Rufus Wrainwright Hates Toronto

[Dusty Ayres]

This guy (a singer who's the son of Loudon Wrainwright III, and also quite overrated, IMHO) has had too much cocaine over the years, and this article proves it:

Toronto. I can't stand it—the place drives me mad. I'm allowed to say this because I'm Canadian. I have friends there, I work there, but I find it really hard to like. I will have to go back there, but I wish I didn't have to. It's trying to be the New York of the Midwest. I much prefer Montreal.

Rufus Wrainwright: Me And My Travels

 

[firehawk12]

I have no idea who he is... but he isn't much wrong. It's a cheap version of NYC... (Dundas Square being a cheap Times Square, etc) and the only thing that makes it bearable is the fact that every other city west of Toronto is pretty much blah compared to it. Which is why he pulls the "Montreal is better" card, and let's face it... it really is.

 

[NewHorizon]

Rufus is right. Although, I would easily take Toronto over Vancouver any day, but if I had to live in another city, I would choose Ottawa.

 

[firehawk12]

Yeah, Ottawa is nice. It's still very much sprawling though, which is its biggest problem.

 

[Agent Richard07]

I could never figure out why people hate Toronto. Whatever it is people see or are picking up on, has totally gone over my head and no one has been able to explain to me exactly why Toronto is so bad, just that they hate it. The best I can figure out is that it's not the city, it's "something in the air". Also, whenever Torontonians or Canadians in general bash Toronto and then hold some foreign place in high esteem, I always wonder if they'd actually live in that foreign locale. I don't think they would.

 

[Goliath]

I too don't understand the anti-Toronto thing. I've never lived there, but I did live in Hamilton for five years. It was very convenient having such a big city right next door--I was just an hour away from Robarts Library, or the HMV on Dundas, or the opera, or whatever. I really miss that, now that I live in Sudbury.

 

[Kryton]

Dead skunk in the middle of the road. (I know that's Louden's and not Rufus's, but wth.)

 

[M'rk son of Mogh]

For me, it's the people. I lived in Brampton for a little while, and all of my friends from Toronto, even the ones not originally from there, seem to get that "I live in Toronto which makes me better than you" attitude. It's subtle, but it's there.

Granted, it's not scientific and only related to a handful of people I've ever met, but it's definately there.

 

[Goliath]

^But that's a reason for hating Torontonians, not Toronto.

Like I always say about my home province: Alberta is a nice place with a lot of nasty people.

 

[Sheep]

How dare he have an opinion about a place he's actually spent enough time in to judge!! Outrageous!

 

[M'rk son of Mogh]

^But that's a reason for hating Torontonians, not Toronto.

Like I always say about my home province: Alberta is a nice place with a lot of nasty people.

People make the city, they're the living breathing part of that organism and what gives each city their charms and negatives. It's not like the grand canyon, or mount rushmore, where it's only the destination that shapes the experience.

 

[firehawk12]

Reasons why Toronto is bad:
1) Bad public transportation. This is the fault of both the city management and the province, but the TTC went from being the best public transportation system in North America to somewhere down in the 30s. Considering there aren't that many large cities in NA, you do the math.

2) A focus on getting big events. The Olympics in Toronto? Commonwealth games? World Fair? Considering that the waterfront is undeveloped and major infrastructure, including a direct rail link to the airport, does not exist, this is just ludicrous. The idea that a big project would suddenly get these projects built makes no sense, given that the city is close to, if not already, in debt anyway. It took Montreal 30 years to recover from Olympic debt and their biggest legacy is a stadium that is falling apart.

3) Fighting the Island Airport. Given the lack of a direct link to Pearson, the fact that the Mayor has gone out of his way to attack the island airport is just insane. Although, it had the good side effect of killing the World Fair bid, since Miller was too busy fighting for a photo-op rather than attend to the business of city improvement.

4) Pitching Toronto as a world class city. Spending money to convince New Yorkers and other Americans that Toronto is some kind of world destination city. Diversity is pitched, but when it comes to actual events, it's always the same Mirvish crap and Leafs games. It's doubtless that Toronto has a great music and theatre scene, but if you live in NYC, why would you bother?

5) Killing downtown. Somehow building condos downtown will revitalize the core. I don't understand this logic, given the fact that there's a huge fucking strip club just south of Bloor on Yonge (the one where every male celebrity comes out of when they bother to come up to Toronto), putting condos downtown won't suddenly make it a place to go. Dundas Square is a good idea for a civic space that's easily accessible, but it's ruined by the fact that it's become billboard central.

