Why Tim Kreider is a Cartoonist, not a Columnist
A response to http://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/05/opinion/sunday/my-own-private-baltimore.html
This article made me seethe in a way that I never felt a snobby New York Times editorial would. TK pens Baltimore as a place that bizarre, ambition-less people thrive in harmony with the rats. He writes that if you want to be wealthy you move North to New York, and if you crave political power you book it down to D.C.
The funny thing is that everyone I meet from DC feels to me like they’re trying too hard. They are so polished that conversation with them seems primed, robiticized. They talk about what’s happening on the Hill or what neighborhood will be next to gentrify like they are telling you a secret that they’re not really authorized to reveal.
Similarly, New York is SO glamorous. It is so glamorous like, actually how dare you not want to pay $24 for a martini? Ambition is sacrificing your dignity and living in a hallway with 2 other people for $2,000 a month, so that you can “make it, man.”
According to Tim Kreider, Philly also doesn’t exist. Because definitely no one I know from Baltimore has ever moved there, especially not if they have “ambition.”
Baltimore is perfect for those of us who don’t feel like we have to try to be somebody, because we already are. To everyone who moved away from Baltimore for their so-called ambition, good riddance. We don’t miss you.