Big City Appeal With Smug & White Trash Values
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8/25/2017
I used to work for a company based in MSP so I had the distinct "pleasure" of visiting nearly half a dozen times.
Let's start with the positives: There are some very nice and genuine people here. Not everyone is "Minnesota Nice" but the stereotype seems to suck in the majority. It's a very clean city with good biking trails and parks. It's more affordable to buy a house and raise a family compared to the coasts. There are a lot of Fortune 500 companies based here, so unemployment is a non issue.
The bad - well, there's a ton. The passive aggressive element is real and as someone who was raised in Northern NJ, this type of tone (especially in the business world) is downright unacceptable. People are shallow and extremely insular - as in the coastal cities are frightening and intimidating and anywhere outside the city is too far and unknown. Yet many are "progressive" and are card carrying Democrats who tug the party line. If you even mildly criticize any ideals they get triggered real fast.
Culturally, this place tries to mold itself after Norway yet there aren't any mountains around to make it even a little interesting geographically. Weather-wise this place reminds me of Morristown, NJ (near where I grew up). Bi-Polar weather conditions with a no real spring, hot and humid summers, and cold winters - except in MSP they are even colder and stick around slightly longer. I enjoy the cold but I'll take what we have in Denver over this type of weather any day of the week.
Who knows, perhaps there is still hope for some sort of change. Maybe that's why MN came around 1 percent away from flipping to Trump.
N598 | Denver, CO