
This Is Silicon Valley - yirgacheffe
https://onezero.medium.com/this-is-silicon-valley-3c4583d6e7c2
======
crushcrashcrush
I'm gonna offer a slightly different perspective: SV isn't that nice, and it's
not worth the price premium. There is a distinct lack of culture, of
nightlife, of arts and humanities - even in San Francisco. We're a mediocre
land of strip malls and suburbs masquerading as an international destination.
Go to any other city and tell me that it's not MORE vibrant (Chicago, LA, NYC,
Miami, Austin, Portland, Seattle, Houston, Toronto, London, Paris, etc.)

It just isn't worth the price premium. Restaurants close at 9:30 (why do
people eat so early?) - lack of beautiful modern mid-rise and hi-rise condo
housing, lack of public transportation, last-call is at 1:30PM... it really
sucks here. hard.

~~~
throwaway-1283
The price premium you are paying, especially for housing, is really all about
raising kids e.g. sending them to some of the best (albeit pressure-filled)
public schools in the country all while keeping your high paying SV jobs.

Basically assume that the quality of public SV schools are high enough that
high earning parents are "OK" sending their kids to those schools rather than
paying for private school. If you have 2 kids and would otherwise spend
$20k/year for ~14 years of PreK-12 then living in your preferred public school
district will save you over $500k+ in tuition.

If you are single or have no plans to have kids (thus shifting more free time
toward cultural activities vs raising kids) then agreed living in SV is really
boring and uninspiring and not worth it.

~~~
conanbatt
As a 6 figure salary worker in SV, you get fleeced. You have worse housing
options, worse schooling options, worse public transportations and highest tax
rates in the country.

SV is not expensive because "public schools are good". Its expensive because
both the government and the landlords, that have a huge intersectino of
people, capture the largest chunk of the surplus tech workers get.

~~~
anxman
Landlords don't get it either. I'm a landlord and most of that money goes to
the banks and property taxes. I might see profits in 10-20 years if I'm lucky
but even that's a gamble.

~~~
conanbatt
I would've been ready to disagree with you 2 months ago, until I looked at the
SF budget and saw they spend 2600U$S per household every month. Landlords cant
be getting too much of that: but they do get a piece, particularly old time
landlords.

~~~
refurb
The landlords making money hand over fist are the ones that bought long ago
AND had the tenants turn over (reset rent control).

Right now it’s cheaper to rent a place than buy in SF (rent to home price
ratio is almost 1:30 where 1:15 means it’s equal).

Most landlords are betting on property appreciation, but even that isn’t
guaranteed if you have tenants as they lower the value of the home.

------
sebastos
>I just started working at Google and it wasn't everything I had hoped

This person just graduated college. This is a wildly unremarkable piece of
writing about a widely discussed issue, and the author has no unique insight
into the problem. The sanctimony of repeating "This is Silicon Valley" over
and over as if this pedestrian blogpost carries the weight of an MLK speech is
just silly. Yes, life can be disappointing in these ways. No, discussing
Google's use of plastic straws is not deep. Yes, our whole culture has a
problem with isolation. No, your "I'm quitting facebook" post is not an
incisive expose of that problem.

I'm actually not trying to be mean, because I know part of growing up is
clarifying these thoughts to yourself and trying to make sense of it all. And
I don't mean to diminish her experience - I'm sure it's sincerely felt. We can
probably all agree that it's a frightening and disorienting experience
entering the "real world" and discovering that you have to find your own
meaning.

So the problem isn't the author - everybody thinks or writes these self-
righteous, disillusioned screeds from time to time, even if we don't put them
on a blog. The issue is - can't we, the readers of hackernews, find a better
object of discussion? There have to be a million better words written on this
topic. Seeing this on the frontpage makes me feel like people are really
nodding their heads to this and thinking "Thank God somebody has said it!"
But... we're better than that right? We all understand this for what it is,
right? Please?

EDIT: As I'm reading through the replies, I feel a little better. At least
there's some level of consensus that this is a pretty juvenile hot-take. It'd
be better if the snark was directed at ourselves rather than the author
though. The world is full of 22 year olds' opinions, it's our fault for
putting it on the front page like it's some great piece of writing

~~~
crushcrashcrush
While it may not live up to your editorial standards, it's clearly resonating
with this audience.

Maybe attack the _ideas_ and not the structure / style of the piece?

