Some guy will post a picture of a pretty standard looking pepperoni pizza and say: "Imagine not living in new york." And then there's the whole bodega discourse, which is also funny. "For you non-new yorkers, let me explain: a bodega is not a corner store. It's a place where you can buy gatorade, toilet paper, AND eggs." Thank you sir for explaining that to a slack-jawed yokel such as myself.

  • Spike [none/use name]
    ·
    2 years ago

    From a non American, this seems to be how all Americans talk about their local places lol

    • Catherine_Steward [she/her]
      ·
      2 years ago

      Yeah, Americans are bizarrely insulated. They really do think that the northeast quadrant of their town has a completely different culture from the northwest quadrant of their town, but of course those cultures are slightly more similar than the culture of those goddamn southwest quadrant motherfuckers.

      The people in the next city over may as well be from Jupiter.

      • Spike [none/use name]
        ·
        2 years ago

        My favourite capitalism Murican brained thing is people saying how cool their area is for having x fast food chain

        • crime [she/her, any]
          ·
          2 years ago

          And you can tell how depraved Texas is because they're like this about whataburger of all mushy, mediocre slop

          • viva_la_juche [they/them, any]
            ·
            2 years ago

            Whataburger is super overrated but the chicken biscuit hits at 2 am after drinking all night

            Their burgers are shit I literally never get them

      • Tankiedesantski [he/him]
        ·
        2 years ago

        I've heard Americans unironically claim that American states are more different from one another than European countries.

        Yeah buddy, some places call soda "pop" and that's more difference than between Poland and Portugal.

      • crime [she/her, any]
        ·
        2 years ago

        The people in the next city over may as well be from Jupiter.

        If you live in Florida this is pretty likely

        • viva_la_juche [they/them, any]
          ·
          edit-2
          2 years ago

          Bursting through a wall

          Hot?! It’s only 85, that’s cold where I’m from

          Did you know Texas is the only state in the nation legally allowed to secede

          Too many damn commiefornians coming here trying to make Texas into the place they left

          The stars at night are big and bright 👏👏👏 deep in the heaaaart of Texas

          You ain’t never had bbq if you ain’t ate Texas bbq

          Y’all want some sweet tea

          Whataburger

          Bucc-ees bathrooms!

  • Chapo_is_Red [he/him]
    ·
    2 years ago

    I've been to several cities of global importance and size. Moreover, I've spoke to people from dozens of countries asking them to compare NYC to the principle city of their country.

    Among them all and from my observation there is agreement: NYC is both the dirtiest major city globally and has the most outdated mass transit system.

    • CTHlurker [he/him]
      ·
      2 years ago

      It continues to blow my mind that New York managed to build one of the first functional metro systems in the world, and then decided that they shouldn't ever bother to maintain them beyond the absolute bare minimum, for like 80 years. Surely it can't all be the fault of city planning and Robert Moses, right?

  • Pisha [she/her, they/them]
    ·
    2 years ago

    If I have to read one more article about how some people in New York are really cool for doing ordinary culture stuff (like starting a magazine or writing a book) while in New York, I'm going to scream

  • viva_la_juche [they/them, any]
    ·
    2 years ago

    Couldn’t imagine living anywhere other than New York!

    139 comments

    And if you read lenin, maybe you’d learn to argu…

    • space_comrade [he/him]
      ·
      2 years ago

      In most of Europe a "Bodega" is usually just a smaller branch of a local supermarket chain but you can walk to it because city planning is less deranged than in the US.

  • Bobson_Dugnutt [he/him]
    ·
    2 years ago

    The only cool bodegas are the ones in Cuba that give people free rations of food

  • D61 [any]
    ·
    2 years ago

    It’s a place where you can buy gatorade, toilet paper, AND eggs.”

    So... any gas station in the USA?

  • DeathToBritain [she/her,they/them]
    ·
    2 years ago

    bodegas are hardly special. like, pretty much every 3rd or 4th street in London, even in the suburbs, has those too. in fact we have loads of specialist ones for different diasporas foods. as do like most British towns and cities, at least regular ones though maybe not afro or South Asian , and I would imagine is true for a lot of other places

    • zeal0telite [he/him,they/them]
      ·
      2 years ago

      I have legitimately always been confused by the bodega thing for the same reason.

      We have several chains that do exactly that and they're just called "corner stores".

      "You can get eggs, toilet paper, and Gatorade"

      Damn, that's called a Spar, or Premier, or Londis.

