Why is The North seen as backward and undesirable?

[Sibsmum]

Can't understand why The North, seems to get looked down on , except when someone wants a holiday home somewhere pretty, or a big house for cheaper prices.
There are Universities, theatres, good schools, roads that aren't clogged all the time( and some that are...)spectacular scenery... So why is there still a perception that somehow The North is 'less' everything than the South?

x2boys not a generalisation as I lived it.

Doesn’t really matter that it was a big city. People still have neighbours.

Dp last year went up for the first time in 20 years to help sort through his mother’s flat.

He came back quite shocked at how many people remembered him and were knocking on the door and wanting a chat and to know everything he had been up to.
He just wanted to get on with sorting things out. He didn’t want it known that the flat was empty and these people were never his friends in the first place

@MrsToothyBitch it's clean, friendly, comparatively quiet and cheap

Incorrect. I live in a town in Yorkshire which is seen as the most expensive town to live in, in the country

Obviously the examples in my post above will not be the case in larger places like Newcastle/ Leeds, etc.

Well it is a generalisation because you are basing your own experience,s on the whole of the North ,I also live in the North and that's not my experience at all .

@BankofNook I live in Yorkshire and we call it scraps

Here’s the “sweeping judgements” then from a Spanish person. I actually think “the south” is more homogenous than “the north” because the accents are pretty similar whether you live in Sussex or Hampshire or Wiltshire. Well I can’t hear any difference. Apparently there’s a kind of Somerset / SW accent, but I can’t really hear that. As you go south- west, it feels more rural yes, but my favourite coastline is in Devon / Dorset. There is lovely countryside everywhere, it just varies. The main difference is the fields get a darker green as you go north and there is slightly more of a chill in the wind, for the most part. One accent I can definitely hear, is the difference between a very strong Liverpool accent and a Sunderland one. When I first heard a NE accent I wasn’t sure it was English, to be honest. I can’t really tell the difference between the Manchester and Lancashire accents, I don’t think, but I’ve noticed when some (older)? Yorkshire people don’t use “the” in sentences and they talk very slowly.

Tbh it’s exactly the same where I come from because I come from a region known to be more rainy and people think it’s a bit backward. Well there is more rain to be fair and it’s is probably more insular in some ways, on average than other places. I’m hardly offended or defensive because there’s stereotypes about everywhere. It is what it is.

I think the main differences, if you can identify such a thing, in the UK these days are between urban and rural areas really, rather than north / south. And there is more rain in Western areas and the north is a few degrees cooler on average.

@Oliversmumsarmy I don’t know my neighbour’s first name. I’ve lived next to her for 15 years, in the North.

There are small towns where everyone knows your business in the south. It's not exclusive to the north.

@moj1to I find accents fascinating. I can clearly tell the difference between a Newcastle accent compared to a Sunderland accent and I get irrationally irate when people from Sunderland are called Geordies when they’re not, they’re Mackems. However, I understand that once you leave the north east most people don’t hear the differences. I assume there is similar in other parts of the country. I can’t distinguish between a Birmingham accent and a Wolverhampton accent for example, but I’m told (by my cousin who lives in Wolverhampton) that they are very different.

No it everyone thinks that, just like not everyone thinks the South is full of ponces.

It’s personal choice, I don’t like built up areas so London/West Midlands/big Northern cities aren’t for me, regardless of where they are geographically.

@bankofnook I grew up in South Tyneside and called them Scranchies.

I live in the midlands and when I was in a relationship with someone from the south of England I used to get very fed up with everyone referring to where I lived as the north. The midlands is its own distinct area and neither north or south really, that's the point, not everything has to fall into north or south. Interestingly there isn't this kind of debate or distinction over east vs west - I wonder why that is?

To me there is definitely a large difference in weather. This is apparent most days even on the BBC weather website. It seems warmer (by a significant number of C) and drier in the south of England on average.

There are good places, bad places, all kinds of places in both the north and south but on average, there are some differences. House prices for one (I mean on average, I'm sure people can find examples that run counter to this).

I'm always stunned by food prices outside of supermarkets and stores when I visit the south.

Here a main meal out is usually around £8 or so.

A lemonade in my local is about 75 pence.
A squash is 20p.
Water is free.
A coffee/tea is 90p.

A lunchtime bap is 50p or 99p in some places.

The one thing that gets me most is that on hearing my location people just assume I'm living in some shithole. They have no concept of how good things can be up here. I think they'd be stunned by photographs of the area, the wildlife and the open and wild areas.

I love being from the midlands, I don't feel I fit into either north or south and I hate to hear it being denigrated. I remember being on a train and an older man saying "dreadful part of the world, this is" as we passed through several midland areas.

I don't think I've ever written as much on here but I feel strongly about it because I do feel in the UK there is a lot of judgement on where you were born/from.

I live in one of the Home Counties. Admittedly I've only been "up north" a handful of times, however I found it absolutely beautiful. Amazing scenery and friendly people, I also think London is an overpriced shithole! Only thing that puts me off the north is the weather.

"What do you can batter/scraps/bits/scranchies?" could be the new "what do you call a bread bun?"

London is London! I would never leave but each to their own....

Just how different is the weather ,we don't live in a,massive country so are we talking about a few degrees or massively different temperatures ,someone up thread described the South East as being shorts and t shirts weather for months now ,well we have certainly had some lovely weather here to ,yes we have rainy day,s but I have eaten in the Garden loads of time and my dh. And ds are currently enjoying a fishing expedition

London is an overpriced shithole! That arrogantly thinks that's where the sun shines from and the rest of the world should be grateful.

Boris Johnson is London personified.

Photos taken in zone 2 of the “overpriced shithole” 🙄.

London is incredibly varied and also home to many. As for Boris Johnson, most boroughs are Labour.

I think it’s maybe actually rained 3/4 times in London since lockdown started? It was mid- 30s the other week, but now cooler.

You can see the difference in rainfall by the colour of the grass as you drive up and down the country. Compare the Lake District or the Yorkshire Dales where is dark green fields to say Cambridgeshire where lots of the fields are yellow or parched brown by August.

So I just checked the temperature in London is 19 degrees today and in my town in the Northwest it's 17 degrees ,so yeah a couple of degrees different .

Yes it was also in the 30,s where I live in greater Manchester too.

I think it's rainfall that varies the most, but this is more East Vs West, rather than North Vs south.

For example, Bristol has about a third more rain per year than York.

But a lot of the north Vs south examples on here are more urban Vs rural. It's like some southerners are unaware of the existence of several large cities in the north of England, or Scotland for that matter.

He came back quite shocked at how many people remembered him and were knocking on the door and wanting a chat and to know everything he had been up to.
He just wanted to get on with sorting things out. He didn’t want it known that the flat was empty and these people were never his friends in the first place

We just call this friendly and welcoming, maybe not seen much in the south, so not appreciated when you experience it.

“Boris Johnson is London personified.”

Sorry, I don’t use the word stupid often, but if the cap fits....

I think you’ll find it was “the regions” including the former “red wall” constituencies that are the reason we are stuck with BJ. So thanks for that.

And what an insult to the millions of people of other ethnicities And other nationalities who call London home and also “personify” it. Thanks for that as well.

He came back quite shocked at how many people remembered him and were knocking on the door and wanting a chat and to know everything he had been up to.

He sounds lovely.