Why is everyone hating on London

[greenwichvillage]

Recently a lot posts I read on social media is about how much people hate London. Its has been called all sorts of names - cesspit, dirty, crime ridden and the foreigners have taken over. They don't recognise London anymore and they are glad they have moved to whiter areas with cheaper housing.

For context, I have lived here all my life, lived in North West London and now live in Southwest London. I admit there are parts of London that have deteriorated, equally there part parts of London that are really nice. Yes it is expensive to live in and properties are expensive but that does not make it a cesspit.

I love living where I am and I love all that London has to offer. I'm not English but I am British and I'm not white and I feel really safe here in London. Yes there are problems with crime, but there is crime everywhere.

I have been to other areas in the UK and really none of it appeals to me, I have been to beautiful country side and small towns and cities and tbh I would get bored after two days there. But I would never go as far as insulting it which people seem to do quite a lot with London.

I think Farage/ Reform and Tommy have a lot to answer for.

Came here to add the same, I have the same experience in my part of zone 2 where I have lived for over 30 years. The neighbours are lovely, and I can also pop into my local coffee shop and be called by name. I can walk down the high street and be greeted by neighbours and friends. We don't all live in the touristy parts, those places are for the tourists. Where our homes are completely different areas and where I live the streets are clean, the bins are collected weekly, the schools are outstanding.

We also know everyone on our street in Z3. I grew up in a rural village and it's not the friendly utopia everyone makes out.

And finally, before I get accused of working for the tourist board! the public services are pretty good where I am. I do not live in a wealthy area.

But I have a couple of NHS Dentists within walking distance that are still taking NHS patients. I went to the walk-in centre with my daughter a month ago and she was seen and had a plaster cast put on in an hour and a half or arrival. We have weekly bin collections, black bins and recycling. Our trees are maintained and pollarded. Same-day GP appts. Despite all the immigrants living here! I get the impression that this is not the case everywhere. Maybe we are just lucky. But the quality of life here is still pretty good although it may change of course.

I think the capital of any country gets some flak. Especially when they are seen as being unfairly rewarded in terms of finances and resources.

The lucky amongst us are living where we want to live, whether that’s London, the Highlands or the Welsh valleys, or a Manchester suburb. I fear that the next generation will have fewer and fewer choices and that’s sad.

A lot of it stems from the US right-wing press, Londonistan and all that crap. I don't recognise their descriptions.
I love London, couldn't live there as I'm not a city girl, but love staying there. There are plenty of places where I have felt more unsafe.

Someone mentioned schools and I work in education. The falling rolls are pretty shocking even for ones that stay open due to the funding model.

www.standard.co.uk/news/london/school-closures-primaries-falling-pupil-rolls-birth-rate-b1237247.html

It should be an Olympic sport, finding ways to accuse the brits of racism to avoid allowing them an opinion.

I’m from London and south, love the place, but if you go up the country it is so much cleaner and better looked after generally. London is so filthy and not looked after - I’ve not been south of the river properly for a while so I won’t comment there but north of the river it is just so filthy. There’s graffiti all over the tubes, inside and out, which there didn’t used to be. There’s rubbish strewn everywhere and houses are just not looked after. There are rats everywhere in the open in the day in a way they never were. Bins not collected everywhere. If you’ve lived there and not had space away from it you will not notice but if you leave for a while and come back you will be shocked. Boiling frog syndrome. And I’m talking about nice and affluent areas. People living in 2 million pound houses stepping out to discarded mattresses, drug wrappers, graffiti, dealers, overflowing bins bags, rats etc isn’t really ok…is it? Have we become so accustomed to putting up with bad behaviour and people not looking after things that we are really sitting here calling people islamophobic rather than acknowledge that the state London, and much of the country, is in isn’t cool?

If you continue to blinker yourself and say oh yeah well all cities have their issues. you’re actively contributing to running the place into the ground, no matter how nicely you prune your own window boxes nor how many artisan cafes you train your eye on to avoid the crap around it.

Whinging right wingers for you.

Sorry just had to laugh at the irony of the person making sweeping statements about how small minded people are and how they’ve probably never left their town, saying that they’ll never leave London… this thread is wild

Sorry my brain can’t be clever in this heat, but have lived in surrounding area and worked in London for many many years so not just an occasional tourist and it’s just my opinion. There are lovely spots but too busy for me.

