3. Neither SF nor LA are particularly more diverse than many other major metro cities. SF has a lot of Asians (SF is 53% white and 35% Asian) and LA has a lot of Hispanics...but Atlanta has a lot of Black Americans (53%) and Dallas and Houston have large populations of Blacks, Hispanics, and Whites. Miami is over 70% Hispanic. NYC may be more diverse than any of them.
> _It's just easier to be an immigrant or hyphenated-American in world class metro areas that can support a variety of ethnic and cultural clustering._
The fact that there aren't as many african-americans in the bay area (outside of a handful of locales), doesn't make the GP's point invalid.
I'm an immigrant in SF, and there are few places in the US where I would feel remotely as comfortable. Even being "white" (latin american of southern european ascent) I have a noticeable accent. That accent has triggered abuse by an elderly woman right after the past presidential elections in an ice cream shop in Hayes Valley, SF. And that is without going into the countless cases of "involuntary micro-agressions" ("oh, we don't mean you guys", "you're one of the good ones", etc.).
Outside of the bay area the landscape very quickly changes to white picket fences with two large pick up trucks and white crosses in the lawn, towns with multiple churches of different christian denominations. All of this within an hour of driving from SF. I wouldn't feel at home, and likely not be accepted as part of the community in places like this.
Because there are so many immigrants in the bay area, that gives exposure to the native-born citizenry making them less likely to treat immigrants like the feared "other", as well as immigrants treating other immigrants of different origin decently, for the most part. I think these points are what the GP was referring to. The problem of lack of systematic racism and unequal opportunities for african-americans are still a big problem in the US as a whole, and in the bay area as well, but that doesn't immediately affects the entirety of the immigrant population.
OP was talking about major metro areas and the cities I mentioned are major metros with all the pros and cons that implies.
At any rate, you should really try exploring and getting outside of the Silicon Valley bubble if you think the rest of the U.S. is just a bunch of racists ready to shout offensive things to you.
Even in rural areas in Texas and Florida, big portions of the population are Hispanic. It's not unusual at all. In many Texas honky tonks, you'll find quite a few Hispanics. Some of the top rodeo stars are Mexican and Brazilian. In fact, most of Southwestern culture, from cuisine to music to dance to fashion, is a blend of cultural elements from Mexican, German, Czech, and Pole immigrants.
So far, the place I've been shouted/told offensive things by have been in the bay area for the most part, but it might also be because I'm "white".
I realize now that when I said "outside of the bay area" I didn't make it clear that I was talking about California in particular. People from outside the US, and even some inside the US too, have this image of California that is a pastiche of cliches, where the Golden Gate bridge is next to Venice Beach and the Central Valley doesn't exist. I've travelled throughout many rural areas in the US and have been treated in a lovely way. I remember a recent trip where my wife and I stopped for a quick snack in a rural bar, where we struck a conversation with the people working there were lovely. At the same time, on the walls there were plenty of "american patriot" paraphernalia in the vein of "we say merry christmas here, and if that offends you fuck you". That makes it harder to feel welcomed.
> At the same time, on the walls there were plenty of "american patriot" paraphernalia in the vein of "we say merry christmas here, and if that offends you fuck you". That makes it harder to feel welcomed.
Why should that make you feel unwelcome?
I'm also an immigrant, and have spent a decent amount of time in rural America, and my point of view is that it's wrong to hold Americans to a different standard than you would people from whatever country you're from. My family is from Bangladesh. If there were people going around trying to remove "Eid Mubarak" from the public discourse, there would be a total shit storm. 90% of Americans celebrate Christmas--tolerance for immigrants does not mean that people don't get to publicly celebrate their own culture, their religious traditions, etc.
> _it's wrong to hold Americans to a different standard than you would people from whatever country you're from_
You have a point. The culture I grew up in has its own share of terrible things that _I didn't even notice_ until I traveled and lived in other countries. Which is why I critique much of my own culture as much as I'll critique parts of american culture.
Having lived in other countries I not only wouldn't be able to go back (because I find some pervasive things of the culture repulsive and unlikely to change any time soon), but it has also made it easier to notice the cliched patterns of hatred towards the "other", the same things that are said of mexicans in the US are said of the polish in the UK, people from some arab countries in France, the turks in The Netherlands (although they are far more "polite" about it), etc.
