#91 San Francisco
March 23, 2008 by clander
San Francisco is one of the top US destinations for white people in terms of both travel and living. It is universally agreeable and is a safe discussion topic for any situation.
The city is considered one of the world’s premiere locations for white person research.
White people like to vacation in San Francisco because it has beautiful architecture, fantastic food, and it is near the water. They like to live in San Francisco because of its abundance of Non Profit Organizations, Expensive Sandwiches, Wine, political outlook, and most importantly its diversity.
Since many white people either live in, plan to move to, or closely identify with San Francisco it is imperative that you know how best to deal with them.
The City of San Francisco has a very multicultural population that ranges from white to gay to Asian. Within white culture this known as “ideal diversity” for its provision of exotic restaurants while simultaneously preserving property values. The presence of gays and Asians is imperative as it two provides two of the key resources most necessary for white success and happiness.
However, it is important to be aware of the fact that regions outside of San Francisco feature many people who are not white, gay or Asian. They are greatly appreciated during the census, but white people are generally very happy that they stay in places like Oakland and Richmond. This enables white people to feel good about living near people of diverse backgrounds without having to directly deal with troublesome issues like income gaps or schooling.
Still, the presence of other minorities are welcomed by white people for so many more reasons than just statistics! Much in the way that white people in Brooklyn feel a strong and unfounded connection with The Notorious BIG, white people in San Francisco feel the need to identify with rappers from the East Bay. Interestingly enough, the further they venture from San Francisco, the stronger their need to represent their region.
“Oh man, I went to the Too Short show last night. So hyphy man, so hyphy. You should come by some time and we’ll ghost ride the Prius.”
When you are presented with statements like this, the best response is to say “Berkeley is close to Oakland,” and the white person will likely nod and throw up some sort of west side hand sign.
Though it is exceptionally easy to put someone from San Francisco in a good mood, there are some caveats. When talking to a white person who lives in San Francisco, it is best not to bring up New York City. Though they live in a world class city, San Franciscans have a crippling inferiority complex about New York and even hinting at that will make them very sad or very defensive.
Fortunately, there is a fool-proof method for quickly returning the conversation to a positive, trust-building tone. No matter how much you have offended someone from San Francisco, you can always make them feel better by asking them how they feel about Southern California. They will instantly talk of how it is filled with crime, pollution, hegemonic culture, and the wrong kind of white people: “I swear California is like two separate countries, and I am so thankful that I live in the cultural center of the West Coast.” This will allow them to reassert their superiority and leave the conversation with a positive feeling about themselves and about you.
Castro Photo by bkusler who has done an excellent photo essay on Stuff White People Like. Dancing Photo by amynugget.
Volvos are also acceptable for ghost riding.
Yeah man, San Fran is a trip. You should do a post on the DMB or Charlottesville, VA, which is almost completely populated by “White People”
Fuck charlottesville. this is stuffsmalltownassholeslike.com
http://www.tucc.org
I couldn’t find any where else to post this but in this thread.
Burning Man?!?!?! It has to be one of the most obnoxious thing that white people constantly obsess over year round. They use it as a way to have a one up on say, someone who has not gone or has not gone as many times. They spend all year figuring out new ways to bring attention to themselves by wearing some silly outfit or some stupid art installation…just for bragging rights. Tons of SF people go to BM, so I posted it here.
Please include it on your list.
Thanks!!
I have nothing witty to say about that, so therefore I must bring up an irrelevant tangent, just to bring attention to my own neuroses!
I might look like a tangent, but I’m just a tourist that knows how to live on $5 a day. I still always carries $200 in my wallet just in case when the police are out rounding up tangents.
But that’s besides my point. I just wanted to ask somebody if a Jew is considered white here in Frisco? I don’t hardly see a Jew where I come from, much less know any as a friends.
Forgot tosay I mean I could probly make friend with a Jew, but since I dont right yet then I cannot ask one if their white or not.
Sorry for the double post.
This is really funny I’m really enjoying myself even with a triple post. I guess you can go ahead and enjoy a lot more self indulgence when you are here in Frisco, and white. LOL! OH that felt good, but don’t ask me what it was!
