I recently moved to California. Before i moved, people asked me “why are you moving there, its so bad?”. Now that I’m here, i understand it less. The state is beautiful. There is so much to do.
I know the cost of living is high, and people think the gun control laws are ridiculous (I actually think they are reasonable, for the most part). There is a guy I work with here that says “the policies are dumb” but can’t give me a solid answer on what is so bad about it.
So, what is it that California does (policy-wise) that people hate so much?
It absolutely has a lot to do with Right wing/Republican propaganda, California, Chicago, and New York represent everything they hate so they constantly use both states and that city as negative talking points.
One point they constantly make is that New York City is a crime riddled hellhole, meanwhile NYC has one of the lowest crime rates in the entire country, and one of the lowest murder rates, it’s just a massive city with a massive population and everyone there has cameras so when stuff happens it goes viral. Also the Red States tend to have much higher crime and murder rates.
All in all this is usual conservative/right wing tactics, they constantly want to isolate and segregate themselves from other ideas, and aren’t afraid to take over where other people live to exclude the people already living there. This is why Idaho, Texas, Florida, and Utah have similar campaigns about “don’t California my state” and by “California” they mean don’t bring your “liberal/socialist/Communist/woke/progressive/democratic” outlook to their states, because they don’t want to be responsible for cleaning up the racism and various other problems that the red states seem to have adopted as their identities.
Also I know quite a few conservative Californians and New Yorkers that recently moved to Texas and Florida, and as conservative as they thought they were they actually talk about moving back to where they came from because of how it is in their new states, except for the fact that they moved to the new states because they can afford so much more than what they could in California.
Overall my point is, if you consume right wing media then you are conditioned to hate blue states, and particularly those blue states are Cali, NY, and the city of Chicago as well as DC, I’m not saying these places are without flaws, but I am saying that the propaganda and disinformation about those places has amplified the hate towards those places and their residents.
My conservative family still asks if I’m safe here in Seattle because they “hear so much about it on the news”. They still think Seattle is just always being with protests and the libbrerl government is just running the city into the ground.
Which Seattle and most cities have problems, all cities have crime, but no more than usually. It’s just that people live in cities. Per Capita crime in a big city can and is around the same of a rural area, but people don’t think in terms like per Capita.
But fox news loves to spin that to keep rural people afraid, keep them thankful for their backwards laws and ideas. Because what really happens when you move somewhere like Cali? You meet people from different backgrounds and religions and suddenly your views might be challenged a bit
This is why Idaho, Texas, Florida, and Utah have similar campaigns about “don’t California my state” and by “California” they mean don’t bring your “liberal/socialist/Communist/woke/progressive/democratic” outlook to their states, because they don’t want to be responsible for cleaning up the racism and various other problems that the red states seem to have adopted as their identities.
This also happens to a lesser degree with “the nearest large & fairly progressive city” I grew up in Madison, WI, fell in love with a girl from a small town across the state and we moved in together, got married started a family etc. So the dogwhistling that happens when you talk about the nearest liberal big city is real. I’m selective about who I tell that I grew up in Madison, and I listen for the obvious dogwhistling like “oh I try to avoid Madison as much as possible” “oh I really don’t like Madison”
And now that trumpian politics have had a chance to really take hold we’re planning on moving to a larger city, in part because we dont want our kids growing up around so much racism. When local online communities, local organizations and local community meeting places (aka the local bars) are riddled with dogwhistley comments because people feel comfortable saying them (which wasn’t so bad just a few years ago!) It’s just not pleasant
Exactly right! Conservatives will say this about literally any nearby city, the only thing I’ve been able to come up with is that they’re petrified of the city, just pure fear. Even something as small as Madison they’ll dogwhistle up and down on because they’ve never been and they’re terrified of it. Anything new or different is bad, of course.
I don’t know that they’re actually afraid. I think they are just signaling group affiliation and have chosen to side with the bosses.
I believe this is true. Progressivism is just one thing I like about the state. It’s also gorgeous. Big Sur, San Francisco, Yosemite, sequoias, numerous vineyards, craggy beaches, and scenery that can transition from valley to plains to desert to mountains in just a couple hours’ drive.
California gets trotted out in the conservative media sphere as “liberalism run wild”, a place where being what they consider to be a “real American” is illegal but crime is subsidized by the state, where everything is expensive and dangerous, and homeless people have gay sex in the street. There’s an entire industry focused on filtering for the most extremely awful news they can find in a state of almost 40 million people, packaging that news as though it’s the typical experience everyone there goes through, and then blasting that news into the brains of Americans 24/7. That image, carefully crafted to be as extremely negative as possible, is the only experience most people have with California.
I moved from Canada to California a few years ago and spent almost 5 years in the San Jose area. Loved California; the food, the people there, the scenery, definitely the weather. End up hating America though.
I live in the Bay Area and love all the natural beauty in all directions. We can hike a different trail every weekend during the months when it’s not unpleasantly warm or chilly and never repeat. The tragedy of it all is that it’s attached to the rest of the country, by which I mean red states.
The liberalism run wild concept is kinda what I’m curious about. Like what things? I know California protects abortions and has stronger gun control laws. But is that really it? There’s gotta be more actual examples
A lot of social programs, better employee pay and benefits, legal weed. Conservatives are just jealous that their shithole backwater hick towns will never change so they point at the scary liberal boogeyman that is “Commiefornia” in some vain hope they will get noticed.
their shithole backwater hick towns
That image, carefully crafted to be as extremely negative as possible, is the only experience most people have with California.
