I was part of the FFA. Went to national conventions in Kentucky. Still have my royal blue and corn gold corduroy jacket from high school. *And* I'm from Southside Chicago.
You were saying?
Once, when my youngest was 2, I spent a single night in Indiana.
He is now 7, and asks every few months whether we remember “that time Mom lived in Indiana”(like any South Sider, he pronounces “Indiana” with tremendous disdain).
Best of luck erasing the stain from your soul.
Don't worry. Indiana is cool. When the bombs fall and America becomes a radioactive wasteland, we'll make sure everything west of the Dunes is safely inside our Perimeter Wall. Can't let those super mutants - sorry, *Missourians* - get their hands on our fresh water, now, can we?
>When the bombs fall
Some vaguely related history you might find interesting.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nike_Missile_Site_C-47#Chicago%E2%80%93Gary_Defense_Area
This is where stories about "nuclear missiles under the Museum of Science and Industry" come from. The missiles were actually in Jackson Park just south of the museum and some were nuclear-*capable* but not necessarily nuclear-tipped. All to protect the US steel industry from Soviet bombers flying down Lake Michigan.
I think they mean someone gave them grief because of their Berwyn location tag, as if someone in a suburb in cook county shouldn’t have a say on a cook county election
I can guarantee anyone giving you grief has nothing else going for them than living in Chicago proper. Literally nobody but these weird pockets of people from Chicago, cares. It’s all Chicago to the rest of the world.
Side comment, I was bar hopping up north a few years back and was lucky to witness a someone getting kicked out of a spot yelling “bitch I’m from Naperville!” At security.
Me and my ex literally lol’d at that shit. I still don’t know what to make of it tbh
The Chicago residents that get most worked up about this are transplants. Additionally, how many suburbs were annexed to be part of Chicago? Do they count? The number of suburbs that incorporated between 1890-1893 shows how real that push to incorporate as far south as Lincoln Highway was.
Edit for grammar and:
Chicago literally doubled its geographic size and population by annexing Hyde Park Township to claim its larger than Philadelphia and get the 1893 worlds fair. Dolton, Riverdale, Tinley Park, Chicago Heights…1892. Homewood is 1893, Harvey is 1891.
I’ve been saying this forever. The transplants, especially the ones who didn’t even grow up in Illinois, are the *worst* about gatekeeping the entire Chicagoland area.
I was born in Chicago Heights and grew up in that area and other surrounding burbs. I’ve spent a lot of time working and hanging out all around the entire metro area. I grew up watching Chicago sports and news. I have used Chicago public transit (Metra and CTA) my entire life. All of my field trips were in and around the city. My job is in the city. I have family in the city. *All* of this and I still get told that I’m “not from Chicago” when I tell people that I’m from *Chicagoland*.
One of my old fraternity brothers was giving me shit after he moved here because he said that I have “no right to claim Chicago.” I never claimed Chicago proper anyway, I claimed Chicagoland, but it doesn’t matter anyway because he moved here a few years ago _FROM OHIO_ where he was born and lived for 23 years.
I personally don’t enjoy city life, so I chose to stay out here where I can mind my own business, but I support everyone who does live downtown and tend to share the same politics as those who do. I think that gatekeeping a city is absolutely ridiculous and is something that only transplants really give a shit about. Not to mention the division that it causes amongst the people who live close enough to have an impact on each other’s lives.
> I’ve been saying this forever. The transplants, especially the ones who didn’t even grow up in Illinois, are the worst about gatekeeping the entire Chicagoland area.
I think that's because they don't have family here, or ties to many of the areas they're making fun of. The people who are from Chicago and have family all over the suburbs spend time in those places and usually see that there are pros and cons to both the city and the most boring of the suburbs.
My kids are the 5th generation of my family born in the city of Chicago. My great grandpa was a mobster era city of Chicago cop. But my parents moved to the suburbs when they got married so I mostly grew up in the suburbs. I have aunts, uncles, cousins and in-laws scattered everywhere around Chicagoland. My in laws are from a farm way out west, my grandma lived on the south side, my parents are on the west side. I have cousins on the north shore. My wife has family in Naperville.
I don't typically make fun of any of them specifically because I'd be making fun of someplace where I spend a lot of time in visiting family.
Everyone that I've met that has a Chicago flag tattoo or some knockoff version with the red stars has been someone that didn't grow up here. "I'm from Michigan but I got a tattoo of Mayor Richard M. Daley on my back and The Bean on my chest!"
>I think that's because they don't have family here, or ties to many of the areas they're making fun of.
It is because they grew up in a suburb and now not being in a suburb is a core part of their identity. Ironically, most of them will be headed back to the burns within a few years of having kids.
I don't think that's the kind of transplant OP was talking about. It's the people who moved to Chicago from out of town and have never been to the suburbs who seem to gate keep the worst. I grew up in a suburb but my grandparents and great grandparents lived in the city and now I live back in the city. I have ties to both so I try not to make either place my whole identity.
Hey heights buddy. I started my deep dive of Chicago Southland suburbs and documenting cool architecture because of that city. I taught at Trail for a handful of years. What an absolutely wild ride that was.
Hey heights friend 👋🏼
The far south suburbs have a lot to offer, so I love that you’re documenting a lot of it! I’m going to have to do a deep dive on your page now lol Also, if you haven’t already, you should swing by Zarlengo’s. That’s my favorite ice cream spot in the area
I’ve been!
I don’t work out that way anymore and live on the opposite end of south Cook County in Lemont, but I am out fairly nearby a few times a month hosting history tours at Thornton Distilling. I still stop by to take some photos of Euclid or east side houses =]
Many of us native city-limits dwellers were dicks about it too. My friends and I talked shit about "suburbanites" even though we grew up a 10-minute walk from the border with Niles!
This. The gatekeeping from out of state transplants is really annoying. “You dont live in Chicago now!!!” Who. Cares!! Does your two years of living in Chicago now really trump a person who grew up there for 20 and moved to the collar counties? SMH just stop with the bullshit already.