It has nothing to do with the author "finding meaning." It's critiquing an
overpriced, socially bankrupt culture and area, and the toll that can take on
mental health and happiness.

~~~
sebastos
I mean, I could do that, but that's kind of missing the point. In fact, I
don't particularly disagree with the ideas. I think it would be pretty hard to
find people who do! That's what makes the piece so banal - it's saying things
that everyone will agree with in a very fluffy, very unexamined way.

>It's critiquing an overpriced, socially bankrupt culture and area, and the
toll that can take on mental health and happiness.

This is what the piece _thinks_ it's critiquing. That's what it wants us to
think too. But I'm arguing that it's very obvious where the author is coming
from. You can tell from the examples she picks that she's just basically a new
Google hire who's not really fitting in, and feeling disillusioned with her
cohort. "Everybody goes to Lake Tahoe for the weekend"? Tell me that's not
coming directly from somebody who's feeling bored and unfulfilled and
surrounded by people she hasn't bonded with. And so my point is that this is
something that a lot of people go through, and it doesn't have much to do with
the monotony of Silicon Valley or the moral decay of our society (which, as a
reminder, I don't really deny as real phenomena!). This is basically a diary
entry of someone walking through a tough time in their life, but it's trying
to bring the weight of society's problems along with it to make you feel like
it's a deep insight. But it ain't. And we, as adults, should be able to
understand what's going on there, and call it like it is.

~~~
TheHwangover
Does that make what the author is trying to convey any more right/wrong?
Doesn't matter if you have experience/insight through years of trial or
turmoil. If you get to an enlightened state faster, more power to you. Don't
discredit the author for missing whatever steps you had in mind

------
rsweeney21
I totally bought into the Silicon Valley dream. I moved to the bay area to
work at Netflix and launch a startup. I bootstrapped my first company because
I didn't know how to raise VC money. That was pretty great. For my second
company I raised millions of dollars from VCs. I went to exclusive parties,
did press interviews and had a huge net-worth (on paper). I became the person
I always envied. It was HUGELY disappointing.

I remember being at the company party after we closed our series A and
thinking, "Is this it?". I was expecting a much stronger sense of
accomplishment.

I'm curious what the experience was like for other founders. For me, I
realized that what I thought was going to make me happy, didn't. Not only did
it not give me the happiness and satisfaction I was hoping for, it ate up some
many other parts of my life that do bring me real happiness - family life,
friends, traveling, adventure.

The deeper I dig into the world of startups and VC the more I realize that
it's very much not what it seems.

~~~
smallgovt
The disappointment you describe is either because your achievements don't
actually contribute to your core values or the benefits are short lived.

I recommend taking some time to figure out what your core values are.

Why did you want to start a successful startup? What were you really chasing
after? Some superficial answers might be financial security or social status,
but you should keep asking why these things are important until you arrive at
something that is important just because you feel it is. These are your core
values.

Once you figure out your core values, you'll find that:

1) The event that resulted in disappointment either didn't contribute to one
of your core values

2) The core value that you've identified is partially out of your control, and
so, your achievement made you feel good, but it was only temporary.

To me, values are the measuring sticks by which people quantify success in
life. Whether or not we realize it, we constantly measure our actions against
our values, and how we 'measure up' determines our self-worth.

Once we actually know what we value, we can either change those values (bc
they are too extrinsic), or design our life to optimally fulfill them.

~~~
jlukic
If anyone's interested in reading something along these lines from the
literature. One of my professors in college who I greatly admired has written
a tremendous amount around PPA (personal project analysis) a framework for
interpreting motivation and happiness in relation to your core life projects.

[http://www.brianrlittle.com/articles/%EF%BF%BCpersonal-
proje...](http://www.brianrlittle.com/articles/%EF%BF%BCpersonal-projects-and-
free-traits/)

I find this to be a very helpful framework for engaging in a more
scientifically rigorous discussions around happiness and life satisfaction.

------
conanbatt
Its a rant but I'm also surprised at how she writes "people's perfect life".
Whats perfect about San Francisco, that has such a low demographic
representation of family, the city is super dirty, people live with 6 figure
salaries live in terrible housing conditions.

Maybe google gets to shelter their employees from a lot of the cruft of SF,
but walk 2 blocks away from the google offices in SF and you'll get yelled at
by homeless people.

Also sad that the writer does not see a correlation between homelessness and
public policy, but blames it to income inequality due to the tech companies.
Without tech companies SF as a dump would not be masked by 6 dollar coffee.

~~~
crushcrashcrush
I also look at this as - individuals have so much wealth, along with these
companies, yet no one is doing a single fucking thing to help the homeless.

Facebook and Google could reverse their negative PR so quickly if they
actually put some money meaningfully toward the problem, not into fake tax
shelters for their founders.

~~~
jeffreyrogers
How would you solve it? I think it's a really tough problem and a significant
fraction of the homeless population has serious mental health problems. I live
in a city (Salt Lake City) that did a great job fixing its homelessness
problem... for a couple of years. Now it's worse than it has ever been. Partly
this is because more homeless people are coming to the area because they've
heard about how great the resources here are. The problem with trying to solve
homelessness is that most things that work to solve it incentivize more
homeless people to move to the area that is solving the problem. At least
that's what it seems like to me.

~~~
crushcrashcrush
It's simple.

We need more fucking housing. Period. End of story. We need condo towers. We
need townhomes. We need mid-rises.

And secondly, we need free and low cost mental health services.

That's it. Problem solved. The problem is we're 20 years behind.

