Quote:
Originally Posted by GoCUBS1
Onliner, Remember Me? I took your last Superduper Poll and voted for the Cayman Islands. I lived in the Caribbean and then moved back to Chicago. I love Chicago but would not recommend it to you because of your first, most important criteria: 1. People move slowly, have time in their lives...
I do not feel Chicago meets this criteria. I have also spent significant time in the other towns on your list (except San Jose) and I feel they would all meet your #1 factor better.
p.s. You should reconsider the TAX-FREE Cayman Islands. If only I could get there...
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Yeah, thanks for hollerin' back. The funny thing is, I did this really rigorous analysis of the cities in the Superduper, and it turns out based on the analysis - basically using the list as a weighted list so if a city ranks tops in the top factor it gets more points than if it ranks tops in the last factor - anyway, it turns out based on that kind of analysis (using pretty much only hard numbers and hard rankings from other sources) that Honolulu ranks first (go figure) then Chicago ranks second (go figure again) and West Palm ranks third (huh?). Now those three cities are so close that's within the margin of error in my analysis. As for the other cities - San Fran, San Jose, Berkeley even, San Diego, Seattle, Houston, the list goes on - they ranked further - in this analysis only - behind. It was a very very weird and unexpected result. Chicago did well because it has affordable shopping compared to some of the others, the diversity is good (i.e., friendly to minorities), it has very strong Democratic values so it beats even San Fran I think on that front surprisingly, I think it did anyway, and it's friendly. It meets all of the factors better than most cities except for the weather and except for its upbeat pace. Honolulu and West Palm scored well because of the weather (they scored tops on that front over all the other cities pretty much) and West Palm is also very affordable (remember, we're not talking about the Donald Trump part of West Palm, but the nice suburban areas) and it has solid economic growth - Honolulu very much the same but it beats West Palm overall because it has stronger Democratic values by far, and its higher cost of living is made up for with the weather, friendly atmosphere, and again super strong (super Obama friendly) Democratic environment. So it's weird - I mean I like Chitown - cold yes, but I think the demographics there are perfect, and it's really not that hectic to me - a grind, sure, depending on were you live perhaps - but not hectic like NYC it seems, but I've only visited once.
Having said all of that, I will say this. I am curious as to how friendly Chicago really is to blacks and minorities? I do not mean at all to inject any doubt as to this, as when I visited it seemed great, really great. But is it as friendly to blacks and minorities as for example San Francisco is? Is it as friendly to blacks and minorities as Houston I've heard is? This is a big question mark for me over Chicago and really is a core question. It's the second factor on the list, and in my rigorous analysis I used a calculation for that factor that may not be entirely accurate possibly. I mean are blacks and whites friends in Chicago - or is it more segregated. I would expect if I moved to San Fran, for example, that I could make friends with people from a variety of races - that's really what I'm looking for - an atmosphere where that regularly happens and is more the norm than it is the new trend shall we say. Atlanta for example - whites and blacks party separately by and large. NYC, I don't get the feeling we see a whole lot of mixed relationships going on there - I mean obviously there are a lot - but it's not the garden of eden uknow. That's what's very very appealing to me about San Fran - and that image of San Fran may be something of a fairy tail. But nonetheless, I have always imagined (I've visited San Fran once) northern California in general as having an atmosphere where your racial background really has nothing to do with whether you can easily make friends with a variety of races. And people will always say, hey if you're friendly to everybody, everyone will be friendly back - but I would respond and say, okay, well do you have black friends, do you actually have them, do they come to your house, do you have Chinese friends, do they come to your house. All this sounds a bit silly really - but to be serious, it is that kind of environment that I am looking for. Sure, one could move to LA, or Miami, or NYC and pretty much enjoy that without much concern - but of the cities listed - Seattle, San Fran, Chicago, San Jose - do we really have that there, or is trying to do that going to be new ground. All are multicultural, yes - but when you scratch the surface, does all that multiculturalism kinda stop once you get out of the streets and into peoples homes - that sounds harsh, but let's hear some thoughts...
For those of you who currently live in multicultural cities and take this for granted, I have too, but presently live in a city (or small city) where that is less the case unfortunately.