California Is Losing Its Cool People
When I moved to California in 2007, I drove down from Bellingham, Washington listening, on repeat, to a mix CD a friend made me. It was all songs about California. And it was glorious. California! The land of movie stars and tech titans. The land of girls on the beach and hippies in the mountains. The land of— You know, all that. Put to music. On repeat.
For the longest time, California has been known as the place that draws cool people. The hottest people in the world move to LA. The smartest people in the world move to the Bay Area. All of whom—both the smarties and the nerds—are overburdened with egos and ambitions. Get them all intermingling as members of the same large community and BAM. Magic happens. Magic in the shape of world-shaping culture.
I was indoctrinated into the myth of California long before I listened to my California mix CD on repeat. I’d already lived vicariously along the Central Coast through Steinbeck’s cannon. Already spent years of my life in LA thanks to countless films and TV shows taking place there. I’d already lived and died and lived again in San Francisco through the Beats. In fact, the very first CD I ever bought was Surfing USA by the Beach Boys. I was maybe seven. I’d been seeped in California’s mythology for virtually my whole life.
So, forgive me for thinking, still, to this day, that California is a special place. I’m a true believer. A Jesus freak for all things Golden State. Even the rows of tents in the Tenderloin and the mudslides in Big Sur. I love it all.
But even I have to admit… California, as a cultural powerhouse, is not doing so well. At the heart of the issue is that cool people aren’t drawn here anymore. This may seem like a simplistic take, but it has profound (and overlooked) implications for the future of the state’s status as a place where impactful, myth-making cultural products are produced. Without an overabundance of ambitious, dreamy-eyed cool people, California is just a pretty place with a forest fire problem.
There are many reasons for this: home prices, taxes, tech people moving in and overloading the state in normie culture, a hard drug scene that kills people rather than energizing them to party… But whatever the reasons may be, the end result is that we have fewer cool people moving in, which means less cool culture being created.
A few weeks ago I attended the Quillette party in New Orleans. I met a lot of fabulous people. Again and again, I kept hearing the same thing, “Hey, why don’t you come to Austin?” I heard this from Razib Khan (cheers!). I heard this from Jamie Kilstein. And plenty of other former Californians. Austin, Austin, Austin.
It doesn’t matter if Austin has great weather or the best BBQ. If it’s where the cool kids are—plus celebrities like Rogan and Musk—then that’s where the next generation of cool culture will originate.
Right this moment, no doubt, there’s a young kid in Montesano, WA—the sleepy town where I grew up—who’s being indoctrinated into the awesomeness of Austin, TX. He’ll keep the dream of Austin in his heart for his entire youth, through his college years, until, one day, he’ll put on a song mix and drive halfway across the country to bring his culture and his cool to this new town. And California will be that much poorer for his absence.
For more of my thoughts about California’s cultural decline, check out my recent podcast on Team Futurism with Dain Fitzgerald and Robert Stark.