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Comment by syshum | Hacker News Reader

The stereo type of "Coastal Elite" did not materialize from no where.

Personally my impression is this narrative has gotten worse not better of the last few decades as the political divide between "red states" and "blue states" have deepen, even if you live in a midwest "blue state".

Also by "are there buildings there" I would assume that a person on the east coast would be referring to Skyscrapers not just generalized building, which are quite rare in the mid-west.

My encounters with Coastal people generally result in them believing that the midwest is just farming and retail, Tech Jobs or other high income white collar jobs like Finance are not associated with the mid-west region...

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> Skyscrapers not just generalized building, which are quite rare in the mid-west.

If you ignore cities like: Chicago, Columbus, Cleveland, Cincinnati, Detroit, Indianapolis, Kansas City, St. Louis, Minneapolis, etc.

So no not really quite rare by any measure. And if you want to take a look at economic output as well, Illinois (5) and Ohio(7) are heavy-hitters, with states like Michigan(14) and Indiana(17) rounding out the top 20 and Minnesota(19), Missouri(22), and Wisconsin(21) not far behind.

As an aside (not targeted toward you) we gotta stop the “Midwest” as a geographic representation. It makes no sense. Make it Great Plains and Great Lakes after the major geographic features of the regions and what uniquely define them.

An aside to your aside. I had quite an argument once with a man, who I learned after the fact was autistic (I wouldn't have engaged him on this point if I had known...), that was from New York City who was beyond adamant that Ohio, where I grew up, couldn't possibly be in the "Midwest" because it's not near the literal geographic center of the country. I eventually had to walk away from the guy because he would not let it go.

TBF, Ohio is an odd duck. Even if we follow GP's advice and split the midwest into plains and lakes, Ohio has both. Except the east, which is more like West Virginia. Ohio is kind of a West Virmichigiana.

I'd argue for adding Appalachia, rounding us out to three "not just one midwest" categories: plains, lakes, and sandstone/coal seams.

Ohio is, I think, the only state that would fall right smack dab in the middle of all 3 new sub-midwests!

So, to be fair to your autistic interloctuor, Ohio is uniquely difficult to type :)

You're not wrong, but... Ohioans, for better or worse, for right or wrong, consider themselves Midwesterners.

I grew up in and near the Appalachian foothills. Appalachia has my vote, if it ever happens.

edit/

> Ohio is, I think, the only state that would fall right smack dab in the middle of all 3 new sub-midwests!

IIRC, Colin Woodard, in his book American Nations, split Ohio into 3 distinct cultural regions. I think it's apt and your thoughts on the matter are shared by many others.

Woodard said the same splits ran through Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois.[1]

[1] http://colinwoodard.blogspot.com/2012/04/presenting-slighty-...

That seems like the opposite of what I'd expect. As an unrepentant coastal elite, I know that the Midwest starts in upstate NY and goes to... uh, IDK, eastern Oregon or something?

It stops at Montana. Anything west of the Dakotas, Nebraska, or Kansas is either the “West”, “Mountain West”, or “Southwest”.

There are two "lines". One is the hundredth meridian. It's important because west of there, there's much less rain. (The hundredth meridian lines up pretty closely with the western edge of the Gulf of Mexico, meaning that moist air from there doesn't lead to rain west of that line.) Also, west of (approximately) there, the elevation rises to above 2000 feet. Agriculture is much more limited by water west of this line.

The other line is the mountains. Draw it through Denver. West of that line, you are definitely in "the West". It's the western third of the country.

Between Denver and the hundredth meridian? Maybe call it the "Great Plains".

That’s funny. Thanks for sharing that.

On that note, why isn't it called the Mideast?

Just historical usage, as the nation settled on the East coast and headed West.

Historically "the west" referred to west of the Mississippi river. "Midwest" was the Territories mid way between the eastern colonies and the western plains west of the Mississippi

Because it used to be the western frontier, with everything west being Spain/Mexico/France.

Even smaller cities like Grand Rapids have skyscrapers. They're not rare in the Midwest at all.

I agree that Great Lakes and Great Plains are good to distinguish. The Great Lakes has a long history of industrial development, you can't lump in Chicago, Cleveland, Milwaukee, and Detroit along with vast expanses of farm land.

When ever possible I try to ignore cities... I firmly believe high population density is the root of most societal problems.

That aside, I never said there were no skyscrpers I said they were rare compared to area's like NYC...

Chicago is probably the closest, but a skyscraper is generally defined as building over 100m, indy has like 9 of them over a pretty large foot print, so ...

I agree with you w.r.t density. Skyscrapers are on the opposite end of the spectrum from suburbs. Probably better overall, but not great. Medium-density, mixed-use development is the sweet spot and how farming humans eventually lived.

It’s interesting to note that the first skyscraper is generally accepted to be built in Chicago (10 floors) and the steel frame technology was developed here, too. Although nowadays NYC has become synonymous with high buildings, this was not the case in early days: “New York trailed behind Chicago, having only four buildings over 16 stories tall by 1893.” [1]. An early jewel of a building from this ear still stands, The Rookery. If you’re ever in the Windy City I suggest you visit this building.

Other large Midwest cities I’ve visited, Indy and St Louis don’t really hold up, I’ve got to admit.

[1]: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Early_skyscrapers#The_first_...

The mentality in Los Angeles is that nobody is from LA--it can be surprisingly true within a lot of social circles. My suspicion is that coastal elitism comes from people who chose to leave those center states. There seems to be waves of comedians that have affection or derision.

> Personally my impression is this narrative has gotten worse not better of the last few decades as the political divide between "red states" and "blue states" have deepen, even if you live in a midwest "blue state".

Honestly it goes beyond state lines. A liberal in Texas is a radically different liberal than one that's enjoyed coastal luxuries. Now living on the coast I feel it because it's almost as if some coastal liberals go out of their way to be exclusionary to life I've lived or the experiences I've had.

I would image that a liberal in Texas is more closely defined as a classic liberal almost libertarian

Where coastal liberal have been transform into more authoritarian "progressive"

In my experience, some progressives are authoritarian-ish, but the same can be said of conservatives. I don't think it's a property of the political belief itself as much as some people have an innate character trait that makes them very all or nothing and probably not just about politics. Those kind of people are probably fairly intolerable to begin with, but the last few years we (both liberals and conservatives) have given a pass to people with nightmarish personalities for some reason.

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