A Tale of Two Cities
Nightlife in Washington, D.C., is as segregated as the partisan divide on Capitol Hill.
By Ben Adler
October 1, 2008
Young professionals in D.C. rarely cross the red/blue divide when making social plans.Every year dedicated young politicos flock to Washington, D.C. looking for jobs and to advocate their causes, both on the left and the right. Whether they're here to promote the free market or worker's rights as Republicans or Democrats, young people from Massachusetts to Mississippi might move to the city with excitement—or trepidation—at the chance to bump into their cultural and political opposites while out on a Saturday night.
But these graduates will soon discover that unless you work at a bi-partisan law firm, reside in the environs of Capitol Hill, or go out drinking in Adams Morgan, you might never meet someone from the "other America" during your time in Washington, D.C. You will probably work, sleep, eat, drink, and party with folks who are more or less just like you.
On the Hill, staffers on both sides of the aisle make the roughly same salaries and often live, work, and party in close proximity. But the scene among other early twenty-somethings in the District often breaks down along a blue/red divide with roughly Connecticut Avenue as the border. But the young liberals scraping by on the salary of an entry level worker at a non-profit are pushing ever farther north and east. Young conservatives tend to reside mostly on the west side of the city, but even there the liberal city has plenty of progressives.
You won't find many Republicans in rough-around-the-edges neighborhoods like Shaw and the increasingly gentrifying Columbia Heights. The bar scene for young liberals falls mostly within a one-mile radius of the intersection of 14th and U Streets, two major corridors of the new coffee shops and bars frequented by what passes for D.C.'s hipster set. It covers U Street, Logan Circle, and Columbia Heights, while dipping slightly into Dupont and Adams Morgan (depending on the bar in question). Some pioneering hipsters have even pushed as far east as H Street in the city’s northeast sector.
Jennie Kim, a 24-year-old research assistant at George Washington University who lives in Dupont Circle, says she sees a distinct difference between the Georgetown crowd and the hippies and hipsters who go out in U Street. "Georgetown/Dupont is a different enclave than Adams Morgan and U Street," she said. "Georgetown has a different look and feel. You're more likely to find chain restaurants. Adams Morgan is more like hip coffee shops. It's more artsy."
Ground zero for the young conservative scene is Georgetown. The bars along Wisconsin Avenue are the hub, including the bar Late Night Shots has made famous: Smith Point. The neighborhoods where young conservatives tend to live and party radiate north to Glover Park, south to Alexandria, and across the Potomac River to Northern Virginia.
Catalina Cabral, 24, who graduated from George Mason University in 2005, is a political appointee in the Justice Department who previously worked in the White House. Cabral lives in Arlington, VA, but says she usually goes out in Georgetown where most of her friends live.
"The young person scene in Arlington has changed substantially since I was growing up," said Tom Lee, 27, who was raised in the Virginia City. Lee is a web developer for a firm that works with exclusively progressive clients. "It didn't become a satellite of Georgetown until more recently. After college, I lived in a house there and I was shocked that my beloved hometown had a reputation to people in the city as where young Republicans live."
When his fellow liberals balked at coming out into enemy territory, Lee decided to move into the District. He has lived in the Shaw neighborhood, just east of Logan Circle, ever since.
Lee thinks the fact that so many people come to Washington for a just a few years between college and graduate school is partly to blame for the social segregation. "People constantly talk about how it's such a transient town," said Lee. "One of the side effects is that your professional contacts are more important to your social landscape than in other cities. So if you work with people who are ideologically compatible that will cause it." But even Lee’s neighborhood isn’t free from right-wingers. He has spotted an SUV sporting a Bush/Cheney ‘04 sticker across the alley behind his apartment.
Other counter-examples to the self-segregation abound. Kim is a loyal Democrat, who worked for the Stanford Progressive, a left-leaning magazine, as an undergraduate. But in Washington she mostly hangs out with conservatives. "I've been in DC for 2 years, and have met more young Republicans…at Smith Point alone than I've ever met in the first 22 years of my life combined," she wrote in an email.
This spring, I ventured over to Union Pub one Friday night, across the street from Union Station, to the heart of D.C.'s political-social segregation, a First Fridays happy hour. First Fridays is run by Derek Hunter, who works for Americans for Tax Reform, a fiscally conservative group. He built the list of conservatives and libertarians who drink together on the first Friday of every month through his previous jobs at the conservative Heritage Foundation think tank and in a Senate Republican’s office. Hunter says that he did not intend to worsen the red/blue divide by starting First Fridays—he just wanted to drink with friends. "In general, you meet people where you work," he said.
"As a libertarian, I have the weird position of hanging out with Democrats and Republicans," said Nicole Kurokawa, a 27-year-old who works at the Cato Institute. Although liberals are welcome at First Fridays, they are a distinct minority. "I have liberal friends who come to first Fridays and they love it. They love to spar."
