Thoughts on Noisy Neighbors
Jul 27, 2024
There are a number of ways that people can be inconsiderate towards others. People will sit on staircases, park their cars in bike lanes, and refuse to take the window seat on a bus. Here in Europe, people will smoke cigarettes while eating at a restaurant, ruining the meals of all non-smokers nearby. Whatever the case may be, there is always a small percentage of the population which engages in antisocial behavior, with nary a concern of how it may affect others. Yet, I think there is one type of offense which is not only much more common than my aforementioned examples, but also far more inconsiderate: being a noisy neighbor.
For the most part, people understand that noise can be a nuisance. Nobody likes it when someone is blasting their stereo on public transit, speaking loudly in a library, or zooming down the street with an obnoxiously-loud motorcycle. When it comes to being a noisy neighbor, however, there exists a large number of apologists who will express sympathy or even push back on complaints lodged against them. This makes no sense to me, because most noise-related nuisances are short-lived and/or easily remedied by changing one's location. But noisy neighbors are usually long-term problems, and moving to a new home is not only a huge burden, but there's no way to guarantee that the new neighbors won't be noisy as well. I suspect that because noisy neighbors are so common, the "apologists" I've encountered are not truly apologists, but are themselves perpetrators.
Before breaking down why being a noisy neighbor is so inconsiderate, I want to narrow the scope down a bit. There are a variety of ways that someone can be noisy. Because I've experienced every kind of noisy neighbor, I've done a lot of research into soundproofing techniques, which has made me aware that not all noise is due to someone's lack of consideration. Depending on how an apartment building was constructed, for example, even the lightest of footsteps can sometimes sound like banging on a drum to a downstairs neighbor. This is a huge problem for old buildings and even some newly-constructed low-budget buildings. To some extent, I do believe that renters in such buildings should utilize rugs and tread lightly. I also believe that owners of such apartments should take measures to better soundproof their property, both for the sake of their tenants as well as their neighbors.
However, for the sake of this post, I am more focused on people who are engaging in unnecessary behaviors which lead to noise being heard by neighbors. People need to walk around their home, but they don't need to listen to music out loud, especially at high volumes. My next-door neighbor in Brooklyn didn't need to play music so loud that my entire apartment would be vibrating for hours from the bass. Likewise, there was no reason I should've been able to hear music from the guy in the adjacent building, three floors above me every Friday night until 2-3am the next morning. Music simply doesn't need to be this loud in order to be enjoyed.
I thought Amsterdam would be better, but for the most part, that hasn't been the case. I have a "neighbor" (in the adjacent building) who plays their piano for hours almost every single day, sometimes until 9pm or so. There's another "neighbor" (from the side street) who hosts extremely loud parties in her backyard, sometimes lasting until past midnight, and on some occasions past 2am. Our next-door neighbors recently had a party where the music was so loud that even being in our living room—let alone in our backyard—was unbearable for about six hours or so. On rare days when the weather is nice, I'll take the opportunity to relax on the hammock, only for someone in a neighboring building to start playing loud music with open windows, forcing me to put on headphones and play music of my own to drown it out. Personally, I'd rather listen to the birds chirp.
This is inconsiderate behavior. This is an undeniable truth, and it infuriates me when people disagree. What's also mind-numbingly frustrating is that most of what I've recounted is actually technically legal. Based on what I've read, Amsterdam requires people to be quiet past 11pm. In New York, quiet hours are from 10pm to 7am. In theory, this means that if someone wants to, they can blast their music from 7am to 10pm with no consequence. How is this fair to a neighbor who works graveyard shifts, a neighbor with children who needs to take naps throughout the day, or someone who works from home and requires the quiet in order to concentrate? Frankly, though, it doesn't matter who one's neighbor is or their reason for not wanting to hear music coming from someone else's home; If a person is engaging in unnecessary behavior that limits someone's else's ability to enjoy their own home, then it should not be permitted. Full stop. As the saying goes, your right to throw a punch ends where my face begins.
If this post is ever read by more than three people, I'm sure someone might be asking, "Have you tried talking to your neighbor(s)?" Yes. In Brooklyn, I tried speaking to both neighbors whose noise made my life a living hell. The next-door neighbor would agree to turn down her music, and then proceed to keep the volume and bass level exactly the same. I had a conversation with the guy in the adjacent building—who was objectively breaking the law—and he straight up said to me, "I don't care if you work on Saturdays," and refused to ever turn down his music. I also spoke to my landlord and the property management company of the adjacent building. For the guy in the adjacent building, I even tried getting the police involved. Absolutely nothing came of any of it.
When it comes to my current home, I have no idea who plays the piano since it's in the adjacent building; All I know is that it's not the neighboring apartment, because that was once simultaneously occupied by temporary dwellers who I needed to ask on three separate occasions to turn down the music they started blasting anywhere from 12-2:30am, forcing me to get out of bed, put on clothes, and even walk out into the rain. My wife has tried talking to the neighbor with the backyard parties about an unrelated concern regarding an invasive plant in her backyard which is spreading into ours. The neighbor was very rude and refused to try to come up with a solution, which makes me fairly certain that she won't take kindly to requests to be quiet while we're trying to sleep. Most other music comes from places that I can't identify since the people and speakers aren't visible. Also, like I mentioned before, a lot of the behavior I'm describing is legal for some reason, so there's not much I can do other than soundproof our home, which is on the horizon.
Something that noisy-neighbor-apologists will often say is that if someone doesn't want noisy neighbors, then they shouldn't live in a city. I find this to be the most brain-dead piece of "advice" regarding noisy neighbors. Not only are there an infinite number of reasons that suburbs and rural areas are awful places where I and many others would never even consider living in, but it's still entirely possible to have noisy neighbors in those places. Just for a second, though, let's pretend that suburbs are desirable places to live, possible for anyone to move to, and guaranteed to be devoid of noisy neighbors. The "advice" not to live in cities is still brain-dead.
Let's apply this line of thinking to another scenario. Imagine being at a conference or some other large gathering in an indoor space. Now, imagine that even five percent of attendees are constantly farting, causing other people not to enjoy the event. Can you imagine any rational human being saying, "Well, if you don't want to smell farts, you shouldn't be in a room filled with people?" Absolutely not. The more common stance by far would be that if you want to fart without consequence, then you shouldn't surround yourself with people before doing so. Similarly, the onus should be on noise-makers to move out of cities, because their actions will have less impact in sparser areas. Want to play piano for hours every single day? Want to host loud parties until 3am? Then go do it somewhere where you won't bother anybody. Otherwise, you're no better than someone peeing in a pool instead of a toilet, or a wet dog who walks into the middle of a group of people before deciding to shake to dry off. It should be obvious that the existence of other people in close proximity to you doesn't justify your selfish actions at all; No, the more people you choose to surround yourself with, the more of an asshole you become when you engage in behavior which will bother them.
Perhaps that was a bit mean, but simply writing about noisy neighbors gets me pretty heated. I take the Golden Rule very seriously, and as a result, I try to have the lowest impact possible in almost every single situation. Even within my own home, for example, I almost always wear headphones so that my wife isn't subjected to whatever I'm watching or listening to. When we host parties, we play music from a tiny Google Home at a volume which can barely even be heard from within the apartment when people are talking normally, let alone from our backyard or other apartments. Is it really so much to ask for others to be considerate when it comes to making noise? I just don't get it.