What is up with people hating the city of Phoenix?

Answer: Phoenix kinda sucks.

As someone who loves the heat and still voluntarily lives somewhere nearly as hot, it’s unbearably hot. The heat island effect is real. Driving from a location of similar elevation that isn’t built up into the center of Phoenix at night will see an increase of like 20 degrees. The “testament to man’s arrogance” line is from an episode of King of the Hill, where they visit Hank’s mother in what I suppose is Sun City (a retirement city in the Phoenix area). It’s 111 degrees which doesn’t really happen in most other places. Though I don’t know if a Texan is the best person to whine about that, because Texas does get very nearly that hot and also humid. Some people feel the dry heat is like standing in front of an oven and might prefer swamp humidity though.

As a city, it’s just not very nice or city-like. It’s growing very quickly and just kind of sprawls into endless suburbia. People move to (or stay in) Phoenix expecting and essentially a laid-back western cow town, but it’s the fifth (?) largest city in the country, and it’s suburbs are massive and indistinguishable from the city proper. Towns that were dinky outposts ten years ago today have populations of 100,000. The residents screech tooth and nail to prevent any sort of infrastructure to accommodate and sustain the population, so nothing gets built but giant identical mini McMansions, identical low rise “luxury” apartments, and chain restaurants. Public transportation? Affordable housing? Basically incites a riot. HOAs that take your house for painting it the wrong shade of eggshell white rule the land. You need to drive an hour on the freeway to get anywhere.

There’s also a serious homeless problem that never gets addressed other than by whining about it then refusing to allow any action. So homeless people just die and cook in the street. When I lived there, there was also a serious feral chihuahua problem. The sheriff’s department used to essentially be an ethnosupremacist street gang as well, but I hear they’re better now that they’ve dismantled the tent city outdoor prison. Phoenix and Scottsdale both top lists of the rudest cities in the country; people are hostile and nasty all the time for no reason. Many people feel there is zero culture. I disagree, but I will say that any sort of culture that isn’t strip malls and complaining is fucking hard to find. If you want culture in Phoenix, you need to make finding it a part time job.

This likely isn’t the biggest reason for everyone else, but it’s also the fucking scammiest place I’ve ever lived in my life. Everyone is trying to scam you all the time. Every job posting is a scam. Every party is an MLM pitch. People walk up to you cold all the time trying to scam you. Billboards advertise scams like they’re legitimate companies. The fucking professional sports teams are in on it.

I will say, the scenery and the food (if you can find a place that isn’t a chain) are pretty good.