Most of the comments here are hung up about the accuracy or lack thereof of the saying hi observation, which is just the article's title and hook. I'm more curious to see if anyone agrees with the author's point about the lack of intermixing in SF between people of different classes, and the seeming lack of urban social cohesion, unlike other cities such as NY or perhaps Boston ("Boston Strong").<p>Certainly, if one works in tech in SF, it's easy to get stuck in an industry bubble where the first questions strangers ask each other at social events is "oh who do you work for?" and it just becomes a parade of corporate logos, tech stack holy wars, weekend side projects, and comparing option offers.
I think this is the same for every major american city. I don't know how is Chicago, or LA, but in NYC for sure nobody is saying hi to random folks.
The only time you say hi is to old neighbors (which are few, as people move in and out often), and to the coffee place/restaurant/bar you frequent often.<p>NYC does have plenty of homeless as well, but the cold clears them up pretty quick. By late November, NYC is too cold, and during the summer it can get too hot.<p>SF definitely has other major problems. It is just too lenient on crime. NYC has seen somme uptick as well, since last year (pre-covid), and the culprit might be the no-bail reform. While might seen progressive in nature, it is letting out folks that have done multiple crimes back to back, and they return doing the same. SF has implemented this earlier and the uptick in crime is reflecting it:<p>There was a guy that got arrested 14 times in the last 18 months for car theft. And he is still free:
<a href="https://twitter.com/SFPDTenderloin/status/1337280516609884161" rel="nofollow">https://twitter.com/SFPDTenderloin/status/133728051660988416...</a><p>When you have car-thieves/robbers running free around, immagine all other lower level of criminals. They know they can operate with impunity and they act accordingly.<p>Ps. (I lived in SF for 7 years, and now in NYC for 6 years. NYC folks are less friendly in general, and more direct. SF-ers are more polite, but also more flakey).
I would say, yeah people in SF can come across a bit cold, but so do people in most larger cities, especially now during COVID. I now go out of my way to avoid people in a way I never would have before. SF pales in comparison to the overall apathy of places like NYC or London though. I find the weird outgoingness to strangers off-putting (as a Brit) in the smaller towns and cities in the states. People are always asking invasive questions, and it can start to get grating after the first few dozen times.
> San Francisco is functionally divided into a set of groups that, as far as I can tell, rarely talk to each other. [...] SF has all the pieces of a kaleidoscopically diverse city, and yet the pieces don’t talk to each other. They walk the same streets but they live in parallel, non-interacting universes.<p>This reminds me of how LA is often described, to bring up a rival city that us NorCal denizens might bristle at being compared to. LA County is a hugely diverse area, but each distinct ethnic and immigrant group has its own enclave, its own self-sustaining community. So the need for them to intermingle is lessened.
I say hi to people on San Francisco, but I don’t get discouraged if some don’t respond. There are all sorts of people with wildly divergent circumstances. I’m not or rushing to reach a conclusion about others (or about the overall fate of the city) just because some people don’t say “hi” back.
I lived in Manhattan for a decade and SF even longer.<p>I noticed no difference whatsoever between the two cities regarding how likely strangers on the street are to say hello.
We notice it here in Cornwall, UK. Most of the time everyone is super friendly, lots of hellos and smiles between people you see in the street, even strangers. Then it's holiday season and the place fills up with visitors - there's a palpable change in the interactions.<p>I make a special effort to say HI and smile very enthusiastically during these times, see if I can break people out of their misery :-)
idk, depends on the neighborhood.<p>I've lived in North Beach for around a year. Both before and during Covid, I've found people to be super friendly and willing to have a short conversation if it makes sense to have one. A simple "hi" would be welcomed the majority of the time.<p>On the other hand, I used to love in lower polk, fairly close to the tenderloin (sutter st). No way would I talk to anyone on the street there, and I suspect most people would ignore or become fearful of a "hello".
Rents per square ft / tatami mat are not that reasonable in Tokyo. Westerners are generally treated with caution rather than friendly greets on the street too...
My experience from a few years ago, most people were already engaged communicating with somebody.<p>So, it would be odd to ‘interrupt’ somebody while they are in conversation.<p>It was interesting to see lots of people communicating, but with somebody not physically present.<p>Anecdotal, of course.
I noticed a large decline in friendliness, and it was one of the reasons why I moved out of California; Chico to the SF Bay Area were basically the same. And, new mail people eventually wouldn't even acknowledge my presence.<p>It seems like most average people were struggling and near the boiling point of discontent.<p>Even worse, because so many people in the SF Bay Area are semi-temporary transplants, they are often in "vacation"-mode and don't care about the area or other people as much because they're uninvested.
I know this observation may infringe on the boundaries of good taste, but this line stuck out to me -<p>"I noticed that the group was one Black guy, one South Asian guy, one East Asian guy, one White girl, and one guy who might have been Hispanic. It was like some sort of promotional photo from an HR department. And suddenly I thought of the Axis powers, and their insane delusions of racial purity and supremacy, and I thought: 'How could you idiots ever hope to beat us?'"<p>The United States was ~90% white for World War 2 [1]. Other major allied powers, the USSR and the UK probably were even moreso. It doesn't make sense to suggest that modern diversity had anything to do with World War 2.<p>A better, modern example, might be comparing the modern US to modern China, which is 92% Han Chinese[2]. Only, I'm not sure US dominance against China will be as decisive as it was against Nazi Germany.<p>1 - <a href="https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historical_racial_and_ethnic_demographics_of_the_United_States" rel="nofollow">https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historical_racial_and_ethnic...</a><p>2 - <a href="https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_China" rel="nofollow">https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_China</a>
I've never in my life have been in a city where it would be OK to just say "hi" to a person you don't know and are not planning to get to know. This sounds... like something out of pure fantasy. Where on Earth do people do that?