Turns out it’s not so evil. And it’s not a recent, nor an American, phenomenon, according to Glenn Reynolds’ review of Robert Bruegmann’s new book, Sprawl: A Compact History. I loved this bit:
He notes the irony of Pete Seeger’s condemning “little boxes made of ticky-tacky” when they represented working people’s hope for a better life, and compounds the irony by noting that those same houses are now “being reappraised by hip, young urbanites who see them as charming period pieces.”
Actually it was Malvina Reynolds who wrote “Little Boxes,” but the point remains valid. That song always grated, with it’s sneering superiority and ridicule. John Mellencamp’s “Pink Houses” in the 1980s carried on quite well the lefty tradition of making fun of middle-class aspirations.
