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’s endless soulless suburbia interspersed by twelve-lane traffic jams, what’s there to like?
The fucking ridiculous natural beauty everywhere? I live in the most soulless of the soulless suburbs of Los Angeles and if I left my house right now and didn’t stop for anything I could be standing beneath the biggest tree in the world in just 4 hours. Or if I want to see the oldest trees in the world I can go roughly the same distance and do that instead. I could be at the trailhead to climb the highest peak in the contiguous US in 3 hours and on my way there I would see an ancient basalt waterfall where obsidian litters the ground, the Grand Canyon of the Mojave where semiprecious gems flow out of the mountains, lakes, rivers, the Sierra Nevadas, Death Valley, it’s ridiculous. Every fucking state has traffic and suburbs but I’ll go to my grave arguing that we can’t be beat for scenery.
What if I want to walk five minutes to a cafe? There’s trees there, too. Fuck biggest and oldest and grandest if I can’t be there without incurring one of those twelve-lane traffic jams.
It’s not “endless suburbia.” It does end — the state is just huge!
You can hop on a bike in downtown San Francisco after breakfast, and end up in the middle of nowhere in the Mt. Tam watershed before lunch.
And if that’s too urban, go hike the Lost Coast. Or check out Yosemite.
Yeah but in the end I still have to go back to suburbia.
Granted pretty much the same applies to the whole of the US and Canada, either you’re in the wilderness or suburbia but CA is especially egregious because you’d think with that kind of density they would’ve thought about building, you know, a couple of four-storey apartment blocks or something somewhere. The kind of density that enables public transport to work.
I can go surfing in the morning, hike beautiful mountains in the evening, and experience the TJ nightlife, all in a single day. The next day I can go offroading in ocotillo or take a stroll through a park bigger than NY’s Central Park. idk, my section of California is heaven.
They’re jealous because they’re too poor to live in CA. They believe everything they hear on the news and don’t realize that there’s more to the state than wildfires and homeless people. They aren’t cultured enough to appreciate theater, fine cuisine, fine wine. They’re too fat to surf.
I would say the attitude shown in this comment is a more likely reason than the content of this comment.
(Dislikes an entire state with 35 million people)
(Accuses others of having a bad attitude)
(Feels superior)
I don’t dislike California. In my other comment I said I think it’s an okay place. I only provided negative statements because that’s what OP asked for. CA has a lot going for it. It’s a beautiful state, home of Silicon Valley, etc.
And I think the attitude in your original comment speaks for itself.
You are missing out on all the state parks, beaches, lakes, rivers, mountains, snow, etc. We have it all. Every type of environment is only a few hours for me to get there.
Poor republicans are butthurt
I don’t live in California but visit the bay area frequently for business. Here’s a typical experience:
Depending on travel budget, I’ll either stay at a motel for $400/night, or a regular hotel for around $800/night. It’s not my money, but it’s still ridiculous to need to file a budget exception to stay at a Motel 8.
When I arrive in the evening, I try to watch Netflix but the cellular bandwidth is so shitty I can’t even watch at the lowest resolution, and the hotel wifi isn’t much better. I boot up a wifi scanner and find nearly a hundred different base stations in range all stomping on the spectrum, so I just play Switch for a while and go to bed. When I get up in the morning, I go down to the free breakfast which is plastered with Prop 65 signs indicating the food served at the establishment is known to the state to cause cancer.
On the walk to the convention center, I have to sidestep multiple people strung out on who knows what. A person riding by on a bike yells “FUCK YOU” to all passers-by, including myself. Multiple vans with oversized LCD screens advertise a variety of AI and Blockchain startup “solutions”. One company has set up a 20-foot display on a parked “van” opposite the convention center to advertise to conference-goers despite being unaffiliated with the conference. Conference staff call the police but apparently the van has a permit, and it’s public parking so there’s nothing they can do.
When I arrive, I’m stopped by staff because I’m carrying my own demo machine. They tell me their union contract requires that all hardware setup must be handled by contracted staff. I leave my machine in the area they designate, and fill out the form indicating it must be ready in room 1005 by 2pm for my presentation.
After attending several morning sessions, I walk to find lunch. A local sandwich shop doesn’t sell Diet Coke or Doritos, but they do have cucumber water for $8. I decide to go to CVS for my Diet Coke fix, but almost every product is locked behind a door. Overhead speakers announce “Security, walk the floor” as several people enter the store, casually stuff their pockets full of M&Ms, and walk out without paying. Nobody stops them, including the security guard who just watches them until they leave. I decide to skip the soda.
When I return to the conference center to prepare for my presentation, my demo machine is there but is not connected to any of the room equipment. The contractors who plug in the machines are apparently different than the ones who move the machines, and they are on strike.
On the way back to my hotel, someone asks me for money for a bus ride. I ignore them, but they begin following me. I tell them no but they follow me back all the way to my hotel, where a security guard turns them away.
I get my bags and head to the airport. My driver thinks he’s in the Indy 500 despite being in stop and go traffic. It’s about 78 degrees and humid inside the terminal - The AC is off because PG&E is having capacity issues due to wildfires, which were incidentally caused by downed lines (owned and poorly maintained by PG&E).
