French is exposing one aspect of the problem: the N.A.R. movement.
The Beeb recently ran a piece exposing another one, more directly traceable to the Russian state. People should be very aware that the Russian Orthodox Church is under the direct command of the Russian state.
I would not be in the least surprised if the Russian state and its Authoritarian Axis friends aren’t injecting a lot of their money and effort into spraying accelerants into the passionate flames of this violent, supposedly “Christian” zealotry.
Good morning. Happy Juneteenth! 71 degrees and cloudy, with ran later and highs in the high 70s.
The mothership is reporting on Trump’s off-again, on-again immigration enforcement and deportations. The FP is headlining “What American Students Aren’t taught about Slavery”. A quick scan reveals that what they mean, is that slavery was not a uniquely American phenomenon, but occurred through the world. This is true.
However true, 10s of millions of grandparents and parents were taught the Lost Cause.
and in counterpoint, how few know that free blacks voted already for the separation from King England? That one of the first patriots to die for American freedom was black? That the greater rider announcing the start of the American Revolution was not Paul Revere? It was in fact a black rider named Israel Bissell!!!
Historical knowledge and teaching is an area ripe for distortion. Every writer of history has had a point of view, often formed prior to their research into a particular subject area. This then leads them to find supporting evidence to support their conclusions, rather than the other way around.
The good news is that historians often balance each other out and the overall historical record can then be reviewed to provide a reasonable view of the past. The bad news is that the existence of multiple viewpoints also allows those with a particular agenda to cherry-pick the histories that support their POV and to attempt to make those sources, and ony those sources, the definitive views on particular topics.
I’ve always believed that many, perhaps most, of the Confederates who fought in the Civil War, were non-slaveowners who fought, not to preserve slavery for the planter elites, but simply because the South was their home. That was the reason that Robert E Lee, who hated slavery, fought for the South.
While many of their descendants who have “Southern pride” may be motivated by the residue of racism, I refuse to believe that across the board. I tend to grant a degree of grace. Along those lines, things like removal of Confederate statues are best decided by local Southerners while and black, not by outside agitators.
It's complicated of course. There is written evidence about Robert E. Lee's approval of slavery and racist attitude. Remember that the Lost Causers, including Lee himself, worked tirelessly to spin the Civil War. See "War Between the States" as one example. States Rights, the skirt of dishonesty.
I understand that Lee's attitudes have been disputed in recent years. The larger point still stands. Most Confederates never owned slaves. They may have been racist to one degree or another (perhaps simply seeing the racial caste system as a given), but poor white Southerners had no investment or stake in slavery as an institution.
The larger problem is that after Lincoln's assassination, Reconstruction was, for a variety of reasons, only half done and ultimately abandoned after the disputed 1876 election. So reconciliation between North and South was incomplete and flawed. It allowed the country to get back together and become the world power it has been since the early 20th century -- at the cost of allowing Jim Crow racism to continue for another 100 years. The unhealed wounds of that racism are what troubles us now, coloring arguments over the "Lost Cause" and allowing spurious rewriting of history like the "119 Project".
I've been in meetings all day (long story), so I missed this discussion.
1 thought comes to mind. I presented a paper on slavery (I was opposed to it!), but the audience was shocked at there existed over 10 different perspectives on slavery; even on the anti-slavery side there were several. A big split was between gradualists and immediatists (think Underground Railroad). Both opposed slavery, but disagreed on what was appropriate. I can respect that, actually, as I had family that were gradualists, immediatist, and even one slave-owner.
Although I suspect Henry Clay isn't as honorable as he is made out to be, he gave several speeches where he defended slavery as caring for existing slaves, rather than freeing them in their old age, when they would not be able to care for themselves. I'm not unsympathetic to the argument: if you inherited a 70 year old slave, keeping them fed, clothed, and sheltered on your estate can be defended, even though slavery is wrong.
Clay also offered to sell his slaves to the government, who could free them, provided they made sure they were cared for. Now he financially benefits from that, so was it altruistic, or self-interest? IDK.
Lee had his faults, I won't ever deny nor excuse that. But I think in general he was a decent man who lived in an era where states rights was the norm, not a radical position. I cut him grace for that. I also think he worked hard after the civil war to help reconcile the union.
all true Phil. Lee, hypocritical in this writing, says one hand, slavery is not moral. Yet, claims the teaching of Christianity that it has existed and only Providence in time, will emancipation the slaves. He goes on to write, that "they are better off than in Africa". Wow. Substitute the evil German Guys and Jews, and that's black antisemitism in a nutshell.
