The piece is emblazoned with the alarmist headline, "Why Does Hollywood Hate the Suburbs?" Siegel groans about "over 50 years of antisuburban sentiment in American culture" and accuses a popular novel of possessing "rage against the suburbs."
Aw, did someone suffer feewinghurt?
Fact is, the media's longtime bias against poor central cities and rural areas (and in favor of wealthy suburbs) is one of America's untold stories. And if you really want to feel the media's wrath, announce that you're from a central city in the Midwest.
My experience has been that the suburbs are where my aspirations have gone to die. I know I'm not the only American with this feeling. But the media's bias favoring the suburbs is far more than merely annoying: It's detrimental to America's political interests, as major parties try to appeal disproportionately to elite suburbs.
Official figures show that most Americans live in suburbs, but that's misleading, because this definition of a suburb includes many central cities. Still, it skews political dialogue.
It's also true that the suburbs exert disproportionate control over American politics. I'm certain that - with the exception of 1984 - the Republicans have lost every presidential election of my lifetime if you don't count the suburbs. Even '84 is iffy.
Another untold story is that many American suburbs were founded entirely on racism. Not all suburbs - but many. This bigotry was so central to suburban life that it was in effect illegal for minorities to even live in many suburbs (as well as some other places). Now there are laws designed to halt racial discrimination (which aren't always enforced), but economic discrimination hasn't subsided.
Are we supposed to think wealthy suburbs are poor, beleaguered victims all because one movie or novel portrays suburbs negatively?
Friday, January 2, 2009
Why does Hollywood hate the cities?
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