White People Who Hate “Stuff White People Like”

The New Republic’s Adam Sternbergh, for starters:

When black people dance, they dance like this. But when white people dance, they dance like this.

You have now essentially experienced every episode of “The Arsenio Hall Show.” You have also now essentially read the entirety of Stuff White People Like, a comedic blog which may have recently popped up in your inbox, forwarded to you by an enthusiastic friend (him or herself no doubt, like the blog’s author, white).

For those few who haven’t yet seen it, read about it in the Los Angeles Times, or heard about it on NPR, the blog was created by a 29-year-old aspiring comedy writer in L.A. and it is, by its own description, “devoted to stuff white people like,” presented as numbered, encyclopedia-style entries, e.g. #1 Coffee; #5 Farmer’s Markets; #69 Mos Def; or #79 Modern Furniture.

A few observers have already pointed out, rightly, that Stuff White People Like isn’t about white people in general, but rather about a very specific demographic sliver of left-leaning, city-dwelling white folk–in other words, people like me. These people have previously been trapped and tagged alternately as yuppies, or Bobos, or (by yours truly in New York magazine) grups. Basically, they embody the uneasy marriage of urban affluence and liberal (and/or progressive, and/or alternative, and/or “indie”) ideals. For example, there are plenty of white people in America who fairly obviously don’t like (#15) yoga or (#46) The Sunday New York Times or (#28) not having a TV. But it’s much funnier and, at least on its face, more original to say “White People” rather than “Yuppies.” I mean, if someone sent you a link to a blog called “Stuff Bobos Like,” would you even open it, let alone forward it to all your Bobo friends?

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