GardenBanter.co.uk - View Single Post

01-06-2003, 07:32 PM

(Frogleg) wrote:

On Sat, 31 May 2003 07:29:35 GMT, (Dianna
Visek) wrote:

Our town was in the process of reworking its "nuisance vegetation"
ordinance. The first draft outlawed all plants that had any parts
poisonous or injurious to humans or animals. We would have been left
with nothing but lettuce!

Not even lettuce ... it has opiates in it, in low concentration.

That's the problem with wholesale legislation and regulation. When you
leave out common sense, things become nonsensical. Anyone with an
ounce of sense knows the difference between, say, ornamental grasses
used in a landscape design, and wild grasses growing high and
unattended and drying to present a fire hazard. The line between
"it's my property and I can do what I like" and "everyone must think
the same way I do" isn't a clear one. I think *most* people would be
agreeable to making minimal effort to be in tune with previailing
norms. This growing dependence on legislation and regulation is what
bothers me. It appears to be designed to relieve all involved from
thinking at all. A can be fined because he has more than 3 dandelion
plants per square yard in an area less than 10' from a public road. B
goes without sanction because he only has a back yard full of poison
ivy. There's also a diminishing effort for neighbors to actually
*talk* to each other, instead of calling the Codes department. You
have a problem? Sic the law on 'em. Don't go over and say, "did you
know there are water restrictions here now?" or "would you mind if I
trimmed your cottonwood tree?"

Tsu

--
To doubt everything or to believe everything
are two equally convenient solutions; both
dispense with the necessity of reflection.
- Jules Henri Poincaré