Midwest Nice

And then came Trump!

WW R1 - no shit right? LOL! SO TRUE.

Oh my GOD that guy is fuckin hot. AND we get a shot of his feet. Holy hell. Absolute perfection. I’m going to be checking out everything else he’s done now. WOOF.

And as for the “Midwestern nice” shtick, yes it’s accurate, even to my hometown area, which is in western Pennsylvania (not Pittsburgh) but indistinguishable from the sort of typical MI/WI/etc. brand of Midwestern quirkiness, etc.

That is a Wisconsin accent, if I knew better. Lol

OP must live in WeHo or the westside. Living elsewhere in LA (Silverlake, Northeast LA, Pasadena) people always help each other. FYI, I’m from the east coast, so manners aren’t geographically exclusive.

Yes, very typical of my WI hometown. People always did stuff like shoveling a neighbor's walk ("because I was out there anyway"), bringing the neighbors produce from their gardens or cookies they'd baked, etc.

I've now lived in NYC for 25+ years, but my sister and her family live in suburban Minneapolis and it's still that way—they and their neighbors are always helping each other out with yard work, rides to the airport, emergency kid and/or pet sitting, blah blah. And everyone looks out for the old people in the neighborhood. My sister and her kids often cooked or baked for a (now-deceased) couple in their 90s, and I think the whole neighborhood pitched in to make sure their grass was mowed, sidewalks shoveled, etc. Last time I visited, my sister and I were in her car when she spotted an elderly neighbor with dementia out walking by herself. She immediately turned around to track the woman down and return her to her house and caregiver husband. Pretty sure anyone else in the neighborhood would have done the same.

I've lived in S. and N. CA (not WeHo) and the East Coast, and no, it's not the same and it's something more than "manners".

I was born & raised in Central IL. People are more polite throughout The Midwest, but ultimately just as rotten as New Yorkers, Los Angeles residents, etc. They just go about their backstabbing differently. But those manners seem more civilized and go a long way in making people feel comfortable.

The first big city I moved to when I left IL was Washington, DC. I was immediately made to feel "weird" for smiling at strangers, saying "Hello" and attempting to be helpful. It didn't take long for me to drop "The Nice Shit" and become just as mean, suspicious and stone-faced as everyone else.

Give me a NYer telling you to fuck off to your face and absolutely having your back in a crisis over any passive-aggressive walk-shoveler trying to shame you into servitude. Midwesterners are the least good people in America. Look how they vote. .

Okay but can we PLEASE get back to talking about what a HOT MOTHERFUCKIN STUD Charlie is. Head to toes, that is a real man. And that intense furrowing of his brow that he does—I’m gonna need a pregnancy test here pretty soon after this marathon I’m doing here on his YouTube channel.

He reminds me of a Michigander friend of mine, same hair, similar accent. hot trim body, off the charts masculine charisma. Sublime.

R9 is the typical New Yorker. Take from that what you will.

We’re just good hearted neighborly folk! We’ll help you keep the sidewalks clean.

R9 is a fucking idiot who knows nothing about the Midwest and apparently lost his humanity a long time ago, too.

We're just kindly people who keep to ourselves but will definitely have your back in an emergency.

@r4, "That is a Wisconsin accent, if I knew better. Lol "

You betcha, don'cha know? I'm from Chicago, but now live in Wisconsin and this guy has nailed it. Politeness to the point of annoying and the small talk, oh that lame small talk about absolutely nothing.

My own neighborhood was like this in Western NY in the 60s/70s but I thought we just had a nice neighborhood; I didn't realize it was a Great Lakes regional thing.

Charlie is such a good guy, and you can tell he’s a progressive. All throughout his videos this past year, he sneaks in little bits about COVID and the election. He keeps it non-partisan but you can draw your own conclusions from his “PSAs”.

Can you imagine what it must be like to have him lying on top of you and grinding his pelvis against yours while his wavy hair tickles the side of your face and neck as you clasp your arms tightly around him and he grunts and breathes heavily into your ear?

new yorkers can be aggressive and hostile "ya fuckin' asshole!"... but also very friendly and open..."how ya doin'? what's goin' on wi' yo?"

When I moved to London from NYC I really had to learn to shut down. In NYC I used to talk to strangers all day long. Waiting for the elevator, little chats with people..on the bus, in the coffee shops. London. ZIP.

Los Angeles as well. Very open and friendly..."hey, gurl!"