A lot of wordsmithing to self justify his own incapacity to be a moral man. That it it stinks to be a slave, and all the horrors, meant nothing to Robert E Lee.
Where you see "black antisemitism" in Robert E. Lee's letter, I see well-meaning but misguided paternalism, no doubt common in that era. That he still considered slavery an evil is still evident.
If you cannot grapple with the fact that many otherwise good men and women in antebellum America, supported or at least tolerated slavery, then you will misunderstand their role in American history. That extends even to the one essential American without whom our Constitutional Republic would not exist -- George Washington, who owned slaves.
Have a good one, Doug. I sense we will not agree on this matter.
Please feel free to expand on your disagreement. Explain how a single individual with radical…understandable but radical…personal takes on American history, is allowed to rewrite our entire history to align with her narrow belief system, and then have that history cast as undeniable gospel by a media business.
I propose that is the worst possible way to understand history.
It hasn’t been pummeled enough. It was misplaced and severe grudge mentality insisting on sole right to define an entire country’s …and by definition…an entire population’s history. Screw that. That’s how we got where we’re at now, just from a different direction.
George Floyd sparked racial debates that in many cases degenerated into moral panics. The history-rewriting “1619 project” is a prime example of moral panic. OTOH, Juneteenth, which is all about the effective end of slavery after the Civil War, not about DEI, is a worthy result.
American history should be taught, warts in all, in our schools and in our public discourse, the ‘warts” being the injustices of slavery and racism and the maltreatment of Native tribes. But things like the “1619” project” threaten to allow the “warts’ to overwhelm the larger narrative of American history.
Happy Juneteenth. It seems to be an issue that confuses our state’s political leaders in their deep commitment to MAGA/Trumpism. They don’t want to recognize it as a holiday—and it isn’t a state holiday—because MAGA/Trumpist lore says it was the Southern Rebels that define West Virginia’s identity. This is despite the fact that the state was created because these Virginia counties wanted to rebel against the arrogant slaveholding snobs of the rest of the Old Dominion…
Those MAGA idiots are providing proof that “Southern pride” lies really about nothing but racism. Not to mention blatantly ahistorical with respect to WV.
Mountani Semper Liberai. from memory. My ancestors on the Jackson side were of course split Union and Confederate. Thomas went to Bull Run, while others in the Western Virginia counties refused to go along with the Virginia traitors...
So close. Montani Semper Liberi. The state motto of West Virginia. (I had to Google it to double check my memory.) I only remember it because there is a huge mural in the center of Franklin, WV with the motto at the top with a black bear and mountaineer standing in front of mountains.
Shocker. On that front, the daughters and I took the babies to story time at the library yesterday. The theme was opposites. The first book was very simple and she read every page verbatim except the page that showed piano keys. The words said some piano keys are black and some piano keys are white. She substituted black with dark and white with light. Huh? Why? I mentioned it to my daughter and she said “I noticed that too, why didn’t she say black and white?”
Maybe she didn't want to say that "black" and "white" are opposites because she's obsessed with "Black people" and "White people," as though either of those categories actually correlated with the colors black and white.
As colors, black (absence of reflected light) and white (all reflected light) are opposites.
That’s where our minds went as we rolled our eyes and said “so stupid.” I was happy my daughter noticed it. She said “oh mom I’m very clued in to those things these days.” The other daughter was chasing her 15-month-old around the library and not paying attention.
I think I thought that, too, but it was more of an assumption than having actually expended any effort wondering about other places and the rest of human history.
I have a knife drawer, a silverware drawer, and a commercial grade hanging rack with hooks above the sink that has a dozen or more utensils I use all the time. I can be an overbearing fascist when it comes to kitchen design. I am always right, and if everyone would just follow my advice, everyone would have a perfect kitchen.
I've had professional chefs tell me my kitchen is as close to perfect as a residential kitchen gets. It's actually very simple and relatively inexpensive. Folks get caught up in dumb stuff the fashionistas promote instead of designing low budget kitchens focused on cooking and cleaning.
In my dream home, I'd have a carefully sloped floor to a floor drain with a grease trap, and a hot water hose and nozzle for hosing the place down.
Thanks. American kitchens are not designed for cooking and cleaning. They're designed to look cool, with "cool" being in constant flux to reflect current fashion trends.
