You know, nothing bothers me more than people who aspire to live in New York shit-talking Atlanta. It’s like how you are with your best friend in college – you’ll complain about her being crazy and irresponsible to anyone who will listen, but if anyone so much as remarks on her three-week crying jag you want to break their thumbs. So it goes with me and our fair city. And the heart of the matter is that it’s ultimately like comparing apples and oranges (or BIG APPLES and PEACHES, HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA) – they’re just really different cities. The other heart (the black, empty one) of the matter is CRY ME A RIVER. MOVE BACK IF IT’S SO AWFUL HERE.
Many of my reactions upon reading the New York Sun article Miss Darrow posted yesterday were echoed in the comments on Fresh Loaf, so I don’t need to rehash what you all have already read.
The gross mischaracterization of the South – especially equating residents of a major metropolitan with an outdated hillbilly stereotype – infuriates me because it’s not only unfair but wrong. I was pissed off enough last week after reading Jeffrey Hill’s post on Southern infrastructure on Next American City because of this little gem with which he concluded:
Contrary to the belief of the news media, southerners aren’t stupid to the issues of connectivity. They love railroads and communication just as much as any American. Tell them that we’re being outrun by countries like India, China and France and watch them fire up their 56k modems and gas-guzzling F150s to find a way to catch up.
…and then yesterday I had to read about Long Island ex-pats complaining about the pizza and lack of beaches in Stone Mountain as an indication of how terrible and unlivable Atlanta is.
My friend and I were just talking yesterday about how in some ways, Atlanta (and some other “second-tier” cities) are a lot like New York was in the ’70s and ’80s – you can live really, really cheaply if you put your mind to it. For those with creative pursuits, they can come here with nothing, work part-time, and still have plenty of time for art or music or addiction or whatever as long as they don’t mind putting up with a neighborhood crackhead or seventeen. There are a lot of really cool things going on and people aren’t so desperate to jump on the Next Big Thing and hype it senseless that you can really feel a part of it all in a very intimate way. (Oh, and also the crime is terrible here and parts of the city look like Beirut.) You know, I complain a lot about the City’s failure to embrace and support the arts scene and drum up more of a creative professional community, but then after going to the Sustainable Atlanta event I’d just as well the City and its corporate darlings keep their hands off of Eyedrum.
Atlanta sucks in all kinds of ways, but many cities would love to have our problems (e.g. Philadelphia, NAC’s favorite city). And I wouldn’t be here if those cons even came remotely close to the reasons I love this city. For example, on my way to get a mediocre, overpriced Americano at my Plan B coffeeshop, I approached a herd of intowny-looking families carrying Jim Martin signs down the sidewalk, and right in the middle of the mob was Jim Martin himself casually listening to some lady in Keds talking about what colleges her kid wants to go to. It was adorable!
Then, on my way out of the coffeeshop, I had to step around an older Italian couple affectionately slow-waltzing to some unheard melody.
Previously: This is why we’re HOT
Tags: bad stereotypes, love/hate relationships, new york, new york sun
This is probably my favorite post of yours ever. As you know, the main reason I have such a hard time with Atlanta is because of its unrelenting need to be something other than it is. It has allowed (or encouraged) so much destruction of its history that you could land in almost any given spot (save for, say, the Cyclorama)and have no idea you were in THE major Southern city.
That said, I agree wholeheartedly that the stereotype of Atlantans being hillbillies is unfair and incorrect. Thing is, though, if Atlanta keeps on its current path of obliterating any connection it has to the old south then the only authentically Southern people and places will, indeed, be those stiocked with hillbillies.
I’m the only one who can hate on Atlanta. Other people better step off.
I hate the way we kill the things that make the city unique: the trees and creeks and dirt roads, the old buildings and funky businesses, the laid-back charm and easygoing attitude that comes with the heat, the porch sitting, the barbecues in the park.
I hate how the city was located — most places, you can see why they were founded there: it’s a spot of natural beauty, usually by water or other landmarks. Atlanta was going to be on the Chattahoochee, but railroad engineers decided it would be easier to lay the tracks on flat ground. Our city was located by engineers! Contrast that to this observation of Augusta, made by William Bartram during his travels:
“The village of Augusta is situated on a rich and fertile plain, on the Savanna river; the buildings are near its banks, and extend nearly two miles up to the cataracts, or falls, which are formed by the first chain of rocky hills, through which this famous river forces itself, as if impatient to repose on the extensive plain before it invades the ocean.”
The focal point of Atlanta is the interstate system, which also tore up our city neighborhoods so that they are only now recovering. If Bartram had to travel through Georgia today, one turn around I-285 and he would pull out his blunderbuss and commit an act of road rage, colonial style.
Still, I do love this city. There’s a new group of folks living here now who are fierce and creative and visionary, and I hope they will help forge some change that, for once, is positive. Atlanta, unlike New York, is still malleable — we can be a part of what it will become.