From whence comes the idea that people have either the need or the right to maintain and be consulted on their neighbourhood character?
@ipsquiggle the internet supercharged busybodyness I think. Before the internet, people who had an opinion on stuff that was none of their business could mostly just vent at their friends impotently. Sometimes they would get enough people together to make a stink but it took real work and so there was a filter on importance and widespread support.
Now political parties and other groups like them mine social media for social wedges they can amplify and exploit.
@megmac Yeah reading all the candidate profiles this election (it's municipal election time in BC), "neighbourhood character" is definitely whipped out as a wedge even in sentences where it makes no sense. That's actually a much more sane (if aggravating) view than simply thinking one's neighbourhood is their domain.