HOA regulations are all about appearance, on the theory that appearance will preserve property values, and not about the people who live in HOA controlled houses.
Since the condo board and outside manager decide what kind and they pay for them, I don't have a problem with that...mine look awesome and I think looking nice as people or buildings is a good thing
A condo is different from an HOA. Elements in common, their maintenance and appearance is the proper concern of a condo board. That's different from a HOA board using the instrument of restrictive covenants (virtually always written by the original developer with no individual owner input) to control property owned by individual owners.
When getting into management intensive grazing in the 80s I read Joel Salatin's book, "Salad Bar Beef". While I agree with what he wrote about raising animals on pasture, he stated that houses should be built to last 50 years only. I forget his reasoning, but I found that concept hard to accept.
> Part of my thesis of American home building being primarily a fashion industry. <
Hear, hear!
Home decor stuff that was once designed to last a lifetime is now the equivalent of costume jewelry. You notice it in everything from furniture to light fixtures, plumbing fixtures, kitchen cabinetry, flooring… The list goes on and on.
They say the whole “big bland white box” thing is thought to be an expression of it, since most people believe that bathing everything in slight off-white colors is the best chance for making a home start to look like it has a dated design in just a few short years.
Of course, the other long-term trend that hasn’t shifted—despite the effort to popularize “tiny homes”—is ever rising indoor square footage per capita. No one knows what to do with a 1/4 to 1/3 acre lawn and garden plot. They’d rather have it enclosed under a common roof.
NAHB has done a survey every year for the last 50 years on most requested specification on any new home, and unsurprisingly, it's square footage. Square footage over design, functional kitchens and baths, storage, energy efficiency...anything. Square footage tops all.
OTOH, the whole tiny home thing was dumb. I don't want to live in a 480sf box. No one does.
I've designed completely functional 2BR/2Bath houses that are around 1250sf, and 3BR a 2.5 baths are around 1500sf....not including garage, and face it, everyone including me wants a nice garage...not just for cars but for shop and workspace.
"the whole tiny home thing was dumb. I don't want to live in a 480sf box. No one does."
But what about people who subscribe to the "Van Life" philosophy? Not something I aspire to, but there is a movement surrounding this lifestyle. Although I have seen a few social media proponents lately renounce the concept after a few years of living this way.
On the other hand, my wife occasionally casually mentions, why don't we sell the farm and live and travel in an RV. Although I suspect the only RV she would really be happy with is one of those $1 million dollar ones. If anyone here wants to set up a Go Fund Me for us, I wouldn't refuse ;)
From someone poster JohnM:
Worth Your Time II: 'The Problem of the Christian Assassin' --David French
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/19/opinion/minnesota-killings-boelter.html?unlocked_article_code=1.QE8.hhjX.mh-7Pi1ehHeF&smid=url-share
,loonies are loose in lots of places.
yikes...
Thanks Phil H and John M.
French is exposing one aspect of the problem: the N.A.R. movement.
The Beeb recently ran a piece exposing another one, more directly traceable to the Russian state. People should be very aware that the Russian Orthodox Church is under the direct command of the Russian state.
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c30q5l8d4lro
I would not be in the least surprised if the Russian state and its Authoritarian Axis friends aren’t injecting a lot of their money and effort into spraying accelerants into the passionate flames of this violent, supposedly “Christian” zealotry.
Could be.
Good morning. Happy Juneteenth! 71 degrees and cloudy, with ran later and highs in the high 70s.
The mothership is reporting on Trump’s off-again, on-again immigration enforcement and deportations. The FP is headlining “What American Students Aren’t taught about Slavery”. A quick scan reveals that what they mean, is that slavery was not a uniquely American phenomenon, but occurred through the world. This is true.
However true, 10s of millions of grandparents and parents were taught the Lost Cause.
and in counterpoint, how few know that free blacks voted already for the separation from King England? That one of the first patriots to die for American freedom was black? That the greater rider announcing the start of the American Revolution was not Paul Revere? It was in fact a black rider named Israel Bissell!!!
Bet really never heard of him!
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israel_Bissell
Historical knowledge and teaching is an area ripe for distortion. Every writer of history has had a point of view, often formed prior to their research into a particular subject area. This then leads them to find supporting evidence to support their conclusions, rather than the other way around.