~~~
rak00n
Nope, your just indentfied the problem that needs to be solved. You haven't
"solved" the problem, which is massively more complex.

------
MechanicalTwerk
People need to seriously get over themselves. The world is not fair. Life is
not fair. Neither of them ever have been and neither of them ever will be.
Every city has major problems. Every person experiences tragedy. Up and moving
to a new city is just a band-aid. You'll see that new city through rose
colored glasses at first. But after a few years those rose colored glasses
will become a lot clearer and you'll see a lot of the same problems from SF
with some new ones mixed in. Life is a struggle, not an endless search for
some perfect city or perfect life. No one owes you anything. Your coworkers
don't owe you a conversation about politics or art. The wealthy don't owe you
a pristine city. Death doesn't owe you the guarantee it won't take your loved
ones before their time. The struggle is real, and it is real for everyone. It
doesn't discriminate based on age, gender, race, wealth or any other
dimension. The people who have it the best in life are those who have accepted
this fact and dedicated themselves to working within the struggle to achieve
the most they can for the people and causes they care about in the short time
they have.

~~~
sershe
The first part contradicts the rest. World isn't fair, life isn't fair. That
means there's no universal law declaring that every city has problems or that
everyone has to struggle. Some cities (and countries) have much fewer and
smaller problems than others, and life can be much more, or much less, of a
struggle; regardless of you (in)action(s).

It is in fact exactly what it should be - a search for better life until you
are satisfied with what you have, whether you are escaping war-torn Syria and
hoping to run a barbershop in Beirut, or escaping boredom-torn SF and hoping
to run a hedge fund in NYC. Nobody owes you either, therefore you have to make
if happen all by yourself.

------
throwaway-1283
My biggest issue with SF tech scene (after having worked in it for several
years now) is that in order to be successful you really need to drink the
Koolaid, which requires extreme emotional investment in your work.

I've come to realize that I am not programmed that way at all, and it has made
it difficult for me to really be happy working in that kind of environment.

------
thedz
Did some of y'all stop reading at half of the first sentence?

The article isn't a parody, and is expressly saying that SF/Silicon Valley can
be a pretty bad place to live, specifically with regards to the author mental
health.

I'm not sure how people are getting from this piece that SF is a great place
with no problems

~~~
david927
I applaud bringing up some of the unseen issues, especially regarding mental
health, of the area.

But if you walk down a street in SF you risk stepping on a needle or human
feces. It's a catastrophe and some of the issues raised here seem to pale in
comparison.

------
erulabs
Weird flex, but okay.

But seriously, it’s hard to read “look how tough we have it” about getting a 6
figure job out of school. You didn’t get into Harvard. That’s not a life
defining tragedy... hoping this is parody. The vast vast vast majority of the
world works harder for less. We should be thankful, not weirdly bragging about
how hard our childhoods were. Try Detroit or Bangladesh....

~~~
romwell
>We should be thankful, not weirdly bragging about how hard our childhoods
were.

The kids that ended their lives aren't bragging or complaining anymore.

This author speaks on their behalf.

It is not a life-defining tragedy until it becomes a life-ending one. And
saying "you _should_ be happy" doesn't help a bit to those who are getting
tired of living.

Some people have it better, some have it worse. The kids who killed themselves
don't have it any way. The kids who are writing these posts could have been
next in line.

Mental health is a serious issue, and collectively, the successful part of the
Valley seems to be very, very broken.

A rich person with cancer is still a person with cancer. A successful kid with
depression is still a kid with depression.

So I'd ask y'all to show some empathy, as withiut empathy there is no
understanding, and without understanding, there's no fixing the problem. And
there is a problem. Something is rotten.

And have some empathy for yourself too (yes, that's you, parent commenter!).
If you grew up like this kid did, yes, you grew up in a fucked-up environment,
it probably fucked you up, and it's not right. If you feel _obligated_ to be
happy, you are broken.

What you have doesn't define who you are. And a well-paying job doesn't give
you all you need. Being poor sucks, but that's just one way life can suck.
There are many, many others. And the only way to get to a happy life is to
understand what makes you happy and thankful rather than what you feel you
_should_ be happy and thankful for.

The disconnect between the two -- well, that's a part of how those kids ended
up on the tracks.

I didn't grow up in the Valley (or anything remotely similar), but I live here
now. It's a silly place. Take care of yourself, y'all.

~~~
bduerst
You've missed what they're saying in their comment.

Mental health _is_ a serious issue, but the author isn't bringing up these
suicides to talk about how she's going to help prevent them, or even bring
attention to suicide in high schools - she's using it in a social media-esque
post about why she's out. She's done.

Goodbye Silicon Valley, you're not the utopia I expected right out of college
with my cushy job and free lunches. People around me are suffering and I'm
not, so I'm not going to help you, I'm just going to leave because of a false
trichotomy. It's not me, it's you.