Yep.
And as far north as Gurnee was a 312 area code when I was a kid.
Only then was it 708... And then 847.
All before I went to college when my mother's house was in Gurnee.
We're all fucking from Chicago when we're not IN the city limits whole in a conversation.
Same way people act in Florida after 5 short years
Isn't that the rub? Chicago*land* != Chicago so people who claim otherwise one way or the other are those OP is discussing in this meme. There's no shame in saying one is from Chicagoland
I'd be cool with someone just saying from they're from the "Chicago area". "Chicagoland" just sounds awkward to me. Even if it's mentioned in carpet and used car commercials.
It's true, I got into a near-yelling match with AT&T because they claimed an offer for people residing in Chicagoland didn't apply to me as a suburbanite. The offer was on a poster in the Lombard store I was at 😆
Chicago at one point liked annexing townships, and Western divides several: Worth-Calumet, Bremen-Thornton, Rich-Bloom, Monee-Crete, etc, or how Chicago annexed to 138th instead of the water boundary. Hyde Park Township extended to 138th, but west of Halsted there’s a three block jog and 135th stays the township divider all the way through Plainfield and beyond.
That three block jog screws things up in the south suburbs, too. It’s 159th Street from Lockport to Calumet City, but it’s 162nd in South Holland, despite that being collinear to the other towns mentioned.
Worth Township’s official boundaries are so weird looking. Seeing old Cicero Township maps is kinda neat.
Worth township—are those areas in Chicago automatically removed from worth township when they were annexed to Chicago? Like all other properties are part of towns and townships. And is that one exclave legally part of worth township? Looks like a cemetery (part of a much there)
I’m very curious about the 3 street gap there. Makes no sense why it is like that
Chicago doesn’t have townships anymore. The entire purpose of townships was to provide satellite offices within a 6x6mi mile square (usually) to make it quicker to process legal documents and pay taxes when you didn’t live in the county capital.
I’m pretty sure the Indian Boundary Lines have something to do with it. It causes Thornton Townships northwest corner to not be a normal right angle, too
> The Chicago residents that get most worked up about this are transplants.
Yeah, especially transplants from the suburbs. But it kinda makes sense.
I grew up in the Willowbrook/Burr Ridge area. After college, it seemed like all of my friends from high school either moved to Chicago or moved to Naperville, because they do have a night life scene, it's just as someone who (clearly) chose Chicago, just feels small compared to all that you have here. They, on the other hand, talk about the price of Chicago and the perceived worse crime here and, because the distance is just far enough away to not really hang out together all that often, it all happens online, where people act more inflamed than they probably actually feel.
The further I get away from that age, the less I care. It's a really dumb argument, people can do what they want.
Disagree hard, the people who say only transplants care, are usually transplants themselves.
Grew up in Chicago, went to Whitney Young, and every Chicagoan I knew would check suburbanites/people from Indiana hard if they tried to pull that “I’m from Chicago” BS.
What? It was in 1889, why would it blow anyone's mind, specifically transplants? No one alive "remembers" when it was a suburb. Most people know cities don't start out giant, they grow. Would the fact that Chicago used to be inhabited by the Potawatomi blow the minds of Chicago natives?
Yeah, kinda. Chicago had literally just doubled in size and population with Hyde Park, not to mention Lake and everything north and west happening. Water and sewage was a big deal for some municipalities. Getting paved roads and public transit was a big deal for others.
I went to grab a map to share with you and found this:
https://chicagology.com/population/
I grew up there. I think it’s basically a few things
- It’s one of the largest suburbs in terms of population and geographic area, and it’s also fairly wealthy and conservative, so it kind of has a culture of its own in a way that smaller suburbs don’t.
- That culture is very much “we’re the best! Magazines say we’re the best city in America!, We have the best schools, the best downtown, the best people. Joe Naper was the best founder too! Gosh I bet you wish you could live in Naperville too, huh?”
Moved here in 2020 and yeah, 57% blue. Far cry from our time in the city proper, but these comments would make you think it’s Wheaton. https://www.bestplaces.net/voting/city/illinois/naperville
It’s just far af from the city. I think the people there are nicer than say those from Hinsdale or the rich burbs up north. If anything “old Naperville” people have been complaining about all the new people moving in for years. A lot of the new people seem to be from closer to the city, but that part doesn’t get talked about lol
They claim to be from the city, claim our culture/traditions, etc simultaneously harboring this attitude of “god, live in Chicago? I could never” and give Chicago shit about crime, housing costs, etc
Hating on suburbs is just a common pastime for many big city folks. Naperville-Aurora is the biggest suburb so it gets more exposure.
Many people think of Naperville as a ultra wealthy sundown town but that perception is outdated. These days you see lots of East & South Asians there, some Hispanics too. None of the richest people I know live there - it's not cheap but it's no Winnetka or Glencoe. Median household income is around $70k.
It's boring but is an ok place for middle class families to raise young children. That demographic doesn't overlap much with this subreddit.
FYI it's similar on the LA subreddit, except instead of hating people from the suburbs (LA is mostly a collection of suburbs) it's people from out of state hating people from out of state, specifically from the midwest.
Hemingway would’ve said wide lawns and narrow minds
I grew up in Naperville and I thought we were fairly poor because our house only had two stories. Friends got a Lexus for their 16th birthday, that kind of thing.
>I grew up in Naperville and I thought we were fairly poor because our house only had two stories. Friends got a Lexus for their 16th birthday, that kind of thing.
Depending the time frame you grew up in Naperville, this was the average household. Those getting the new cars were not the average but screen more because they got new stuff and attracted attention. I grew up there too and felt very similar fwiw. When I older I looked at some accessable days via the library and realized there was more families like mine than I thought. What I was really surprised about was the diversity of cultures across Naperville: Indian, different east Asian's, some Pacific islanders, some pockets of African culture, Hispanic and Latin cultures, small pocket of Brazilian/South America cultures and European/white. Naperville gets a lot of shit here for being white and racist when it's a lot less white than Geneva, Batavia, Elmhurst, Hinsdale and some other areas. It at least has a objectively good downtown and children programs.