The good news is that historians often balance each other out and the overall historical record can then be reviewed to provide a reasonable view of the past. The bad news is that the existence of multiple viewpoints also allows those with a particular agenda to cherry-pick the histories that support their POV and to attempt to make those sources, and ony those sources, the definitive views on particular topics.
I’ve always believed that many, perhaps most, of the Confederates who fought in the Civil War, were non-slaveowners who fought, not to preserve slavery for the planter elites, but simply because the South was their home. That was the reason that Robert E Lee, who hated slavery, fought for the South.
While many of their descendants who have “Southern pride” may be motivated by the residue of racism, I refuse to believe that across the board. I tend to grant a degree of grace. Along those lines, things like removal of Confederate statues are best decided by local Southerners while and black, not by outside agitators.
It's complicated of course. There is written evidence about Robert E. Lee's approval of slavery and racist attitude. Remember that the Lost Causers, including Lee himself, worked tirelessly to spin the Civil War. See "War Between the States" as one example. States Rights, the skirt of dishonesty.
I understand that Lee's attitudes have been disputed in recent years. The larger point still stands. Most Confederates never owned slaves. They may have been racist to one degree or another (perhaps simply seeing the racial caste system as a given), but poor white Southerners had no investment or stake in slavery as an institution.
The larger problem is that after Lincoln's assassination, Reconstruction was, for a variety of reasons, only half done and ultimately abandoned after the disputed 1876 election. So reconciliation between North and South was incomplete and flawed. It allowed the country to get back together and become the world power it has been since the early 20th century -- at the cost of allowing Jim Crow racism to continue for another 100 years. The unhealed wounds of that racism are what troubles us now, coloring arguments over the "Lost Cause" and allowing spurious rewriting of history like the "119 Project".
I've been in meetings all day (long story), so I missed this discussion.
1 thought comes to mind. I presented a paper on slavery (I was opposed to it!), but the audience was shocked at there existed over 10 different perspectives on slavery; even on the anti-slavery side there were several. A big split was between gradualists and immediatists (think Underground Railroad). Both opposed slavery, but disagreed on what was appropriate. I can respect that, actually, as I had family that were gradualists, immediatist, and even one slave-owner.
Although I suspect Henry Clay isn't as honorable as he is made out to be, he gave several speeches where he defended slavery as caring for existing slaves, rather than freeing them in their old age, when they would not be able to care for themselves. I'm not unsympathetic to the argument: if you inherited a 70 year old slave, keeping them fed, clothed, and sheltered on your estate can be defended, even though slavery is wrong.
Clay also offered to sell his slaves to the government, who could free them, provided they made sure they were cared for. Now he financially benefits from that, so was it altruistic, or self-interest? IDK.
Lee had his faults, I won't ever deny nor excuse that. But I think in general he was a decent man who lived in an era where states rights was the norm, not a radical position. I cut him grace for that. I also think he worked hard after the civil war to help reconcile the union.
https://encyclopediavirginia.org/primary-documents/letter-from-robert-e-lee-to-mary-randolph-custis-lee-december-27-1856/
all true Phil. Lee, hypocritical in this writing, says one hand, slavery is not moral. Yet, claims the teaching of Christianity that it has existed and only Providence in time, will emancipation the slaves. He goes on to write, that "they are better off than in Africa". Wow. Substitute the evil German Guys and Jews, and that's black antisemitism in a nutshell.
A lot of wordsmithing to self justify his own incapacity to be a moral man. That it it stinks to be a slave, and all the horrors, meant nothing to Robert E Lee.
Where you see "black antisemitism" in Robert E. Lee's letter, I see well-meaning but misguided paternalism, no doubt common in that era. That he still considered slavery an evil is still evident.
If you cannot grapple with the fact that many otherwise good men and women in antebellum America, supported or at least tolerated slavery, then you will misunderstand their role in American history. That extends even to the one essential American without whom our Constitutional Republic would not exist -- George Washington, who owned slaves.
Have a good one, Doug. I sense we will not agree on this matter.
Right. Dipsquat...and hugely promoted...initiatives like the 1619 Project have utterly bent perceptions.
disagree
Please feel free to expand on your disagreement. Explain how a single individual with radical…understandable but radical…personal takes on American history, is allowed to rewrite our entire history to align with her narrow belief system, and then have that history cast as undeniable gospel by a media business.
I propose that is the worst possible way to understand history.
I'll pass, respectfully Kurt. It's been mitigated as nauseum. Have a wonderful day!