That Mike Pence is a good solid midwestern Christian. Salt of the earth, you might say! Family values.

It seems to be related to the famous niceness of Canada. It must be a cross-border thing.

The idiots bringing politics into this haven't got a fucking clue. None of this has anything to do with how one votes.

Midwesterners tend to have a lot of Germanic and Nordic (e.g. Swedish, Scandi) genes. It's in their blood to lean towards some quirky form of village-mindset softcore socialism. You can take the boy out of Scandinavia, but you can't take the Scandinavia out of the boy.

Midwesterners don't even realise it themselves (and they'll balk at any mention of Friedrich Engels and they'll spend their whole lives trying to embrace Ayn Rand because it's the ethos of their new country), but deep-deep down they're intrinsically predisposed to be a bit commie-lite, their North European ancestors were bred & conditioned for this for generations.

As one famous German named Karl M. once said: "From each according to his Ability - to each according to his Needs" (German: "Jeder nach seinen Fähigkeiten, jedem nach seinen Bedürfnissen"). Applying this principle to practice: if you have the ability to help your village-mate Hans - then git yer ass off the couch and help your village-mate Hans - "for the common good".

The first softcore proto-socialist movement in Europe was created by the Germanic Anabaptists (a non-Protestant Christian denomination, ancestors of the Midwestern Mennonites). They were persecuted during the "German Peasants' Revolt" and fled to the U.S. Most settled in the Midwest. Charlie Berens has a German / Dutch surname, so he fits in.

But the thing about the Germanic/Scandi Anabaptists is that their communal-istic mindset was quite insular and cliquey - they were expected to be helpful and altruistic towards "their own" ("sharing is caring"), but they wouldn't necessarily extend the same favours to an "outsider" or different village. I think remnants of this ancestral philosophy still remain in some pockets of the Midwest.

Absolutely crawling with MAGATS

Illinois, Wisconsin, Michigan, Minnesota, all blue. It's not the Midwest that's the political problem in this country. It's the South and the Plains states.

Lived in Buffalo area for 10+ years. This over the top niceness wasn't always a thing, although we did have neighbors that would plow your driveway for you in winters without you asking, which was always very much appreciated. generally, people knew their neighbors and would look out for them, but not over the top shit as in the video. Again, Buffalo area and not Wisconsin. I'm moving back after the new year. i'm tired of the wildfires, power shutoffs and expense of the west coast. i'll miss it but family is the bigger draw now.

R22 There's something to this but I think the cold weather probably has lots to do with it. The Western New York neighborhood I grew up in was mostly Jewish, Greek and Irish. Not sure why frosty New England isn't "nice".

[quote] Illinois, Wisconsin, Michigan, Minnesota, all blue.

Somewhat correlates with the number of Scandi descendants & influence of Germanic/Norse communal culture. Makes sense. Most forms of hybrid-socialism originated precisely from Germanic village culture & Germanic philosophers.

As mentioned, Scandi/Germanic ethnics aren't "crimson-red commies", but deep-down they still have a subconscious ancestral-heritage instinct to turn "pink".

Mmmm... This Charlie fellow... Any verificatia of sizemeat? He's indeed quite the scrumptious snack.

The 4-way stop is so true, in Wisconsin if you get 4 cars at a stop at the same time you all will be there until next Tuesday trying to get the others to go first

[quote]Any verificatia of sizemeat?

You go first, Mary

[quote] Not sure why frosty New England isn't "nice".

Too much old-school Imperial British influence, R26. They may have thrown the tea overboard and declared "independence" - but they were still mostly cocky British descendants in terms of culture, the highfalutin' ancestral attitude was still ingrained in the psyche:

[quote] Massachusetts is one of the least friendly states, survey finds. And the rest of New England isn't far behind. [...] The survey blames the low ranking on the “proudness” and “stubborness” of the New Hampshire locals.

I find Charlie oddly hot, after fucking you for hours he'll go out and rake your leaves

OMG, Charlie in New York, too funny

He is so hot, he needs to ease up on it a little actually, I’m getting all wound up over it. He has nice biceps and a little chest fur and longish armpit hairs. And he’s tall and of German or Dutch descent, so you can pretty much bank on a big hog between his hairy legs.

Also has been married to a blond women for a few years; they were together for a few years before that, too.

[quote] Also has been married to a blond women for a few years

A blonde? In Wisconsin? No way!

