Is it true?

Several friends have told me that people from Oregon don’t like us Californians, ist that true? and why?


whatever?

I don’t know, but I don’t like Californians and I live here!


“Love Story? There’s two things wrong with that movie: No Smokey, and no Bandit!” – Eric Forman, That 70’s Show

It’s generally true that people here in the Puget Sound area look with askance on immigrant Californians. There seem to be two main themes to the animosity:

  1. Bringing California to the Pacific Northwest – all Californians are assumed to be the worst of the weirdos, either aging hippie environmentalist wackos or cocaine-snorting Hollywood wannabes. We can blame congestion, liberal politics, high taxes, rudeness, the rain, whatever we don’t like on these upstart newcomers and then we don’t have to blame ourselves.

  2. Californians supposedly come in and buy up Washington real estate. By California standards it is dirt cheap and the demand drives up the price so that we honest, upright citizens are priced out of the market. Then, having stolen the land, the purchasers move up here and bring all their California evils with them (see Item 1.)

It is a common theme and pretty well understood up here, but it is actually a very minor, low-grade sort of concern. If we really need scapegoats we always have our legislature committing egregious public offenses and sidelights like WTO, cancelling New Year’s and building sports stadiums.

The only place the animosity is expressed is on the freeway. If you have California plates you will not be accorded even the slight courtesies that are rare enough as it is. Admittedly some of this is directed at people who move to Washington but license their car in their home state since Washington, until very recently, had a very high annual automobile excise tax. Californians, already held in low esteem, are assumed to be guilty of this tax dodge, even if innocent of the rest of their stereotypical crimes.


“You have no choice but to be impressed.”
Tony Rothman and George Sudarshan
Doubt and Certainty

Gee, I’m Californian and I like Californians just fine. Except the ones who come from New York, of course.

Catrandom

I heard there were bumper stickers that read “Don’t Californicate Oregon!”


“No,” he replied, and smiled seraphically, as was his wont.

I just draw the line at not liking most people, regardless of region of origin or residence. Too many of them, and not enough space between them, mostly.

A committee is a lifeform with six or more legs and no brain.

I dunno, but I’m not real crazy about Californians either.

Anyone who deliberately lives in an Earthquake zone is not sane. Anyone who keeps rebuilding and not only living in an Earthquake zone, but a flood and mudslide zone plus a fire zone (in a wooden house)** is not sane.

PLUS, most Californians I’ve met are too wealthy, have too many luxury gadgets, have that ‘California’ attitude and are often just too dippy. Kind of like how it used to be in Key West – where one would see these ‘cool’ men and women in their 70s dressed like they were 20 with a mental state of 16.

Wow! A blast from the past. My sister’s next door neighbor had one of those when I visited her in Portland in 1976.

luxury gadgets, wealthy, earthquakes, whats NOT hey I am reply to my own post oh well

voguevixen, I live in California and I hate it here! And I’m a native!

Why don’t I like “Californians”? Too many of them are pretentious. Wacko new-agers, or “coke-snorting Hollywood wanna-bes” (You should see my ex-roommate!). I don’t like sun every bloody day!

Besides, all of my friends live in Washington. Yeah, I’ll be moving.

(BTW: I’ve looked, and Seattle seems to be as expensive as Hell-A. I mean L.A.)

“I must leave this planet, if only for an hour.” – Antoine de St. Exupéry

Are you a turtle?

pluto, you just summed up how a lot of us here in New Mexico feel about Californians. Have you been to Santa Fe or Taos lately? You see what I mean. And don’t even get me started on those bloody Texans…


Heck is where you go when you don’t believe in Gosh.

Oh bite me. The only “Texans” You get over there are the Oklahomian refugees we chased out of our great state. We figure we might as well dump them into the wasteland to our left.

And as far as being “bloody”, well, don’t blame some of us for being extra enthusiatic about capitol punishment. :smiley:


You say “cheesy” like that’s a BAD thing.

Oh how true you can’t even go to Santa Fe anymore its been taken over. If I have to hear one more person tell me “Oh I just moved from CA” well I can’t be held responsible.

Keep smiling it makes 'em wonder what you’ve been up to.

OK, let me first say, if you are living in California and don’t like it, get the fuck out! There are too many damn people here as it is. And Vix, feel free to go back to corn/wheat/soybean land and free up some real estate! :wink:

Second, it was brought up about how us Californians choose to live in an earthquake area. Is that any different than living in an area that is subjet to tornadoes? Or is always hot and humid? Or is always cold and raining or snowing? Please!

Third, Pluto, Puget Sound? LOL! I lived in Tacoma for four years(in the military, didn’t have a choice) and talk about depressing! Folks, try to live in continual drizzle and overcast for four years! I was about to go fricken AWOL!

Umm, I can’t think of anything else in defense of this beautiful state right now, so I’ll be slinking out the backdoor now… :wink:


“Can’t this lousy rotten useless fucking lump of cosmic shit planet make up it’s fucking mind? It just makes me sick.”
–Dr. Watson

Gee neuro, if y’all don’t like us in New Mexico I guess we can go visit Colorado, where we’re loved.

I’m a fourth generation Californian, in exile in the South for 20 years. I’m really missing the California openness now. So, if I wanna move to Oregon, am I a shit-biscuit because I’se born in CA, or because, bein’ now from Mississippi, I’d be a perceived yeeha? Is there a questionnaire to be filled out at the state line? Has Oregon really gone on yond?

You are talking about LA. All of California is not the same.


I am a redhead, you see, and I do not tempt. I insist. -Cristi

Ahem. L.A. is a city of 8 million people. It is perhaps barely possible that not all of us are the same, either.

Catrandom

There’s a big difference between northern California (north of Santa Rosa), and southern California (South of Santa Barbara), and the stuff caught in the middle. I grew up in northern California, home to redwoods, ferns, fog and rain. If you want to swim in my ocean, you best be wearing a wetsuit. And the interior of northern California is filled with wild rivers that damn L.A.er’s want to dam, and big mountains, which make the rivers nice and icy on the hottest days of summer. I grew up proud to hate the south–they steal our water, and screw up our politics. And then they move to our pretty part of the woods, and complain about the rain. I understand Oregon and Washington saying–Welcome to Oregon, Spend your money, then Go Home" I felt like that in Eureka.
I’ve soften a bit, but I still think most folks from southern California are aliens from another planet–why else would they be so afraid of water falling from the sky? I swear a saw a guy hold an eighty dollar book–not in a bag–over his head to prevent rain from falling on his clean-shaven head. And it was a misty little drippy rain at that.

Proud to hate?

Good of you.

Yup. We’re from a planet that doesn’t cherish silly stereotypes.

Catrandom