THE VICE GUIDE TO SAN FRANCISCO
BY B.S. ELIOT
Greetings from never-never land. Want to stay young forever or act like you’re 21 for the duration of your pathetic existence? Are you an outsider inside your small town of 2,500 farmhands? Are you seeking exile from daily persecution due to your love of cock? Would you like to be part of an entire social movement to extinguish and gentrify a once cosmically diverse metropolis? Do you enjoy 50-degree weather in mid-July? If you answered yes to any of these questions, then we’re here to recruit you (thank you, Harvey Milk)! Come sit on the dock of the bay, leave your heart and your liver in San Francisco, and don’t forget a sweater, ’cause it’s cold out here!
The renting population in SF is around 65 percent. There are more dogs than children. Since the cost of living is so high, rent is out of control and most of us are living in hovels above Mexican gang dens and lowcost bordellos. But besides that, and despite the June gloom that always rears its foggy head, the quality of life is very high here.
Unlike a great many urban environs, in SF you don’t need or want a car. Sure it’s nice every once in a while, but parking is a bitch and superexpensive. (Meters are now active on Sundays and most holidays. Bullshit.) If you’re coming to visit, don’t rent a car because we have some of the most reliable public transit in the world. If you insist on renting anything, it should be a bike.
We’ve got culture out of our ass: art, live music, bars, and sourdough bread, to name a few. The food is second to none. There are more bars and restaurants per capita than any other city in the US. Trying to cover all the spots in SF would be like compiling all the glory holes in the Castro.
Lastly, and this is probably the biggest draw, you can be whoever you want out here. If you want to be a male-identifying dyke who runs his/her own butcher shop, go right ahead. If you want to make it as a lonely drifter with a cape, tattoos on your face, and a penchant for smelly, used hockey pads, go on with your bad self. If you want to be a buttoned-down, roofiedropping suit, well, you’re welcome, too! It’s the opposite of New York because anybody can make it here.
See all articles by this contributor Anonymous, on Nov 11, 2009 wrote:
The coke sucks here : ( | | Anonymous, on Nov 11, 2009 wrote:
I grew up here. Your piece might bear some truth for the arrogant, pathetic leisure-class white/asian kids who flock here for drugs. I mean who can afford rent when an 8-ball costs so much? Dad, I need more money.
Other than that you don’t know WTF you’re talking about.
The rest of us work, pay our rent, make our own dinners and don’t waste our paychecks at Whitey McBloodstool’s House of Fine Dining. The MUNI is fine unless you’re a racist whiner.
Don’t like what I just wrote? Then you probably didn’t go to SF public schools. Eat a dick. | | Anonymous, on Nov 11, 2009 wrote:
hahahahaahaa. omg. i think you nailed it, at least from my 12 year perspective run in SF... | | Anonymous, on Oct 16, 2009 wrote:
San Francisco:
. Our green party is a cult. They are the PETA for plants.
. At Wholefoods, you will find not the healthiest of people but the wealthiest.
. Gays would like for a priest to marry them but are disgusted by Christians and worship Buddha.
. Freedom fighters would like nothing more than to liberate Tibet but not so much Iraq.
. Obama is praised for having accomplished nothing yet Bush is bashed for the very same accomplishments.
. Hipsters ... like a city-wide roach infestation.
. Yuppies ... much worse. Everything has to be quiet and clean, yet they move to the noisiest and dirtiest of neighborhoods and complain about everyone that lives there.
. Traffic ... all day.
. Our roads? Like the moon.
. Newsom? Shut down most massage parlors, but had sex with his best friend’s wife. | | Anonymous, on Oct 12, 2009 wrote:
Just to cover another specific inaccuracy, I don’t think there are really too many glory holes in the Castro. The Castro is one of several heavily gay neighborhoods in SF (including SOMA and the Tenderloin). The only difference is that the Castro is relatively purely gay, and therefore also very gentrified. That said, I’m sure there has been countless safe sex campaigns against things like glory holes that have sweep the Castro, leaving them to the seedier districts. | | Anonymous, on Sep 20, 2009 wrote:
MUNI is a cluster of degradations. The rider is subjected to an incessant stream of infantilizing pre-recorded messages hectoring him or her about all manner of things. More and more of the buses are encased in wrap-around ads which obscure the rider’s view of everything outside. Some lines are reliable, others are like spotting the Loch Ness monster. They kill and maim pedestrians on a fairly regular basis. The insides of the buses are much like stainless steel dog kennels. | | Anonymous, on Sep 16, 2009 wrote:
all true. this city is a great postcard. | | Anonymous, on Sep 13, 2009 wrote:
I have to agree with most of these comments on this guide. Being a native San Franciscan, I almost cringed everytime you guys tried to explain a neighborhood. It’s pretty obvious you didnt live here long enough or do enough research on what you were talking about. It’s definitely a miss and very embarrassing for Vice as a mag. | | Anonymous, on Sep 9, 2009 wrote:
anyone posting on the web about SF knows nothing... the true stories lie within those who are offline.... | | Anonymous, on Sep 4, 2009 wrote:
As a San Francisco native I would rate this guide at about the same quality one expects from an in-flight magazine. I mean where the fuck do you get off having a bunch of people who didn’t grow up here write about a bunch of corny shit that is already played out? It really bums me out to read this shit, I am embarrassed that SF is being represented like this. I mean couldn’t you guys have tried a little bit harder? It’s not as if I have high expectations for your magazine but you guys fucking blew it on this one. The authors of this guide offer the same insights and knowledge of the city as an SF state freshman. You guys should be fucking ashamed of your selves.
SLAP ONE
BKF PREZ | | Anonymous, on Sep 1, 2009 wrote:
Haha -> imgur.com/Y2aDe.jpg | | Anonymous, on Aug 29, 2009 wrote:
What have you done Eliot. Like we don’t have enough Willamsburg refugees desecrating Dolores Park every weekend. This is just going to accelerate the diaspora. Seriously folks, nothing to see here but ugly people trying to be weird. Move along. | | Anonymous, on Aug 27, 2009 wrote:
San Francisco is where ugly people go to be "weird". | | Anonymous, on Aug 22, 2009 wrote:
What, that’s it? Well at least you saw the movie. | | Anonymous, on Aug 19, 2009 wrote:
Very witty! | | Anonymous, on Aug 18, 2009 wrote:
"the most reliable public transit in the world." Hahah, thats a joke. The bus runs on its own schedule and the trains have to make up for it when they aren’t hitting each other. SF is wondering and always will be but this selfrightous | | Anonymous, on Aug 18, 2009 wrote:
I’m out of this bitch, immediately. -Bootsy | | Anonymous, on Aug 10, 2009 wrote:
san francisco does have some pretty sweet public transit. its no new york, but its a solid second place | | Anonymous, on Aug 10, 2009 wrote:
its not a good idea to have signs up about jumping....it might be counterproductive and put ideas in peoples heads | | Anonymous, on Aug 10, 2009 wrote:
"There are more dogs than children"... is that a fact? because I actually would believe it... the dogs run rampant in SF | | Anonymous, on Aug 10, 2009 wrote:
wow that photo is a pick-me-up. thanks, i needed that. | | Anonymous, on Aug 10, 2009 wrote:
i’ve never been there but i think only los angeles has been a city that i’ve heard more polarizing reviews of. but even the bad reviews say it’s better the la. | | |
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