HOA truly scares me about American living. That a group of people can dictate what you can and can’t do with your own house is absolutely wild. How is that home ownership?

You probably do have a group of people that can dictate what you can and can't do with your own house. You just call them "local government", "county government", "provincial government", "state government", etc as appropriate to however your current region organizes things at the smallest level.

The difference is that the bad kinds of HOA are essentially extra-local government chartered into existence for just one neighborhood, and since the "real" government has covered most of the actually important issues, they need to do something to justify themselves and are local enough to actually pay attention to your front yard and make ordinances against things they think will lower property values.

don't leave your yard in disrepair

Even that should be your own business, unless you're endangering anyone

It's worth mentioning that in the majority of residential neighborhoods, either they do not have HOA enforcement or the HOA is entirely optional, in that you can pay to belong to the HOA and gain benefits like access to community centers and pools, but then have to abide by guidelines.

In these places, you can ignore HOA rules if you're not interested in joining. I've greatly enjoyed telling their offended members that no, I will trim my shrubs when I feel like it, thank you very much.

There is still going to be a lot of regulations against like, turning your house into a tavern or something, but there is a little more freedom here in most places than people talk about. But it's still pretty bad and getting worse, there are more and more "master planned" communities that turn entire countrysides into oceans of rooftops in these homogeneous people hatcheries where you have to get approval to grow flowers in your yard.

Freedom \TM

Also no chickens (usually)