6) Urban sprawl. This is a problem in all cities, but it's also a problem in Toronto as well. Because public transportation can't keep up (where's our BART? Go Transit? Really?), traffic clogs up during rush hour because no one wants to or can't afford to live in Toronto itself.

That's just a few reasons why I think Toronto is broken. Don't get me wrong, I'd love to live in Toronto simply because there's just more to do there than anywhere else in Southern Ontario (other than Ottawa), but it's a hate-love thing. If there was one single thing I could fix with a few billion dollars, it would be the public transportation. There was an hypothetical subway map that showed a TTC with 10 different lines. Now, that's unrealistic, but improving and expanding the streetcar lines would do so much to imrpove the city it's ridiculous.

 

[benny]

How dare he have an opinion about a place he's actually spent enough time in to judge!! Outrageous!

I was gonna say...just because he doesn't like a certain city for whatever reason and says so is no reason to crucify the guy. Hey, I don't like his music either-I can never understand the words-but sheesh. He IS entitled to an opinion.

 

[Chess Piece Face]

WGAS about Toronto? I mean, really.

But Rufus and Loudon both kick ass.

 

[Agent Richard07]

Reasons why Toronto is bad:

Pretty much everything on your list is a technical problem that every city has to some degree. It still doesn't explain this strong anti-Toronto mentality or discomfort that even visitors, mostly from across Canada seem to have. I'm not totally convinced that it's the people either. That might play a part, but I don't think that's the ultimate answer. A lot of popular and iconic cities have nasty people too. In fact, they probably all do, yet their image or reputation isn't dictated by it.

This point is interesting...

4) Pitching Toronto as a world class city. Spending money to convince New Yorkers and other Americans that Toronto is some kind of world destination city. Diversity is pitched, but when it comes to actual events, it's always the same Mirvish crap and Leafs games. It's doubtless that Toronto has a great music and theatre scene, but if you live in NYC, why would you bother?

I think that Toronto being promoted that way should be something to be proud of. It really is one of the central hubs to a lot of popular and/or important events.

 

[Goliath]

^But that's a reason for hating Torontonians, not Toronto.

Like I always say about my home province: Alberta is a nice place with a lot of nasty people.

People make the city, they're the living breathing part of that organism and what gives each city their charms and negatives. It's not like the grand canyon, or mount rushmore, where it's only the destination that shapes the experience.

No, I don't agree. I hardly ever interact with Torontonians when I visit the city, except when I'm paying them to provide me with goods and services. To me, they're just part of the background.

 

[Goliath]

Reasons why Toronto is bad:
1) Bad public transportation.

If you lived in Sudbury, like me, you'd realize just how silly this sounds.

5) Killing downtown. Somehow building condos downtown will revitalize the core. I don't understand this logic...

Well, consider. Since the end of the Second World War, all across North America, city centres have decayed. And why? Because the middle classes moved to the suburbs, and took their money with them. They became tourists in their own cities. And ultimately, business followed them.

It seems to me that, if you want to revive a city's downtown core, the first step is to get people with some money to live there. Building condos may not be the answer, but if it gets people to live downtown, then it sounds like a step in the right direction, to me.

 

[firehawk12]

I'll admit that these are policy problems that would only explain why a lifelong Torontonian might hate Toronto. I have no idea why someone from Vancouver or whatever would hate Toronto though, since I just don't have that perspective... other than apparently Toronotonians feel like they're the center of the universe, whatever that means.

Anyway, compare the TTC to any big city in NA and its completely broken. Even OCTranspo works better, without managing to use a rail system other than that dinky little train that runs through Carleton.

I also don't deny that having people live downtown, even though it's only affordable to the rich, is a good thing. But when Yonge and Bloor is essentially giant condos, there's almost no reason for non-residents to go there. The "biggest intersection in Canada" is suddenly just another place to go see condos.

As for promoting Toronto as a big city... you'd have to spend the money to make it a big city first. The problem is that everything is being held by a string here, so the municipal government is completely paralyzed and directionless.

Maybe Montreal has the advantage of just being much older, but you go there and it feels like it could be classified as an important city. Toronto, not so much.

 

[Goliath]

Anyway, compare the TTC to any big city in NA and its completely broken. Even OCTranspo works better, without managing to use a rail system other than that dinky little train that runs through Carleton.

All I'm saying is--that's entirely relative. Compare the transit system of any big city in NA to, say, the London Underground, and that transit system will look completely broken. And yet Londoners bitch and moan about how inadequate the Underground is. The grass is always greener on the other side of the fence.

