[Mike20613]

I've lived on Long Island, I lived in the Capital District for 10 years or so, and worked in NYC. My experience was that upstate NYers are more polite, but they are easily offended and vocal about transgressions. Everyone says the appropriate polite things in common interactions, but if you fail to do so, you *will* hear a comment. A good representation of the difference is horn-honking; in Brooklyn, people constantly do it, but it is not a big deal; in Albany, people rarely do it, but nearly always give the finger and yell something when it happens. The cause of this is a belief, held by Upstate NYers, that downstaters are taking disproportionate resources from the state government, and that this has contributed to the region's economic decline. As jobs have left upstate NY, there has been a search for scapegoats. My understanding is that this belief is false. There's also an important distinction between conservatives and liberals. Conservatives have more hatred for New York City, which they associate with welfare and crime; but self-conscious liberals focus more on Long Island, where the rich people supposedly live. Lastly, there's an ethnic element too, seen in racial code words associated with evil NYC (e.g. crime, drugs) and a phrase I've heard a number of times, 'all those Jews from Long Island'.

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Name : Mike20613, Gender : M, Race : White/Caucasian, Age : 32, City : Brooklyn, State : NY Country : United States, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, Social class : Middle class, 

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