> _ If there were people going around trying to remove "Eid Mubarak" from the public discourse, there would be a total shit storm. 90% of Americans celebrate Christmas--tolerance for immigrants does not mean that people don't get to publicly celebrate their own culture, their religious traditions, etc._
Sure, there are plenty of sensitive subjects that can put you in the bad side of a culture, but the "Merry Christmas" crowd is the same as "Guns, God & Country" crowd which is in many occasions the "racism doesn't exist" crowd. I used that sign as an example because it's the one I remembered the most vividly, but it wasn't the _only_ sign.
> Having lived in other countries I not only wouldn't be able to go back (because I find some pervasive things of the culture repulsive and unlikely to change any time soon), but it has also made it easier to notice the cliched patterns of hatred towards the "other", the same things that are said of mexicans in the US are said of the polish in the UK, people from some arab countries in France, the turks in The Netherlands (although they are far more "polite" about it), etc.
That's an odd set of examples. The countries you named are just about the least racist places on the planet. I'm sure you can hear some racist things about Bangladeshis/Pakistanis in the U.K., but nothing compared to what you'd hear about various groups in Bangladesh or Pakistan! (I’ve lived in the US 30 years, and almost all the racism I’ve ever witnessed was when other Asian people would be like “oh it’s just us Asians here, let me tell you how I really feel about [people].”)
> Sure, there are plenty of sensitive subjects that can put you in the bad side of a culture, but the "Merry Christmas" crowd is the same as "Guns, God & Country" crowd which is in many occasions the "racism doesn't exist" crowd. I used that sign as an example because it's the one I remembered the most vividly, but it wasn't the _only_ sign.
Even the "guns, god & country" crowd in the U.S. is far more welcoming and tolerant than most people in the rest of the world. In the U.S., we fight over whether English should be the official language. In France, few people question French as the official language. (And can you even imagine suggesting in France that kids should learn Arabic in schools to accommodate immigrants? But that's very common in the U.S. with Spanish.) And the French are incredibly tolerant compared to Bangladeshis. Even among the "gods, guns & country" crowd I'm more welcomed (as a brown guy with a beard) than a white American would ever be welcomed into Bangladeshi society.
Agree, despite what many people say (and the fact that it could always be better), the US and the west are some of the most welcoming and friendly places in the world
>I’ve lived in the US 30 years, and almost all the racism I’ve ever witnessed was when other Asian people would be like “oh it’s just us Asians here, let me tell you how I really feel about [people].”
Your personal experience just doesn't square up with mine.
I lived in the US for 15 years and definitely got racist comments hurled at me. More so than my time in India and Sri Lanka.
Having said that, I do agree that in general, American's are fairly welcoming and tolerant. But people in South Asia are as well!
> than a white American would ever be welcomed into Bangladeshi society.
Never been there, but I do know that white Americans would be well received in many of the South Asian cities I've lived in/visited. They may not be treated the same way a local would but they would be accommodated and welcomed.
> but it has also made it easier to notice the cliched patterns of hatred towards the "other"
Perhaps it isn't "hatred towards the other" but rather love for their own citizens who share a similar cultural background, upbringing, and values...especially when "the other" comes off as ungrateful and in some cases even complains that the host country isn't doing more to make them feel more at home in a place that isn't their home...
> Sure, there are plenty of sensitive subjects that can put you in the bad side of a culture, but the "Merry Christmas" crowd is the same as "Guns, God & Country" crowd which is in many occasions the "racism doesn't exist" crowd
> Perhaps it isn't "hatred towards the other" but rather love for their own citizens who share a similar cultural background, upbringing, and values.
I make a distinction between patriotism and nationalism, which gets conflated quite often. Criticizing something is something only done when wanting the target of criticism to be better.
> especially when "the other" comes off as ungrateful and in some cases even complains that the host country isn't doing more to make them feel more at home in a place that isn't their home...
What is the appropriate level of gratefulness to be accepted? What's the threshold to be considered part of the "host" society? When can I consider the place I chosen to live in and have my friends in "home"?
> This is a very biased view.
As stated, it is biased, stereotypical and cliched. There is a group of people that inhabit the center of that Venn diagram, the size of which I do not know.
