system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
[The Last Airbender/The Legend of Korra] How cool would Earthbenders be now?

I know in the Legend of Korra series this concept is touched on with metalbending and such, but how many modern innovations and technologies would an Earthbender in a modern society be able to control? I'm going based on the fact that almost everything comes from nature if you go back far enough. How far does it have to go from straight out of the ground for an Earthbender to no longer be able to control it?
gpt
Earthbenders can only bend dirt/rocks specifically, they can't bend derivatives like metal. Some can "bend" metal, but in those cases they're actually bending the dirt impurities in the metal and the rest of the metal goes with it. So in modern day, because our metal is so pure, they really wouldn't be able to do much of anything in a city.