Monday, August 15, 2011

Philly's New York Complex

I think that most native Philadelphians have a raging, senseless hatred for New York City and all of its inhabitants.

It’s strange, but I keep noticing evidence of it. I’ll watch a Philadelphian meet a New Yorker and immediately either write him off as a douche bag, or begin to act like he has something to prove. Philadelphia Magazine, in its “Best of Philly” issue this month, described one particularly delicious restaurant as “the place to bring your snobby friend from New York.” I’ve found that even I am guilty of this bias: I saw someone reading the New York Times on the trolley the other day, and I immediately found myself thinking, “What a tool.” If our newspapers aren’t good enough for you, buddy, then just go back where you came from.


Try saying that anything in New York is better than anything in Philly (while in Philly, of course), and watch the swiftness with which you are shot down. Yes, we only have two subway lines, but New York’s massive subway system is too confusing and inefficient. Yes, so many TV shows are set in New York, but we’ve got It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia. Sure, they’re one of the most populated cities in the world, but do you know how crowded things are there? Philly’s population is much smaller and more pleasant.


But what I believe to be the most overt sign of Philly’s hatred for New York is captured in the way Phillies fans feel about the Yankees. I mean, the 2009 World Series certainly didn’t help things, but even before that, Phillies fans seemed to have this burning hatred for all things Yankees.


I can’t seem to find any logical reason why: the Yankees aren’t even in the same league as the Phillies, let alone the same division. They’re almost never required to play each other. Despite popular belief, most Yankees aren’t using, and in fact have never used, any sort of performance-enhancing drugs. They don’t “buy up” their players any more than we do. Most Yankees players are actually very respectable people, on and off the field: during a recent charity weekend where the Yankees spent time with various groups of unfortunate youth, closing pitcher Mariano Rivera gave one kid his cell phone number after hanging out with him all day, because, he said, the two of them really connected. Yankees outfielder Nick Swisher just released an album of children’s songs, even though he’s not really a performer; he did it because the proceeds of the album go to charity. I’m not saying the Yankees are better than the Phillies are (because they aren’t); I’m just saying that a little research will prove that the Yankees aren’t exactly the monsters that Phillies fans think they are.


But, to get back to my point, ask a Phillies fan why he hates the Yankees, and, after citing the above untruths and being proven wrong, he’ll say, “I mean, they’re the Yankees.”


And that really is the reason why: Phillies fans hate the Yankees because they’re the Yankees. They hate them because they’re the most famous baseball team; they’re the flashiest, the ones who appear the most in popular culture. They hate them because they have 27 World Champion titles, and we have two. Because they’ve produced most of the most famous baseball players in history, and we haven’t. Phillies fans hate the Yankees because, throughout history, they’ve been wildly more successful than the Phillies have been, and they continue to be the most popular team in baseball, even when they’re not necessarily the best team in baseball.


But really, it’s not the Yankees’ success that Philadelphians hate. Everything that Philadelphians despise about the Yankees is symbolic of why we despise New York as a whole—its success, its popularity, its flashiness—and this is what gives us our inferiority complex when it comes to all things New York. We don’t hate the Yankees because they’re the Yankees. We hate the Yankees because they’re the New York Yankees.


It makes sense, when you think about it. Philadelphians are fiercely proud of their city. It’s a defining characteristic of all Philadelphia citizens, and it’s what causes us to do things like beat up somebody who’s wearing another team’s jersey at a football game. We have this other East Coast city that’s only an hour or so up the road, though, that’s bigger, more famous, and more popular, and that makes us feel like we’re losing something to that bigger city. It’s like if New York didn’t exist, we’d be the most popular city on the East Coast (because, come on, Boston’s a little too foofy to hold its own against Philly, and no one wants to go to Baltimore because you’ll probably get shot).


And, no matter how much any given Philadelphian will complain about the state of virtually everything in this city (roads, crime, public transit, city council, other Philadelphians), we’ll all defend it to the death as the greatest city in the country. The problem is, we realize, that we’re the only ones who know how great it is, because everyone else is too busy being captivated by how shiny New York is that they don’t even notice Philly in the shadows. This fact gets under our pride-soaked skin and sets up camp, until it’s seeped into every pore of our beings and even the words “New York” make us scoff, smirk, and grimace.


This is what makes us do the things we need to do to show our pride- things like beat the other team’s fans up at football games. We’re like the little bird that puffs up its feathers next to the larger bird to make itself look more intimidating. We take it to ridiculous measures, though. Desperate to seem like the best in any way possible, we hold onto the defining characteristics of Philly that are actually terrible qualities in a city, but we make it sound like they’re good things. You’re from New York, huh? Well, fuck you, because I’m from one of the fattest cities in the country, and I’m proud of it. I’m from the city that beats the shit out of you if you wear a Mets shirt, and I wouldn’t have it any other way. I’m from the city where kids get together in violent mobs in the safest parts of town and break windows and step on people. I’m from Philly, bitch, and I could kick your fancy, cultured, New-York-Times-reading ass any day of the week.


Just let me get my breath first, because I just walked up a couple of stairs and I’ve never exercised in my life. And let me just eat this Butterscotch Krimpet first, because I’m hungry and I haven’t had anything fatty to eat since an hour ago when I sucked down that cheesesteak with the bun so soggy with grease that it was falling apart.


God, I love Philly.

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