I think the social fabric of the US is more complex than you're making it out to be. I'm an atheist with liberal Californian views on most social issues, but I also happen to be pro gun rights and grew up celebrating Christmas. It really pisses me off when overly PC weasels complain about how wishing people a Merry Christmas is non inclusive, so I think that sign is great. Point is most people don't fit the stereotypes that well once you dig a little bit and it's best not to assume malice in the absence of very strong evidence.
I think it’s important to put the “war on Christmas” in context. We are at the tail end of a long period of removing religion from the public sphere, something that has happened more aggressively in the US than in the rest of the world. (Many European countries, after all, still have state-supported churches!) One segment of society has decided that freedom of religion and an inclusive society means freedom from religion, and has been very successful pushing that view in courts. Thus, removal of nativity scenes from public grounds, restrictions on school sponsorship of religious activities, restrictions of state funding of religious-affiliated groups, etc. So when people are mad about “happy holidays” they’re reacting to all of that.
And “happy holidays” is a passive aggressive thing to say. 90% of Americans celebrate Christmas. When people say happy holidays, they mean merry Christmas. “Happy holidays” is a form of erasure—a refusal to acknowledge Christianity without also acknowledging other religions in the same breath.
> When people say happy holidays, they mean merry Christmas. “Happy holidays” is a form of erasure—a refusal to acknowledge Christianity without also acknowledging other religions in the same breath.
This is a bit much. I say “happy holidays” out of respect for the fact that a lot of people I know aren’t Christian, but still enjoy that time of year for whatever reason they choose, be it other religious reasons, nostalgia for family traditions they don’t believe in religiously, or just plain consumerism being fun.
>We are at the tail end of a long period of removing religion from the public sphere, something that has happened more aggressively in the US than in the rest of the world. (Many European countries, after all, still have state-supported churches!)
That's technically true, but it's misleading. Religion is much more important in public life in the US than in most of Europe. For example, this kind of thing wouldn't happen in most European countries: https://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/08/16/tonights-obam...
I say this as someone who doesn't believe that what most people describe as separation of church and state is required by the constitution btw.
>And “happy holidays” is a passive aggressive thing to say. 90% of Americans celebrate Christmas. When people say happy holidays, they mean merry Christmas. “Happy holidays” is a form of erasure—a refusal to acknowledge Christianity without also acknowledging other religions in the same breath.
Happy Holidays has existed since at least the middle of the 19th century, and has been popular since the 30s--long before people cared about recognizing other religions. Trump even said it publicly fairly often over the years.
The family members I know who have a problem with the "War on Christmas" literally think that globalists are trying to force people to stop celebrating Christmas because that's what their media tells them.
Huh? Bing Crosby sang "Happy Holidays". It's a perfectly, entirely banal thing to say. I'm mystified by the emotional valence conservatives have given it --- and by the notional (and I think fictitious) concern that conservatives have that "Merry Christmas" is unsafe to say, as if every random shop you walked into in Chicago in December wouldn't greet you that way.
One thing I have thinking about recently is that there is a class of hostile behaviors which only seem to manifest online.
This is the stuff that people usually don't have the balls to say in the real world -- only when they're shielded by a computer screen.
For instance last night a friend of mine posted a photo on Facebook of the two of us being out for a drink.
A woman who I have worked with in the past immediately messaged me on Facebook and told me I looked fat in the photo. (I didn't, and I'm not.)
Wtf? I'm sure she never would have had the guts to say that in person.
I think a lot of the worst preachy PC behavior policing, like telling people it's insensitive to wish people a Merry Christmas, happens mostly online or in echo chambers. The majority of people live out their lives being reasonably restrained and trying to get along with other people, then on the Internet they turn into a dick.
Which is one reason why it can seem hostile to some people when the reaction to online anti-Christmas dickery makes it's way onto the walls of a real life restaurant.
They've never experienced said online dickery themselves, so they don't understand the context. If they happen to be the kind of person who says happy holidays, it can feel like an attack on them instead of a response to someone else.
Similarly if you walk into a restaurant and the owner has posters on the wall that all say things like "You'll never make me eat meat.", it might come across as a little hostile to you as a carnivore. Despite the fact that it's a reaction against some online troll, not you.