Btw, I think "bottle-blonde". Her eyebrows & natural hair are the same colour as Berens' hair - light brown. Though I know some hair stylists who call this shade "dark blonde".

I’m from Buffalo originally and have lived in New England for more than 30 years. I actually found true Bostonians approachable and quirky. A lot of the attitude in New England comes from trashier elements from outside the city. Those Islanders are parochial and unfriendly.

Whenever I go back to Buffalo I am quite astounded by the “niceness“ of people. It’s not just the helpfulness but the willingness to engage on almost every level. Some people find it obnoxious to have a five minute conversation with the cashier at the grocery store but it has its charms .I know many big city people, and especially Europeans, react to this effort to engage as bizarre but it’s just another cultural quirk. In fact I’ve always found it hypocritical of people from big cities and Europe who say one of the great things about living where they do is a mix of cultures. Then they go to small places throughout the US and find a culture too much to bear. (See the soda vs. pop debate.)

*Rhode Islanders*

[quote] A lot of the attitude in New England comes from trashier elements from outside the city.

Not to derail, R36, but this is similar to what I and others have said about Florida. Most of the crazy and trashy behavior comes from transplants, and I hate that others are so willing to believe that my state is a freak show because of them.

Thank you, now back to the Midwest topic.

Its not real. Its PC for passive aggressive, ESPECIALLY in Wisconsin and Minnesota. So many rude people in both states. However, I traveled all across Iowa and just met the nicest people everywhere.

[quote] The idiots bringing politics into this haven't got a fucking clue. None of this has anything to do with how one votes.

Exactly. Further, no one is arguing that Midwesterners are better or genuinely nicer than people in other areas of the country, just confirming that the video parodies actual Midwestern traits. Whatever you want to make of it, the over-the-top neighborliness is for real.

[quote]Not to derail, [R36], but this is similar to what I and others have said about Florida. Most of the crazy and trashy behavior comes from transplants, and I hate that others are so willing to believe that my state is a freak show because of them.

But who ARE the true Floridians. I've had no sense of them when I've visited. Whereas NYC (& L.A.) which are also invaded -the natives and native culture is very strong...especially NYC, due to the accent. Do Floridians even have an accent?

Iowa: Trump-53 Biden 44

I am forever grateful that I grew up in the Midwest (ILL/Minn/South & North Dakota). Primarily because people were generally so nice, friendly and helpful. Been in NYC for 30 plus years now but I still use Sir/Ma'am/Miss when addressing strangers and offer to help if I see someone struggling with something.

I also need to point out that when the shit does go down (9-11/Blackouts etc.) NYers absolutely step up to the plate and help each other out.

[quote] Iowa: Caligula - 53, Nero - 44.

FIFY, R42.

Well, I'm from the lower east side of NYC, and we work together all the time. Recently, there was this homeless guy who pooped on the sidewalk, and me and my neighbors all got together and beat the shit out of him.

I hope all of you realize that this video is an exaggerated parody. Most people in the Midwest tend to be nice to people in general but not this nice, but we also have our share of jerks, bigots and assholes. I have shoveled the snow off neighbors sidewalks and snow blown their driveways, had neighbors bring me desserts just because they thought I would enjoy it, they have dug up crab grass in my yard and reseeded while they were doing their own. I have cleaned out the outside part of their dryer exhaust that was clogged with lint while I was doing my own, I share my homegrown tomatoes with the people on each side of me and put extra out by the mailbox with a free sign. It much nicer to have friendly neighbors than unfriendly neighbors. The important thing is to not over do it and be a pest and don't expect anything in return.

Western NY is NOT the midwest.

They sound identical tho

@r47,Yeah, it is. I live in Wisconsin and have family in Buffalo, their values, attitude and priorities are very similar. Maybe it's a Great Lakes thing, but cities that line the lakes are very similar

I'm from the Midwest and have lived in NYC for 20 years as an adult. People in the Midwest can be extremely nice, but they can also be extremely unkind. East coasters are often not very nice, but underneath it they are kind and compassionate people in a way Midwesterners morally object to.

Shoveling someone's sidewalk is the ultimate aggressively nice tactic. Low stakes, improves the neighborhood as a whole, sets you up to have a favor in return coming when you need something, helps keep up the "Everything is wonderful!" illusion but once they're done they go inside and talk about everything their neighbor does that they disapprove of. If their neighbor knocked on their door because they were having a domestic situation, I suspect the neighbors would be far less welcoming and consider it none of their business and not want to get involved.