>good American towns to raise kids in
It definitely is tbh. The whole ass town is basically built for families.
I could see some Google magic helping Naperville. When I visited a friend in Orange county, Ca and I mentioned Naperville every Asian I talked with knew where it was but far and few other folks knew. It was wild. A bunch said a relative lived there or did at one point.
> Naperville gets a lot of shit here for being white and racist when it's a lot less white than Geneva, Batavia, Elmhurst, Hinsdale and some other areas.
if this ain't the truth lol. naperville is for sure white and privileged, but it's nowhere close to the whitest or most privileged suburb of chicago.
Ya know I just got back from the dentist and my fucking mouth hurts like fuck but you just reminded me of something. Bear with me also fuck yeah Caleb we ready.
But I went to CPS k through 12 an all that shit, anyway there was this kid in high school, rich spoiled brat kid who's dad owned like a car wash or some shit like that, anyway this kids 16th birthday. A Camaro. In the mid 90s, in a Chicago public high school. This dumb ass kid really thought he was the shit but considering all of us took the bus an train to school we actually made fun of him. Look, the kid was an arrogant rich kid dickhead, still is, so it was warranted.
Anyway, point being, flash forward to 30 years later, kid is still a kid who swears he hit a triple but was born on third yada yada. Took over his dad's business, posts rabid Trump "just be born rich" type of shit, work hard and you can make it too! (As long as you are born rich and privileged!) was hilarious though few years ago this FB thread on a hs reunion, kid got taken down a notch. We all struggled as you were handed everything and then have the nerve to look down at others who weren't handed anything at all, Because there was nothing to be handed off period to us. Its like these rich kids have zero idea how lucky they were.
I made it because I actually did it, not because Mommy and Daddy handed me everything, Danny.
If you pay attention it's almost always people hating things that like 1 person said and them blaming everyone for. There is still a lot of new development so there are very few large trees and a lot of "perfect looking" homes with a lot of grass. Old trees tend to disrupt the grass/lawn.. and there are not a lot of old trees yet around houses.
Most of the development after 1990 was on former farm fields so there were no old trees to even cut down. Source: lived there during 90s through mid 00s.
It’s just Reddit. It’s fine. It’s a suburb. People just get annoyed because they so often claim they’re from Chicago and it’s really nowhere near the experience growing up
If you want a safe and normal place to live or raise a family it’s probably a good place to do so tbh
I mostly don’t mind people from the burbs claiming to be from Chicago because it gives a frame of reference when people ask where they’re from.
What I don’t like is when they claim to be from Chicago to try and look tough, or so they can sound like they know what they’re talking about when they parrot scaremongering Fox News headlines about the city. I live in another state now, and I’ve heard multiple people from Illinois tell me they were “from Chiraq”, and that did piss me off, especially when they turned out to be from Evanston or Lincolnwood or whatever.
This is obviously the correct answer and it’s annoying how many times this sub has to go round and round on it. If you are from the suburbs, and someone from elsewhere in the country asks where you are from, say Chicago, because few others know fucking Arlington Heights or wherever or Naperville, even. But when talking to a local, you say the suburb.
And yes, it does make you an asshole if you make big sweeping statements about the city when you don’t live in it. (Even if you do live in it and try to make over generalizations about ~3 million people, you are kind of an asshole but for a different reason.)
Been there dozens of times due to family. I have no problem with them until they ask when I'm going to "say enough is enough" re: crime and "grow up" to come out to the burbs. That mentality, which is not unique to Naperville, is the source of the suburbs hate
I lived there for 10 years and I very much think it sucks.
But yeah, it’s not especially bad. There’s like an invisible line when you cross from the pre-war suburbs to the post-war, car centric suburbs where they all suck, just to varying degrees. But at least Naperville has the train and a mildly walkable downtown.
Also there are plenty of places in Chicago city proper where you can't live without a car. They are car-dependent and yes... sub-urban, by the original meaning of the word. But we're never supposed to talk about that.
Boston proper is so tiny… they never went through the annexations like we did. A lot of Greater Boston is suburbs. Cambridge, Brookline all are very urbanized and basically on par with Boston in terms of development and density, if not name.
You think about Harvard or MIT as being in “Boston”, but they are not.
To be fair--as someone who's claimed both city and suburb citizenship--like 99% of the conversations you have with people not from your regional suburb direction have no idea where it is. After a hundred college conversations that end in "Winfield" "where's that?" "Like 30 miles west of Chicago" "oh you're from Chicago!" You kind of just give up. I recently had a conversation with someone from Libertyville that doesn't know where West Chicago is.
I’m a transplant from St Louis (1997). Imagine my surprise after living here for 10 years that there’s a North Chicago no where near Chicago. It took me a minute to realize west (side) Chicago and West Chicago were to VERY different things.
We heard so much Naperville hate when living in Chicago that we almost turned down our realtor who wanted to show us a Naperville house when we started house hunting. Guess who now lives in Naperville and loves it? It literally had EVERYTHING we were looking for, has a great downtown, and yes, there is still reasonably priced housing. Try saying that about the North Shore suburbs.
Don’t mind the transplants. This subreddit is filled with them and they’ll give you grief about being from the suburbs while they moved here from California or New York.
It's a transplant regional pastime. If I remember correctly, Logan square requires 3 instances of accusing someone of being from the suburbs or else you have move out of your 3 flat.
You also are suppose to make at least one comment about how mt greenwood is only cops
Someone from Naperville becomes a native Chicagoan the moment they eat somewhere in Pilsen. That's like the transplant bar mitzvah where you're now ready to get a city flag tattoo.
I have no idea what’s going on with this. I’m a transplant and the only time I leave city limits is on a plane from ohare. Don’t know anything about the suburbs and have no reason to hate on them. If you asked me to draw a map of Chicagoland, I could place Evanston and that’s about it.