One more thing though if anyone has any questions about black people I can probably help you because I have a mess of black friends back home LOL
White people from San Fran never say “Frisco”. We can always spot the out of towners.
Then again you may just be spotting the people from the area who like tweaking the nose of all the white people who get all haughty about being from “The City.”
Oakland should be called the City and SF called West Bay
We also NEVER say San Fran.
White people don’t like Calling It Frisco, but we’re changing that. Callitfrisco dot com!
Every time I hear Frisco I think of the city in Texas. :[
it be b callin called the like sick frazzle or the ese effe or the you dont! thats the slang
You are wrong.
It’s fun to say Frisco when you move away from it, though.
isn’t judaism a religion (not race)
Judaism is a race and a religion. You can convert to Judaism, but there is a long cultural heritage that is attributed to the Jewish ethnicity. You can be of Jewish descent, but not practice Judaism. The Jewish ethnicity is considered a middle eastern race, (I think, not 100% though) and a more interesting question is are Jews white? They may have white skin, or may not, but are they part of white culture? Is there even a white culture? Or is it jsut an amalgamation of other cultures that white people have conquered, forced to assimilate or extinguished entirely?
White people do in fact have a culture. One you can thank for the things like the Magna Carter, the Constitution, Democracy, Communism, Socialism, impressionism, harnessed nuclear fission, flight, gothic architecture, classical music, country music, The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, Elvis, American Idol (sadly), Dry humor, Superman, MTV, Fiddle/Violin, Bag pipes, champagne, the sandwich, mashed potatoes. As with all cultures, there are pros and cons of equal magnitude. Don’t be mad that historically Europeans where better at government…
Wow…so many people on this site display not just the reason why both white people and America are viewed so dismally at times. First of, it is the “Magna Carta”…lets repeat that…Magna Carta. I wonder how many people on here even know what that piece of parchment actually describes.
Also, lets get our semantics and grammar correct as well (I mean, if you’re white, isn’t that the point anyways, aren’t you supposed to prove your superiority to the “uneducated, inarticulate minorities”). Yes, Europeans “were” better at “creating government” or “governing” - government is not a verb. (One could argue that Europeans still ARE better at governing; however, that is an entirely separate topic.)
Then we agree on the list, excellent. I’ll get my bi-lingual secretary to proof my posts next time.
Why can’t government be a verb?
I will government you if you continue the behavior. or When I government I fell amazing, like a fresh nicely smelling breeze!
that is really all I have.
Magna Carter? Is she related to Jimmy?
Judism is not a race, never have and never will be. Just because the Jews wish it was a race, it is not. Check the REAL facts, not a wiki. Just because they have one of the highest incidents of Autism, and other diseases specific to them, it is still not a race. I have never seen it listed as a race on any of the food stamp applications, job application, or hand gun application. (damn thats a dangerous combination of forms to fill out).
Get real, next you gonna want special treatment at the Special Olympics. Two finger booger dig competition.
i’m a jew. if jews are middle eastern and non-white, then i guess i’m not white, and therefore all jews are non-white. but — who says all jews are middle eastern or that all middle eastern people are non-white?
Only if you have blue eyes and look the Jesus pictures we have hanging in our white living rooms, will you be able to qualify as “white”. Otherwise, you probably look like Judas or Barrabas and are therefore black. White people really like pointing out racial tension issues in the Bible.
Yes, a jew is considered white provided he is from a etnic group that would be consodered white: Russian/German/Spanish etc. However, of he was a black Moroccan jew then he would be black.
Jews are a “nationality”. Look it up and ruminate.
“They use it as a way to have a one up on say, someone who has not gone or has not gone as many times.”
I disagree with this part of your assessment. Like evangelical Christians, “burners” (as they are commonly known) do not try and one-up “non-burners” so much as they are attempting to evangelize the event to anyone who has not attended.
Bragging rights are usually centered around the number of, and earliest, Burning Man attended, not around costumes, art installations, “mutant vehicles” (an art car meeting the event’s strict safety and artistic requirements) or theme camp.
Burners typically consider the “last good Burn” to be the year they first attended. Within the hierarchy of burners’ sense of superiority, the earliest year of attendance seems to trump the total number of events attended. So a burner who first attended the event in 1994 tends to think themselves superior to someone who has attended continuously since 2000.
