why does everyone in Portland hate Portlandia?

[u/GoggyMagogger]

Sorry if this seems like a stupid question but i've noticed a ton of dislike regarding the comedy show Portlandia coming from residents of your lovely city. I keep hearing people on podcasts and such, portlandians (is that the correct term?) whenever the show is mentioned theyre like "ewwww"

I was in portland a few years ago when having brunch we spotted fred armisan across the road filming a sequence. me my wife and daughter were sort of thrilled, we waved at him and he waved back, seemed like a nice fellow. but our waiter was really pissy about it, he told us he wished theyd all just fuck off and die basically... i didnt understand.

I get that the show pokes fun but its pretty funny and supposed to be satirical. are portlandians really that thin skinned? I have visited portland many times and i can see some of where the jokes in the show come from. i used to live in Victoria BC canada, often we think of ourselves as a "miniature canadian portland" and the whole "left coast" hippie/hipster/organic/artisanal vibe is there as well. thing is, we know it and think its funny.

or am i missing something? maybe you are able to laugh at yourselves but there's something else about the show that rubs you the wrong way? i know film crews can get a little tiresome, always blocking streets and such... also Victoria is a tourist town as well and we get annoyed at out-of-towners sometimes, is that whats happening? i don't mean to offend anybody, and i think Portland is great... whats the deal with portlandia though?

[u/misha_the_homeless]

The show isn't that bad but, for me, it's emblematic of an overall trend that shifted Portland from a place to live to a product to be purchased. The fact that it commodified the city based on lazy characterizations makes it worse. In any case, watching your rent dramatically increase year after year, absorbing an ever increasing portion of your disposable income, all while Fred and Carrie paint your town as the place where young people go to retire, is pretty fucking obnoxious.

[u/GoggyMagogger → u/misha_the_homeless]

ive heard theres few job opportunities and rents/cost of living is skyrocketing, so all the new implants must already be wealthy to make a move there viable while the life long residents suffer the brunt.

gentrification is destroying my home too. at least they dont have a nationally popular tv show rubbing it in our faces. so i "get" that

[u/misha_the_homeless → u/GoggyMagogger]

You're right about the gentrification, but the "rubbing it in our faces" part is even worse than it seems on the surface. There's also this aspect of Portland being a place predominantly inhabited by transplants, and all of these dumb little narratives about the cultural identity of the region got developed and perpetuated by those people moving here. Then all of that was grossly exaggerated and capitalized upon by the show, which somehow enticed even more people to move here. You end up with an unaffordable city populated by people who came here to live out and embody these caricatures that they saw on television.

I've never been to L.A., but I imagine Portland is now some poor man's version of it, where instead of all these people trying to live out their idea of being an actor or entertainer, they're just trying to live out their idea of being a guy who rides a bicycle. Even using the word "Portland" feels bad because it's somehow more of an ill-defined adjective now than it is the name of a place. An affordable, livable town was turned into an overpriced and intolerable cliche.

[u/GoggyMagogger → u/misha_the_homeless]

i have heard that portland is like an escape for los angelenos who have grown sick of the big city and stress and look to portland for a calm center, a return to nature... all that pseudo-hippie new-age cure-all bullshit. thats the narrative i've heard anyway. bloated, burned out, very wealthy careerists running to an oasis that is humble portland. obviously milking it dry when they get there too.

i cant really imagine someone, anyone actually emigrating to anywhere based on a satirical skit show though

i mean, i used to like Mary Tyler Moore when i was a kid. it has never occurred to me to move to Minneapolis

[u/[deleted] → u/misha_the_homeless]

As someone pretty familiar with LA, the trope about everyone there being a wannabe actor is really exaggerated. It's a big industry, sure, and it definitely attracts people who want to be famous, but for most people LA is just like any other big city. Most people I knew who worked in entertainment were office workers or working on set doing lighting or set building and they lived lives closer to other trades than to acting.

The major difference I've seen is that Portland seems much more insular. It feels like there's a greater attempt at maintaining a particular culture, for better or worse. LA also just doesn't seem to care about things like sprawl, public transit or natural preservation to nearly the same extent.

[u/MechaAaronBurr → u/misha_the_homeless]

I’m with you on this. Portlandia was a huge visible step in turning the way of life so many people enjoyed into a product to be bought by select industries and taxpayers.

There’s a valid argument that the city was destined to change eventually, but the show is a symbol of a very stark change in belief that many resent and certainly very few were ready for.