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Lake Charles, LA is known for its lively and vibrant culture and entertainment. The city has a vibrant nightlife with an array of restaurants, bars, nightclubs, and live music venues to satisfy all tastes. With its stunning waterfront views, Lake Charles is also the perfect spot for outdoor activities or just a quiet stroll along the lakefront. The city also boasts a plethora of museums and cultural attractions that offer visitors plenty of interesting things to see and do. Visitors who have visited Lake Charles are often left with lasting positive memories due to the hospitality they received by locals in town. People have praised the food scene in Lake Charles, as well as the friendly atmosphere found in many establishments. In addition to these positive experiences, most people who have visited Lake Charles are pleasantly surprised by how affordable it can be despite all it has to offer. All in all, reviews of Lake Charles tend to be overwhelmingly positive, making it an ideal destination for anyone looking for a fun-filled getaway.
based on 34 ReviewsGet to know Lake Charles with the latest comments and reviews from people who live in or have visited Lake Charles
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Very tense atmosphere - 6/16/2021
Lake Charles, Louisiana is one of the absolute creepiest cities in the USA. The people feel dead inside. They also seem to secretly hate each other. It is also an Industrial city. It seems like a city that is right out of a horror or thriller movie. It is also prone to extreme weather, like Hurricanes and flooding and severe thunderstorms.
A lot of the people out here are a bunch of weirdos and losers hanging around. If I had any children, I would never allow them to play outside alone here, out of fear that one of these weirdos would kidnap and kill them. (It’s happened before: Read about the murders of Jeremy Guillory in 1992, and the murder of Mary Jean Thigpen in 2001. Anyone who doesn’t see Lake Charles metro as being a creepy place has to be naive and not very observant of others and really doesn’t understand how dangerous this place actually is…I feel people need to be more observant and try to figure out other peoples’ hidden motives..)
The people
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clannish (feels like a cult) - 11/24/2020
Beware reader, the city of Lake Charles is an absolute sh*thole. If you are traveling through I-10 you might want to skip this place. This place is the very worst of the South. This city is the most backward place I’ve found in this country. The infrastructure is really poor. It seems to be a city that is decades behind. Also, the cops here are crooked as hell. I know several people who have wounded up in jail for doing almost nothing, even if they were just passing through.
The dating scene really sucks. None of the girls are really attractive. A few of them are. But they don’t seem worth the effort. Lots of the people here have no morals and sleep around. Most of the people here are degenerates. Even the authority figures.
The city is also very clannish. The people in this city act like a clan. They are not welcoming of foreigners. Everybody in this city has a role predetermined at birth and there is a definite social ladder. If you are at the bottom of
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Don't bother with it - 7/25/2020
Don't waste your time here. Lake Charles is absolutely one of the worst cities in the United States in my opinion. I grew up here in the 1990s.
It took me some time to realize this while growing up here, but most people in this city don't care. They don't care about you. They are only looking out for themselves. Forget about your goals and ambitions in Lake Charles, because they will do their best to cut them down. Lake Charles wants you to do the things they want you to do for them, not for you to have ambitions or goals or dreams of your own. You live in this city to work for the city, not for your own interests. That's how Lake Charles is.
Loads of people in this city tend to have a love-hate relationship with each other. They like each other but secretly dislike each other at the same time. If that makes sense. That's what I gather.
Also, the justice system is one of the most corrupt in the nation, right behind New Orleans metro. Sure the
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Not Recommended - 12/18/2019
To be fair, I will start with the positive aspects of this city:
1. Friendly & Helpful - The long term/lifelong residents are very friendly, helpful and welcoming. In my experience, cities that host a lot of visitors, the long term residents tend to be standoffish. Neighbors who didn't even know me came over offering to help me unload my moving truck.
2. Excellent manners - ma'am, sir, please, thank you, people wave hello, offer to let you into traffic, etc. People still send their children to Cotillion here! If you hear someone honking their horn, you can be sure they're not a local. Very refreshing!
