Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Most native or long time Californians know so little about back east they do not really have an opinion.
It's more the transplants, and people passing through for a few years that are the most vocal about back east.
I feel like that's true of every region/subregion. Many Texans don't concern themselves with anything outside the state lines. Austinites don't care about anything outside of Travis County. It's the same thing as "we have the worst drivers" or "if you don't like weather, wait five minutes"
Many of the Latinos here in Miami are completely unfamiliar with any version of U.S. culture that does not exist in South Florida. Still, there's only one city in our country that is almost universally recognized and that's NYC. That's the difference here in my opinion.
According to one survey, the 5 states most likely to answer "Yes" to the question "is your state the best or one of the best places to live?" are not on either coast: Montana, Alaska, Utah, Wyoming, and Texas. (Well Alaska and Texas are technically coastal, but not in the way people usually think of it)
Oregon does appear in the top 10 states for "Yes" answers, while Northeast states appear in both the top 10 and bottom 10 (New Hampshire, Vermont in the top 10; Rhode Island, New Jersey, Maryland in the bottom 10).
On this forum definitely the west coast. I can think of some particular posters from the Bay Area, San Diego, and Seattle with some highly consistent smug.
East coast folks seem chill, though a little over-obsessed with rowhouses.
Re: West Coasters and smug, that's not just on city data but in real life too.
I have lived and traveled all over the US over the decades. However, the majority of my time was spent in the Western US. I grew up in the desert watching spaghetti westerns. I identify with the West. Is that dismissive? Is that superior? Is that just my history and my decision? I have lived in the most beautiful places (out West). I prefer West. I was born here; I will die here. I do not think I am dismissive of the rest of the country; but, I just prefer the West.
...which makes the question much to do about nothing...
Again, it's transplants from the East Coast who look down on their former home--Californians themselves generally have no opinion of other places in favor of or against. Only places that actively come for us like Texas, then we have an opinion.
But as far as the Midwest and East Coast, I can assure you we don't even think much about you let alone 'look down' on you. Aside from agreeing that the weather sucks back there and how we love NYC, or going to college back there, or DC, or Atlanta, or Miami, or Chicago, there is very little conversation about the East and Midwest, unless people from there bring it up, which they do, not us.
Yep we are in our own world out here. Don't think about you (east coast midwest much) and don't care what you think about us. It's 70 degrees
I used to live in California, and I live in the DC area now. I'd definitely say that West Coasters seem to look down on anywhere else, or outright indifferent. There's a fine line that they straddle. A lot of it is due to distance from the rest of the country plus all the amenities available within the states - California in particular. I knew a lot of Californians who never really traveled outside the state or the furthest they went was Vegas or Phoenix. Bay Area people tend to be a lot more smug about where they are than people in Southern California, although I've met my share in Los Angeles and San Diego.
The East Coast - well the NE/Acela Corridor - is a bit different. Maybe because of my background and ethnicity, but most people I know here have connections to the South and the Midwest (or migrated here to DC from those regions), so there's a familiarity with those regions that you don't get out on the West Coast. Also, a lot of New Yorkers go back and forth between there and Florida. I do notice the elitism and ignorance about certain regions and cities on the East Coast, mainly from people who've never traveled beyond the NE Corridor.
I will say that I met quite a few Southerners who look down on the Coasts too when I lived down there, so this goes both ways, so all the faux indignation from people in Middle America about this is amusing to me.
From my own personal experience and anecdotal evidence the East Coast and I'm talking NORTHEAST is the most dismissive group of people I've ran across in my lifetime. I've never heard so many people poop on cities and regions they've never been to in my life. And as someone who likes to travel I've encountered the smug and disdain once people find out I'm from Texas.
I'd say my experiences in Cali were actually pretty cool. Seem much more laid back and reserved with their perspective on every other part of America. I've run into a few elitist there as well don't get me wrong. Felt like it was more so a smugness with some older people in San Francisco than it was with millennials. Unless they were tech bros.
West Coast people tend to have much more familiarity with Texas than East Coasters do IME. Lots of Texans migrated to California and vice-versa and lots of people travel to visit family in those states.
When I went to Houston a few years back, I actually had people here in the DMV area asking me if there were a lot of black people there and if I was worried about being shot at or lynched. A lot of people are weird and dumb and don't know much about anything beyond their neighborhood TBH...I notice a lot of native New Yorkers who never traveled beyond the city have an insular attitude, plus there are certain types of transplants to the city who think that living in NYC automatically makes them more sophisticated and cultured. I had to get one guy from Michigan who lived in NYC for a while together for calling me country, and his people are from Kentucky and Alabama and he retained a lot of those ways. I was like, Look in the damn mirror.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
