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Yes, Boston is very boring. An example of it would be the people who sooo boringly outline the key Facts on how boston is not boring. These include descriptions of industry clusters, academics, movement of people along rail, changing dynamics of culture and ideas, blah blah blah shut up. That's part of the reason boston is so lame. You've got these rational minds that rationalize why they're in the city, why its okay to be there, trying to describe why everything is happening the way it is. They'll be entertained their whole life trying to describe why everything is happening. It's this rational and/or academic mindset (must have a missing piece of logic?).
Alot of people want to think that way nowadays. They think it will bring them success. Its the new business lingo. There's a lot of that in Boston. You've got deluded careerists, deluded students believing in this glorified vision of going to school in the city (good luck)...Mass delusion...mass conformity...With all the education that goes on in that city, it's amazing how many people run around still trying to describe the world using the language of the corporate and government types. You might call it self interest (like wearing headphones all the time)
Some say city's were made in large part for poor people to work in them. Tight housing, etc. Now students flock to these areas and each of them has a car...no parking... Of course, there is something to flock to, in a way. Career...connections, networking! People like to network in Boston and that's really boring. There's a difference between networking and real connections, of course. You can be yourself if you're really connecting with people. If you're networking, you'll have to wear a false face, black pea coat, certain hair style, Red sox gear as some sort of identity.
all the redevelopment of shopfronts and sidewalks is the same (with a budget and a known demographic, known to be boring enough to pass this **** off)
With everything becoming the same (minds included) and so little time available between commuting and career seeking, you've got no room for change. Even this wonderful built up environment with wonderful and diverse architecture and the culture too... it's all in the past. There's no change coming. snoozeville...yea, that was well said.
even the musical acts that come through boston have realized how boring it is. Some don't even come anymore.
I don't know what would make the city different. It's kind of a runaway train of boringness at this point. Look at their city hall, the most boring structure in the US possibly...there's no community organizing or community voice at city hall, of course. They destroyed the poor (and the charles river too -pollution...clean it up with a smile ). The industry folks, like leeches, sucking up all the sun. Generosity lacking..
Really though, what the hell is wrong with Boston? Picture a student going there, what happens? They see everyone is the same. They can toe the line, try to be themselves for a while, maybe pursue the arts a little or try to find new ideas or inspiring people, but they'll come up short. You say find the right people and it'll be fine. There's too many boring people to sift through and find the good ones. With all the boring people anything different is shunned, in a sense.
You might ask what would really make it different? The new pay-what-you-can-afford panera bread store is a decent start. Thing is...that idea definitely didn't originate in Boston. The academics are foreign and the innovators live in relative isolation.
Boston needs radical thought, basically...but the rent is too high...Get those kids out of the city before its too late for them! Also, try not to get hit by a cab or fall on the train tracks. "oh, but i like cities..."
LAUGH OUT LOAD. No, not really because I am at a boring job with a bunch of old scowlers. The people you describe have zero clue how boring they are. I've learned to act interested and smile, but inside my brain is exploding.
I've said Boston is boring as hell, but I don't have a boring life. I stay as far away from these people as I can!
This is probably the a-typical person that makes Boston, Boston. Bitter about people going out and having fun, denigrating cities who party... you don't like partying, let others do it, they don't bother you! I'm not a partier either, at all, but just because I don't, doesn't mean a city shouldn't have those options. NYC isn't a working city? Ummm, I lived there and am under the impression that it is the hardest working city in America, can you say Investment Banking hours??? Artsy and intellectual as opposed to LA and NYC, the art, architecture and fashion capitals of the world (along with paris and milan)?? Intellectual, as in the vast majority of Harvard and MIT grads who refuse to stay in Boston after college, heading to San Fran, NYC, Chicago, Austin or elsewhere? Columbia and NYU not intellectual enough for you, because all those grads stay put right in nyc. How about UCLA, Cal-tech and USC, all top 25 schools in LA.
Just because you enjoy cooking at home, doesn't mean people other than you shouldn't have lots of options. You are literally defining how good a city is based on the things it doesn't offer that you don't need to satisfy YOUR lifestyle. You can relax at home with a book in Omaha, who cares, that doesn't make Boston good.
Museums and art galleries in NYC and LA crush Boston's, it's not even close.
Needing 24 hour spots shows that person "doesn't plan ahead"??!!!! How about they're at a bar until 2am close and want a burger, but nowhere is open? How about they stayed up late with their girlfriend and want to grab some desserts at 1am. They don't want to do it at 8pm, they want to be able to do it at 1am. Ridiculous argument.
This is the type of attitude that kills Boston; stifling, tempermental, neurotic, close-minded, backward-thinking, anti-progress, anti-fun, anti-new, anti-spending money on non-neccessities,, highly neurotic. No wonder a cool neighborhood hasn't popped up in Boston in oh, 80 years, and there is no creative architecture, cutting edge restaurants, or high-tech businesses in downtown. Boston is Finance Insurance Real Estate and Consulting, and the people who work in those fields are every bit as boring as the industries themselves. Thankfully for other cities like New York, Chicago or San Fran; all insurance and finance capitals... they also have major fashion companies, magazines, industrial companies, pharmaceutical giants, engineering powerhouses, television studios, which take the FIRE (finance insurance real estate) heavy cities and employees out of their comfort zone, expand the offerings of these cities to include socially interesting people, people who DO cool stuff, have awesome ideas, don't just sit at a desk their whole life with a bunch of brain power and nothing meaningful added to the world to show for it.
