NIMBY Nonsense- Your Neighborhood Fascists

NIMBY is an older acronym, born well before the dawn of texting and the internet. It means Not In My Back Yard. It describes an attitude people take where they want this service or that, but they don’t want it close to them. Everyone loves bacon. No one wants a pig farm right next door. Everyone squeals when their property values go down because of something happening next door. No one writes his neighbor a check when their property values go up because of something happening next door.

It is true enough that no man is an island. We do not and cannot live hermetically sealed lives. If my pigs poop in the stream that is upstream from your property, that’s a problem. What NIMBY often fails to understand, however, is that my property is not your property. We can and should object all day long when someone who doesn’t own our back yard impacts our back yard. My back yard, however, doesn’t extend to your property. I have no rights over what you do on your property, nor do you have any rights over mine.

It is bad enough that the state seems to believe that every inch of ground is its back yard. The practical truth is that we don’t actually own our property. We rent it. Only our landlord calls rent “property taxes.” Fail to pay your rent and you will be evicted. The good news, you can see these thugs coming. What’s worse is when they invite the neighbors into the fray.

It’s been said that good fences make for good neighbors. Trouble is, these days you can’t get approval for the fence until the neighbors have the opportunity, at public hearings, to voice their objections. These gripe fests inevitably pit neighbor against neighbor. The “neighborhood coalition” shows up demanding democracy, that they the people get to decide what you do on your property. Remember, democracy is two wolves and one lamb deciding what is for dinner.

I confess that I would much rather look out my window at a neighbor’s rose garden than at her container box. I’d rather listen to buzzing bees than a buzzing chainsaw. But it is wrong to seek the power of the state to get my way with your land. It is a failure to love one’s neighbor when you seek to control what they do with what is theirs. Christians would be wise to learn the boundaries of our back yards. Conservatives would be wise to conserve property rights rather than their own preferences.

What is not ours is neither ours to give nor to take. Nor is it ours to control. You can read how Davy Crockett learned that lesson here. Or, check out this brief introduction to how the Bible and economics intersect here.