People Who Annoy Me - Part 4
The Passive Aggressive City-Hater:
You tell me that you think "The city is fun" but you "could NEVER live there." You tell me how you like your space and how you just like things to be clean. You talk about how you couldn't imagine living without your car. The only people you socialize with are other suburbanites - so you've lost all perspective on how your comments are received by a more diverse group of people. You forget that the city-dweller you're talking to actually lives in the city. You forget that this person calls the city home.
Let's play out how it might sound if I made the converse statements about your home. "The suburbs are nice to drive through, but I could NEVER live there. I just can't imagine living in a place where everyone looks the same and believes the same thing. I can't imagine ever getting excited about a new Target. The streets seem clean, but I don't think street cleanliness is a good trade-off for boredom. I can't imagine what I would do every day in the suburbs. Based on my conversations with actual suburbanites, I guess I would have to drive an SUV/minivan, shop at Target, eat at Applebee's, shop at Home Depot, spend all my free time fixing my house, complain about traffic, complain about the price of gas, talk about how nice the new elementary school is, and complain about the increase in property taxes."
Please don't take this as my manifesto against suburban life - because it's not. I had a great childhood in the suburbs and (who knows?) I may move back some day. This is, however, a manifesto against close-minded suburbanites who insist that suburban living is the only way to grow up. This is also a manifesto against oblivious suburbanites who don't realize that when they trash cities, they are trashing people's homes. How about we make a deal? I won't tell you how boring and homogeneous your town is and you can't tell me how cities are dirty, smelly, and crowded? I feel like I've kept up my part of the bargain so far (until this post), so I'd appreciate you beginning to keep up yours.
Reference: Other annoying people
You tell me that you think "The city is fun" but you "could NEVER live there." You tell me how you like your space and how you just like things to be clean. You talk about how you couldn't imagine living without your car. The only people you socialize with are other suburbanites - so you've lost all perspective on how your comments are received by a more diverse group of people. You forget that the city-dweller you're talking to actually lives in the city. You forget that this person calls the city home.
Let's play out how it might sound if I made the converse statements about your home. "The suburbs are nice to drive through, but I could NEVER live there. I just can't imagine living in a place where everyone looks the same and believes the same thing. I can't imagine ever getting excited about a new Target. The streets seem clean, but I don't think street cleanliness is a good trade-off for boredom. I can't imagine what I would do every day in the suburbs. Based on my conversations with actual suburbanites, I guess I would have to drive an SUV/minivan, shop at Target, eat at Applebee's, shop at Home Depot, spend all my free time fixing my house, complain about traffic, complain about the price of gas, talk about how nice the new elementary school is, and complain about the increase in property taxes."
Please don't take this as my manifesto against suburban life - because it's not. I had a great childhood in the suburbs and (who knows?) I may move back some day. This is, however, a manifesto against close-minded suburbanites who insist that suburban living is the only way to grow up. This is also a manifesto against oblivious suburbanites who don't realize that when they trash cities, they are trashing people's homes. How about we make a deal? I won't tell you how boring and homogeneous your town is and you can't tell me how cities are dirty, smelly, and crowded? I feel like I've kept up my part of the bargain so far (until this post), so I'd appreciate you beginning to keep up yours.
Reference: Other annoying people
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