I live near downtown Chicago. Don't own a car because it'd be expensive and unnecessary in such a dense urban area. When someone says "the best xxxx in Chicago is (insert Naperville/Aurora business here)" they'd might as well be recommending something in northern Milwaukee considering the time/money/effort it'd cost me to get there.
If you live in a suburb with cheaper real estate and a car you might think its easy enough to come down to the Loop and consider yourself a Chicagoan. But those of us living near downtown aren't going out to the suburbs when we're accustomed to having everything we need within a mile or two of downtown.
TL;DR: Suburbanites have more reasons to go to Chicago, and its more accessible to them. Chicagoans have less of a reason to go out to the less accessible suburbs.
I grew up in the city and now live in Naperville. Zero desire to move back
The city is there the few times a year I need it
I'm glad I didn't grow up here, though. These kids have zero street smarts
Don’t worry. As someone from Naperville we don’t care. We’re jealous of Lake Forest and Hinsdale, we don’t concern ourselves with what Wheaton or Bolingbrook thinks.
I'm so grateful that there's nothing on this Earth that makes me as angry as a $100% authentic Chicagoan who sees someone from Skokie say they're from "Chicago" while on vacation in Europe.
Weird thing to be upset about. Can't even conceive of it. Someone from a Paris or Rome or Lisbon suburb (yes they exist) wouldn't name whatever small random apartment block town they live in while vacationing, would they. Or if they did, you'd have preferred they just said the big city they live near in the first place. None of this matters the way you think it does
Hey, you guys let my transplant ass feel welcome regardless, so I'm happy to be here.
Everyone's from somewhere. I get how the suburbs work for some folks and it's kinda nice in small doses, but I moved to the city to be in the city. Had some friends I followed up here from OK just move out of town to try the homesteading thing downstate. It's definitely a different lifestyle, a bit cheaper, definitely more car-dependent, but they seem happy and I'm happy for them.
As someone from Indiana I just accept my lower class status.
We said you could be in this room, we didn’t say you could talk. Go back to the corner.
Go back to the corn-er
💀💀💀
Like, what are the mods even doing...just letting any old low class savage comment here? Sheesh....
Ahh, the Alabama of the North
I always describe Northwest Indiana as Chicago's Jersey Shore. (I'm a region rat)
Fellow Region Rat here, and god damnit, you're right 🤣
Indiana is just a Southern state that got lost in the Midwest.
Said by people who have never been to Kentucky
I was part of the FFA. Went to national conventions in Kentucky. Still have my royal blue and corn gold corduroy jacket from high school. *And* I'm from Southside Chicago. You were saying?
You're not wrong. Being a resident of NWI is *so* weird because of this. I identify much closer with Chicago than I ever will with Indiana, lol.
*Florida Alabama has slightly more chill
A few friends and I have started calling Florida “South Alabama”
I’ve always described Missouri as the Alabama of the north 🤣
I feel like they still deserve to be considered south. At least they have sorta southern accents.
Once, when my youngest was 2, I spent a single night in Indiana. He is now 7, and asks every few months whether we remember “that time Mom lived in Indiana”(like any South Sider, he pronounces “Indiana” with tremendous disdain). Best of luck erasing the stain from your soul.
Don't worry. Indiana is cool. When the bombs fall and America becomes a radioactive wasteland, we'll make sure everything west of the Dunes is safely inside our Perimeter Wall. Can't let those super mutants - sorry, *Missourians* - get their hands on our fresh water, now, can we?
You think we're annexing Gary when the bombs fall? Please.
“Wow this place got hit hard during the war!” “There was a war?”
Gary got hit so hard in the war its effects have flowed backward through time.
"what do you mean? That's just how Gary looks"
“This is Gary on a Tuesday!”
Gary Busey or Gary Coleman?
It'll be the prison ... 'Escape From New York' style ... not sure the name "Snake Pilsen" will work though.
*Snek* Pilsen
snake nation plisken
Not all ghouls are feral. Some can be good allys.
That's why we end up building the wall in the first place I'm pretty sure
>When the bombs fall Some vaguely related history you might find interesting. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nike_Missile_Site_C-47#Chicago%E2%80%93Gary_Defense_Area
This is where stories about "nuclear missiles under the Museum of Science and Industry" come from. The missiles were actually in Jackson Park just south of the museum and some were nuclear-*capable* but not necessarily nuclear-tipped. All to protect the US steel industry from Soviet bombers flying down Lake Michigan.
I am 50/50 Gary IN and Chicago. The Gary hate is definitely a drag, especially from folks that don’t even know what Miller Beach is
Those who know, know.
What happened to captains house???
Seriously though, that place was DEEE LISH UHSS.
For real. I was so sad to hear it wasn’t there anymore.
The airshows at Miller Beach are pretty dope!
I hate to inform you that Miller Beach is 100% full of suburbanites and Chicagoans in the summer. My friends and I used to be there all the time.
we welcome refugees from third world countries here in chicago. im just happy you made it out.
Think about it this way. As someone from Indiana you can find solace in the fact that you'll always be better than people from Naperville.
Unless you're from Carmel...
*Eagleton
If we're going to build a wall around somewhere why isn't it Naperville? It's not like anyone, who matters, would complain.
Yeah im basically here to see if anything cool is going on when I have to work late in the city
Honestly, Indiana is as much of a suburb as Naperville is
Same bro we Regionites are just the rodents in the wall lmao
Region Ratitude
I respect Indiana more than the North Shore. Source: parents moved us there for school. Never again.
You're a credit to your race.
Just stop trying so hard to be Florida fam
I was born and raised in Indiana and I couldn’t wait to gtfo
Hey, I’m here cause it was the only way I could afford to own my house.
For April fools the mods should make this into an East Chicago subreddit, and not allow anyone to talk about anything west of the IN border
At least you're not from Wisconsin!
