Stuff White People Like (25 page)

The low rents have made it highly desirable to freelance designers and artists, who no longer have to work 40-hour weeks to afford their lofts. Instead, they can use the rest of their time to focus on their art, check e-mail at local coffeeshops, and go to indie rock shows at the Crystal Ballroom.

But the appeal of Portland goes beyond the young. With affordable real estate prices, it attracts white people with children from Los Angeles, New York, Austin, Chicago, Boston, and San Francisco in droves. Each of them brings their own unique heritage, modern furniture, Prius, and recipe for vegetarian chili.

The city is expanding its bike lanes, adding to its light rail service, and registering more and more Democrats, and it is thriving. On the
Lord of the Flies
timeline, Portland has not reached the stage where they smash Piggy’s glasses, but there is a strong likelihood that the city will have mass riots and murder when the local grocery co-op runs out of organic wild salmon.

This knowledge is important, because whenever a white person complains about their city, you should always say, “Have you thought about moving to Portland?” This will comfort them as they tell you their plan to move there in a few years. But unless you make it clear that you are moving there to open some sort of ethnic restaurant, do not tell them that you plan to join them in the Rose City. It will make them uncomfortable.

112 Free Health Care

In spite of having access to the best health insurance and fanciest hospitals, white people are passionate about the idea of socialized medicine, so much so that they have memorized statistics and examples of how for-profit medicine has destroyed the United States.

Before you can exploit this information for personal gain, it’s important that you understand why white people are so in love with free health care.

The first and most obvious reason is “They have it in Europe.” White people love all things European, and this is especially true of things that are unavailable in the United States (rare beers, absinthe, legal marijuana, prostitution, soccer). The fact that it’s available in Canada isn’t really that impressive, but it does contribute to their willingness to threaten to move there.

These desires were only heightened in 2007 when Michael Moore released
Sicko,
a documentary that contrasts the health-care industry in the United States with those of Canada, France, and Cuba. As a general rule of thumb, white people are always extra passionate about issues that have been the subject of a Moore documentary. As a test, ask them about 9/11, gun control, or health care and then say, “Where did you get that information?” You will not be surprised at the results.

But the secret reason all white people love socialized medicine is that they love the idea of receiving health care without having a full-time job. This would allow them to work as freelance designers/consultants/ copywriters/photographers/bloggers, open their own bookstores, stay at home with their kids, or be a part of Internet start-ups without having to worry about a benefits package. Though many of them would never follow this path, they appreciate having the option.

If you need to impress a white person, merely mention how you got hurt on a recent trip to Canada/England/Sweden and though you were a foreigner you received excellent and free health care. They will be very impressed and likely tell you about how the powerful drug and health-care lobbies are destroying everything.

Though their passion for national health care runs deep, it is important to remember that white people are most in favor of it when they are healthy. They love the idea of everyone having equal access to the resources that will keep them alive. At least until they have to wait in line for an MRI. This is very similar to the way that white people express their support for public schools when they don’t have children.

113 Che Guevara

Though he would likely hate them all, white people cannot get enough of Che Guevara. They love his radical politics, his fight for the peasants, and his role in establishing the Communist government of Cuba, which has found varying degrees of success since its inception. But far and away his greatest contribution to white culture has been his ability to look good on a T-shirt.

Wearing a Che Guevara T-shirt tells the world that you are cool (it’s a T-shirt), you are left wing (he was a Communist!) and you look good in red (the shirt is always red). For bonus points, some white people like to pair the Che T-shirt with a sport coat and a pair of jeans. It’s the ultimate mix of business and peasant.

Though highly successful in T-shirt form, this has not been without problems. Many younger people are fairly confident that Che Guevara was created by the same guy who created Obey Giant.

Still, his dashing good looks and young death have made him a hero to upper-middle-class white people everywhere who hope to one day be able to pull off a beret in public.

When you encounter a white person with a Che T-shirt, it’s very important to approach them with the following understanding. White people would fondly embrace a Communist revolution if they were given jobs as writers, artists, photographers, filmmakers, politicians, or architects. So long as they don’t have to do manual labor, they share Che’s utopian vision!

Follow that simple rule and you will likely find a T-shirt of your own waiting for you at your desk on International Workers’ Day.

114
The New Yorker

The magazine industry relies heavily on white people, not only for staffing but also for subscriptions. White people love many magazines, including
The Economist, Wired, Saveur, The Atlantic,
and
The Utne Reader.
But without fail, the magazine that will get you the most respect from white people is
The New Yorker.

The magazine is made up of many sections: letters, cultural listings, snippets, and extremely long articles. Toward the end of the magazine you will notice ads for many things that white people like, including summer study programs, language software, and berets.

When you first pick up
The New Yorker,
you will notice that there are not a lot of pictures. This is very important to white people, as it makes them feel smarter about reading it. However, do not assume that white people read every word of
The New Yorker.
Due to an abundance of words and the fact that the magazine is published weekly, white people have been subscribing to and not reading
The New Yorker
for more than seventy years.

Every white person is ashamed about letting their copies of the magazine pile up, and this is your ticket to common ground.

Once you have successfully moved the conversation to a place where you can reference the magazine, it’s a fantastic move to say, “I need to take a week off just so I can get caught up on the issues piling up next to my bed.” Once the white person has realized that they are not alone, they will confess their shame to you and feel a deep connection.

Conversely, this information can be used to raise your status at the expense of another white person. Prior to meeting them, read one article in
The New Yorker,
paying extra attention to the end of the article (the part that is continued in the back). When you meet the white person, attempt to engage them about this part of the article and ask them questions. Be prepared for the white person to lie or try to change the subject. Do not give up.

When it finally becomes obvious that they have not read it, try to be apologetic and pretend as though you honestly thought they had read it and you didn’t mean to call them out. This will show the rest of the group that you are kind but also smarter than the person you just burned.

115 Non-American News Sources

White people love to talk about the news. It is an excellent way for them to show off how knowledgeable they are about current affairs. If you plan on spending large amounts of time with white people you will be expected to have some understanding of current events and strong opinions about them. Of course, you will be expected to initiate and back up your salient points with evidence from a reputable news source.