I notice the trend the OP described in the foodie threads here, where it seems like there’s not much of middle ground between chicken fingers and organic, sun-dried free range goat eyeballs.
In my hometown, there’s a strong streak of pretentious anti-elitism; it’s much like a bizarro world where bad is good and down is up. Dirty hole-in-the wall restaurants are far superior to clean mid-to-high end chain and independent restaurants, and many wouldn’t be caught dead in a place that serves New American or northern Italian cuisine, much less anyplace that seems even remotely “trendy”. Blue-collar neighborhoods are places of honest character and grit, while upscale neighborhoods are fake and artificial, lacking a sense of place and history.
When I lived in New Mexico, I knew many who judged the quality of a restaurant by its health inspection score, with the restaurants getting lower scores and multiple violations being judged as better than those that pass with flying colors. Then again, it was always fast food joints and high school cafeterias that scored 100, and long-established mom-and-pops that were almost always a few points away from being shut down. Nobody seemed to consider that there was a middle ground.
On the other hand, I’m going to France next week, and when I get back I know I’m going to bitch about US grocery stores. Even the most pretentious grocery store in the States is white bread compared to the basic French market.
I suspect that the OP does not need a better country so much as a better group of associates.
There is a Starbucks near us as well as a Panera and local chain coffee shop (similar to what Starbucks probably was 20 years ago in Seattle) along with any number of diners and family restaurants. Everyone I know who chooses to go to one place over another does it for the flavor of the offerings or the convenience of the location. I can’t recall ever hearing anyone snear at another person’s choice of venue. (There are the typical jokes about silly names and odd descriptions of sizes at the coffeeshops, but it does not seem to keep people away or entice them to go.)
My in-laws are heavily weighted toward "plain folk"and I don’t recall any of them ranting about elites. They even accept me. My college classmates are heavily weighted toward the arts crowd, and I cannot recall any complaints about “plain folk” when we get together. At work, since technical fields in business tend to get a lot of people from both ends of the spectrum, I see a lot of mixing without ever encountering sneers. (And Southeast Michigan and Northeast Ohio definitely fall into the category of “so-called ‘Middle America’.”)
The one person who was associated with my company who (having been raised in Connecticut with aspirations of higher living) routinely denigrated everything as not being up to New York standards was considered a jerk. Her husband, (the actual employee, who was raised similarly) was considered a nice guy under an evil influence since, while he would order “pretentious” wines (with his tongue planted firmly in his cheek) when dining at fancy places, was quite willing to throw back Budweiser with the guys. The one person in my extended family who rants on about effete intellectual snobs is considered misguided.
Yeah, there are people who indulge themselves in stereotypes, but if you have not encountered them in Europe, I suspect you have simply been luckier in your associations. I was only in Europe for a year, but I recall running into any number of snobs and reverse snobs (neither of which groups were in any sort of majority–they tended to be individuals or, at most, tiny cliques) while I was there.
I think you generalize too much.
Granted, I’ve seen the people your talking about, on both sides of the fence. The pretentious fucks at the Walker museum of modern art who whisper, whisper, whisper to their companion and nod knowingly wide eyed at a box of hair labeled art and won’t eat any any restaurant that has a chain of more than 2.
And the local hicks who like huntin & fishin, keep moving father out into the country to the “white’s only” neighborhoods, and consider exotic vacations to be Disney World and LasVegas.
But those are extremes and most people I associate with don’t fall into either category. In fact most are like me who will watch both Armageddon and Y Tu Mama Tambien and like both of them, take vacations to both Six Flags theme parks and the Irish countryside, watch American Idol and National Geographic, meet a business partner at both a Starbucks and McDonalds, own both a Ford pickup truck and a mini-cooper, think both Rush Limbaugh and Michael Moore are asses that like to hear themselves talk, etc. etc.
I think you’ve fallen into the trap of stereotyping people you don’t really know.
I kinda know where the OP is coming from. I usually am the brunt of the anti-intellectual/anti-foodie diatribe, because I tend to be “discerning” ;). But that doesn’t mean I just go to expensive/pretentious restaurants. I like to find the local specialties prepared at mom and pop places. I have hunted down BBQ in Houston, Kansas City, and North Carolina, searched for country ham in Smithfield Virgina, eaten New Mexico “Christmas” chili on my eggs, and had burgers with cole slaw and french fries in them in Pittsburgh. I’ll also go to highly rated, expensive restaurants when I’m traveling. There is nothing better than a 2 hour meal and a fine bottle of wine at a great restaurant. What I hate, however, are chain restaurants. A quick trip to McDonald’s is fine for convenience, but if I’m going to drop $15 on a meal I’d rather find an ethnic restaurant than go to an Outback.
I’m the same way with stores. I love second hand and salvage stores (I worked at Bldg 19 in MA) and also like high end stores like Nordstroms. Costco and Target I also enjoy, but WalMart is just depressing.
For some reason, Americans tend not to be particularly discerning. In the rest of the world if you ask someone about food they’ll go on for ever talking about their local cheese, ham, noodles, etc. In the US you’re more likely to get a discussion of whether The Cheescake Factory is better than The Spaghetti Factory.
But there are places left in the US where people take pride in their food. Chili and BBQ seem to be two of the foods that people remain passionate about.
Last time I was in Milan, there were two McDonald’s right outside the train station, directly across the street from each other. Fucking sad.
I guess maybe they embraced such flotsam of American culture to make up for their involvement with the Axis powers (gotta keep the Nazi theme going here).
Some things you observe are probably just a case of being different, not better. Europeans (in my limited experience), are less suburbanized so they have more opportunitues to grab a cup of coffee in a cafe. Maybe that’s why that seems a more natural thing over there. Too many people on this side have to get in their cars for the long slog home to the suburbs they live in. Though, obviously there are exceptions on both sides; I know someone here posted just yesterday about living in Trondheim and saying they’re completely car-dependent there, which is not something I associate with Europe. And I live in L.A., but with numerous restaurants, used bookstores, a public library, and even an independent coffeehouse a short walk from my front door.
Re Starbucks particularly, I think the OP’s point was more the act or habit of hanging out in cafe’s rather than the particular one visited. Though Starbucks is a chain-mail of rubberstamp coffeehouses that threatens to choke us all, they do provide an atmosphere of a sort, from the lighting, to the background music, to the furniture. And for those of us who remember when “coffeeshop” meant a Denny’s, they still represent a tremendous improvement.
It sounds to me like you just need to be more confident. When people make fun of you for not knowing about the music that came out five minutes ago, roll your eyes and make fun of them for being dorks. These people are trying to make you feel bad; don’t let them! Faux- elitists are on mission to make themselves look better by calling you a plebe, just don’t play their game. Either they’ll knock it off, or you guys won’t be friends. I think most people are like you, you’re just getting caught up in the game playing of a few freaks. Genuine down home people aren’t offended that you like Starbucks or whatever, and if they are, screw ‘em. They’re assholes. They just want to be offended because they have an inferiority complex. If you just act like who you are, don’t treat people bad, or make fun of what they do, and act confident about your decisions without harping on classism, I promise, most people won’t give a shit about the kind of coffee you drink, or what country your movie was filmed in. I’m a fancy coffee drinkin’, foreign movie watchin’, artsy-fartsy liberal and I live in Redneckville, Mississippi, and get next to no shit about it. And the people who do do make fun of me, I ignore. Because, I don’t care what they think, it’s their problem, not mine. But I admit, it took me awhile to get to this point.
I go to Starbucks sometimes simply because I think their frappuccinos taste good, and it’s a nice atmosphere to do some writing in when I need to get out of my apartment.