this post was submitted on 17 Oct 2024
91 points (88.2% liked)

Ask Lemmy

26875 readers
2635 users here now

A Fediverse community for open-ended, thought provoking questions

Please don't post about US Politics. If you need to do this, try !politicaldiscussion@lemmy.world


Rules: (interactive)


1) Be nice and; have funDoxxing, trolling, sealioning, racism, and toxicity are not welcomed in AskLemmy. Remember what your mother said: if you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all. In addition, the site-wide Lemmy.world terms of service also apply here. Please familiarize yourself with them


2) All posts must end with a '?'This is sort of like Jeopardy. Please phrase all post titles in the form of a proper question ending with ?


3) No spamPlease do not flood the community with nonsense. Actual suspected spammers will be banned on site. No astroturfing.


4) NSFW is okay, within reasonJust remember to tag posts with either a content warning or a [NSFW] tag. Overtly sexual posts are not allowed, please direct them to either !asklemmyafterdark@lemmy.world or !asklemmynsfw@lemmynsfw.com. NSFW comments should be restricted to posts tagged [NSFW].


5) This is not a support community.
It is not a place for 'how do I?', type questions. If you have any questions regarding the site itself or would like to report a community, please direct them to Lemmy.world Support or email info@lemmy.world. For other questions check our partnered communities list, or use the search function.


Reminder: The terms of service apply here too.

Partnered Communities:

Tech Support

No Stupid Questions

You Should Know

Reddit

Jokes

Ask Ouija


Logo design credit goes to: tubbadu


founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
 

A lot of the things we do on a daily or weekly basis have ways of doing them that can either be private or communal, some of these which we do not think to consider as having that characteristic.

For example, bathing in the Roman Empire used to be communal, but then Rome fell and citizens in the splinter countries began taking baths privately.

Receiving mail is another example. There are countries which don’t have mailboxes and everyone gets their mail at the post office in the PO boxes. It was the United States which pioneered the idea of the modern mail system, which is why we associate it as a private act.

There are activities as well which don’t have any history as jumping between one or the other that might benefit from it, for example I think towns might benefit if internet was free and freely accessible but only at the local library.

What’s a non-communal aspect of life you think should be communal?

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] alcoholicorn@lemmy.ml 89 points 4 weeks ago (4 children)

Cooking. 5 people working together can cook for 100 people easier, cheaper, and less wastefully than 100 people can cook for themselves/their families.

Unfortunately the current restaurant system in the US is incredibly wasteful, expensive, and pays fuckall.

[–] SreudianFlip@sh.itjust.works 32 points 4 weeks ago (3 children)

Verified: group cooking is the way.

I have friends and family who live in a cohousing building. About 50 people in 30 units. Each apartment is complete but the kitchens are slightly smaller than typical.

Cohousing is mutual ownership of the building. About 20% of the building is common areas, like widened hallways with couches and bookshelves, or a games nook, music room, workshop, laundry, etc. It's basically a tall village, and they are like roommates with privacy.

The giant kitchen and dining room is used six nights a week. One person is chef with a small crew, and dinner is for around 30 people. It costs $5 CDN per meal, though if you raid the leftovers later it's pay what you want, usually $2. The cooking volunteer roster is optional and organized by a Slack channel. Food is usually awesome and everyone wins.

If you want you hardly ever have to cook dinner for yourself.

[–] laranis@lemmy.zip 6 points 4 weeks ago (1 children)

Amazing. May I ask what region of the world you're describing?

[–] SreudianFlip@sh.itjust.works 5 points 4 weeks ago (1 children)
[–] SatansMaggotyCumFart@lemmy.world 1 points 3 weeks ago (2 children)

$5 a meal and $5000 a month for rent.

[–] SreudianFlip@sh.itjust.works 3 points 3 weeks ago

Other savings built into collective infrastructure:

  • super cheap fast internet. They pay about $5/ month and when I am visiting I get 1ms ping to speedtest servers, amazing.
  • tools, the workshop is set up for tool sharing as well
  • laundry room, no coins
  • car sharing is easy
  • bulk buying groups naturally form
  • event facilities, guest rooms just need booking (big deal in Vancouver eh)
  • profit control: fewer middlemen to feed for maintenance and management
  • dozens of tiny efficiencies that add up
  • village settings are naturally designed for mutual aid, good cohousing is a microvillage
[–] SreudianFlip@sh.itjust.works 1 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

You are familiar with the concept of #cohousing, right? I don't think anyone is renting there, all owners. Land values have been fucked in Vancouver since capitalism arrived, and in fact when the group bought the three house lots they needed, they had to deal with one of them being shadow-flipped during the purchase.

Still, pooling resources did make it very possible for the group. The hard-to-swallow expensive part was actually building to passivhaus standards and dealing with bureaucracy, if I understand correctly.

[–] SatansMaggotyCumFart@lemmy.world 2 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

You know this is a joke on how expensive rent is in Vancouver, right?

[–] SreudianFlip@sh.itjust.works -1 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (1 children)

Yes and it would have been funny if any rent was involved.

Edit, oh wait you mean they are SAving 5k a month, whoosh missed that

I like to light-heartedly make fun about life’s absurdities but I see that’s completely lost here.

Have a nice day.

[–] vaderaj@lemmy.world 5 points 4 weeks ago

I am from India and currently work in IT. Due to a lot of reasons I did not pursue cooking but my main motivation to pursue cooking was this aspect, and if you are interested check out community kitchens in India (Mega Kitchens docu series is a good place to start)

[–] kyle@lemm.ee 2 points 4 weeks ago (1 children)

This sounds amazing tbh, I'm pretty jealous

[–] SreudianFlip@sh.itjust.works 1 points 4 weeks ago

Me too, most of us would be happier and richer living like that.

[–] Brewchin@lemmy.world 25 points 4 weeks ago (1 children)

This makes me think of the Sikh community's charity/giving (can't remember the term) food giving that happens in most towns globally where there a Gurdwara.

There has to be a better way than waves hands everything, really.

[–] dutchkimble@lemy.lol 3 points 3 weeks ago

They call it a langar

[–] CarbonIceDragon@pawb.social 9 points 4 weeks ago

I sometimes think about automats, and what a modernized version, designed to both be healthy enough to eat as one's primary meal source without ill effect and efficient enough to compete in price with home cooking, might be like. I suspect it would probably involve a lot of soup and chili and the like, just because that stuff is relatively simple to produce in large quantities, and uses cheap yet generally healthy ingredients

[–] lvxferre@mander.xyz 5 points 4 weeks ago

Taste differences make cooking specially messy to communalise. Not impossible though.