Stop Telling Me to ‘Go Back to California’
By: Sophie Radvan
Tags: Life Lessons, Travel, Life, Advice, This Happened To Me

Prior to moving to the West Coast, I’d always heard that Pacific Northwesterners, specifically, were incredibly nice, neighborly people. The kind who help push your car to the side of the road when the battery dies or the kind who lend you borrow a cup of sugar (if this were the 60s).

When I first heard that we’d be moving to Portland, Oregon for my husband’s job, I took to Reddit for first impressions. What are the hot topics of conversation there? How do Portland Redditors react to newcomers? What are the hip and safe neighborhoods?

I’m writing this post roughly four years later, having already relocated to Minneapolis for a change of scenery. Within that timeframe, it seems moderators of Portland-centric forums have changed the commenting rules.

r/Portland comments then vs. now

During my Reddit search in 2016, the top comments read something like this, “Don’t move here! We have enough transplants making our traffic horrible and our rents sky-high. We’re full. Portland is full.”

Some examples…

whiskeyboundcowboy: If it’s Californians, go back to hell and stay the fuck out of Oregon. Paladin_PDX: Pack it up folks, Portland is over! feelmyperi: I’m doing my part [to deter newcomers] by being an asshole to strangers. (Only online, though, I don’t have the guts IRL).

Fast forward to 2020 and you see a slight change in comments thanks to moderators.

PDXtravaganza: Should you move to Portland? I would say NO, but here, you’re not allowed to say that, besides, you’ve already made up your mind and only want/need confirmation.

Huh. Somewhere down the line, moderators of r/Portland and r/AskPortland grew sick of such negative feedback toward newcomers and changed the forum rules.

r/Minneapolis comments

In comparison, I went through the same Reddit experiment before moving to the Twin Cities. This is how r/Minneapolis reacts to newcomers.

ftbllfreak14: Welcome to the North! I’m sure you will find that the outdoors will eventually draw you in. CDC_Brad: Transplant from Rancho Cucamonga checking in. Welcome to the area. helloljjames: Well, hello! Welcome. If it makes you feel any better, I moved here in the summer of 2017 and the first few months were super lonely.

Welcome. WELCOME. wElCoMe. WeLcOmE. This must be what people refer to as Minnesota Nice—a concept that stretches throughout the Midwest. Still, I have to be careful not to overgeneralize. Not every Minnesotan is nice and not every Portlander is rude.

I’m not even from California

This is what bugs me the most about the ‘go back to California’ mentality: it doesn’t matter where you’re from or where you came from because you’ll always be considered an outsider. An intruder. Someone who doesn’t belong.

My husband? He’s from Atlanta, Georgia. Me? I was born in London, raised in Prague, and attended college in Phoenix, Arizona. We have zero connection to California.

Not only that, but you’d never look at me at a bar and think “she doesn’t belong in Portland.” I have the stereotypical hipster look: tattoos, piercings, and dyed hair. I wear skinny jeans, beat-up sneakers, and a faux leather jacket when I want to be fancy.

My husband also looks like your typical Portlander: beard, thick-framed glasses, tattoos, Levis jeans, and he drinks IPAs religiously. What exactly is it about us that makes you think that we’re not Portland locals like you? What makes us stand out as “Californians?”

East Coast vs. West Coast mentality

In an attempt to leave you what some sort of takeaway, my best guess for this ‘you can’t sit with you’ mentality stems from the West Coast, where sprawling cities feel like remote islands from one another simply due to distance.

Seattle is a 4-hr drive to Portland, Portland is a 10-hr drive to San Fransisco, San Fransisco is 7-hr drive to Los Angeles, and so on.

On the East Coast, however, Boston is a 4-hr drive to New York, New York is a 2-hr drive to Philadelphia, Philadelphia is a 3-hr drive to Washington. It’s far more condensed and saturated.

It’s normal for an Oregonian to tell a Californian to fuck off even though they’re neighboring states.

But have you ever heard a New Yorker telling a New Jerseyan to ‘go back to where they came from?’ No fucking way.

Minus a few sporting rivalries, Minnesotans welcome Wisconsinites. Floridians interact with Georgians on a daily basis. Kansans drive alongside Missourians.

A message to those unwelcoming assholes

I implore you to travel and explore a world outside of your comforting bubble. Step outside of your safe zone for a weekend and eat/drink/swap stories/breathe/live with someone you once deemed an outsider.

I have to believe the only people who say ‘go back to California’ are the ones who’ve never been there and have only the Kardashians to use as a reference. California is fucking massive, okay? A wide variety of people live there. It’s not all Calabasas and Beverly Hills.

I understand patriotism and hometown pride to a point. I loved those 18 years I lived in Prague but I would never tell a German or an Italian to fuck off out of my city. You realize how dumb that sounds, right?

People come and go. Cities change for better and for worse (yes, I know, gentrification). There’s nothing you can do to stop it so you might as well roll with the punches and make some worldly friends along the way. I promise it makes you a more intelligent, versatile, and well-rounded person.