It hasn’t been pummeled enough. It was misplaced and severe grudge mentality insisting on sole right to define an entire country’s …and by definition…an entire population’s history. Screw that. That’s how we got where we’re at now, just from a different direction.
George Floyd sparked racial debates that in many cases degenerated into moral panics. The history-rewriting “1619 project” is a prime example of moral panic. OTOH, Juneteenth, which is all about the effective end of slavery after the Civil War, not about DEI, is a worthy result.
American history should be taught, warts in all, in our schools and in our public discourse, the ‘warts” being the injustices of slavery and racism and the maltreatment of Native tribes. But things like the “1619” project” threaten to allow the “warts’ to overwhelm the larger narrative of American history.
Yes, especially when it’s backed with the full force of legacy media.
Happy Juneteenth. It seems to be an issue that confuses our state’s political leaders in their deep commitment to MAGA/Trumpism. They don’t want to recognize it as a holiday—and it isn’t a state holiday—because MAGA/Trumpist lore says it was the Southern Rebels that define West Virginia’s identity. This is despite the fact that the state was created because these Virginia counties wanted to rebel against the arrogant slaveholding snobs of the rest of the Old Dominion…
Those MAGA idiots are providing proof that “Southern pride” lies really about nothing but racism. Not to mention blatantly ahistorical with respect to WV.
Yup. my Jackson ancestors figured prominently in the western move to separate from the eastern Virginia traitors...
Mountaineers are always free!
Mountani Semper Liberai. from memory. My ancestors on the Jackson side were of course split Union and Confederate. Thomas went to Bull Run, while others in the Western Virginia counties refused to go along with the Virginia traitors...
So close. Montani Semper Liberi. The state motto of West Virginia. (I had to Google it to double check my memory.) I only remember it because there is a huge mural in the center of Franklin, WV with the motto at the top with a black bear and mountaineer standing in front of mountains.
…and yet everywhere shackled to the burdens of Trumpism…
They also have an unlocked piece by Condoleeza Rice that is good.
From Coleman Hughes's article:
"American kids graduate high school believing, falsely, that slavery happened only in America."
Shocker. On that front, the daughters and I took the babies to story time at the library yesterday. The theme was opposites. The first book was very simple and she read every page verbatim except the page that showed piano keys. The words said some piano keys are black and some piano keys are white. She substituted black with dark and white with light. Huh? Why? I mentioned it to my daughter and she said “I noticed that too, why didn’t she say black and white?”
Maybe she didn't want to say that "black" and "white" are opposites because she's obsessed with "Black people" and "White people," as though either of those categories actually correlated with the colors black and white.
As colors, black (absence of reflected light) and white (all reflected light) are opposites.
Every imaginable color is derived from the same 3 primaries.
That’s where our minds went as we rolled our eyes and said “so stupid.” I was happy my daughter noticed it. She said “oh mom I’m very clued in to those things these days.” The other daughter was chasing her 15-month-old around the library and not paying attention.
Smart kid.
“Some piano keys are birthing parents; others are non-birthing parents…”
🤮
Good gravy.
I think I thought that, too, but it was more of an assumption than having actually expended any effort wondering about other places and the rest of human history.
I learned about most of it in college, not elementary or HS...but, I don't remember thinking even then that we were the only ones
I knew about Egypt.
I knew about Greece and Rome.
I knew by high school, but Egypt was more interesting when I was younger.
Well, sure, there's Bible stories about being slaves in Egypt.
Good morning. The sun is out, the AC is running, I am going to swim in the ocean before the day is out.
And do other stuff. I cleaned out the utensil drawer last night!
Ocean swim! Where?
Topsail Beach! It was windy, strong current but not unpleasant. Battling the current and undertow was invigorating.
If your experience is like mine, the one utensil you decide you don’t need anymore is the one you will need next week.
That has been known to happen.
Worthy ambitions. You have my full endorsement.
Thank you very much!
Swimming in the ocean? I’m jealous. We have a beach trip scheduled in August.
The water is warm in August. Which beach?
Alabama Gulf Coast.
Me too. The Big Lake is still hovering around 59ºF....cold....
Dealing with Mom stuff - one advantage is that she lived on the coast.
I hope you enjoy your swim! We have more than one utensil drawer.
I kinda do, ( though I have several containers for knives, serving utensils wtc on the counters), though one of them has become a misc/junk drawer
I have a knife drawer, a silverware drawer, and a commercial grade hanging rack with hooks above the sink that has a dozen or more utensils I use all the time. I can be an overbearing fascist when it comes to kitchen design. I am always right, and if everyone would just follow my advice, everyone would have a perfect kitchen.