I grew up in New England. Native New Englanders tend to be a bit frosty but generally polite. We hated the rudeness and aggressiveness of New Yorkers or New Jerseyites.

You have to know how to approach New Englanders. I've lived in the Midwest for about 30 years. The people are nice and friendly. It makes daily living a lot more pleasant. In a crisis, they do rally around each other, too. A friend of mine came back to New England with me to visit. I taught her how to be polite but somewhat distant. It worked better than when she was overwhelming them with her niceness. By the end of the week, the New Englanders she met were slowly opening up to her.

I've always felt like in New England, you had to work slowly and earn a friendship but it lasts. In the Midwest, people want to be your best friend right away, but then will move on quickly to someone else when they're no longer getting from you what they want. But there are genuinely nice people in both areas.

Very cute guy. Nice feet! And yes, he appears to be from Wisconsin (flash of the Packers logo at the end).

Those things mentioned in the video can all be Midwest Nice but I also thought (and learned from years living in WI) that there's a second layer to Midwestern or Minnesota Nice, which is: unfailingly polite on the surface, but often only surface deep. A layer of passive aggressiveness to it.

I'm not talking about some of what's shown in the video - helping a neighbor is just nice - but more in the questions people ask, the way they talk to you. In the end, if you aren't from there, you get a polite moment or two of them humoring you by feigning interest, but nothing will ever be as interesting to them as themselves.

As most on the thread have pointed out, there are good people and assholes everywhere. I think the bland suburban sprawl kind of places encourage the kind of disconnect from your neighbors where every man is his own castle.....but if you are lucky to be in a neighborhood where people work together, city or suburb, then you'll find nice people.

[quote] I've always felt like in New England, you had to work slowly and earn a friendship but it lasts

As someone who grew up in Western PA, I can vouch for this. People are not often emotionally demonstrative. Visitors from other part of the country were often shocked at how curt employees seemed at, say, a grocery checkout. I used to joke that if you got two grunts instead of one, it meant "thank you."

But if you break through the ice, that person will give you a fucking kidney. (No, really - a cousin of mine met the chef in a nearby restaurant who needed a kidney and fucking gave him one.)

Yes, I grew up in a small town in Michigan then moved to Boston after college. I felt people in Boston confused kindness with weakness.

I lived in the Boston area for 8 years then moved to Portland, OR. Boston never felt like home where Oregon did from the moment I landed.

[quote] But the thing about the Germanic/Scandi Anabaptists is that their communal-istic mindset was quite insular and cliquey - they were expected to be helpful and altruistic towards "their own" ("sharing is caring"), but they wouldn't necessarily extend the same favours to an "outsider" or different village. I think remnants of this ancestral philosophy still remain in some pockets of the Midwest.

This explains a lot. I believe the Midwest is probably the worst region in America for black people. I think Wisconsin has the highest incarceration rate for black people. Or maybe it's Iowa? Don't remember. And according to education test scores, the midwest is the worst place to be a black student.

[quote] It's not the Midwest that's the political problem in this country. It's the South and the Plains states.

Unfortunately, Midwest is such a broad term, it includes the great plains. And the great plains are SO conservative. But the Upper Midwest plus Chicago is the third best region of the country next to the west and east coasts.

Wisconsin is definitely very insular and very, very racist.

[quote] I hope all of you realize that this video is an exaggerated parody.

No, I'm sure nobody on this thread came to this conclusion. You are the only one.

That's why we need Pete as Prez. He's so genuinely nice! Chasten too.

"But they were still mostly cocky British descendants in terms of culture, the highfalutin' ancestral attitude was still ingrained in the psyche"

This is ridiculous. The vast majority of Brits are not aristocrats in the first place, so there is no "ancestral attitude" among British people on the whole. Also it was middle-class, anti-classist Puritans who settled New England.

No offense, but really you sound like a college student full of left-wing stereotypes.

I live in the most unfriendly area of the world—Washington DC , which is populated mainly by midwestern transplants. It’s not a good mix. Native Black Washingtonians are nice and warm, but the white transplants are horrible. It may be because the types of people who want to be politically influential or make money from being so are not a naturally kind type of people.

R60, is full of shit. I lived in the Washington, DC Area for years. Montgomery County to be exact. There's absolutely NOTHING nice, warm & fuzzy about the Native DC / Baltimore Blacks! NOTHING!!!!!

With that said, no one else is friendly either.

