system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
ELI5: How and why in some places is it illegal to collect rain water?

I've always been curious about this.
gpt
In some States local authorities have deemed rain water to be collective public property. It refills the local water supplies and so collecting it, or collecting a lot of it changes how the rivers and creeks flow and changes how the public water supplies refill. That is theft under these laws.