It is important to note that this type of one-upsmanship is usually reserved only for discussions between burners. Discussing how the quality of the event has declined over years could discourage the non-burner from attending.
The moment a first time attendee arrives, it becomes perfectly acceptable to inform them of how much the event has declined from years prior. This criticism will often be directed at a particular costume, theme camp, art installation, mutant vehicle, sexual experience or drug the first time burner is experiencing at that moment without regard for the effect it will have on their enjoyment of the experience.
WTF is a burner..this must be a west coast thing…
As I described at the start, “burner” is the term Burning Man attendees use to describe themselves.
The term ‘burner’ also applies to individuals who participate in regional burns (events that are more like the original burning man - smaller, more intimate, more community-centered). Regional burns give the feel of community, sparticipation and radical self-reliance that burning man embodied, without so many frat boy gawkers that ravage the original event. Texas held the first regional burn, Burning Flipside.
that’s awesome… you should write the entry FOR burning man. because it should definitely be on here.
bummer. i love burning man, live in oakland, have installed art out at the festival, and love to dress up in costumes. obsess all year long? no. like getting away from my cell phone with all my friends for a week of doing almost nothing productive? yes. don’t hate the player, man
You don’t even have to leave town or bother to go to Burning Man to wear a silly outfit or do a stupid art installation. Keep it local!
yeah. skip the burn. its way over crowded.
totally sucks anyway. just a bunch of old naked hippies running around worshipping satan.
Haha!
The green, blue, red, yellow and orange people that I usually see at burning man also think that there are too many white people… oh well what can you do…?
Just a note I’m mixed and at burning man color really doesn’t matter.
Good idea… seems like everybody I know, (which is mostly white people) has either gone to Burning Man and won’t shut up about how transcendent an experience it is or is planning on going “this year”.
__________
White people love: http://whatiwatchedlastnight.blogspot.com
This whole list is racist and wrong. First of all most of the stuff on here wouldn’t be liked by most right-wing, conservative whites living in the Bible Belt of this country. Second of all, most of these things are liked by middle-class people all over the world. In fact, the middle-class is the only universal class on the planet. And again, were talking about a liberal middle-class here.
Yeah, but there are already a half a million outlets to make fun of the Bible Belt crowd.
The fact that people like you are evidently unable to laugh at themselves once in a while is proof enough for me that this website has some redeeming value.
roberto,
it is people like you that give me migraines.
He’s right though, for the most part—it’s not “white” people, it’s upper-middle class American liberals with general ethnically Anglo and religiously Protestant (though usually secularized) backgrounds.
aka White People.
Actually, this definitely more upper class and very much American. If you go to other parts of the world you will see it is hard to find people who are so ridiculous.
I agree
Very true
Yah, Americans are so funny people
I love this website
Gays and Asians are great minorities for white people because they don’t threaten them.
very true, white men feel inferior to black men because they’re bigger and they feel inferior to hispanic men because they can
dance
are you on crack? white men don’t feel inferior to Black or Hispanic men. we employ them…. of course, I would like a set of 22’s, but my whiteness won’t let me, plus the ridicule from my fellow whiteys would be too much.
Ah….Racism……it always rears its ugly head.
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while some white men do have comfort issues around men of the “darker” - if you will - races (indeed, racial comfort is not something commonly found anywhere in the US where there is also diversity, though its scores better than it was), i dont think it’s so much that they “feel inferior to” these men as much as they are “scared” of them.
The truth hurts. Anger scares people, especially when that anger is felt to be directed at the self; whether or not it is truly directed at one’s self at that point is immaterial really, since the emotion is felt and the fright awakened. And that history of anger is a long one. An interesting example of white anger stemming from fear: the vast majority of black men who were lynched or killed in a similar fashion in the US had violent injury done to his genitals; castration, mutilation, what have you. Strange fruit indeed.
Maybe these old white bastards feared the black men would steal their white women. Maybe they envied them for some other power, imagined or not. But the psychological implications of such acts are very clear. They wanted to attack the very center of the black man’s power, and rip it from him. And they did it, for hundreds of years.
How much damage done to the American black community.
How much anger created in that community psyche, by these unspeakable acts? No wonder people are pissed!
And then things changed. We have some measure of equality.
