I'm reminded of an article I read once, it seems to have gone offline, an interview with indie game dev Jason Rohrer. He said the city took him to court for not mowing his lawn. He ended up winning under the 1st amendment (the lawn was "free expression" or something...)[0]
I thought that was really interesting (and obviously wouldn't work in other countries).
The other day I walked around the neighborhood and found this massive patch of grass and weeds that had been mowed, and scorched by the sun, so it was just mostly dead. Barely 5 minutes away, the city had fenced out special plots and paid to have a bunch of weeds instlled, to help the bees. Comedy.
[0] Edit: Yeah it's deleted. I found backups though!
https://web.archive.org/web/20150315123808/https://www.esqui...
I don't know about other countries, but in Poland you're just not required to cut down your lawn at all, unless it's a fire hazard (you have a lot of dead and dried up plants).
Here in the UK there are no usually legal requirements, but it might be a social problem as your neighbours will not like it.
https://codes.iccsafe.org/content/IPMC2024P1/chapter-3-gener...
I think you undermine your argument when you don't understand the complaint. Because I'd also like to see a lot more native plants, and less manicured, mono-culture yards with poison sprayed all over them.
But at least in my area, the problem isn't "oh look a spider"... it's "oh shit, that house is collapsing because of termites", and "Oh shit, my neighbor's mom's house just burned down because rats chewed through the wiring in the walls", and "Fuck me! That's hogweed growing in that yard! Time to call the city".
Pests are a real concern - they cause lots of monetary damage, and can seriously injure or hurt people if not monitored. Does that mean we should nuke everything with chemicals and make a sterile hellscape? No - I don't think it does.
But it doesn't pay to be dismissive either.
A healthy ecosystem with owls, snakes, and coyotes will keep rodents in check. But well before that point, the ubiquitous feral domestic cats usually wreak havoc on pests and songbirds alike. Not to mention that most of the problem starts with bad food storage and waste management in the first place, not tall grasses or a few fruit trees (hence the flocks of pigeons and seagulls around parking lot dumpsters).
Plus, no one is trying to stop you from tenting houses for termites, which are meditated by landscape practices like mulch and irrigation rather than the types of plants themselves.
Loved him ever since I randomly stumbled across his guerilla tree planting video in I want to say 2020?
Anyway, we all must support the train driver turned botanist.