Also I'm absolutely certain that the reaction against the "War on Christmas" is 10,000 times larger than the actual "War on Christmas."
I had a relative tell me how nice it was to finally be able to say Merry Christmas again the Christmas after Trump was elected. Seriously? Who was stopping you? Obama said it every single year in an official White House Christmas greeting video.
> I think a lot of the worst preachy PC behavior policing, like telling people it's insensitive to wish people a Merry Christmas, happens mostly online or in echo chambers.
For what is worth, the only places I've seen this entire "merry christmas" thing being a problem has been as a backlash against corporations trying to look more inclusive by saying happy holidays in a period where there are multiple holidays being celebrated by multiple religions, but might just be my own filter bubble.
A lot of the war of Christmas is actually fake news made up by very socially conservative bad actors or newspapers trying to sell papers - the Daily Mail is one UK example
Ironically some of the Ultra hard-line puritan sects that colonised America where violently against Christmas
You gotta understand that "American paraphernalia" and patriotism are part of THEIR culture. And it's important to them. It's part of their identity as much as cultural elements of your hometown are part of yours.
Ceteris paribus, less open cultures will be less able to create entrepreneurial environments, especially cosmopolitan ones.
Patriotism and cosmopolitanism can be good friends.
Nationalism and cosmopolitanism, not so much.
The "American paraphernalia" as described seems to have a high level of nationalism versus patriotism, which is very uncomfortable for outsiders.
My current definitions of patriotism and nationalism:
Patriotism -- love of country that most benevolent outsiders could approve of and admire.
Nationalism -- love of country (or tribe, "nation") that most benevolent outsiders would disapprove of and could not admire.
They need improvement, but the examples we're discussing seem to uphold these definitions.
They also fit with Macron's claim that nationalism is a betrayal of patriotism. For example, using the flag to divide instead of unite. Or using love of country to pick fights, start wars and bring destruction upon all involved.
"We say Christmas here and if you don't like it, fuck you" is clearly not a patriotic statement. It debases itself, its speakers and its object. It picks a fight and intends to create division, but it has damaged itself from the start by morally degrading itself. That's nationalism, tribalism, chauvinism. It betrays patriotism because it debases the spirit of the country which it claims to love.
A widespread "pay it forward" attitude will be exceedingly difficult in such a society, it seems.
Bending over backwards to make big displays that everyone should "feel welcomed" is just the culture of the city you're used to. And lets be honest, it's all for show. That doesn't slow down any of the social interactions which make it obvious when someone is unwelcome.
Yes and no. There is a stark difference between Texas and California (I've lived in both states).
Here's a recent story shared by a friend who moved from CA to TX: He took his son (who are Indians) and another bunch of kids, two were Indians and the rest white to a water park in Austin. One of the Indian kids cut the line and moved to the front of the line where my friend was. He asked him why did he do that and he should not cut the line; the Indian kid responded "We are Indians and we need to stick together". This is in the so called liberal oasis of Austin.
I doubt if this frequent in the Bay area; sure you can point to PC culture and all that but this story is a sobering reminder of how segregated Texas espcially when you have kids acting like this.
No offense, but the perception of the US outside of the "diversity bastions" like SF, NYC, LA, etc. has jumped the shark. People now assume that racism and hatred is rampant outside these areas, and it isn't remotely the case. Its actually quite sad and offensive (to say nothing of ironic) that such a large swath of people are at this point all but presumed to be racist until proven otherwise.
To be fair to you, the perception seems to be widespread among residents of the aforementioned mega-cities, as well as non-Americans, and is fueled by the popular media. But I would encourage you to view the idea that these parts of America are backwards and largely bigoted with the same amount of skepticism you would to anyone making sweeping claims about the supposed deficiencies of a group of "others".
I never claimed that a large swath of people are racist and live in backwater, but I seem to have implied it by using a few apparently cliched critiques that carry connotations beyond what I intended. The thesis of my original comment is "foreigners are more likely to feel at home where other foreigners live" in the US, and posited some of the possible reasons. SF
and other cities where the immigrant community is very visible aren't prejudice free, but you're less likely to be prejudiced against for being foreign, and even then it does happen. Also, there doesn't need to be a majority or even a plurality of people with racist views in an area for people that are the target of those prejudiced views to feel unwelcome. I was divorcing this from the larger discussion that the US has around diversity.