And NOW, we wonder why some white men fear when walking through a predominately black neighborhood? (Ironic, of course, since 50, 100 years ago it would have been the black man who feared in the same situation). Pent up anger. Fear. On both sides now. Fear of retribution taken for acts they and their ancestors never committed, but that they still feel guilty for? Anger for being blamed for it? Fear of a race which has systematically enslaved and disempowered you for 400+ years? Anger about that? Doesn’t make for the most comfortable situation.
But it doesn’t mean that the plan has all gone wrong. It’s not terrible to be afraid, feel threatened in a given situation; it doesn’t make you a horrible racist. Its not wrong to feel anger towards someone whose people have fucked your people up for centuries while you built this country. this unchartered path through the morass that is race in America – I believe it IS going in the right direction. These are our growing pains. And its understandable. BUT.
We desperately, as a country, as a people, need to
a) recognize this anger and fear for what it is, and
b) learn to grow through and past it
what obama said in his already famous speech, so heartbreakingly eloquently, is true. There is still significant racial-injustice based anger in this country, in our culture. And it’s real. Really real.
but there’s this
“For the men and women of Reverend Wright’s generation, the memories of humiliation and doubt and fear have not gone away; nor has the anger and the bitterness of those years… the anger is real; it is powerful; and to simply wish it away, to condemn it without understanding its roots, only serves to widen the chasm of misunderstanding that exists between the races.” – Obama, 3/18/08
we cannot just wash it away. its here and we have to engage, scary as it is… for everyone.
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Ain’t got no time to read this post. Can one a y’all summarize it please?
lya. I bet you wear ugg boot and sweat pants with big glasses. nothing quite like a preachy white girls opinion on male racism, oh and thanks for the obama quote, you are so “down”
Lya,
I really liked your comment. I think that Corey’s comment was unnecessarily snarky. I’m Black, and I respect anyone who at least tries to understand both sides of the coin.
Something people don’t often consider is that, despite our countries civil rights movements and laws, racial inequality is still rampant. Most notably in the economic and legal structures of America. Statistically, the majority of people imprisoned are black and hispanic males. Racial profiling is something they teach you in the police academy. Blacks and hispanics do not have the same opportunities, despite the whole “you-can-acheive-anything-you-put-your-mind-to-american-dream” bullshit. I know that I am lucky to live a lower-middle class lifestyle, and that it is most likely attributed to the fact I am white. The truth is, America is a country built upon the ideals of bourgoise white males. Women are still a power minority, blacks are still a minority, hispanics are still a minority, etc. Change is slowly occuring, but it is taking a long time and it will definitely be a while before true egalitarianism is reached.
the more you talk about something the worse you make it. i red heads are the real minority, lets talk about that. we make up 2% of the WORLDS population. i just want everyone to shut up.
Hispanic men can dance?
I was thinking the same thing.
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Not true. Kids growing up in San Francisco have to watch out for Asian gangs.
I’m not afraid of Asians in San Francisco, except when they’re driving.
Bullshit. Speaking as a British person who has spent a lot of time in the US, another thing the particular brand of white people discussed here LOVE is dissing America in a way that is almost as parochial and small-minded as the unquestioning self-adoration of Bible-thumping, confederate flag-wavers. There are whole social chunks of Germans and Brits who are every bit as ridiculous (usually in VERY similar ways) - if you travelled with your eyes open and let your own self satire take a back seat for a while then you’d notice that.
Another thing white people love is smug preaching from our white brethren on the other side of the pond on how provincial we are. Thanks, Furgus!
Damn, Great Britian still a country, I thought Bush bought them back in 2001. My Bad.
Fergus:
What a great name– are you from Scotland? Yes, I have lived in London, Paris and in Italy and the racism there is more concealed but actually more acute. Thanks for an International pespective.
Don’t get so defensive. It’s too easy to point the finger at the right, when its the liberal left that reproduces whiteness the most. Dude, San Francisco is the WHITEST place on the planet.
youv’ve clearly never been to santa cruz.
Yup…as soon as we get our own Whole Foods it’ll be a white paradise!
Or Walnut Creek.
hahahaha. or humboldt. or the sierra nevadas. i hate to break it to ya’ll but theres plenty