Boston is my hometown, 18 years of my life spent there, but I've lived in California, New York, Chicago, Atlanta, and traveled to every country in southeast asia, east africa, west africa, southern africa, western europe, 5 countries in central america, 40 states, most of the caribbean, as well as eastern and central Canada. In all my travels, I have been to some of the world's most exciting and inspiring cities, and met the people of their awesome cultures, experienced the incredible nightlife, been to the museums and galleries, the beaches, mountains, rivers, canals, high-end restaurants and low-end street food vendors, and despite being a total home-body, who doesn't drink or smoke, and spends his free-time pursuing intellectual conversation and playing sports, Boston is a stifling place to live. It is anti-fun, anti-good food, anti-partying, anti-progressive thinking, anti-"enjoying the money you work so hard for." I grew up in a rich town just outside Boston, and the quality of life there opposed to some lower-middle class suburb of Atlanta, is pathetic; if you drove a decent car you were scoffed at, if you renovated your home with some nice new materials, you were looked at like an embezzler, if you stayed at luxury hotels on vacation you were ostracized and labeled "out of touch." Simply put, enjoying life in Boston is a sin. That's why Boston will always suck, because the same, backward-thinking people will stay behind, and the michael bloombergs (Bloomberg LP), bill gates', mark zuckerbergs, sumner redstones (viacom), sheldon adelsons (venetian, pallazzo, sands casinos), Reed Hastings (netflix), Trip Hawkins' (Electronic Arts Founder), and so so so many others chose to leave. You think netflix could have gotten funding and support in Boston, attracted cool, quirky developers to the most stagnant city in the Western Hemisphere? Nope. One in 12 fortune 500 CEOs went to Harvard Business School alone, 40 in all, and just 2 of them are still in Boston. Everyone I went to high school with, and everyone I've met who moved to Boston for work said they couldn't wait to get out of Boston. I never met a Harvard, MIT, BC, BU, Northeastern or Tufts grad who said he would prefer to live in Boston than move to New York or California. All of this hurts me to say as a person who grew up a proud proud Bostonian, but I'm more loyal to the truth than I am some dot on the map where I was raised. Boston stinks, and I hate to admit it.
This is hilarious. You are very articulate! I've traveled a fraction compared to you but I've noticed exactly the same things. Born here and can't stand the people.
Location: RI, MA, VT, WI, IL, CA, IN (that one sucked), KY
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That long post is ridiculous, comparing a city the size of Boston to LA or NYC? Please. Of course Boston isn't LA or NYC, they're multitudes larger.
No high tech downtown? Except for the many many dozens if not hundreds that are downtown. Visited Digital Lumens just two weeks ago. They're all over. Boston is what, the 4th largest metro area for venture capital after SF, San Jose (silicon valley) and NYC... It's almost double that of LA and LA is much larger. Atlanta's footprint is about 1/6th the size of Boston in investment in technologies.
No cool new neighborhood in 80 years? Wow, missed that one too, its changed a ton since the 80s.
Anti good food? Is this a post from the 90s? Sheesh, I lived in Chicago, which I think has a great food scene, and SF which is purported to have one, and its not all that off. It's amazing how far the food scene here has come. I'd still take Chicago, but that's a bigger city too.
I'm not saying Boston is the greatest, it isn't, but for a city its size its a pretty heavy hitter. It isn't going to be NYC or LA, its a fraction their size. Stop expecting it to be... but I'll take it over that cr*phole that is Atlanta any day.
Boston for many years had the rep of being high minded, earnest and dull, even oppressive what with banned books and the hostile reaction to the BPL's nude Bacchante and Infant Faun, which delayed the statue's installation by 100 years or so. All that supposedly changed in the 60s when Boston suddenly became a city of youthful counterculture. The intense gentrification since then may have dulled the city in some respects although people say the same about New York-- lost its edge as the rents go up. A walker in the city can't really be bored in Boston since there's so much to delight the senses.
This is hilarious. You are very articulate! I've traveled a fraction compared to you but I've noticed exactly the same things. Born here and can't stand the people.
I'm pretty sure GE moved to Boston because it's super lame. I mean how can a city with a 2am last call possibly have a functioning economy?
Yeah I have family in Minnesota, and I distinctly remember my younger cousins having no idea that "Boston" was just a [small] city and not the whole state/area. They would never talk about visiting Massachusetts, instead they would always say that they were visiting Boston even if they spent their entire time here in Cape Cod.
They didn't seem to wrap their heads around the whole "Massachusetts" thing until they were at least in middle school. It used to annoy the heck out of me, haha!
When I was living in NYC, I talked to a woman who told me about her "one time in Boston." She said everything was so small and rural and she was disappointed that there was no public transit. I was confused and didn't know what she was talking about. After further prying, it turns out she only been to the Berkshires.
^ i got similar while attending college abroad (out of state). a few people used to talk about vermont being in boston.
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