If people complain about this post rubbing them the wrong way, it's not
because the people complaining are insensitive to the issues like mental
health, it's because of the narcissistic tone of _using_ these issues in a
break up letter with the place you grew up in.

~~~
romwell
I didn't take the original article the way you described it, and I don't think
there's anything wrong with the "I'm done" attitude. Nobody is obligated to
fight all the battles all the time to begin with, and beyond that, speaking
out and voting with one's feet _is_ an effective way to cause change.

To gauge effectiveness, think this way: what would happen if _everyone_ in her
position did the same thing? Most certainly the area would experience a
drastic change.

You know what's not effective? Shaming people into silence by calling them
narcissistic. Sure, you can write off her experience as whining - and how's
_that_ going to help anyone?

The kids who committed suicide were going through what the author was going
through, more or less, and committed suicide for the same reasons the author
does not feel happy in the Bay Area. I don't know what else to say except that
_what she says matters_. Listen to it.

In any case, my main take-away from the post was this: the Bay Area is not a
healthy environment even for the well-off kids to grow up in, and to live in.
The damage of the competitive rat-race is not offset by the prize of getting a
FAANG job even for those who get there.

In the end, people like her make are _representative_ of what drives the
culture here, and this culture sucks. And again: act to change, understand to
act, empathize to understand. This starts with you.

~~~
bduerst
You accused GP of taking mental health issues too lightly. I reiterated their
point of how the tone of this article rubs people the wrong way.

I'm not shaming anyone, just as the GP here isn't taking mental health issues
lightly either. Again, nobody is saying these issues are to be taken lightly,
or that anyone is _obligated_ to solve them (that's part of the false
trichotomy I talked about). Please stop accusing people and projecting these
straw men.

~~~
romwell
>You accused GP of taking mental health issues too lightly.

Excuse me, but I did not make that accusation anywhere.I asked them to exhibit
some _empathy_ , as I do you.

>Please stop accusing people and projecting these straw men.

Indeed.

>I'm not shaming anyone

You mocked and called the author _narcissistic_ for saying what she did. That
is shaming.

>(that's part of the false trichotomy I talked about).

Well, could you at least tell what the three parts that make it are?

------
seibelj
I think it's more professional not to encourage talking about politics at
work. It is unrelated to your job and is more likely to divide people than
bring everyone together, unless the author would be happy if someone said they
didn't care or disagreed with whatever issues they are passionate about.

~~~
sgarman
Obviously there is a plethora of reasons to not talk politics at work, but is
"unrelated to your job" really one of them? I can't think of a single major
startup who's success and direction are not directly influenced by the
political landscape. Perhaps your mindset is employees should just do tasks
assigned and not be interested or vested in their work and companies raison
d'etre (assuming it's more then just making $$$$). IMO that attitude is how we
get to what the author is explaining in this article.

~~~
seibelj
No, I don’t want to talk about politics. If there is a specific issue or bill
that will affect our business directly, then sure. But I don’t want to get
worked up about politics when what we need to do is succeed as a business.

------
matchbok
>The lack of diversity doesn’t stop at work — it permeates every aspect of
life. Everyone wears Patagonia and North Face, everyone has AirPods hanging
from their ears, and everyone goes to Lake Tahoe on weekends. And everyone
talks about the same things: startups, blockchain, machine learning, and
startups with blockchain and machine learning.

Superficial, much? This entire article sounds like a parody.

~~~
smacktoward
HN, where wishing you could talk to your neighbors and co-workers about
something other than blockchain makes you superficial.

~~~
crushcrashcrush
Exactly. The problem isn't the writer of this piece, it's the person you're
replying to.

pot/kettle/black/etc

~~~
CompanionCuuube
It's mind boggling that a criticism of the narrowness of a monoculture is
being called superficial.

~~~
matchbok
But, it's not monoculture. At all. You are making a judgement call with that.
An extremely wrong one at that.

~~~
CompanionCuuube
> But, it's not monoculture. At all.

Then this part from the article didn't happen.

>The lack of diversity doesn’t stop at work — it permeates every aspect of
life. Everyone wears Patagonia and North Face, everyone has AirPods hanging
from their ears, and everyone goes to Lake Tahoe on weekends. And everyone
talks about the same things: startups, blockchain, machine learning, and
startups with blockchain and machine learning.

~~~
matchbok
That's... not a monoculture. Why? Because someone's identity is not defined by
what they wear or where they travel too. It's myopic and childish to think so.

~~~
CompanionCuuube
You conveniently neglected the last part of the quote where it also describe
the narrow and unified interests as well. Are you now going to say someone's
identity isn't defined by what interests them? Now _that 's_ myopic and
childish.

~~~
matchbok
Let's be honest here and admit that that piece was probably tacked on just to
make it sound better. Try again.

~~~
CompanionCuuube
"Let's be honest and say we know better about the primary source's experience
than the primary source." Bravo.

~~~
matchbok
Yup, I will. Because the entire piece is disingenuous and self congratulatory.

------
yalogin
San Francisco definitely feels like that to me. Everyone and everything just
seem like they are part of a cult and worshipping at altar of startups. I
can't explain it.

