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LOL, I found casual jeans Friday a bit hard to imagine in the 1920's.
Very funny! That will teach me to edit more closely.
Anyhoo, I think it's somewhat of a defense mechanism because some Westerners believe Easterners are looking down their noses at them.
I have lived in the PNW for 35 years but am originally from the Midwest so I have seen attitudes from both sides from being born in the middle. Sometimes Westerners I have met look upon Easterners as looking at them as snobs. Those are usually people who have never been west of the Rockies.
When I first moved to Portland, people listened to my Chicago accent and guessed "New York." That was odd since Chicagoans don't sound at all like New Yorkers but Portlanders whom I met back then tended to lump everyone from "back East" as New Yorkers. I almost instantly got attitude until I told them I was from Chicago; the Midwest not the East. Then the attitude eased up just a little. That was just my experience. My first real friend was from California, everyone looked down on Californians.
As time went by, however, and more people moved here, especially from New York, that attitude changed. I still hear some snobbism from my native PNW friends regarding the East Coast but nowhere near as much.
I get pedicures and my feet look fine, but generally speaking, we all wear socks while walking around in the house. I guess it's a cultural thing because if you ever go to California (or Hawaii, Arizona, many places in the West), people don't wear shoes in the house. It just seems extremely strange to wear shoes in a house to me.
I think the uptight formallities of the NE would prevent me from fitting in there.
Well no...plenty of people up here walk around the house barefoot, but NOT during family gatherings and holidays, etc. That's just plain weird. I walk around my bedroom barefoot or with socks or slippers all the time. I never ever wear shoes in the house. It's just uncomfortable. 90% of people in the northeast probably don't wear shoes in the house. I mean, it's just not comfortable.
You are so dead wrong on this, it's downright foolish and naive. Seriously get real nep. This is what happens when someone starts a thread based on the premise of trolling, you get trite, uninformed, and false statements like this and sweeping generalizations usually on both sides of the argument. We got scattered small and large progressive enclaves in the West too. Even in the interior, just to name a few..
Denver, CO
Boulder, CO
Durango, CO
Telluride, CO
Santa Fe, NM
Taos, NM
Park City, UT
Flagstaff, AZ
Sedona, AZ
Tucson, AZ
and too many to count on the west coast.
And since you so often bring up homosexuality in several threads, even little towns like Moab, UT and Gallup, NM have gay pride events. Yeah... who'd have thunk?
I'd like to add Bisbee, AZ to your list. Very cute, small artsy town. They actually recognize civil unions for gay couples giving them equal rights to straight marriages. Only town in Arizona, I believe, to be like that as of right now. Possibly the most liberal place here within Arizona too. Tucson is second closest to doing this, as they already have something similar in place.
Yes, even places in the "extreme right-wing Arizona" can still be supportive of this. Go figure
I know a ton of people who grew up on the West Coast and love the East Coast cities(myself included). A lot of them moved there and feel at home because they found it more to their likeing or wanted to give it a try(instead of just constantly complaining like the OP). Different circumstances in my own life and I would've loved to have move there myself(still might). You have a more urban culture that provides more excitment in many ways.
As others have pointed out, people that really seem to talk about negative elements of the East Coast are often people who lived there previously and then fled to the West Coast. One thing I've noticed though it is that people who move west from the East Coast are more likely to constantly compare everything to back home or make distinctions--either good or bad. People I know who moved East from the West Coast are just trying to fit and shut up for the most part about where they used to live. From my experiences people who move to New York or Boston or Philadelphia from a West Coast childhood shut up for the most part about their previous hometowns and want to desperately be seen as cool enough for their urban NE city--but someone who grows up back east and moves west will constantly explain what is different to everyone about the West Coast vs. East Coast(or South or Midwest). Though I think also that people from the Northeast are just more expressive and direct about how they communicate things, while on the West Coast people might take a more laidback approach.
Though it's really the South that West Coast people are snobby against. You'll rarely hear anyone say that anything positive about the South unless it's New Orleans or someone has family there. Though a lot of blacks on the West Coast will talk about the South in a positive light or maybe desire to possibly move there(though that's also often due to family connections).