LOL, someone gave me grief because I dared to comment on the *Cook County* State's Attorney race.
i might be misreading your meaning, but im fairly certain naperville isnt in cook county
I think they mean someone gave them grief because of their Berwyn location tag, as if someone in a suburb in cook county shouldn’t have a say on a cook county election
As my flair says, I live in Berwyn. Which is in Cook County.
https://youtu.be/axPtgcU7GYc?si=KOIvVguLOkk9b2gw
I can guarantee anyone giving you grief has nothing else going for them than living in Chicago proper. Literally nobody but these weird pockets of people from Chicago, cares. It’s all Chicago to the rest of the world.
Berwyn is, though
Side comment, I was bar hopping up north a few years back and was lucky to witness a someone getting kicked out of a spot yelling “bitch I’m from Naperville!” At security. Me and my ex literally lol’d at that shit. I still don’t know what to make of it tbh
If I had witnessed that in person that memory might have made it to the short list of possible last thoughts I’ll have before I die.
Hahaha. That is hilarious 😂
The Chicago residents that get most worked up about this are transplants. Additionally, how many suburbs were annexed to be part of Chicago? Do they count? The number of suburbs that incorporated between 1890-1893 shows how real that push to incorporate as far south as Lincoln Highway was. Edit for grammar and: Chicago literally doubled its geographic size and population by annexing Hyde Park Township to claim its larger than Philadelphia and get the 1893 worlds fair. Dolton, Riverdale, Tinley Park, Chicago Heights…1892. Homewood is 1893, Harvey is 1891.
I’ve been saying this forever. The transplants, especially the ones who didn’t even grow up in Illinois, are the *worst* about gatekeeping the entire Chicagoland area. I was born in Chicago Heights and grew up in that area and other surrounding burbs. I’ve spent a lot of time working and hanging out all around the entire metro area. I grew up watching Chicago sports and news. I have used Chicago public transit (Metra and CTA) my entire life. All of my field trips were in and around the city. My job is in the city. I have family in the city. *All* of this and I still get told that I’m “not from Chicago” when I tell people that I’m from *Chicagoland*. One of my old fraternity brothers was giving me shit after he moved here because he said that I have “no right to claim Chicago.” I never claimed Chicago proper anyway, I claimed Chicagoland, but it doesn’t matter anyway because he moved here a few years ago _FROM OHIO_ where he was born and lived for 23 years. I personally don’t enjoy city life, so I chose to stay out here where I can mind my own business, but I support everyone who does live downtown and tend to share the same politics as those who do. I think that gatekeeping a city is absolutely ridiculous and is something that only transplants really give a shit about. Not to mention the division that it causes amongst the people who live close enough to have an impact on each other’s lives.
> I’ve been saying this forever. The transplants, especially the ones who didn’t even grow up in Illinois, are the worst about gatekeeping the entire Chicagoland area. I think that's because they don't have family here, or ties to many of the areas they're making fun of. The people who are from Chicago and have family all over the suburbs spend time in those places and usually see that there are pros and cons to both the city and the most boring of the suburbs. My kids are the 5th generation of my family born in the city of Chicago. My great grandpa was a mobster era city of Chicago cop. But my parents moved to the suburbs when they got married so I mostly grew up in the suburbs. I have aunts, uncles, cousins and in-laws scattered everywhere around Chicagoland. My in laws are from a farm way out west, my grandma lived on the south side, my parents are on the west side. I have cousins on the north shore. My wife has family in Naperville. I don't typically make fun of any of them specifically because I'd be making fun of someplace where I spend a lot of time in visiting family.
Everyone that I've met that has a Chicago flag tattoo or some knockoff version with the red stars has been someone that didn't grow up here. "I'm from Michigan but I got a tattoo of Mayor Richard M. Daley on my back and The Bean on my chest!"
“Ya GHOTTA SEE THE BEAN”
>I think that's because they don't have family here, or ties to many of the areas they're making fun of. It is because they grew up in a suburb and now not being in a suburb is a core part of their identity. Ironically, most of them will be headed back to the burns within a few years of having kids.
I don't think that's the kind of transplant OP was talking about. It's the people who moved to Chicago from out of town and have never been to the suburbs who seem to gate keep the worst. I grew up in a suburb but my grandparents and great grandparents lived in the city and now I live back in the city. I have ties to both so I try not to make either place my whole identity.
I should have specified, but I don't necessarily mean a Chicago suburb.
Hey heights buddy. I started my deep dive of Chicago Southland suburbs and documenting cool architecture because of that city. I taught at Trail for a handful of years. What an absolutely wild ride that was.
Hey heights friend 👋🏼 The far south suburbs have a lot to offer, so I love that you’re documenting a lot of it! I’m going to have to do a deep dive on your page now lol Also, if you haven’t already, you should swing by Zarlengo’s. That’s my favorite ice cream spot in the area
I’ve been! I don’t work out that way anymore and live on the opposite end of south Cook County in Lemont, but I am out fairly nearby a few times a month hosting history tours at Thornton Distilling. I still stop by to take some photos of Euclid or east side houses =]
They make the best Italian Ice I've had anywhere. So glad they're still around!
Many of us native city-limits dwellers were dicks about it too. My friends and I talked shit about "suburbanites" even though we grew up a 10-minute walk from the border with Niles!
This. The gatekeeping from out of state transplants is really annoying. “You dont live in Chicago now!!!” Who. Cares!! Does your two years of living in Chicago now really trump a person who grew up there for 20 and moved to the collar counties? SMH just stop with the bullshit already.
Yep. And as far north as Gurnee was a 312 area code when I was a kid. Only then was it 708... And then 847. All before I went to college when my mother's house was in Gurnee. We're all fucking from Chicago when we're not IN the city limits whole in a conversation. Same way people act in Florida after 5 short years
Isn't that the rub? Chicago*land* != Chicago so people who claim otherwise one way or the other are those OP is discussing in this meme. There's no shame in saying one is from Chicagoland
I'd be cool with someone just saying from they're from the "Chicago area". "Chicagoland" just sounds awkward to me. Even if it's mentioned in carpet and used car commercials.