~~~
nielsbot
It's an industry town now. I personally worry how sustainable it is to have a
city that's just "high paid white startup workers and fancy restaurants." I
think a more diverse and affordable San Francisco would benefit all its
residents.

~~~
gowld
It's interesting how Chinese and Indian people are hated for being "white"
now, not long after they were hated for being non-white.

~~~
dragonwriter
They are still hated for being not-white, regardless of the fact (if it is
one) that their not-whiteness is discounted by some other not-white people
leaving them lumped in with white people in resentment of the visible,
economically advantaged (from the perspective of other non-whites) groups.

White America is hardly free of racism targeting East and South Asians (or
Central or Southwest or any other Asians, for that matter.)

------
cabaalis
> So, I’m leaving. But I do hope to come back someday.

You've made what I think is a good choice. Don't turn it into a bad one by
just going to some different urban center. You will learn that there are hard-
working, good-natured, intelligent people all over the country living in very
diverse neighborhoods.

They understand math and engineering just as well as you do, yet they are
constantly told they are flyover hicks whose opinions don't matter, since
"talent" wants to ride on trains to work.

~~~
cknoxrun
I live and co-founded my current company in a colder northern Canadian city.
Often we get derided by larger urban centres in Canada, similar to being
labeled "flyover" country. But what I've found is that there is a sweet spot
in terms of city size (mine is about 1 million) where the community feels
small enough that people seem to legitimately care about each other, and
champion each other's successes, but the benefits of an urban lifestyle are
still available. It's a good life, filled with diversity and genuine people,
but the choice is still there to ride trains to work.

~~~
robterrell
What city is this?

~~~
131012
Most likely Edmonton, unless parent was loose with his 1M pop estimate.

------
pea
I grew up and went to school in Silicon Valley ('02 - '08), and remember one
of the most stark contrasts was the difference in sociodemographics when you
crossed from Palo Alto to EPA. Crazy difference in school quality, poverty,
etc; it was unimaginable that people could live so close to one another and
have such a different experience. I don't remember the really extreme academic
pressures in high school that OP mentioned in Mountain View/Los Altos area,
though.

After recently being back, one of the things that really hit me was what a
monoculture it seemed. Of course in the 2000s a lot of people worked in tech,
but it had a really different vibe to it now; it was never that obvious before
when you spoke to them, and peoples' parents had a wide variety of jobs. SF
seemed more like a normal city. When I spend time there now, after living in
London, it does seem really, really homogenous. This is quite possibly a huge
bias on my part as I was a teenager.

~~~
crushcrashcrush
I pitched VICE media to do a story on the 101 Exit going North that has a
split - Palo Alto and East Palo Alto. The redlining and pure racism that Palo
Alto was founded on is astounding. The bulldozing of whiskey row/gultch to
build the (hideous!) Four Seasons tower there.

Really terrible history around here.

------
president
People that enjoy living in Silicon Valley are either delusional, have never
lived anywhere else in their life, or moved here from the middle of nowhere.
The only thing this soul-less valley is good for is tech and money. If that's
not what you base your life on (most normal people with a life), then you're
not going to like it. Most people I've talked with (excluding new college
grads and people in their 1-2 year Valley honeymoon phase) don't plan on
staying here permanently.

~~~
Nasrudith
Listing the middle of nowhere as a dismissive qualifier seems ironic in
contrast with lived their their whole life. Perhaps you are taking things for
granted about it or your preferred location.

------
DoofusOfDeath
It seems to me that the author is having a fairly common experience: a sense
of disillusion as one enters early adulthood. The realization that some
expectations of adulthood are not in fact true, and doubly so in the corporate
working world. The suspicion that some of the striving done during adolescence
was in vain, or towards goals whose ultimate value is limited.

I'm actually happy for the author, because she's realized these things early
on, rather than having to look back at her 20's and 30's with a profound sense
of regret. I hope she'll find a new path with which she can have long-term
satisfaction.

------
berlinerluft
Personally I find discussing machine learning and blockchain more interesting
than discussing diversity (yet again).

Also, perhaps she could have a bigger impact in SV where few people are woke,
than in some place where everybody is woke.

