Usually, when we do articles for our Dangers section, we find some crime figures that tell a story about various American cities. Sometimes there are stories that warrant their own coverage. Today, however, we will go a more lighthearted route, looking at a list from Travel + Leisure where they identified the rudest cities in the country.
If you are really nitpicky, you might say that these are the cities where there’s a good chance that someone will be rude to you.
Trust us, it is a very interesting list that speaks volumes, despite the fact that the list is based on the subjective effect various American cities had on the T + L readers. And really, when you think about it, there is no other way to determine how friendly or rude a city is.
For some reason, people think that Miami is the rudest city in the United States. One of the reasons is that the city has a strong snobby vibe which plays a huge role in making people feel unwelcome there. In addition to this, the rapid “fancification” (trademark pending) of the city of Miami feels a bit defensive to many people who come there just to have fun. Perhaps it also has something to do with the fact that it has become one of the most expensive cities in the country, making people who haven’t inherited their parents’ millions feel a bit awkward there.
According to the people from Travel + Leisure, Phoenix climbed into second place after spending the last two years on the 12th and the 8th spots on their list. In short, Phoenix is getting ruder and ruder with each year that passes, which is actually quite a surprise since the city has finally started getting out of the economic slump it got itself into during and after the 2008 financial crisis. One of the reasons Phoenix is so rude is that the locals really don’t like all the people who come to winter there. did the opposite of Phoenix and it actually dropped on the list, by two whole places. Whereas it used to be the rudest city in the country, it is now only the third rudest. Trying to work out the mystery of why New Yorkers are so rude (whether it is the lack of money, space or time) would take too much time. One thing is for sure – it’s nice to see that NYC is not the rudest place in the country.
Jack Kerouac said it perfectly:
“New York gets god-awful cold in the winter but there’s a feeling of wacky comradeship somewhere in some streets. LA is a jungle.”
Which also gives us the perfect transition from the 3rd rudest city in the U.S. to the 4th – the City of Angels. Los Angeles is a peculiar mix of places where you are not good or rich enough to be and places where no one wants to be. While there are parts of LA that manage to escape these stereotypes, most people still agree that the city is a very rude place. And the worst thing is you get to experience most of it as a victim of yet another gridlock that always brings out the worst in people.
In the fifth spot, the people from Travel and Leisure have the City of Brotherly Love, whose name suggests a place that could never end up on a list like this. Well, Philadelphia somehow does not live up to its name, really, at least according to the folks who talked to T + L. Its inclusion on the list probably has something to do with the fact that people from Philly really do think that no one is like them and that the fact they live in this historic city gives them the right to look down on most people.
Cities that also made their list include Salt Lake City, Boston, Dallas, Colorado Springs, Ann Arbor, Detroit, Las Vegas, Providence, Charlotte, and Scottsdale.
We told you it was a weird list.