Yeah, I think "Chicagoland" only even makes sense to people from Illinois.
It's true, I got into a near-yelling match with AT&T because they claimed an offer for people residing in Chicagoland didn't apply to me as a suburbanite. The offer was on a poster in the Lombard store I was at 😆
"Western Avenue" and "North Avenue", were once city boundaries...
Chicago at one point liked annexing townships, and Western divides several: Worth-Calumet, Bremen-Thornton, Rich-Bloom, Monee-Crete, etc, or how Chicago annexed to 138th instead of the water boundary. Hyde Park Township extended to 138th, but west of Halsted there’s a three block jog and 135th stays the township divider all the way through Plainfield and beyond. That three block jog screws things up in the south suburbs, too. It’s 159th Street from Lockport to Calumet City, but it’s 162nd in South Holland, despite that being collinear to the other towns mentioned. Worth Township’s official boundaries are so weird looking. Seeing old Cicero Township maps is kinda neat.
Worth township—are those areas in Chicago automatically removed from worth township when they were annexed to Chicago? Like all other properties are part of towns and townships. And is that one exclave legally part of worth township? Looks like a cemetery (part of a much there) I’m very curious about the 3 street gap there. Makes no sense why it is like that
Chicago doesn’t have townships anymore. The entire purpose of townships was to provide satellite offices within a 6x6mi mile square (usually) to make it quicker to process legal documents and pay taxes when you didn’t live in the county capital. I’m pretty sure the Indian Boundary Lines have something to do with it. It causes Thornton Townships northwest corner to not be a normal right angle, too
Transplants rag on the suburbs. Natives know Naperville is the worst.
Dolton riverdale tinley etc aren’t part of Chicago
They all rushed to incorporate to avoid annexation.
Facts
> The Chicago residents that get most worked up about this are transplants. Yeah, especially transplants from the suburbs. But it kinda makes sense. I grew up in the Willowbrook/Burr Ridge area. After college, it seemed like all of my friends from high school either moved to Chicago or moved to Naperville, because they do have a night life scene, it's just as someone who (clearly) chose Chicago, just feels small compared to all that you have here. They, on the other hand, talk about the price of Chicago and the perceived worse crime here and, because the distance is just far enough away to not really hang out together all that often, it all happens online, where people act more inflamed than they probably actually feel. The further I get away from that age, the less I care. It's a really dumb argument, people can do what they want.
New people in any area, hobby, belief system, etc, are always the loudest and most stridently obnoxious lol
Disagree hard, the people who say only transplants care, are usually transplants themselves. Grew up in Chicago, went to Whitney Young, and every Chicagoan I knew would check suburbanites/people from Indiana hard if they tried to pull that “I’m from Chicago” BS.
Lakeview was most definitely a suburb at one point. That fact would absolutely blow the minds of transplants who flock there after college.
What? It was in 1889, why would it blow anyone's mind, specifically transplants? No one alive "remembers" when it was a suburb. Most people know cities don't start out giant, they grow. Would the fact that Chicago used to be inhabited by the Potawatomi blow the minds of Chicago natives?
And the Potawatomi are originally from Straits of Mackinac and gained control of the Chicago area largely through their military alliance with France.
And France is all the way in Europe
Mount Greenwood annexed in 1927. It hasn’t even been a part of Chicago for a century yet.
Did they all incorporate because they were afraid of being annexed into Chicago even though they were far from it?
Yeah, kinda. Chicago had literally just doubled in size and population with Hyde Park, not to mention Lake and everything north and west happening. Water and sewage was a big deal for some municipalities. Getting paved roads and public transit was a big deal for others. I went to grab a map to share with you and found this: https://chicagology.com/population/
The Napervillian on Aurorian crime in this sub is out of control. lmao
you are doing exactly what the meme is making fun of
How? Their flair says they live in Albany Park, which is neighborhood in Chicago, not a suburb.
Can someone enlighten me on the reasons for Naperville hate? New to the area but have f&f that live there. Not trying to incite just understand.
I grew up there. I think it’s basically a few things - It’s one of the largest suburbs in terms of population and geographic area, and it’s also fairly wealthy and conservative, so it kind of has a culture of its own in a way that smaller suburbs don’t. - That culture is very much “we’re the best! Magazines say we’re the best city in America!, We have the best schools, the best downtown, the best people. Joe Naper was the best founder too! Gosh I bet you wish you could live in Naperville too, huh?”
Yup, it's the culty aspects.
So it's the Fishers and Carmel (Indy suburbs) of Chicago?
I grew up there too. It’s not conservative anymore, it mostly votes blue. Or at least it broke for Biden I know.
I live there now and it seems very blue
Moved here in 2020 and yeah, 57% blue. Far cry from our time in the city proper, but these comments would make you think it’s Wheaton. https://www.bestplaces.net/voting/city/illinois/naperville
The last time it voted red was Kerry-Bush 2004. So 20 years ago. I guess we gotta keep calling it conservative so people can keep hating on it though.
It’s just far af from the city. I think the people there are nicer than say those from Hinsdale or the rich burbs up north. If anything “old Naperville” people have been complaining about all the new people moving in for years. A lot of the new people seem to be from closer to the city, but that part doesn’t get talked about lol
There was a popular meme from years back which is basically "say I'm from Chicago, actually from Naperville" which put Naperville as the target IMO
They claim to be from the city, claim our culture/traditions, etc simultaneously harboring this attitude of “god, live in Chicago? I could never” and give Chicago shit about crime, housing costs, etc
It’s basically the Karen capital of Illinois.
Hating on suburbs is just a common pastime for many big city folks. Naperville-Aurora is the biggest suburb so it gets more exposure. Many people think of Naperville as a ultra wealthy sundown town but that perception is outdated. These days you see lots of East & South Asians there, some Hispanics too. None of the richest people I know live there - it's not cheap but it's no Winnetka or Glencoe. Median household income is around $70k. It's boring but is an ok place for middle class families to raise young children. That demographic doesn't overlap much with this subreddit.
