HOAs are such a fascinatingly American thing. They seem to cause no end of annoyance for those living in them, and have few to no positive effects (at least, we don’t hear about any positives), yet they persist.

Can those who are adversely affected not do anything about their local ones, or is it actually a case that they’re not too bad for most people most of the time?

There’s very little people can do. In order to fix things you usually need to get on the board, but the people who run HOAs are usually retired nimby assholes and they hold meetings while most in the neighborhood are at work so nobody can oppose them. They then reelect themselves to the board and the cycle continues. HOAs are usually a thing set up by the builders to make their lives easier for some paperwork and stuff. They absolutely suck 99% of the time.

Native plant garden bans aren’t just an HOA thing. Many counties or cities ban them too. Much of it stems for chemical manufacturers selling the white picket fence image after WWII to veterans receiving funding to buy a home. The chemical manufacturers pushed hard for that image so they could keep making as much profit as they made manufacturing for weapons during the wartime.

This means that trying to fight your HOA on yards is useless, you have to go higher and it’s a big big fight

Man none of that is true.

You make a compelling case

I made my case in a different comment because responding to a user that claims board members can reelect themselves completely disqualifies them from having an actual conversation about the topic. Everything they said is made up from someone who has read too much online from other people that have no clue what they’re talking about.

All they had to do is qualify with some hoa’s do that… There’s a million different types of them, each state will have different limits.
I’ve heard horror stories about some, I’m sure a lot of them are fine… I would never move somewhere with an HOA personally