It’s ok but has definitely changed.

it is convenient though and what I’m used to

But London has more people in it than everywhere else so a higher volume of crime. Also more organised gangs.

There’s graffiti all over the tubes, inside and out, which there didn’t used to be. There’s rubbish strewn everywhere and houses are just not looked after. There are rats everywhere in the open in the day in a way they never were. Bins not collected everywhere

Which borough is this?
ETA I am not being facetious; it is just that London is enormous so I wonder which bits are like this.

There’s nothing wrong with London, just the small minority behaving badly and giving it a bad name 😒

I didn’t call it a cesspit. But I did find it dirty, unfriendly and threatening in places. It’s always a relief to get on the train home.

The hating is just from the Mumsnet bubble...
I am a Londoner (Cockney by birth) but my parents moved to Herts when I was 2. I have lived in zone 2 London as a young person and although certainly not living the high life, enjoyed mooching around different areas, went to the cinema once a week and the theatre once a month.
We did have a horrible experience with anti-social neighbours once which was very stressful - as a result ending up living not far from where I grew up in leafy suburbs (100% home ownership, little rented).
I commute into London twice a week and via a station where people are either starting or going onto their holidays - all dressed up, all ages and very excited to be in London.
Nowadays I'll be going out after work midweek and getting deals - TodayTix and seat filling agencies.
I'll go to exhibitions in places which have reciprocal deals with where I work.
Out with colleagues, I'll get restaurant vouchers with Time Out.
OK there's A LOT of visibly homeless people in pop up tent cities e.g. along Tottenham Ct Road ATM and an exponential rise in rubbish but this is a summer blip and not typical.

It's your home, you love it and are completely in your element there. It's only natural that you feel that way.

I studied in London and then stayed until I was 27 for work. I lived in south London and then bought a flat in north London for the last three years.

I found it expensive, unfriendly, lonely, dirty, noisy, polluted, unbearably crowded. Full of sexually aggressive men. I was relieved when I got a job elsewhere and could finally leave.

Now I live somewhere where nights are quiet and dark, we have birdsong, open space, fresh air, fields and trees. Friendly people. Neighbours who speak to each other. A decent home.

We each have our preferences. That's normal.

i agree with all of this. Well, except I lived in Leicester not Bristol for a bit. Grew up in the countryside - sod that. Crime wise, I mean yes you have to be careful but do you in Paris, Barcelona.. it’s part and parcel of urban living unfortunately. No worse in London.

It’s also where your ‘community’ is. I was lucky. After graduation, a few of us stayed in this bit of London. Our kids have grown up together and now graduated themselves. A couple are even dating! Our families are close and it’s lovely. No green spaces or bigger houses could make up for that. Yes, London is London, and I think it’s fabulous, but my friends and family make it home. Like for many other people all over the country, wherever they live.

See I find night time in the countryside terrifying! At least there are always people around in London. I honestly never feel unsafe. Walking in the dark in the countryside with nobody around (and maybe even no pavements) is literally the stuff of my nightmares. I've seen too many horror movies and I feel like there are probably psychos hiding in the bushes and nobody about to hear me scream! (I realise that's actually pretty unlikely to be fair but it's a genuine fear)

@Devonshiregal well that's North London for you! Here in the People's Republic of Lewisham we get daily street cleaners in all the key centres.

Joking aside, I am currently on the Southbank and it is full of people enjoying themseves in the warm weather - bars and restaurants are full, kids are skateboarding, children are playing in the fountain and there is a small crowd watching a free display of traidtional Middle Eastern dancing.

Usually based on a VERY limited or non existent experience of London…

We’re all different I guess. I basically hate everywhere that isn’t London. There’s just no place better in my opinion, and I have travelled extensively around the country and world.

I don’t like the ignorant labelling and dismissing of dissenting opinions from some on this thread. People who don’t love London are right wing, are they? OK. Simplistic, or what?

And as someone said - there’s always been massive irony in those who look down on non-Londoners yet who hardly leave the place themselves. They need to get out more.

I

It's not that people who don't love London are right-wing, it's that there's a very particular brand of 'Londonistan' misinformation being put about by far right wing interests online. The two aren't the same, but the misinformation is happening (Farage thinks he's got his sights set on London). I've got relatives who think we're all cowering in our homes as lawless islamists sweep down the street.