Yeah. Alot of family connections between Blacks in the South, and Blacks in all other regions of the US. Many Black Westerners(Californians in particular) will attend school down South, or move down South for economic reasons. Familiar ties between Blacks in the South and Blacks in the West/Northeast/Midwest, gives Black folks a more open-mind about other regions of the US than, say for example a Liberal/Progressive White person from the West/Northeast/Midwest, who would otherwise only rely on stereotypes and statistics about the South, and have no real family ties to the region. The process of slavery/racism and forced social segregation, has created a bond between Blacks of other states, cities, and regions in the US. So the cultural differences(there are still differences) between a Black person from NYC, and a Black person from SF, will seem alot more superficial and navigable than differences between a White person from NYC and a White person from SF.
Just the responses I expected, thus proving my point!
When people here talk about east vs. west, they really mean the coasts. There's a whole country in the middle, and we don't all act like people on the coasts (thankfully!). People from both sides are snobbish toward the vast majority of the country.
The midwest has their own version of snobbishness too.
How many times do we hear people say it's the real, genuine America? The heart of America? And all those sorts of things.
You are so dead wrong on this, it's downright foolish and naive. Seriously get real nep. This is what happens when someone starts a thread based on the premise of trolling, you get trite, uninformed, and false statements like this and sweeping generalizations usually on both sides of the argument. We got scattered small and large progressive enclaves in the West too. Even in the interior, just to name a few..
Denver, CO
Boulder, CO
Durango, CO
Telluride, CO
Santa Fe, NM
Taos, NM
Park City, UT
Flagstaff, AZ
Sedona, AZ
Tucson, AZ
and too many to count on the west coast.
And since you so often bring up homosexuality in several threads, even little towns like Moab, UT and Gallup, NM have gay pride events. Yeah... who'd have thunk?
Denver has the biggest gay pride event between Chicago and San Francisco Plus, CA/WA/NM have legalized SS marriage, and CO and OR have legal civil unions. Progressives/Liberals can find a home in the West.
The midwest has their own version of snobbishness too.
How many times do we hear people say it's the real, genuine America? The heart of America? And all those sorts of things.
Well, duh, because it is.
I do suspect a lot of that comes from people who are tired of being looked down upon, though. I don't spend my time obsessing over the coasts or what's going on there. However, when I see or experience the snobbery and elitism (which, in my experience, has been more prevalent from easterners), I am reminded of why I'm glad I DON'T live there.
Yeah, there's not as much "Western" pride or regional identity--there isn't even really much of a "West Coast" one. Even California feels a bit split between north and south, and the Northwest prides themselves as being far away and different from Los Angeles/Southern California.
Except for San Diego and Orange County. West Coast cities share an equal individualistic, socially liberal, progressive culture with relaxed social norms compared to cities East of the Rockies which have more conformist and traditional social norms.
Seattle, San Francisco, and Portland are far more to the left than most American cities.
I do suspect a lot of that comes from people who are tired of being looked down upon, though. I don't spend my time obsessing over the coasts or what's going on there. However, when I see or experience the snobbery and elitism (which, in my experience, has been more prevalent from easterners), I am reminded of why I'm glad I DON'T live there.
For those coasties who spend any amount of time lionizing themselves for being such a cut-above us inland drudges, you have to wonder if it ever comes as a surprise to them when they discover that, despite how meritorious/worldly/educated/virtuous they've convinced themselves of being, it has mostly never occurred to the inland drudges to ever pay them much thought (you could maybe say that, in a sense, there's a reciprocating pattern of insularity between the two).
Now on a more genial note, of course not all coastal dwellers are snobs (this is especially likely to be the case in the West ), which in turn means that there are many, many of them who should not be drug through the mud as such--not everybody in every part of the country is a warrior in these internal culture clashes, and even some of those who are can at least understand that human decency exists in every region, state, city, etc., oftentimes without this insight being necessarily informed by ideology or politics.
It's kinda unfortunate, though, that not everyone, be them from the great enlightened coasts or salt-of-the-earth middle America, can even humble themselves enough agree with the above statement for one second.
Eh, whuddya' do?
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