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This. Who the hell compares Philly to DC or Boston?
More than a few people, and not just here on C-D. I mean they are Philly's closest peers after all.
Quote:
Originally Posted by EddieOlSkool
The perception of Philly is not ever made in comparison to DC because outside of the BosWash nobody hypes DC.
I can tell you that Black folks, especially educated Black folks, down South do indeed hype DC. It gets a lot of press in Virginia, the Carolinas, Atlanta, etc.
Your anecdotes aside I don't really see how you assumed race into what these West Coast clients were thinking. Maybe the reason they said Newark is because they probably had knowledge of Newark and little else on the East Coast. You don't know. But you certainly love assuming others are racist for no reason. Probably because you're one yourself. See how easy that is?
Just wanted to apologize for jumping to a race issue on the negative comments relating Newark to Philly. I was called a racist here for pointing out the connection between the dislike of 2 cities with high minority populations may have been related to racism.
That whole ''race'' association with cities as ''sh*tholes'' has been cleared up by President Trump being ''racist'' for calling out whole countries as being ''sh*tholes''.
I jumped the gun in making the association that the people putting down cities like Newark and its larger sister-city Philly were actually putting down these places because of the large minority presence in both, while they sing the praises of Boston, Seattle, Portland etc.
Like the people dumping on Philly/Newark/Detroit/Baltimore/Cleveland/Camden etc. (many consider these places to be dysfunctional sh*tholes) it has nothing to do with race, just like Trump putting down El Salvador, Haiti, and some other African countries.
My apologies to this thread for my mistake. Race has no bearing on whether someone likes a city or calls them sh*tholes even if they are cities with crappy economies, high crime, poverty, blight, and dysfunctional leadership just as race has no bearing on countries with crappy economies, high crime, poverty, blight, and dysfunctional leadership.
Again, I apologize for making the race possibility when putting down what some may consider to be 3rd world US cities.
More than a few people, and not just here on C-D. I mean they are Philly's closest peers after all.
I can tell you that Black folks, especially educated Black folks, down South do indeed hype DC. It gets a lot of press in Virginia, the Carolinas, Atlanta, etc.
Not only this, but I can tell you black people in California have an awareness of DC. Probably not to the same extent as blacks who are down south (closer to the source); but plenty of California blacks have regards for DC and there are more than a few Californians in Metro Washington...
I know it's the nature of some people on this board to minimize black values and the like, but I'd even posit that DC has a name to non-blacks around the country...
As to the actual thread, Philly does not have the worst perception problem, and I'm getting tired of this crybaby "everybody looks over me" Philly mentality on here. It's getting old. The perception of Philly is very high in comparison to Detroit and a number of other American cities...
My general perception of Philadelphia is positive. I see the city as bedrock Americana. A true legacy city. Great urban core, neighborhoods, universities, local culture, sports, history etc..
The one negative I have is how grimy the city can appear at first glance. Maybe it’s just endemic of me living in relatively tidy and spread out new South cities for much of my life (Atlanta and DFW). When you see Philly, you know you’re in someplace old with serious urban density.
As far as recognition, Philadelphia is in an impossible situation. Sandwiched between NYC, Boston, Baltimore and DC.
I mean, imagine if the South’s Big 4 cities or the West’s biggest cities were all within a 5-6 hour drive of each other. A corridor with Miami, Atlanta, Houston and DFW. How about, LA, SF Bay Area, Seattle and San Diego all in close proximity. Someone is going to be overlooked.
Sir, You can call the area between downtown Philly and the stadiums alot of things but its definitely not a wasteland. Upwards of 400,000 live there and the population density of Center City + South Philly is 35,000 people per sq mile. Thats top 1% in the USA. It might not suit your personal taste but wasteland is the wrong description.
Philadelphia doesnt have a grid pattern of wide streets. Maybe Market Street + Broad Street I would categorize as normal city streets. Ben Franklin Parkway was meant to be a grand boulevard but other than that the street grid in Philly is probably more compact than any city in the USA.
And truth be told Philadelphia didnt try to be like NYC. Its more like NYC tried to be like Philadlephia and surpassed it measurably.
It's weird, but I don't know anyone in real life who has ever spoken more than a few sentences about Philly. In Dallas people talk about Chicago, Houston, LA, San Francisco, NYC, Boston, DC or the PNW pretty regularly, but I have never know any person to go to Philly for a weekend. I even knew a guy who taught in Philly for a year out of undergrad and even he didn't have much to say about it. I actually met a girl pretty recently from Hershey who was very dismissive of it. "Eh, its just sort of a big city, kind of dirty and lots of crime, if I want a big city fix I go to NYC or DC. In PA, Pittsburgh is more interesting"
I think the previous point that Philly is to NYC what Baltimore is to DC is a pretty good point.
It's weird, but I don't know anyone in real life who has ever spoken more than a few sentences about Philly. In Dallas people talk about Chicago, Houston, LA, San Francisco, NYC, Boston, DC or the PNW pretty regularly, but I have never know any person to go to Philly for a weekend. I even knew a guy who taught in Philly for a year out of undergrad and even he didn't have much to say about it. I actually met a girl pretty recently from Hershey who was very dismissive of it. "Eh, its just sort of a big city, kind of dirty and lots of crime, if I want a big city fix I go to NYC or DC. In PA, Pittsburgh is more interesting"
I think the previous point that Philly is to NYC what Baltimore is to DC is a pretty good point.
It's not a bad point entirely.
But, maybe it might behove you to see for yourself rather than believing in hearsay from other people with limited exposure to Philly. Lots of people from the rest of PA( like that girl from Hershey) dislike SE PA because, in part, it's the most liberal part of the state and where much of the state's wealth is concentrated. You might tell that girl that Milton Hershey started in Philadelphia.
Right now I'm sitting in a coffee shop filled with successful looking millennials and just about everywhere that I go in the city nowadays it's a similar story. I'm an oldhead Boomer and it's clear to me that I'm the oldest one in this particular shop. 46 million tourists came to Philly in 2016 so someone likes us!
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