FYI it's similar on the LA subreddit, except instead of hating people from the suburbs (LA is mostly a collection of suburbs) it's people from out of state hating people from out of state, specifically from the midwest.
Wait what’s wrong with Naperville again? Edit: So what’s the best suburb to live in?
Hemingway would’ve said wide lawns and narrow minds I grew up in Naperville and I thought we were fairly poor because our house only had two stories. Friends got a Lexus for their 16th birthday, that kind of thing.
>I grew up in Naperville and I thought we were fairly poor because our house only had two stories. Friends got a Lexus for their 16th birthday, that kind of thing. Depending the time frame you grew up in Naperville, this was the average household. Those getting the new cars were not the average but screen more because they got new stuff and attracted attention. I grew up there too and felt very similar fwiw. When I older I looked at some accessable days via the library and realized there was more families like mine than I thought. What I was really surprised about was the diversity of cultures across Naperville: Indian, different east Asian's, some Pacific islanders, some pockets of African culture, Hispanic and Latin cultures, small pocket of Brazilian/South America cultures and European/white. Naperville gets a lot of shit here for being white and racist when it's a lot less white than Geneva, Batavia, Elmhurst, Hinsdale and some other areas. It at least has a objectively good downtown and children programs.
For sure, there’s a lot of different cultures. I think it comes up when you Google “good American towns to raise kids in” or something in Asia.
>good American towns to raise kids in It definitely is tbh. The whole ass town is basically built for families. I could see some Google magic helping Naperville. When I visited a friend in Orange county, Ca and I mentioned Naperville every Asian I talked with knew where it was but far and few other folks knew. It was wild. A bunch said a relative lived there or did at one point.
> Naperville gets a lot of shit here for being white and racist when it's a lot less white than Geneva, Batavia, Elmhurst, Hinsdale and some other areas. if this ain't the truth lol. naperville is for sure white and privileged, but it's nowhere close to the whitest or most privileged suburb of chicago.
Ya know I just got back from the dentist and my fucking mouth hurts like fuck but you just reminded me of something. Bear with me also fuck yeah Caleb we ready. But I went to CPS k through 12 an all that shit, anyway there was this kid in high school, rich spoiled brat kid who's dad owned like a car wash or some shit like that, anyway this kids 16th birthday. A Camaro. In the mid 90s, in a Chicago public high school. This dumb ass kid really thought he was the shit but considering all of us took the bus an train to school we actually made fun of him. Look, the kid was an arrogant rich kid dickhead, still is, so it was warranted. Anyway, point being, flash forward to 30 years later, kid is still a kid who swears he hit a triple but was born on third yada yada. Took over his dad's business, posts rabid Trump "just be born rich" type of shit, work hard and you can make it too! (As long as you are born rich and privileged!) was hilarious though few years ago this FB thread on a hs reunion, kid got taken down a notch. We all struggled as you were handed everything and then have the nerve to look down at others who weren't handed anything at all, Because there was nothing to be handed off period to us. Its like these rich kids have zero idea how lucky they were. I made it because I actually did it, not because Mommy and Daddy handed me everything, Danny.
...Did they put you under anaesthesia at the dentist?
Ah ok.
Daddy’s money kids
they got the worst karens
If you pay attention it's almost always people hating things that like 1 person said and them blaming everyone for. There is still a lot of new development so there are very few large trees and a lot of "perfect looking" homes with a lot of grass. Old trees tend to disrupt the grass/lawn.. and there are not a lot of old trees yet around houses.
Most of the development after 1990 was on former farm fields so there were no old trees to even cut down. Source: lived there during 90s through mid 00s.
The people
lol I know some good people out there. Can’t vouch for everyone though 😂
It’s just Reddit. It’s fine. It’s a suburb. People just get annoyed because they so often claim they’re from Chicago and it’s really nowhere near the experience growing up If you want a safe and normal place to live or raise a family it’s probably a good place to do so tbh
I mostly don’t mind people from the burbs claiming to be from Chicago because it gives a frame of reference when people ask where they’re from. What I don’t like is when they claim to be from Chicago to try and look tough, or so they can sound like they know what they’re talking about when they parrot scaremongering Fox News headlines about the city. I live in another state now, and I’ve heard multiple people from Illinois tell me they were “from Chiraq”, and that did piss me off, especially when they turned out to be from Evanston or Lincolnwood or whatever.
This is obviously the correct answer and it’s annoying how many times this sub has to go round and round on it. If you are from the suburbs, and someone from elsewhere in the country asks where you are from, say Chicago, because few others know fucking Arlington Heights or wherever or Naperville, even. But when talking to a local, you say the suburb. And yes, it does make you an asshole if you make big sweeping statements about the city when you don’t live in it. (Even if you do live in it and try to make over generalizations about ~3 million people, you are kind of an asshole but for a different reason.)
As a former suburbanite (Lombard) and current chicago resident, I can confirm that hating on Napervillians never goes out of style.
I'd love to see a percentage of Naperville haters who have actually spent time in Naperville
Been there dozens of times due to family. I have no problem with them until they ask when I'm going to "say enough is enough" re: crime and "grow up" to come out to the burbs. That mentality, which is not unique to Naperville, is the source of the suburbs hate
I lived there for 10 years and I very much think it sucks. But yeah, it’s not especially bad. There’s like an invisible line when you cross from the pre-war suburbs to the post-war, car centric suburbs where they all suck, just to varying degrees. But at least Naperville has the train and a mildly walkable downtown.
Also there are plenty of places in Chicago city proper where you can't live without a car. They are car-dependent and yes... sub-urban, by the original meaning of the word. But we're never supposed to talk about that.
There's no reason to go there unless you have family out there
I think that's true of most city suburbs scenarios though. Do people in Boston have suburbs they love to visit?
Boston proper is so tiny… they never went through the annexations like we did. A lot of Greater Boston is suburbs. Cambridge, Brookline all are very urbanized and basically on par with Boston in terms of development and density, if not name. You think about Harvard or MIT as being in “Boston”, but they are not.