I'm sure your kitchen is far better than ours.
I've had professional chefs tell me my kitchen is as close to perfect as a residential kitchen gets. It's actually very simple and relatively inexpensive. Folks get caught up in dumb stuff the fashionistas promote instead of designing low budget kitchens focused on cooking and cleaning.
In my dream home, I'd have a carefully sloped floor to a floor drain with a grease trap, and a hot water hose and nozzle for hosing the place down.
That sounds fantastic.
Thanks. American kitchens are not designed for cooking and cleaning. They're designed to look cool, with "cool" being in constant flux to reflect current fashion trends.
Big square footage is not necessary.
Thanks!
I need more than one.
Good morning. The roofers are here!
Treat them with respect; they are my brothers.
Shingles or pro panel (metal)?
Personally I don't care for metal roofs...they look ugly to me..plus the rain is very loud on them...lol
iYo hablo shingles!
Que gusto.
I'm not that hungry, thanks.
Weirdly, two of the youth have not emerged in spite of all the banging.
They will awake from dreaming of popcorn. 🍿
Shingles. I don't think we could get a waiver from our HOA to get a metal roof.
HOA regulations are all about appearance, on the theory that appearance will preserve property values, and not about the people who live in HOA controlled houses.
Since the condo board and outside manager decide what kind and they pay for them, I don't have a problem with that...mine look awesome and I think looking nice as people or buildings is a good thing
A condo is different from an HOA. Elements in common, their maintenance and appearance is the proper concern of a condo board. That's different from a HOA board using the instrument of restrictive covenants (virtually always written by the original developer with no individual owner input) to control property owned by individual owners.
American roof material design is stone age. We could all have (nearly) permanent roof systems, but "look" overrides all other concerns.
Part of my thesis of American home building being primarily a fashion industry.
When getting into management intensive grazing in the 80s I read Joel Salatin's book, "Salad Bar Beef". While I agree with what he wrote about raising animals on pasture, he stated that houses should be built to last 50 years only. I forget his reasoning, but I found that concept hard to accept.
Saladin is, in a word, a moron, for both his ideas on raising beef and the house thing.
> Part of my thesis of American home building being primarily a fashion industry. <
Hear, hear!
Home decor stuff that was once designed to last a lifetime is now the equivalent of costume jewelry. You notice it in everything from furniture to light fixtures, plumbing fixtures, kitchen cabinetry, flooring… The list goes on and on.
They say the whole “big bland white box” thing is thought to be an expression of it, since most people believe that bathing everything in slight off-white colors is the best chance for making a home start to look like it has a dated design in just a few short years.
Of course, the other long-term trend that hasn’t shifted—despite the effort to popularize “tiny homes”—is ever rising indoor square footage per capita. No one knows what to do with a 1/4 to 1/3 acre lawn and garden plot. They’d rather have it enclosed under a common roof.
Sigh, I like my condo and don't think it is fashionable, though it looks very nice , which I do like
These last few comments seem to imply a nice looking home is a bad thing? And people who like them are also bad of course
Don’t take it to heart. It’s just normal belly-aching at the recognition that you don’t get to have it your way when you do remodel jobs for others.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
NAHB has done a survey every year for the last 50 years on most requested specification on any new home, and unsurprisingly, it's square footage. Square footage over design, functional kitchens and baths, storage, energy efficiency...anything. Square footage tops all.
OTOH, the whole tiny home thing was dumb. I don't want to live in a 480sf box. No one does.
I've designed completely functional 2BR/2Bath houses that are around 1250sf, and 3BR a 2.5 baths are around 1500sf....not including garage, and face it, everyone including me wants a nice garage...not just for cars but for shop and workspace.
"the whole tiny home thing was dumb. I don't want to live in a 480sf box. No one does."
But what about people who subscribe to the "Van Life" philosophy? Not something I aspire to, but there is a movement surrounding this lifestyle. Although I have seen a few social media proponents lately renounce the concept after a few years of living this way.
On the other hand, my wife occasionally casually mentions, why don't we sell the farm and live and travel in an RV. Although I suspect the only RV she would really be happy with is one of those $1 million dollar ones. If anyone here wants to set up a Go Fund Me for us, I wouldn't refuse ;)
My mother's condo in The Villages was nice.