this post was submitted on 28 Jan 2024
139 points (97.3% liked)

Asklemmy

43402 readers
1688 users here now

A loosely moderated place to ask open-ended questions

Search asklemmy 🔍

If your post meets the following criteria, it's welcome here!

  1. Open-ended question
  2. Not offensive: at this point, we do not have the bandwidth to moderate overtly political discussions. Assume best intent and be excellent to each other.
  3. Not regarding using or support for Lemmy: context, see the list of support communities and tools for finding communities below
  4. Not ad nauseam inducing: please make sure it is a question that would be new to most members
  5. An actual topic of discussion

Looking for support?

Looking for a community?

~Icon~ ~by~ ~@Double_[email protected]~

founded 5 years ago
MODERATORS
 

I have started listening to random American city council meetings lately for white noise. Since they're all bureaucratic-flavored boredom anyway.

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] [email protected] 17 points 7 months ago (1 children)

I watch my city council meetings attentively. Local politics has an enormous impact on your day-to-day life and it’s also an area where being informed and engaged is most easily able to actually effect the outcome you want. City councillors are more likely to have their view swayed by a modest letter-writing campaign than your Member of Parliament/Representative.

For white noise, I often use Age of Empires games. I’ve got Survivalist’s Twitch stream open as I type this, but I couldn’t even tell you if he’s winning or losing at the moment because it’s mostly there as background noise.

[–] [email protected] 18 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago) (2 children)

Yeah, but the city council meeting I'm listening to is on the other side of the Pacific Ocean (Filipino here), so I couldn't do anything even if I wanted to. And given the geographical distance, the impact on my day-to-day life is.. zero.

But still, the stories I hear during the meetings are entertaining and they really do help me understand America just that little bit more. Curiosity for the win!

[–] [email protected] 8 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago)

Hahaha yeah fair enough!

If you’re interested in another country, my city of Brisbane, Australia streams all its council meetings on YouTube, and we certainly have some…interesting debates. (I would certainly not hold it up as a good example of well-functioning democracy…)

[–] [email protected] 3 points 7 months ago (1 children)

Please, listen to the City Commission of Fort Scott, Kansas. It is so very dull.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 7 months ago (1 children)

Interesting. It looks quite dull from the thumbnails indeed. At the moment my current source of city council white noise is Spokane, Washington - the stories that people tell during open forum are entertaining and I sometimes hate how an amazing story gets cut off by the 2-minute limit.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 7 months ago (1 children)

No limit on how long someone can speak during public comments.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago) (1 children)

~~Well, Spokane enforces a 2 minute limit. What city do you recommend I listen to if I want to hear longer open forum stories?~~

EDIT: Oh wait, I replied from the inbox, nevermind. Fort Scott, Kansas is definitely the place.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 7 months ago (1 children)

People can ramble on about anything. Come on down! :)

[–] [email protected] 2 points 7 months ago (1 children)

So... if I have the money to fly down to Fort Scott do I get to ramble on for 3 hours about how their city council has been such a great source of white noise, generating additional white noise for me in the process that I can use once I return to Manila?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 7 months ago

Please do. Our one good barbecue closed, please bring some good food. Also a gallon of calamansi.