[quote]Those things mentioned in the video can all be Midwest Nice but I also thought (and learned from years living in WI) that there's a second layer to Midwestern or Minnesota Nice, which is: unfailingly polite on the surface, but often only surface deep. A layer of passive aggressiveness to it.

Yes, "Minnesota Nice" is more of a pejorative than a compliment.

[R61] Ha I know what you mean. I lived in Southeast DC and the little old church ladies were so nice though! I made the mistake of being pressured into going to Easter services and was stuck there for hours on end. Couldn’t get out of that place until sunset.

Yes, we are nice in the Great Lakes Region. (I prefer that to 'Midwest'). I remember reading the Lake Woebegon stories by Garrison Keillor and not being sure if he was making fun of us or celebrating us.

[quote]Wisconsin is definitely very insular and very, very racist.

Obviously not a UW alumni...

[Quote] unfailingly polite on the surface, but often only surface deep.

I'll take it.

Any more than that is a relationship.

I was doing technical support for a guy in D.C and he said "Where are you located?" I told him Kansas City Missouri and he said "Well I knew it wasn't D.C., you sound so happy.

[quote] "But they were still mostly cocky British descendants in terms of culture, the highfalutin' ancestral attitude was still ingrained in the psyche"

[quote] This is ridiculous. The vast majority of Brits are not aristocrats in the first place, so there is no "ancestral attitude" among British people on the whole.

R59, the only thing that is “ridiculous” is your lack of basic reading comprehension skills. I said British ancestral attitutude is [italic]cocky[/italic] (and that’s the gospel truth), I didn’t say it was “aristocratic”. “Aristocratic” means refined, upper-class, etc. “Cocky” means self-important, hubristic (I’m talking about this historic sentiment: “Rule, Britannia! Britannia, rule the waves! Britons never, never, never shall be slaves / The nations not so blest as thee / Must, in their turn, to tyrants fall / While thou shalt flourish great and free / The dread and envy of them all.”)

And it was this cocksure, casually supremacist attitude that spurred Brits to take over one-quarter of the planet.

[quote] Also it was middle-class, anti-classist Puritans who settled New England.

You can take the boy out of the British Empire, but you can’t take the British Empire out of the boy. They grew up in a ‘high-and-mighty’ Empire - and ironically (despite their attempts to follow Calvinist principles) ended up by instinct re-creating good ol’ Imperial, supremacist traditions in emigration: taking over the continent’s best fertile land, slowly but surely pushing their domain to stretch from coast to coast, pushing out the ‘inferior’ pagan locals futher & further, persecuting the pesky Quakers, instituting internal witch-hunts.) They emigrated from an Empire - and ended up creating a similar, but even bigger Empire.

As for “middle-class” - well, depends what you mean by “middle-class”. It sounds average now, but it wasn’t average back then. In that time period most of the planet didn’t even have much of a middle-class. The majority of the world was still feudal (illiterate rural peasants living hand-to-mouth, under the protection of military clans). The main places which had a “middle-class” were big land-grab Empires where commerce was booming.

As for “anti-classist” - well, again, depends on the defintion. The Puritans tried to follow Calvinism’s egalitarian beliefs. But the Puritans ended up clashing with many “classes” of people, again, because of their British ancestral culture (which in turn mimicked Rome’s Imperial culture). For example, Britain (as a former colony of Rome) adopted Rome’s legal doctrine of “Terra Nullius” ("Nobody’s Land"). When Brits landed anywhere on the planet (be it Australia or New England) and noticed that some land plots e.g. weren’t used annually by locals or were in communal ownership (i.e. had no individual owner) - the British-type [italic]Imperialistic[/italic] property doctrine automatically allowed them to ‘legally’ claim the land ‘as vacant’ and take it for the Crown or for themselves. (It’s a bit similar to Britain’s ongoing squattor rule).

John Winthrop (a Puritan lawyer and one of the leaders of the Massachusetts Bay Colony) said: “As for the Natives in New England, they enclose no land, neither have any settled habitation, nor any tame cattle to improve the land, and so have no other but a Natural Right to those countries, so as if we leave them sufficient for their use, we may lawfully TAKE THE REST”.

The Puritans wanted to follow Jesus of Nazareth's ascetic lifestyle - but they still couldn’t get ingrained British Imperialism out of their DNA.

^^... and all that led to Charlie being a nice, funny midwestern comedian

Don'cha know?