You never know what random thought posted on Twitter will go viral and cause a passionate reaction from other people. Twitter users share their opinions on certain topics or want to hear other people’s opinions to find out if the majority agrees with them or they should reconsider their beliefs.
One such silly question was shared by Mal, who wanted to know if people feel that 23 minutes is a walking distance. The thread was filled with passionate responses and caused quite a divide. Also, the tweet got over 33k likes as it is an entertaining read, half serious, half trivial.
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Twitter user sparked a heated debate when she asked a simple question she didn't put much importance on: "Do you guys consider 23 minutes a walking distance?"
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The person who tweeted the question is Malaika, a 20-year-old media student with a love for social media living in London. We wanted to know if there was a story behind the question as it was so specific, so Bored Panda reached out to her.
Turns out, it was more of a mindless tweet with no expectations to get such serious answers or stirring a debate, “I was thinking of signing up for a gym and the closest one is a 23 minute walk, so I just tweeted it without thinking anything of it.”
The tweet attracted a lot of attention and was liked by 33.5k people with many people joining the chat
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Even though Malaika posted the question just out of curiosity, not wanting to cause a whole debate, she was surprised to see how many people joined the conversation.
The student admitted, “I didn’t expect that many responses at all. I muted the tweet after like 100 quote tweets, so when I looked back to see like 11k quotes I was shocked. I didn’t expect anyone to be arguing or going back and forth on the topic either.”
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The comments were divided and people had heated opinions
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But apparently people got offended and took the matter more seriously, maybe than they should have. Malaika has no idea why the comments are filled with such passionate responses: “maybe walking is their passion or something. In my mind I was like, some of these people need to relax.”
A lot of people thought that Malaika is an American and that is why she thinks that walking for 23 minutes is too long, because of how dependent Americans are on their cars. She shared her sentiment about it: “Yeah, it was annoying for people to assume I’m American. Some of them were bare rude and made assumptions but that’s just the internet.”
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A lot of them assumed that Mal is American and that they all have a problem with walking even short distances
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Even though it was an assumption, Americans being too dependent on their cars is a real issue. According to Brookings, the average commute for an American is more than 10 miles, so a car is the most convenient means of transportation for such distances.
The number of cars in the US increased from 96.6 million to 221.4 million in the span of 13 years (2005-2018), which means there are 25 million cars more on the road and statistically a household has almost two cars.
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But others pointed out that it's because of the infrastructure that isn't adapted for walking
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Bloomberg points out a few reasons why Americans ended up in such a situation. It all started in the 1930s with mass motorization. While in Europe only the wealthy had a car and it was a status symbol, for Americans they were more affordable as they were cheaper because production took place in the US.
It is still more affordable to have a car in the US than in Europe because of their taxation of car ownership and lower gas prices.
Another reason is that because of mass motorization, the government made sure that the roads are well taken care of and created convenient infrastructure. That means their roads are more adapted to individual cars rather than public transportation, cycling or walking.
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Some of them also made a good point that walking in the heart of a European city isn't the same as alongside a busy road
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The US and Europe also have a different approach to land-use planning. For example, if a German needs to go to a doctor’s office, they can easily find it by foot in their residential area, as opposed to the US where they don’t allow residential areas to have doctors' offices, cafes, corner stores, or apartment buildings, so they have to drive everywhere.
You could find even more reasons why Americans resort to going by car instead of any other means, but it’s just that different parts of the world developed differently, as Twitter user Bojan Tunguz pointed out. And those factors made Americans think they have to use their car to go anywhere, while Europeans tend to walk most of the time. But for Americans it’s not a big deal to commute 100 kilometers, which is very unusual in Europe. It’s a matter of perspective.
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So the walking habits were formed not by the people themselves, but by which area they live in and if it allows a more convenient drive or a walk
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While there were people who defended themselves by saying that it’s possible to walk to places you need to go if they are so near, others agreed that 23 minutes is just not a walking distance. Although, in an update tweet, Malaika said she went on the walk and it wasn’t so bad.
Do you think that 23 minutes is a walking distance, taking into consideration what condition your roads and sidewalks are in? Also, why do you think people had such strong opinions while answering the question? Let us know your thoughts in the comments!