    • ClathrateG [none/use name]
      ·
      2 years ago

      Well according to CumTown you can get drugs in NY bodegas, here on terf island I have to go meet a guy in an alley behind the shop

  • UlyssesT [he/him]
    ·
    edit-2
    2 years ago

    I've said it before and I'll say it again: New Yorkers that need to tell strangers about their high standards and about how exceptional and unique and grounded and worldly and tough and cosmopolitan and sophisticated and cultured they are for being from New York are insufferably boorish.

    If I watch a stand-up comedian and they mention New York within the first few minutes of their performance, I'm out. I don't want to hear it again.

    • Frogmanfromlake [none/use name]
      ·
      2 years ago

      I've met way too many like this when I lived in Upstate New York. You'd get the transplants who lived in the city and then came back acting like they were above everybody else. The people actually born and raised in New York City almost never brought it up.

      • UlyssesT [he/him]
        ·
        2 years ago

        One of the most obnoxious people I ever dated in my college years spent one semester in the UK and came back with Standard Issue Posh British Accent Used By Generically Sexy Love Interest Scientist In Almost Every SyFy Channel Original Movie.

        She'd drop it when distracted or off her guard but she insisted it was "natural" to her. :sus-deep:

        • ScotPilgrimVsTheLibs [they/them]
          ·
          edit-2
          2 years ago

          Confession time? Confession time:

          I used to be someone like her. I'm from a small town in the middle of nowhere in the Midwest but I claimed to be from Chicago (closest major city people give a damn about) only went there once every few years. Basically the stolen valor is about trying to feel like you're from an important place and to make one seem less "normal".

          Eventually I grew up when I realized no one really cared either way. Where I grew up does not make me interesting, and there's a ton of racist people in the "cool" places in California and New York. Conversely, one really cool guy I met in college came from deep red Texas. Accent and everything. He understood where I was coming from but he helped a lot in getting me to just own it. Yeah, I say "ope" and call soda "pop", that doesn't make me a "dirty racist normie"

          Yeah, my childhood was kinda boring. But that can't be helped.

          • crime [she/her, any]
            ·
            2 years ago

            This is kind of a tangent but everyone says "ope" I don't know why the Midwest acts like they're the only ones. Grew up in florida and heard it, heard it when I lived in Pittsburgh, heard it when I lived in Boston, haven't heard it with any greater frequency now that I'm in the Midwest myself

            • FlakesBongler [they/them]
              ·
              2 years ago

              It's because the Midwestern oafs spread out

              Huge wagon trains of Germanic folks heading in every direction with their smoked sausages and folksy wisdom

      • Caitycat [she/her]
        ·
        2 years ago

        I'm starting to feel like thats just what happens when people move somewhere. Like something about being a transplant to a city suddenly makes you way more likely to talk about how thats the best city ever and how nowhere else is like it. Kinda like when people convert to a new religion and become really devout to it, compared to people who were born and raised in that religion.

    • ScotPilgrimVsTheLibs [they/them]
      ·
      2 years ago

      What really bugs me is that they brag about their open-mindedness, but call anyone they deem a "dirty redneck" who moves in a gentrifier and thus not welcome in the city as if a good chunk of people living in Brooklyn at any given moment aren't "small town rednecks" themselves.

      Not that they themselves are the problem, it's landlords, real estate "investors", and the "muh property values" types.

  • Lester_Peterson [he/him]
    ·
    edit-2
    2 years ago

    I think a lot of the more obnoxious aspects of that discourse comes from transplants who are either trying really hard to be seen as a real and authentic NYer, or grew up in a suburb of a city whose downtown they barely visited, and now see common features of walkable urban cores as unique to New York.

    • UlyssesT [he/him]
      ·
      edit-2
      2 years ago

      Sounds a lot like tryhards that want to be very Californian in California. The only thing I could suggest for people that didn't live most of their lives in California and want to fit in without seeming like a poser is to learn how to pronounce some basic Spanish words, especially food items. If you say "caysa-deeah" instead of "kwesa-dillah" you'll be fine.

      • Nagarjuna [he/him]
        ·
        2 years ago

        kwesa-dillah

        You can not convince me anyone says this.

        • UlyssesT [he/him]
          ·
          2 years ago

          I know people that said it like that.

          If you want to hear the latter half of that out loud, watch the movie Napoleon Dynamite.

          https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=poO2BsVGdIU

  • UlyssesT [he/him]
    ·
    2 years ago

    “For you non-new yorkers, let me explain: a bodega is not a corner store. It’s a place where you can buy gatorade, toilet paper, AND eggs.”

    Dollar General has all of those things. I don't see what's so magical about them.