~~~
DoofusOfDeath
I don't think she was focusing on the relative interesting-ness of diversity
vs. {ML, blockchain}. Rather, it was about the narrow focus on such a small
set of discussion topics.

~~~
berlinerluft
I find it difficult to believe that even in SV people have no other things to
talk about.

------
RcouF1uZ4gsC
>In my liberal arts college, conversations varied dramatically, from British
literature to public policy to moral philosophy to socioeconomic inequality.
Compare this to my product management program filled with new grads, where
even social conversations revolve around tech — whether it’s spilling the
hottest gossip on the new VP, plotting how to get “double promoted” from a
Level 3 to a Level 5 product manager in exactly 22 months, or debriefing where
the top angel investors get drinks on Thursday nights. (And yes, Silicon
Valley has an alcohol and drug problem, too). Attempts to hold discussions
about social issues are often met with bored faces and are quickly terminated.
For example, a friend in the program and I have brought up climate change on
many occasions, since it’s an issue we’re particularly passionate about. We’ve
mentioned the worsening air quality in light of the Camp Fire that devastated
more than 150,000 acres of Northern California, lamented the fact that Google
still uses plastic water bottles and straws, and encouraged others to donate
to environmental organizations during our company’s giving week. Each time, we
were met with silence.

Unless you embrace the orthodoxy on these positions, you would be a fool to
talk about them at work. Basically, these "discussions" are met with bored
faces because either 1) people agree with the position and it feels like
"preaching to the choir", or 2) people disagree with the position, but don't
want to endanger their nice job by taking a position against the orthodoxy.

Given the above, people talk about safe topics like tech, investing, and
insider gossip.

~~~
badpun
Politics became the new religion for a lot of people and they act a lot like
religious zealots - they feel very strongly about their worldview and will
defend it, and at the same time, they're not interested in other points of
view. So, just as it was never wise to discuss religion in a work environment,
now it's better to not talk politics.

~~~
eanzenberg
This is the bubble we should be talking about.

------
asdffdsa
Hi Gloria, yes this is the real world, where -- if we fixate on negativity --
everything is worse than we'd like it to be. Running away from the problems
you see is a sure way NOT to fix them, and if everyone thought the way you did
(or never grew out of that mindset) then problems would not be solved.
Unfortunately, you seemed to focus on how bad YOUR city was and criticize the
people YOU associate with and ultimately did little to reflect on anything but
YOUR experience.

Did you ever attend a city planning meeting? Did you speak and argue a point?
Did you listen to their counterarguments and amend your position? Volunteer at
a nonprofit which helps minorities become qualified for STEM jobs? Give a
homeless person food or supplies? Or even talk at length with one?

I'll be frank; this mindset is juvenile. When I find myself thinking with a
similar perspective, I do my best to rationalize the best plan to solve the
problems I'm reflecting on and commit the actions necessary to manifest it.
The world won't get better if the status quo is recognizing problems and
despairing at them; it will get better if we recognize, confront, and attempt
to solve them.

~~~
dcole2929
Your comment is basically just pure FUD and name calling. The author's entire
point is that the culture of SV is one that she does not find to be good for
her. You're not even asking what did she do to work to change it, your cherry
picking random strawman and attacking it. A city planning meeting isn't going
to change the culture of an entire area. Her giving resources to a homeless
person doesn't change the fact that the area has a homeless epidemic or the
fundamental inequalities that exist in SV as a result of high tech salaries,
and NIMBY politics inflating housing prices out of the reach of well pretty
much everyone. Volunteering at a non profit to get minorities qualified for
STEM jobs might (emphasis might) get more minorities jobs at tech companies
but again does nothing to combat the culture she describes. SV in her eyes is
a place that lacks diversity, both racially and economically as well as in
peoples lifestyles, conversations, and interests.

I don't live there. I can't comment on whether this is an accurate
representation of the area or not but certainly I can say a viable answer to
things you don't like is to leave. It's perfectly fine to try to be the change
you want to see but it's absurd to state that leaving any situation that feeds
into your depression and anxiety makes you juvenile. You wouldn't stay in a
relationship that made you feel that way. Why would you stay in a city that
made you feel that way?

~~~
asdffdsa
Interesting, you say my argument has no substance, then you immediately go on
and address all the substance within it. "She does not find to be good to
her". What was the process by which she found it not to be good? "You're not
asking what did she do". Seriously? I read her entire post; if she had
discussed her attempts to change the culture which was more than "hold
discussions about social issues" with her peers at Google who she describes as
"fake, self-serving, status-seeking" then I would have a different opinion.

Every productive suggestion I make to change the culture -- which me and some
of my friends do (rarely, we're not perfect or close to it) -- you argue
against with a resigned fatalism.

"Would you stay in a city that made you feel that way." And here's where we
differ. There's a process, a reason why something makes you feel a certain
way. And if you short-circuit personal responsibility, if you never act out or
different in the world (or in your relationship) to see whether your
nihilistic despair matches reality, that is juvenile. Maybe you don't have the
bandwidth to tackle the problem. Fine. But you still take an L for never
confronting the world, for never breaking through your inward solipsistic
perceptions.

------
kenneth
> The weather is lovely, the crime rate is low, and the schools are well
> funded.

Low crime… do we live in the same bay area?

~~~
david927
I laughed at that too. And "well-funded schools" very much depends on where
you live.

------
narrator
I did badly in high school and ok in college, and still got a six figure job
because I had natural programming talent. I had an enormous amount of fun in
High School though. There are things you can do and get away with when you are
a teenager that you will not be able to do for the rest of your life, so have
a good time! Don't break your brain with sketchy drugs though. As the movie
"The Boys and Girls Guide to Getting Down"[1] states. There are "fun" drugs
and there are "sketchy" drugs. Stay away from Sketchy drugs.