The deal breakers
Don't move here if you rely on your job for income, will have to rent, need medical care of any sort or are intolerant of laziness.
Jobs come and go frequently here. If you're not a local, expect to be on the short list of those to be cut, and at the bottom of the list of the hire list. You've been warned.
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Very sordid and corrupt city - 9/2/2019
I had no idea that the people in Lake Charles were so bad. We agree- There is something really sick and malevolent about this city that I can definitely agree with all of the reviewers on this website here. I had left Lake Charles almost 17-18 years ago and have returned only to find out it that shockingly it has become a crime-infested slum, just like the big city of Seattle. I have no idea why this is happening though. Lake Charles was not like this when I was younger. When I left this city way back in early 2002 the people seemed fairly nice and normal. Now today, the city is very different and the people are very rude and suspicious. (You get a feeling of dread being in this city. As if someone is going to try and hurt you. All of the people will give you a sour look and seem like they secretly hate you? Or want nothing to do with you? They will only pretend to be your friend and pretend not to mind when you talk to them. But it seems they truly hate you underneath their mask? Did
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A city of scumbags, lowlives and thieves - 8/6/2019
This city really sucks. I don't like Lake Charlesians, they are all scumbags. Don't buy into the hype that revolves around it. It is a very boring and corrupt city, and a terrible place to raise children. It is also very deadly as a high crime wave constantly. Nobody seems like this place very much. Some Lake Charlesians would have you to think otherwise. But no, they don't know how crap and schlocky this city really is. Most of them have never even been outside of Lake Charles before, so the ones who defend it would not really know how bad it actually is. As someone mentioned a few definitions before, nobody goes to Lake Charles because it's a good place to live. They only go there for job opportunities. All of the rivers and lakes and beaches in this city are polluted by chemical waste where corrupt corporations dump their waste into the lakes and rivers. The kids in the schools are some of the meanest in the country (maybe not just Lake Charles - but the suburbs of Moss Bluff and
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too dangerous and uncivil - 6/16/2019
this city is a very dangerous place to work and live. i've lived here for most of my life and it is definitely not the city it used to be when I left it in 1991. i've returned and am also in the process of leaving it again. as it is very dangerous and not like it was when i was younger. i am very old and nearing my 60s, but I remember this city being pretty laid back when I was a kid in the 70s. but even then, it was a very miserable corrupt and disorganized city back then too, compared to the rest of the USA standards. the people that live here are just confused. And most of them are angry, which is why a lot of crime happens. but the city management just doesn't care and needs crime to help reel in some extra dollars. it is a very corrupt city, so watch your back. there are very safe neighborhoods and some good people too but all in all, this is probably one of the worst cities in the USA. if you were transferred here, this place is an even bigger prison then what you just got out
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Never met such bizarrely arrogant two-faced people - 5/15/2019
Lake Charles - I've never met such bizarrely arrogant, rude, sycophantic (but) two-faced people in my life before, as I have when I lived in this city of SWLA. Not originally from Lake Charles but I've lived there before, since 2001. I moved out in 2013 when things were getting pretty rough in that city. Economically and job-wise. I'm originally born in the 1970s from the East Tennessee/Western North Carolina (smokey mountains) area. And am now back there as a truck driver with kids of my own, and much happier. And much more connected to my family.
Almost everyone in this city seems to secretly hate each other. everyone in this city seems to have a chip on their shoulder, for some odd. and most people will not help you, even if you ask for it. Reading the other definitions below, i'm a bit relieved (but not too surprised) to see that I'm not the only person here who believes that everybody in this so-called city called "Lake Charles" is a closet psychopath. Or has
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Young man eager to leave this boiling cesspit - 3/31/2019
Lake Charles sucks ass! This place is a hell-hole. Buncha white trash, alcoholics, meth-heads, aggressive gangster black people; and poor, clueless, uneducated people in general. Very dumb, arrogant and aggressive people too. Most people are just Bottom feeders fakes and crooks looking for something. Lots of fat people and people who smoke tobacco and don't take care of their health.
Born here unfortunately... can't wait to finish University and leave
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