Enclosure of cheap urban space drove cultural conservatism by eliminating room for experimentation

Evidence

If you want a simple explanation for the growth in cultural conservatism, for London’s seizure by the forces of Restoration, you need look no further than this. As Jon Savage points out in England’s Dreaming, the London of punk was still a bombed-out city, full of chasms, caverns, spaces that could be temporarily occupied and squatted. Once those spaces are enclosed, practically all of the city’s energy is put into paying the mortgage or the rent. There’s no time to experiment, to journey without already knowing where you will end up. Your aims and objectives have to be stated up front. ‘Free time’ becomes convalescence. — Mark Fisher, Ghosts of My Life, 471

Categorization

• XREF: Directly pays off the theme from the earlier chapter claim ‘Cultural conservatism tracks the cost of rent’; here the mechanism is made fully explicit. — connects to: Cultural conservatism tracks the cost of rent and social withdrawal. — Mark Fisher, Ghosts of My Life: Writings on…, 49; Childhood emotional tones get reapplied to adult situations — Mark Fisher, Ghosts of My Life: Writings on…, 436; Control over space is simultaneously control over time and the past — Mark Fisher, Ghosts of My Life: Writings on…, 467 (+2 more)
• SEED: The economic-materialist explanation for aesthetic conservatism — rent cost as driver of cultural retreat — is a strong essay angle on why generational nostalgia wins elections and playlists alike.

Broader Connections

• Rising property prices caused the cultural conservatism of recent decades. #corroborates (0.85) — Mark Fisher (edited by Darren Ambrose), K-Punk, 1637