small house, an old one in an old neighborhood. She had no idea it was an HOA neighborhood until the day she moved in. They arrived with paperwork she “had” to sign or things would get “complicated”, aka do this or we’re gonna make life hell for you. She immediately told them no, she has no desire to be part of the HOA, and they about blew a gasket. Went from civil to wtf real quick. They tried sending her violation reports, demanded she pay fines, threatened her, etc. What they didn’t know is she’s petty and gives zero fucks. She also lives keeping paperwork nice and tidy.
Shit hit the fan when she installed a wall around her property. A 3 feet tall 2 foot wide wall around her yard. Topped with gorgeous iron work with sharp points that make climbing dangeous. Think Addams Family Lite. They tried to stop the construction because she was using the /wrong/ company (a mutual aid group she worked with). Send her fines and fees, and made the mistake of sending a copy of the HOA contract with a forged signature.
Ooooo…it got so ugly! She remembered the HOA post here about that happening to others and, well, the HOA broke up because of other fuckery on top of this. But it was mostly due to her dragging them in court for fraud, harassment, disturbing the peace, trespassing, stalking, and a few other things. She was petty about it too, looked into every fucking thing she could to destroy them.
I was informed that you not, in fact, obligated to sign the HOA contract. It’s not a legal requirement. When you look for a home, make sure to ask about the possible HOAs, and look at the details of your homeowner’s contract. Sometimes HOAs have that shit written into the purchase. If you see it, change the contract, put your initials and date in the changed sections, and see how the real estate agent handles in. This is legal, btw.
Don’t sign the HOA contract, learn the laws regarding yard stuff (did you know you can apply to have your yard declared a wildlife reserve?), and be petty af when the nosy neighbors won’t mind their business.
I had no idea you could just not sign an HOA when one was given. I’d looked to stay away from any HOA when I bought my home, and had explicitly been looking for homes without HOAs for when I move. This is really good to know!
That’s because it’s super, super not true. I’m not entirely sure what the motive was for the poster above to fabricate essentially every word of their post, and I don’t especially care, but when it comes to the point of giving people advice that stands to get them in enormous legal trouble (up to and including liens against their home) it stops being a hilarious lie on the internet and starts being an actual menace.
There are two types of HOA, voluntary and mandatory. They operate more or less how you’d expect from the name. You can choose not to join a voluntary one, but MUST join a mandatory one if your home or property is within their jurisdiction. Mandatory HOAs are very common and are what most people are thinking of when they say “HOA”. You cannot purchase a home in an area with a mandatory HOA and simply not sign or join. It is also illegal not to disclose the existence of an HOA governing a property during sale, so that whole “had no idea there was an HOA” thing is almost certainly another wild flight of fancy, thankfully. It almost certainly DOES happen occasionally, but not legally, and you’d have a rock solid legal case against the seller or selling agent for failure to disclose (though you still wouldn’t be able to just opt out of the HOA).
This is a fun vengeance fantasy against shitty HOAs, which I can certainly get behind (fuck em) but please don’t make irreversible monetary and legal decisions on its advice.
Also, moving into an HOA neighborhood and then attempting not to pay the mandatory dues is like moving to a new area and refusing to pay the local taxes, and will get you in about the same amount of trouble.
The reason why so many houses (particularly new houses) are in HOA neighborhoods is because many cities and counties will only give building permits to planned HOA communities. Why? Because all of the things that normally the local government would have to pay for is paid by the HOA, and they don’t have to spend tax dollars on it - the burden is shifted onto the HOA, and then passed on to the homeowners in the form of dues. HOA’s typically pay for snow plowing, road/asphalt repair, common area landscaping, garbage/recycling removal, pools, fitness facilities, public parks, etc. (though these services obviously vary from place to place and are not universal).
Do most associations have problems? Yes. Are they a huge pain in the ass? Also yes. Can you choose not to pay your HOA dues while driving on HOA roads and using all of the services that the HOA is paying for? No. No, you cannot.
NAMJOON MIGHT HAVE CRIED BECAUSE HE KNEW BETTER THAN ANYONE THE STRUGGLE OH HATING YOUR OWN SELF AND HAVING TO LIVE IN YOUR OWN PRISON YET HE WENT ON A TOUR CALLED LOVE YOURSELF TO NOT ONLY LOVE HIMSELF BUT INSPIRE MILLIONS OF LOST SOULS TO DO THE SAME AND EVEN NOW HE IS TELLING YOU ALL THIS IS THE END OF THE TOUR BUT NOT OF OUR JOURNEY TO ACCEPT OURSELVES. HE CRIED FOR HIMSELF BUT HE ALSO CRIED FOR US AND THIS SAYS A LOT ABOUT HOW AMAZING HE IS AND HOW FAR HE GREW.
