Citizen complaint of the day: You shovel five spaces and what do you get? Another day older and deeper in debt

I learned a lot about my neighbors this week. The ones who threw a chair on the street and claimed it as their own are low-lifes. I made some enemies forever this week and I won't forget it. Note to decent people: Don't move the space savers and throw them in a yard as you go down the street--I know it seems like a good idea and I commend your intentions. Unfortunately, the scumbags who put them out don't know who threw the chair aside and the unsuspecting driver gets the full thug-life experience when she gets home. We have to make the city do something about this. Winters might be just tolerable if we do.

Space savers aren't backed up by any laws, even though they're quasi-tolerated by law enforcement. It'd be great if fairness and cooperation were what drove most people to "respect" the "rules" of space saving, but you yourself pointed out the real reason these ridiculous practices continue: the threat of violence and property damage.

When people see your space saver, they don't know that you're non-aggressive. The reason they're not throwing your garbage in the garbage and parking in "your" spot is because you might be a psychopath who is willing to do hundreds or thousands of dollars worth of damage to their car in the night, or perhaps even start a physical altercation if they catch you parking in "your" space. The only reason your space saver works is because there are plenty of psychopaths out there doing the same thing. The fact that you aren't backing up your threats with real violence doesn't change the fact that your space saver is threatening everyone who might want to park on your street with violence. That's all space savers are, and that's why they need to be done away with. I don't know what should be done instead, but I think we can do better than this Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome bullshit, especially when it is immediately abused. Once it is established that every space saver might be defended by a psychotic ape that is somehow unaccountably living in a major city, people (probably psychotic, maybe just douchey) can and have started setting up "space savers" when it's not snowing, just to reserve a spot. Why not? At worst you lose a cone - or a vacuum cleaner or whatever, and if you're lucky, you get to park wherever you like, at the city's and your neighbors' expense. It's a bunch of giant assholes enabling lesser assholes, and while you may not quite be an asshole yourself, you're riding on their coattails and supporting their freakish system.

Yes. The irony is that even though space savers are selfish and lazy, they are only necessary because everyone is selfish and lazy.