Brickbat: That's Crap

Gary Bydlo / Dreamstime.com

A Pennsylvania court has ordered an Old Order Amish family to connect to the local sewer system. The Yoder family says the move will force them to violate their religious beliefs since it would require them to install an electric pump to move waste from their home to the sewer system. The Amish do not believe in using electricity in their homes.

Comments

[Telcontar the Wanderer]

The Amish People's Front People's Front of Am-ea is going to hold a committee meeting about this SO HARD.

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[adarious]

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[Scarecrow Repair & Chippering]

Why not mandate a horse-powered sewage transfer pump? It could even incorporate automatic horse shit collection to include the pump horse's own shit. That way, no electricity, and the shittiness of the order would be made clear by example.

[Slocum]

My understanding is the Amish object to being dependent on the grid rather than to electricity per se. Apparently some Amish communities are big on solar power now.

[phillhamian]

The article describes this particular Amish family as old order, I take that to mean that they are not apart of the general Amish population in Pennsylvania that uses generators and solar panels.

[Stormy Dragon]

It's very idiosyncratic from one Amish community to another. Some ban electricty but are fine with pneumatic power, which has created this weird niche business in modifying things like blenders to run off of pressurized ait rather than electric motors:

SUPER DELUXE AIR POWER BLENDER-MIXER

[SQRLSY One]

Yes, you have that correct. In some communities, some Amish do a LOT of carpentry work and furniture-making. However, electrical tools not being cool, they use pressurized air power tools (saws, routers, sanders, etc.) instead, which has become known as "Amish electricity". One could devise an internal combustion engine to air-pump to air-motor to electric-power-generator scheme... Admittedly the last stage does need to be electric, but so is the electrical starter on large internal combustion engines used on MANY-MANY farms and shops of even the MOST conservative Amish... And then we could use the final resulting electricity to run a TV! Wallah! An Amish Television!

Can I get a patent on that? And how many Amish church elders would be OK with it? Inquiring minds want to know!

[Rebel Scum]

The Amish do not believe in using electricity in their homes.

God only wants you to have a certain level of technology.

[I am the 0.000000013%]

That's true of all authorities

[? Aggressor]

Zing!

[croaker]

Party like it's 1699.

[Wizard4169]

+1 Al, but let's give some props to the Electric Amish.

[Fist of Etiquette]

Maybe we're not privy to all the details.

[Fist of Etiquette]

The president has spoken. The country will not abide shitholes.

[Fist of Etiquette]

In retaliation, they should release alligators into the sewers.

[Rebel Scum]

I don't think the Amish get cult Syfy movies.

[Jimbo]

CHUD

[El Oso]

just another Amish shit-hole...

[Longtobefree]

Missing from the account; a report of the compelling government interest that can only be satisfied by sewer connection and electric pumps.
If the pretense is sanitation, and assuming the gov can whistle up some statistics to show actual environmental harm from the existing situation, then they are several other options that spring to mind.
Easiest is to have the Amish switch to chemical toilets. A private company would be using technology to service the facilities, not the Amish themselves.

[croaker]

Or just a storage tank and a pump-out contract. This smells of a government agency looking to perpetuate itself.

[Leader Desslok]

Or what ever happened to the idea that "the government that governs least governs best"?

[PaulTheBeav]

They should start a go-fund-me to fight this. I'd kick in two chickens and a basket of potatoes for the cause.

[Bubba Jones]

Why does the city care about the privy? Are the neighbors complaining?

Why does the sewer connection require an electric grinder? Mine doesn't.

In what context do they use electric tools? Is their house on the electric grid?

What if they connect to the sewer and keep using the privy?

[Conchfritters]

Hook up the toilet, but keep the out house in reserve. Pennsylvania government workers could fuck up a bowl of cereal. I wouldn't depend on that devil throne if I was them.

[Stormy Dragon]

What's happening with their waste now?

[Kivlor]

Septic systems? Latrines?

[SQRLSY One]

Typically an out-house connected to s septic system. Some "Old Order" Amish will allow a toilet in the house, but many will not. Most do not get hooked up to the electric grid... No electricity in the house. For some, electricity in the BARN is OK, but in the house? No!

"Come on, guys, let's go watch some TV in the hay loft!"

[Agammamon]

Because its not electricity, or phones, or cars that are bad in themselves. Its the social effects and changes that access to these technologies have on their lives and social relationships. God and family have primacy and nothing is supposed to be allowed to get in between that. So they're very choosy of what technologies they adopt and maintain strict - if artificial - limits on how they are used.

That's why electricity in the barn is OK - because you're working there. Once done and back in the house - no distractions from God and family.

Some Amish allow telephones but they're landlines and kept in a separate outbuilding to prevent the ringing of the phone from disturbing and distracting the family - as anyone who's watched anyone from the last 40 years, a ringing telephone or incoming text means that the person will immediately ignore whoever they were interacting with in person to answer. I've seen people drop critical work in dangerous situations to answer a fucking text.

[SQRLSY One]

Yes, you are correct. There is some logic and basis behind the arbitrariness of these "Old Order". However, we in the thoroughly modern world can act... With self-discipline, self-control, and restraint... And judgment... To combine the best of the old and the new.

The danger on their side, is the constant temptation of all the "forbidden things". Often, their young folks will discover... As have the youngsters of more modern folks as well... "Oh, pot is forbidden, lemme try that"... And discover it is totally harmless, except that it might get you thrown in jail and butt-fucked by your fellow prisoners... And then, having discovered that "pot" is harmless, suspecting that "society" lied to me about that... Lemme try heroin and LSD and fentanyl... And end up insane or dead.

Where or where is the happy if muddled middle?!?!?!

[Lurker Kurt]

Couldn't they use a windmill to pump the sewage?

At some of the farms where I grew up, windmills were used to pump water out of the ground for livestock. Wouldn't the same principle work to pump sewage away from your house?

[croaker]

Trash pumps (which a shit-kicker essentially is) require more power than a regular water pump. Likely enough to make it impractical.

[croaker]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lOfZLb33uCg