You're comparing SF to rural America. They're of course quite different.
But OP is asking about other major cities like Atlanta, Boston, Chicago etc. If you think those are anti immigrant racist homophobic etc hellholes, you might be stereotyping quite a bit yourself :)
Nowhere in my comment am I implying that Atlanta, Boston or Chicago or any other big metro areas are racist homophobic hellholes. I'm trying to lay the argument for why a place with a big immigrant population might be easier for other immigrants to feel as they belong. And the vignette about the Ice Cream shop was meant to show that even in blue, blue California, in liberal San Francisco, in trendy Hayes Valley, you can still be made to feel you're somehow "bad" through no fault of your own.
Edit: I realize now that I didn't specify when I said "outside the bay area" I meant California, as in "rural america is very close geographically to metropolitan america".
If you think Chicago doesn't have clear and well known racial conflict you've never driven across the city. SF and California is certainly not perfect but it tries to be better.
I don't know if "trying" has anything to do with it. It's much easier to be a harmonious multi-racial society when it's just rich white people and rich asian people.
Not problems that San Francisco isn't also having. People like to prop up SF as an example of inclusiveness, as if it isn't the pinnacle of gentrification. Things may feel inclusive if you are white/asian and working in tech. Ask a black or hispanic person if they feel like SF is a land of opportunity or inclusiveness.
And the rest of California is just as bad. LA somehow has a reputation for inclusiveness despite being home to some of the most serious racial conflicts and explosions of racial violence in the last century.
That California is somehow radically more inclusive than the rest of the country is a myth, but one they are exploiting very well.
Interesting perspective. I've often been tempted to work in the US, but one factor that always deterred me was the treatment of African Americans. I've generally had a very good time as a business traveller. I'm half-white and from a privileged background, so it's never been a question of access or belonging -- I've found the tech industry very welcoming. It's more one of personal safety and general disgust at how the US has never really tackled the legacy of slavery. I also find the US bone-deep assumption that "we're the best" extremely irritating -- kind of epitomized by the opening portions of this article only considering US locations.
I understand where you're coming from, but I do not intend to imply that the US or the bay area in particular are not a nice place to live. If anything, I'd find it hard to adapt to most other places, having had some of my prior personal positions jolted by points of view that I hadn't ever considered. Most people are I interact with are lovely and open minded. The scars of institutional racism are very noticeable and are uncomfortable to me, and it makes it hard to comment on some subjects when presenting a perspective that to you might look obvious (due to having seen alternatives) that go counter to the general accepted "narrative". Living in the US has been very rewarding and a good experience overall, to the point where I'd say it's the place I'd like to stay in, but no place is without trade-offs.
FYI, in SF there are also multiple churches of different christian denominations. Most of them will welcome you, doing their best to make you feel at home and accepted as part of the community. It works best if you don't treat them like the feared "other".
I did not intend to needlessly bash on religion in general, but seeing (what felt to me like) a dozen churches in a town of <500 inhabitants was very surprising.
There's more to diversity than skin color. Immigrants from other countries look for people who can speak their own language, eat the same food, worship the same gods etc, and given that the bulk of SF's immigrants (in the tech industry) come from across the Pacific, these communities are much larger in SF (33% Asian) than Atlanta (3%).
"Diversity" in this context is a politically-correct way of saying there is a large community of well-educated Indian immigrants on H1-B Visas living in Silicon Valley and working in the tech industry. Not San Francisco as much, but the South Bay (Santa Clara, Cupertino, San Jose, Sunnyvale, etc.).
Or maybe they meant the large established-long-before-tech Asian communities in Sunset & Chinatown, the Latino/African American communities in Mission-Bayview, the Eastern Europeans in Richmond, or the Italians on Russian hill, the Russians sprinkled around Goddard, or the Vietnamese community in San Jose or .... I could go on and on.
If all you do is focus on tech its really easy to miss the massive immigrant enclaves that have formed in the Bay Area and won't be driven out so easily.
Of course the Bay Area is actually diverse. But I’m skeptical that tech companies actually care about these communities. They care about close proximity to a large population of engineers.