That’s the thing. No one I’ve ever heard who says this kind of shit has ever lived here for any length of time or knows anything about the state beyond what the “news” has told them to believe. There are issues here like there are issues everywhere. So people want to focus on homelessness. Of course we have more homeless people, we have more people. We have two of the largest and most well known metro areas in the nation with an up and coming third.
The bitching takes away (maybe intentionally) from the homeless issue that is rapidly increasing throughout the rest of the country. This is an issue of inflation and greed masquerading as inflation. Of corporate property owners buying up rentals and raising rents. Of workers not being paid a living wage. Of food and essentials becoming increasingly unaffordable by the month. Of course people are losing their homes and stealing from walmart. But this is a national problem. It gets worse all over the country for the same reasons and at the same time that it gets worse in California.
But what I will say is, we do have reproductive rights. Reasonable firearms regulations. More tenant regulations that most places, though still never enough. Some cities have social worker response teams instead of sending cops to kill people having mental health problems. We have homeless outreach and a statewide homeless census. Our schools and colleges still have diversity programs and sex ed. The state provides tuition waivers and grants for low income and marginalized students. We have drag shows and pride parades. And our libraries aren’t being purged by fucking nazis. So there’s that.
California is the target of conservative fear mongering.
Which is silly considering how many conservatives there are there. The current speaker of the House is from California.
Doesn’t matter. Cali and NYC are the epitome of librul chaos and if those places aren’t made out to be smoldering shitholes with 2.7 homeless people to every citizen the gullible nitwit voluntarily angry dopes in the party (most of them) might actually vote in their best interests
It’s a left-leaning, progressive state. Everyone who talks shit about this state in anything other than the cost of living generally doesn’t have an answer because their actual reason for disliking the state is that it’s not a republican state.
Fwiw there are more Republicans in California than most red states it’s just a matter of having an enormous population. Hence OP’s coworker.
And they all seem to be in the Central Valley; The worst region of the state.
Also 8% of US agricultural output by dollar value. Let’s not forget that we need conservatives as much as they need us.
their actual reason for disliking the state is that it’s not a republican state
Largest number of electoral votes for presidential elections, too, which drives 'em nuts!
There’s a large amount of perceived haughtiness from the residents of California. They have a lot to be proud of though - it’s a great state in a lot of regards.
Full disclosure, I’m Canadian but travel to San Diego often for work.
Downtown San Diego is not as I remember it from before the pandemic. It’s quite clear to me that California is struggling with a massive mental health and addiction issue. The cost of living compounds these issues and amplifies the worst in people. Even “normal” working class folk are quick to anger and explode at the slightest inconvenience and people just do not give a shit about each other. I pin it to everyone being stressed out because they live paycheck to paycheck and the future is always uncertain.
Things that I think could help: universal healthcare, increased public housing, and the execution of the sackler family.
Long time resident of California (SoCal in particular), can confirm haughtiness. I’ve grown increasingly prideful of my state for holding strong on specific human right issues.
You’re also right about the increasing disparity though. It feels like stratification is getting stronger and stronger each year. The Beach Cities area in particular, from my experience, where they’re building a bunch of (very expensive) flats. California has had a history of states shipping homeless/refugees to us and that doesn’t help our increasing number of state-grown displacements.
When I lived in Southern California (which is very different from other parts of the state) in the early 90s it was exactly like that. And when I have visited. I always tell people to watch it because a lot of people are really quick up take offense and anger in public and they never believe me until they see it, which they have on each trip back.
I love other areas of California, it’s beautiful, but Southern California always felt like a pressure cooker to me.
San Diego used to be a lot worse in a lot of ways. Honestly people have short memories. Admittedly, downtown is starting to look like 80s-90s downtown again, in a lot of ways though.
I can honestly say that there are a lot of terrible people out there, but in my experience San Diego always manages to come together when it matters. And honestly, in most day to day interactions, the vast majority of people I interact with are pretty nice overall.
I mean I lived in Anaheim in a terrible part of town on the early 90s with no car and a 40 minute bike ride to work, it was inevitable that I was going to have some bad experiences (robbed at gunpoint, crazy lady with rabid dog living in front of my building, getting screamed at and having stuff thrown at my by passing cars because I was on a bike, etc).
My coworkers (kitchen work in a big hotel) were great, it was just when I was going to and from work I’d see a lot of crazy stuff.
In later years, going back, I just found people were on a hair trigger. Like I was with two co-workers (was there for something like a work conference) in a store buying beer and these two guys were in costume so my buddy (from the Maritimes) said “those are awesome costumes” and these two guys went nuts on us.
Profanity, threats, it was wild. We just apologized and they were telling us to go f ourselves as they left.
Or I went to sf with my wife about ten years ago and she wanted to stop at a gas station in the city to use the washroom. I was like “just keep your focus on the cashier to get the key and I’ll wait outside the bathroom”. She told me I was being paranoid. Before we even got out of the car two dudes got into a fistfight and a cop saw it and tore in return the lights and siren going.
Just stuff like that going on all the time. Meanwhile, a few hours away you have paradise on earth.