Besides, going to a good school doesn't matter if you have no talent. You'll
just burn out and get crap grades. Life at that stage is about figuring out
the nexus of what your good at, what you like, and what you can get paid for.
Trying to fit a square peg in a round hole is not a good strategy for this.

[1][https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Boys_%26_Girls_Guide_to_Ge...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Boys_%26_Girls_Guide_to_Getting_Down)

------
largehotcoffee
The author graduated from college last year.

~~~
jiveturkey
Ah, now I understand the "four year hiatus". And the lack of perspective. In
another comment I suggested she move to Sacto. I'm thinking instead she should
spend a year abroad.

------
bjohnsonsv
Somber, sobering truth. It is discouraging that young people are giving up and
leaving because of the lack of critical mass of caring people who "don't have
the time" to roll up sleeves and help make change. They're too busy pursuing
that "perfect life" to see that life is never perfect, but can be perfectly
fulfilling when helping others.

------
infinteLooping
Love how the map doesn't even show the actual "Silicon Valley". Anyways this
is also why I now prefer to live with "non-techies". It's a great way to
separate work life from home/personal life. Just hard to find roommates who
can afford to live here and are also not engineers/techies.

------
bargl
I grew up in a church. I know churches aren't perfect but man I miss that
community. OK so I actually grew up in 2 churches, Mormon and Catholic on
alternating weekends.

A friend of mine suggested (also previously Mormon) that we create a church
called, "Good without God". I love the idea because I have seen the good that
having a community can do for many (not all) and for the community.

I miss going to a place that pushed people to be "good" (air quotes because
different people and even religions define this differently). Anyway, this is
something I think we're missing from our culture right now. I'm finding it for
myself in other places right now, but it's not quite the same.

This is one of my more rambling comments, sorry about that.

------
joncrane
Meh. Extreme circumstances result in extreme behaviors. It's a story as old at
time.

~~~
jfrankamp
The start of the story is. This one has a different ending though w/ climate
change. We'll optimize our ad spend right up until the end.

------
jiveturkey
> So, I’m leaving.

Implied: in the hopes of finding a place/community where her penchant for
social and larger scale issues are top of mind.

I understand her complaint, which comes from being a well-off Upper Middle
Class person with liberal values, but frustrated by inability to move the
needle. Yes, this is Silicon Valley. But this is every liberal city. (minus
the high school pressure tho.)

I wish she would tell us where she is moving to. She should move to
Sacramento. Close enough to SV, and she can hate on all the weekend Tahoe
traffic. But where she can find a group of soulmates that care about and are
actually doing something about the social issues she cares about.

------
SamuelAdams
As someone not in the valley (Michigan resident here), do other jobs not
exist? I'm sure nurses, financial analysts, and auto mechanics love to go to
Lake Tahoe and talk about their professions.