I share your skepticism but take it a step further: can corporations actually care about something other than money? I don't think it even makes sense to anthropomorphize organizations that are governed by profit-before-all shareholders with limited liability and directors with a fiduciary duty to maximize returns.
At the end of the day, the workers the tech companies are competing for do care and that's what matters.
I think it is more about the attitudes than the numbers - there is a neophillia and xenophilia that is pro-diversity.
They don't seem to particularly care about the resulting demographics and occasionally get caught with insensitive assumptions like algorithms that fail to detect dark skinned people due to bad assumptions about how light reflects but they don't like the close-mindedness of xenophobes and homophobes.
Of those cities I've only spent time in the Bay Area and NYC, but NYC feels much more diverse than the Bay Area. The Bay Area has people of every race and ethnicity, but it feels very segregated both geographically and economically. People don't interact across ethnic lines as much (with a few prominent exceptions). In NYC, it doesn't feel like race/ethnicity and socioeconomic status are so tightly correlated.
> There's more to diversity than skin color. Immigrants from other countries look for people who can speak their own language, eat the same food, worship the same gods etc, and given that the bulk of SF's immigrants (in the tech industry) come from across the Pacific, these communities are much larger in SF (33% Asian) than Atlanta (3%).
That's always been my impression of the US. Cultures seem ridiculously segregated - voluntarily. And that applies to hobbies and interests as much as it applies to race and politics.
It's not that people don't mix, it's more that they define their identities by multiple tribal affiliations. And "tribal" doesn't just mean race, it means anything from Mac vs PC vs Linux, to frat houses, to financial traders, to progressive academics, to LARPers, to indie musicians, to YC applicants.
Plus the usual political camps.
There's a patchwork of scenes and monocultures which don't seem to have much to do with each other - which is a different and less permeable dynamic to just being interested in something, or working in some field.
Add language and religion to the list of tribal affiliations and replace racial segregation with ethnic segregation, and you have the way the US sees the rest of the West.
It seems like we're all playing the same game, just with different pieces.
Wrong diversity. All of these places are industry towns. SF is tech, LA movies, Miami tourism and trade, Texas energy and chemicals, NYC Wall St and media.
You wouldn’t start the next big startup in Houston, because who will leave a fat gig at the oil company? NYC is a little different because it’s historically more diverse from a business POV. SF is different because tech spans industries.
regarding #3 -- I kind of despise the Valley in this regard. When you are a tech firm not in the valley, inevitably you get a middle-manager type that comes in and tries to emulate what the latest hip SV firm is doing to boost your street cred. When I look around the offices I have worked at in the South, and up in D.C. in the 00's and early 2010's, we have never had a diversity "problem". There was plenty of diversity, not just male/female diversity, but also multicultural diversity, and diversity of thought and opinion(I've actually worked with some conservatives! They are real!). SV to me pushes their "we have a white male broculture" projections out, so suddenly now it's everyone's problem. Now we have to be explicit with our "diversity" initiatives, despite the fact that we were already much more "diverse" than the SV intellectual and social monoculture you have now.
Anyways, just kind of ranting, but yeah. SV's problems in tech somehow always branch out to be everyone else's problems that are in tech, at least media and high profile twitter accounts and bloggers would have you think that, but it isn't really so.
SV doesn't have a "white male" broculture problem imo. Asians are overrepresented as are Jews, compared to their makeup of the general population, both of which don't identify as white.
SV culturally has a "white male" broculture problem. When people think of tech startups, that is the image they think of.
On a different note, there are two major reasons why you might consider Asians and Jews overrepresented in SV. Jews have historically had major populations in NY, California, Florida and Massachusetts and Chicago[1]. Similarly, Asians have historically clustered in California, NY, Seattle. Asian populations have historically been much more spread out across the US, but some of the largest populations are in California, NY and Boston[2]. Additionally, Asians and Jews have high proportions of individuals working in STEM fields (doctors, engineers, etc) because if you're being discriminated against, in math/science you are either right or you are wrong whereas if you choose a liberal art field like english, there's much more room for teachers/professors to discriminate intentionally or not.
I'd be willing to bet there are more undocumented immigrants than are a part of that breakdown. Also "asian" encompasses half the world unless they are using the classification in a different way... that's pretty diverse.