#Nobody wants to be a Napervillain
Yeah, everyone wants to be from Wheaton.
Yeah, I grew up in Naperville. I get it. Nice town but annoying culture.
That one meme: “I’m from Chicago.” Tell the truth. “I’m from the suburbs.” Where? “Naperville.” There it is.
My favorite is when they don’t answer or kinda mumble, and in your head your like I know this mother fuckers from Naperville lol
To be fair--as someone who's claimed both city and suburb citizenship--like 99% of the conversations you have with people not from your regional suburb direction have no idea where it is. After a hundred college conversations that end in "Winfield" "where's that?" "Like 30 miles west of Chicago" "oh you're from Chicago!" You kind of just give up. I recently had a conversation with someone from Libertyville that doesn't know where West Chicago is.
Couldn’t you just say “I’m from (A suburb), close to Chicago” Edit: never mind I reread the comment
I’m a transplant from St Louis (1997). Imagine my surprise after living here for 10 years that there’s a North Chicago no where near Chicago. It took me a minute to realize west (side) Chicago and West Chicago were to VERY different things.
I love the suburbs. You can run around barefoot out there.
We heard so much Naperville hate when living in Chicago that we almost turned down our realtor who wanted to show us a Naperville house when we started house hunting. Guess who now lives in Naperville and loves it? It literally had EVERYTHING we were looking for, has a great downtown, and yes, there is still reasonably priced housing. Try saying that about the North Shore suburbs.
No one gives a flying fuck if you’re from Naperville. They just want to bitch about bike lane safety and whatever thing the mayor said most recently.
In all fairness, Naperville has done this to themselves.
Correct
suburbanites are fine it's Naperville specifically i got a problem with
Don’t mind the transplants. This subreddit is filled with them and they’ll give you grief about being from the suburbs while they moved here from California or New York.
my favorite tactic is when someone says they’re from chicago i go “oh! wait where’d you go to high school??” and then watch the light leave their eyes
>:[
I really appreciate the unintended authenticity of this meme by way of the woman holding a PICA-compliant handgun.
It's a transplant regional pastime. If I remember correctly, Logan square requires 3 instances of accusing someone of being from the suburbs or else you have move out of your 3 flat. You also are suppose to make at least one comment about how mt greenwood is only cops
Someone from Naperville becomes a native Chicagoan the moment they eat somewhere in Pilsen. That's like the transplant bar mitzvah where you're now ready to get a city flag tattoo.
People born in Naperville that live in Chicago as adults > people born in Chicago that leave it for the suburbs as adults.
Can confirm, am from suburbs, love to talk smack on Naperville.
I thought this was r/chicago not r/chicagoland. I trust that everyone from the suburbs will see their way out.
I have no idea what’s going on with this. I’m a transplant and the only time I leave city limits is on a plane from ohare. Don’t know anything about the suburbs and have no reason to hate on them. If you asked me to draw a map of Chicagoland, I could place Evanston and that’s about it.
I live near downtown Chicago. Don't own a car because it'd be expensive and unnecessary in such a dense urban area. When someone says "the best xxxx in Chicago is (insert Naperville/Aurora business here)" they'd might as well be recommending something in northern Milwaukee considering the time/money/effort it'd cost me to get there. If you live in a suburb with cheaper real estate and a car you might think its easy enough to come down to the Loop and consider yourself a Chicagoan. But those of us living near downtown aren't going out to the suburbs when we're accustomed to having everything we need within a mile or two of downtown. TL;DR: Suburbanites have more reasons to go to Chicago, and its more accessible to them. Chicagoans have less of a reason to go out to the less accessible suburbs.
This is truly some edgelord shit.
Everyone knows this my dude
Burlington Northern Santa Fe (BNSF). You're welcome.
*the* Naperville?
*laughs in ravenswood*
Real
Born in Chicago and raised…. Live in Naperville now it’s awful.
I grew up in the city and now live in Naperville. Zero desire to move back The city is there the few times a year I need it I'm glad I didn't grow up here, though. These kids have zero street smarts
Don’t worry. As someone from Naperville we don’t care. We’re jealous of Lake Forest and Hinsdale, we don’t concern ourselves with what Wheaton or Bolingbrook thinks.
I'm so grateful that there's nothing on this Earth that makes me as angry as a $100% authentic Chicagoan who sees someone from Skokie say they're from "Chicago" while on vacation in Europe.
Well that’s more so the “Chicagoland”, right?
Someone from Paris doesn't know what "Chicagoland" is. Best case scenario he'll think he heard "Chicago" anyways.
I guess. When I moved to the suburbs I would usually say the Chicago area/Chicagoland. I get it though.
Chicagoland is a theme park.
Not the theme park - Chicagoland also refers to the Chicago metropolitan area. Literally just county’s surrounding Chicago.
But I wanna go to Chicagoland, the theme park!
😂
Weird thing to be upset about. Can't even conceive of it. Someone from a Paris or Rome or Lisbon suburb (yes they exist) wouldn't name whatever small random apartment block town they live in while vacationing, would they. Or if they did, you'd have preferred they just said the big city they live near in the first place. None of this matters the way you think it does
Skokie is literally right there, they're ok.
Hey, you guys let my transplant ass feel welcome regardless, so I'm happy to be here. Everyone's from somewhere. I get how the suburbs work for some folks and it's kinda nice in small doses, but I moved to the city to be in the city. Had some friends I followed up here from OK just move out of town to try the homesteading thing downstate. It's definitely a different lifestyle, a bit cheaper, definitely more car-dependent, but they seem happy and I'm happy for them.
you're not accounting for the fact that we just don't like Naperville out in the burbs
No one here lives in the city of Chicago
🫠
Circle of life 🤷♀️
Hey man, I'm from CA not the burbs. Get it right.
I'm convinced people who hate on the suburbs think that the people are too soft but secretly are jealous of all of the bonfires and parking spaces.