It sounds to me like the OP doesn't like spending 100% of her time in the tech
sphere. And that's fine. Find people who are in completely unrelated fields,
and become friends with them. Spend 50% of your time at work, in the tech
world. Then leave work and spend the other 50% talking to different people
about more diverse problems.

~~~
NTDF9
Let me explain the monotone.

In Michigan, if you go knock on the door of your neighbors, what is the
probability that they work in the same industry as you?

In SV, the probability that they work in tech is very very high (99% in my
case, the 1% is an old retired engineer).

SV's monotone is a bubble of gigantic proportions. Everyone is in tech. There
are no auto-mechanics living nearby (they drive in from 1.5 hours away)

------
zackmorris
It's funny, living in Boise (Idaho), I have the opposite view of California
and especially Silicon Valley than almost everyone I've met who lived there.

They tend to complain about fakeness, or the high cost of living, or too much
government.

But to me, San Francisco has the best aura of any place I've ever been, other
than possibly Costa Rica. It's like some kind of Mecca.

It seems like part of the reason San Francisco is so hyper-competitive is that
everyone wants to live there. Which is understandable, because if it was any
cheaper, everyone WOULD live there. An acre of land where I live can be as
cheap as $10,000. The catch is that it's desert so you have to drill your own
well, which may not be available. Also the social scene is essentially
nonexistent, so you will likely be single for months, possibly years. And
you'll be surrounded by half a million people who are more influenced by
religion, football and having a large family than anything else.

I'm disappointed that the big tech companies don't get (and likely will never
get) issues like wealth inequality and how they directly diminish the quality
of life of all people who are not part of the illuminati. But I think
conflating that central problem with the symptoms of it like homelessness,
poor mental health and high taxes on low income earners is a fallacy.

------
lordnacho
I think I can see why the teenagers are so angsty.

The problem when you grow up surrounded by an elite is you really want to join
the elite. This is what everyone mentions about the bay area: there's lots of
6 figure jobs, but everything is expensive even if you have one.

And how do you get these jobs? The standard path, and that's just about all
you'll hear as a kid, is get good grades, get into a good school, do
internships, interview well and then you're on the ladder.

If you fall off the ladder, you'll know just enough friends to go green with
envy, and you won't be able to afford anything.

The thing is teenagers who are going to be part of the elite tend to be
clumped together in their affluent schools. They see disproportionately many
other success stories, and they see other kids pushing themselves as well.

All I can say is when you get a little older, your circles widen. Or they CAN
widen, it's up to you who you hang out with. Also, you tend to get a bit less
intense, nothing really bothers you as much as when you were young.

------
JohnFen
"This is Silicon Valley. Who wouldn’t want to live here?"

I wouldn't! I find Silicon Valley to be a very creepy, disturbing, and
depressing place. I don't live there (but I go there fairly regularly), and so
have no comment on the experience of people who do, but the author's
description does dovetail nicely into my own outsider's perception of the
place.

------
Lerex
People living in Silicon Valley writing shits about Silicon Valley is so
typical Silicon Valley.

------
trimbo
> So, I’m leaving. But I do hope to come back someday

I hope this person moves to, like, Tokyo or London or something super
expensive. If they move to a low cost of living area, trying to move back
later isn't a great plan.

------
bproven
"It’s where everyone wants something from you, and you never know when someone
will betray you because they want something from someone else more."

This is the part I really hated about SV and the bay area.

------
mnm1
Funny how the lack of diversity (% of people employed from each race) exactly
mirrors this graph of wealth by race in America:
[https://www.forbes.com/sites/laurashin/2015/03/26/the-
racial...](https://www.forbes.com/sites/laurashin/2015/03/26/the-racial-
wealth-gap-why-a-typical-white-household-has-16-times-the-wealth-of-a-black-
one/#3627bc671f45)

Who'd have thought?

------
rdiddly
My brief experience of Silicon Valley in the 90s was that people there didn't
give an inch or a damn. Now 25 years later I guess those people have been
raising kids.

------
cromwellian
How much of the author's early childhood stress is the result not of SV, but
of tiger mom/dad competitiveness? Kids crying over getting an A- and being
loaded up with 7 after school classes and college prep activities usually
indicates parental pressure more than peer pressure.

So some of her commentary is transferring blame to SV culture as a whole for
what is probably a result of the culture of the parents.

~~~
Apocryphon
Tiger mom parenting has become a part of SV culture, or at least many schools
in SV.

~~~
cromwellian
True but it’s much more prevalent in first generation immigrant families
especially from Asia, so there’s some selection bias.

Yes, some areas can be 30-90% this demographic makeup (eg cupertino schools)
but it is not the norm for the entire Bay Area.

~~~
Apocryphon
Right, but since the article is talking about the SV elite (both in terms of
educational and economic attainment, and one follows the other), it seems
pertinent.

------
cpr
So moving away in the hopes that SV will magically get better while you're
away?

Doesn't sound like a practical plan.

~~~
smacktoward
The only alternative is the one Mario Savio
([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mario_Savio](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mario_Savio))
famously described at Berkeley in 1964:

 _> There's a time when the operation of the machine becomes so odious, makes
you so sick at heart, that you can't take part! You can't even passively take
part! And you've got to put your bodies upon the gears and upon the wheels...
upon the levers, upon all the apparatus, and you've got to make it stop! And
you've got to indicate to the people who run it, to the people who own it,
that unless you're free, the machine will be prevented from working at all!_

The only way change happens is when people go that way instead. But putting
your body "upon the gears" is a really hard thing to do; it means a life spent
fighting mostly losing battles and foregoing most of the conventional
consolations life offers, like family and social acceptance and material
comfort.

In other words it's asking someone to be a hero, and while I wish we had more
heroes, I can't blame anyone for not leaping up to volunteer for the job.

------
gpsx
Wow. I'm shocked by the comments here. If the author reads these I am sure she
will give up all hope for the area. Of course a number of commenters didn't
actually finish the article.

------
zyncl19
The map doesn't show Silicon Valley

~~~
svachalek
It's definitely migrating north over the years. Some would argue it's centered
in SF now, which I'd disagree with, but I have to admit it's moving that way.

------
pashabitz
How the fuck is this on the third page with 110 points in 2 hours? I have a
conspiracy theory.

------
throwaway-1283
Curious for anyone living in SF/SV and thinking about moving - what are your
top choices?

~~~
Redoubts
NY/CHI/PDX

------
pulsarpietro
Thanks for writing this.

------
jiveturkey
Interesting juxtaposition of non-PC "black" and PC "latinx" in the same
sentence! Surely that says something about the author although I'm not quite
sure what.

~~~
uxp100
I think black is the "PC" term. Poc is more broad, and african-american is
seen as outdated to some. It certainly reflects different ideas of one's
identity.

~~~
jiveturkey
Black is certainly the most correct term, but african-american still
dominates. My comment is not about how one views one's own identity, which
yes, these are different reflections, it's about how others want to tread
lightly to avoid any perceived slight. IOW, PC for PC sake.