I'm increasingly coming to the conclusion that it's just human nature to be dissatisfied with our lot in life, to envy other people and places for having what we don't have, and to never appreciate how good we have things--no matter how good those things might be--unless or until we lose them. And even when we lose things, our appreciation for them is the product of their absence: if we got them back, we'd quickly stop appreciating them again. It's probably a trick of evolutionary psychology.

Lasting happiness and contentment are as unattainable as the speed of light: and like the speed of light, the closer we get to them, the slower our progress becomes. Starving people are easy to satisfy. But satisfying people who are chronically overfed and have every food in the world at their fingertips? That's difficult.

In my case, living and teaching in Sudbury, Toronto seems to offer all the things I don't and can't have: decent public transit; a large university library; a wide variety of well-stocked stores in which to shop; etc.

FFS--Toronto even has more than one first-run movie theatre. It's paradise! But I'm sure if I actually lived there, I'd quickly find some reason to be dissatisfied with my lot in life, to compare Toronto unfavourably with other cities, and to eventually start talking like--well, you.

 

[Dusty Ayres]

Reasons why Toronto is bad:
1) Bad public transportation. This is the fault of both the city management and the province, but the TTC went from being the best public transportation system in North America to somewhere down in the 30s. Considering there aren't that many large cities in NA, you do the math.

2) A focus on getting big events. The Olympics in Toronto? Commonwealth games? World Fair? Considering that the waterfront is undeveloped and major infrastructure, including a direct rail link to the airport, does not exist, this is just ludicrous. The idea that a big project would suddenly get these projects built makes no sense, given that the city is close to, if not already, in debt anyway. It took Montreal 30 years to recover from Olympic debt and their biggest legacy is a stadium that is falling apart.

3) Fighting the Island Airport. Given the lack of a direct link to Pearson, the fact that the Mayor has gone out of his way to attack the island airport is just insane. Although, it had the good side effect of killing the World Fair bid, since Miller was too busy fighting for a photo-op rather than attend to the business of city improvement.

4) Pitching Toronto as a world class city. Spending money to convince New Yorkers and other Americans that Toronto is some kind of world destination city. Diversity is pitched, but when it comes to actual events, it's always the same Mirvish crap and Leafs games. It's doubtless that Toronto has a great music and theatre scene, but if you live in NYC, why would you bother?

5) Killing downtown. Somehow building condos downtown will revitalize the core. I don't understand this logic, given the fact that there's a huge fucking strip club just south of Bloor on Yonge (the one where every male celebrity comes out of when they bother to come up to Toronto), putting condos downtown won't suddenly make it a place to go. Dundas Square is a good idea for a civic space that's easily accessible, but it's ruined by the fact that it's become billboard central.

6) Urban sprawl. This is a problem in all cities, but it's also a problem in Toronto as well. Because public transportation can't keep up (where's our BART? Go Transit? Really?), traffic clogs up during rush hour because no one wants to or can't afford to live in Toronto itself.

That's just a few reasons why I think Toronto is broken. Don't get me wrong, I'd love to live in Toronto simply because there's just more to do there than anywhere else in Southern Ontario (other than Ottawa), but it's a hate-love thing. If there was one single thing I could fix with a few billion dollars, it would be the public transportation. There was an hypothetical subway map that showed a TTC with 10 different lines. Now, that's unrealistic, but improving and expanding the streetcar lines would do so much to improve the city it's ridiculous.

I have issues with Toronto myself as a citizen; I even talked about them before in posts here, about the subway, and about the lack of high-speed rail, and I agree that it needs improvement. But something about this ex-druggie's diss of the city just set me off. If he didn't have anything nice to say about Toronto, he shouldn't have said anything at all. It seems to me that he just wants to say something outrageous to impress the interviewer, or his jaded sophisticate socialite friends who look down upon him for being from Toronto (his famous mother Kate McGarrigale still lives here, and she doesn't say things like that).

If he hates it here, he should stay away, and keep his mouth shut.

Fighting the Island Airport. Given the lack of a direct link to Pearson, the fact that the Mayor has gone out of his way to attack the island airport is just insane. Although, it had the good side effect of killing the World Fair bid, since Miller was too busy fighting for a photo-op rather than attend to the business of city improvement.

The Island Airport has no fracking business existing anyway-it's a money loser, its environmentally unfriendly and it's too loud for the people who live there-not to forget that it's also a potential terrorist hazard. If it were not for the fact that EMS choppers need that airport, it wouldn't be around. A subway to Pearson (going west on Eglington Avenue to there) would be a better idea.