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More calumny from the reporter who claimed we have a neighborhood called SoBo
By adamg on Sat, 11/09/2013 - 8:00pm
Katherine Seelye, the New York Times correspondent who has better places to be than Boston, but for some reason remains stuck here, opens a report on the Walsh transition today by mentioning that Tom Menino "is widely credited with transforming Boston from something of a backwater into a world-class city with a gleaming new seaport and innovation district."
Seelye, you may recall, announced to Times readers earlier this year that the gritty, parochial South Boston of the Bulger days "has morphed into SoBo and is now overrun with yuppies and glassy condos."
Rev. Hank Peirce wonders:
If NYTimes thinks Boston is such a back water why do they keep electing Bostonians as mayor?
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Comments
What Does "World Class" Mean?
I know what an "M Class" planet is, but exactly does "world class" mean?
It means whatever you want it to mean
But more specifically: It means whatever it is you want that Boston doesn't currently have, without which, of course, we will never be world class.
BoSto GoSlo BeFo MeNiNo
She's right. BoSto was such a BaWa until Mayor ToMe came in and ProMoDevelo.
She's not only lazy, she's
She's not only lazy, she's incompetent and has no sort of analytical skills to help readers place things in context.
Menino pledged 30,000 new housing units by 2020? Uh, how many residents are there in Boston (or, what percent of growth is that)? Are they affordable units? Parse the sentence and it's not clear.
She's awful.
Well, he has been in office for a long time..
Maybe she thinks Tom Menino and John Hynes are the same person.
I'm glad I'm not the only one
who rolled my eyes at this. It's like she never heard of Kevin White.
You guys sound ridiculous
As a man who lived in Boston for 23 years until moving to NY last year, I have to say from the outside looking in you sound really hyper sensitive about NY. There might be a quibble or two about the article, but it general it pretty much reads like articles ive read in the Globe or Boston Magazine. I thought Menino was given wide credit, no? If not why the hell was he reelected by wide margins for 20 years? Sure she made it sound like he was the only mayor Boston had that could be given credit, but frankly in speaking to a lot of Bostonians they would make the same statement.
Which brings me to say this: From NY, the rivalry Bostonians imagine they have with NY does not exist. No one here thinks about Boston, and believe it or not, people here dont live and die by baseball, so the Yankees-Red Sox are at about number 150 in things NY thinks about. The response here, along with the response to that silly thing in Gawker after the Red Sox win just makes me giggle. If Boston was self confident it wouldnt give a shit what a minor NY writer has to say about Boston but you all act with such great concern. Ill tell you, if someone in Boston wrote a crummy article about NY, there wouldnt be a response because no one in NY would give a shit.
As for why NY keeps electing people from Boston, thats because really talented people from Mass keep moving to NY and NY isnt so insular that it rejects them for not having been born here. It imbraces them. Myabe Boston should give that a try.
What does Imbraces mean?
Sounds dangerous.....
Internet truth
When someone points out a typo, it means they have nothing of substance to say
Or, it might mean
there are so many misapprehensions in the post it saves time to dismiss the whole thing by aiming at the easiest target.
"When someone (hides behind 'anon'), it means they have nothing of substance to say"
mutual sillyosity
Except you, apparently. And the readers of the NYT (Boston is the fourth-most oftened mentioned non-NYC city in the Gray Lady, behind DC, LA and Chicago). And as someone who was born in Astoria and spent the first couple decades of my life within its sphere, I would say that Noo Yawkers like to claim they never think about Boston, but they do - often with a vague, sub-conscious sense of unease. Bostonians and New Yorkers understand each other and share huge amounts of history and attitude, but we also get on each other's last nerve - as much as Boston loves getting the best of NYC, counting coup on Boston gives New Yorkers pleasure in a way that you don't see with other cities, even bigger ones. It's a very sibling-like relationship.
More accurately, it's probably because New England produces more talented people per capita than pretty much anywhere else. So the region is a net exporter of talent.
You might be overanalyzing just a tad
The reason I posted what I did was not to deny Tom Menino his moment in the sun - I'll be the first to agree that Boston is better than it was 20 years ago. The streets are safer, the schools are better and, yes, we're seeing a vast swath of parking lots replaced with an actual neighborhood along the South Boston waterfront.
And my reason had nothing to do with complaining about New York. OK, that tweet about where New York mayors come from was maybe, almost, slightly over the top, but it was a joke. Believe me, I know New Yorkers never, never, never give the slightest thought to us poor provincials - because they take pretty much every opportunity they can to tell us that.
My problem was with that one line about Boston being a backwater before Menino got upgraded from city councilor to mayor. It wasn't. 1950s? In a city that was hemorrhaging population and jobs that hadn't seen a skyscraper built since the Custom House? Perhaps. Boston in 1993? No, not really.
Coupled with her line about "SoBo" in that earlier article, and you get a complaint about reporters at the nation's paper of record who seem to have a problem understanding the places they cover.
Singling out NYTimes
....seems like a mission you are on when most of the thing written about Boston by Bostonians are just as bad.
New around here?
We complain about the Globe and everybody else around here on a regular basis.
I remember going to Boston in
I remember going to Boston in 1993 and hearing an architect say, "The city is really overbuilt right now. We've got an oversupply of office space, and it'll be 20 years before it's fully rented." Ha, aha, ha, ha, ha. I think Menino was very fortunate to be able to ride the economic wave of the 90s and early aughts. I think his time as mayor should have ended at least one, if not two, terms ago. Then again, if Maura Hennigan was the alternative, I'm not so sure about that, either.
I've read articles in the NYTs about city neighborhoods, and it's pretty obvious that the reporter got off the subway, walked about three blocks in each direction, and wrote down the names of the first diner, bar, and park he/she saw. It's clear that the reporters never spent any time getting to know these neighborhoods. I imagine that the reporter took the Acela to South Station, walked around for a few hours, and then got back on the Acela to go home.
Exactly.
It's not remotely about Boston vs. NYC or whether or not we're even a "world class city" or bashing Menino--it's the notion that he was the one who brought the city out of its provincial backwater days that's just foolish. The change started long before he arrived--most people would credit White for having the transformative vision. And yes, btw--plenty of people here are happy to chime in when reporters at the Globe get things wrong along these lines.
Many UHub readers have no delusions about Boston
We know that Boston isn't a world class city. We're a second-ish tier city and we know it. We excel in some areas like universities, medical research and hospitals. I don't think there are many people here who claim we're in the same league as NYC, Tokyo or London when it comes to being a world class city.
I have been offered jobs in NYC a few times and said no. Why? Because I really like it here. Not because I particularly hate New York.
New Yorkers do care about Boston. If they didn't, why would they bitch and moan every time something good happens here?
the irony here is the new
the irony here is the new york times is something of a backwater these days itself.
although that's not to say the globe is ANY better.
They were from Medford,
They were from Medford, actually.
World Class means...
...having an honest-to-goodness transit system with a manager who isn't on a milk carton. World class means not pretending Roxbury, Dorchester and Mattapan don't exist in glossy magazines (Looking at you, Improper Bostonian). It also means being honest about the racial divide in the city. Just because it's not 1974 doesn't mean those divisions don't exist. Bars and clubs that stay open past 1 A.M. How long am I going to have to go to Chinatown for the "special tea". This was cool when I was a kid, but I'm a grown man now.