Of course, over time the realities of real estate dictate that not everyone can live with people who think just like them. Hunter lives in Baltimore, almost entirely with liberals
But for any young newcomers looking to find their cultural bearings, below is a broad outline of how you might find your life shaping up.
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If you're a member of the hippie or hipster left
You live in: Columbia Heights, Logan Circle, Mount Pleasant, Shaw, or U Street
Your metro line is: Green
You work for: the Democratic National Committee, the Service Employees International Union, The Urban Institute, or the National Resources Defense Council
You drink at:
· The Black Cat, a dive bar on 14th Street known for hosting Indie Rock bands
· The Wonderland Ballroom, a dive bar in Columbia Heights, known for hosting Hip-Hop and Soul DJs
· Townhouse Tavern, a dive bar in Dupont Circle known for hosting gatherings of internet activists and bloggers
· The Raven in Mount Pleasant, a dive bar known for its bizarre local characters and cheap domestic beers
Your website for local nightlife: DCist.
You went to college at a place like: Yale, the University of Michigan, or Oberlin
You Think Adams Morgan is: Played out and over-run by the “bridge and tunnel” crowd
You see Movies at: E Street Landmark Cinema, specializing in artsy and foreign features
The magazine placed on your coffee table to make you look urbane and sophisticated is: The New York Review of Books
You eat out at:
· Rice, a non-traditional Thai restaurant on 14th street
· Vegetate, a non-traditional vegetarian restaurant in Shaw
· Red Rocks, a gourmet thin-curst pizza restaurant in Columbia Heights
And you buy your clothes at: vintage stores or boutiques on U Street
When you settle down you'll move to: Takoma Park or Silver Spring, MD
And you'll drive: a Suburu
But for now you drive: one of those retro bicycles from City Bikes in Adams Morgan
If you're a member of the preppy right
You live in: Alexandria, Arlington, Georgetown, or Glover Park
Your Metro line is: Orange or Blue, if you take the metro at all
You drink at:
· Smith Point, a dive bar on Wisconsin Ave in Georgetown known for hosting the Bush twins
· Whitlow's on Wilson, a classic-throwback kitsch bar and diner in Arlington
Your website for local nightlife: Late Night Shots, so members-only you need a login
You work for: the Republican National Committee, the Family Research Council, Booz Allen Hamilton, or National Association of Manufacturers
You went to college at a place like: George Mason, Southern Methodist or University of Georgia
You eat at:
· Old Glory, the traditional Southern barbecue restaurant on M Street in Georgetown
· Town Hall, a fancy bar on Wisconsin Ave in Glover Park, with an impressive menu containing not a single vegetarian entree
You Think Adams Morgan is: Still kind of sketchy
You see Movies at: AMC Loews in Georgetown, specializing in major Hollywood blockbusters
The magazine placed on your coffee table to make you look urbane and sophisticated is: The Economist
And you buy your clothes at: the Pentagon City Mall or Tyson’s Corner
When you settle down you'll move to: McLean or Falls Church, VA
And you'll drive: an SUV
But for now you drive: an SUV
Ben Adler is the former editor of Campus Progress and a staff writer at Politico.
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Comments
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to me, anything west of north capital is strictly for the bourgeoisie. genuine radicals live with struggling masses – not the cry baby children of the affluent.
— santiago - Oct 1, 06:17 PM - #This is really outdated — the Town Hall cite (among others) is not accurate. Also, is it possible for quotes to expire? I’m mortified that I’m quoted in here from a year ago.
I will 100 percent own-up to the fact that I sound like a twit, but couldn’t you have gotten fresh, new quotes that reflected the unique mood of this unprecedented election instead of recycling ones from 2007? How hard is it to ask college students where they like to drink and who they’re voting for? That’s just lazy journalism.
I usually love CP (and Politico), so I’m genuinely disappointed by this piece.
— JK - Oct 1, 07:20 PM - #Really, are there NO conservatives who work for non-profits and scrape by on an entry-level salary? At all? There are conservative nonprofits – surely they don’t pay first-job salaries sufficient to live in Georgetown?
— confused liberal - Oct 1, 09:23 PM - #@ confused liberal: oh there are. But the kind of person who believes the “tale of two cities” in DC is about liberals and conservatives is the same kind who makes other ridiculous assumptions.
— confused conservative -- does this SUV just appear one day? - Oct 2, 12:35 AM - #I mean, no.
This article is talking about white people. DC, which has a majority of black folks, is overwhelmingly democrat to the point that these crackers in Georgetown who rest their heads in former slave quarters don’t even have pull.
For what it’s worth, if you’re a Republican, you’re definitely not wanted in this city.
Go back to Nebraska, gentrifiers.
— J. - Oct 2, 08:01 AM - #This article is pretty polarizing, you are just reinforcing negative and idiotic stereotypes.
— Hipster tree-hugger on the orange line - Oct 2, 08:42 AM - #i’m sorry, but your article is bullshit. my roommates and i live in arlington, and we’re democrats, liberals, whatever you want to call us through and through. hell, i live with a kennedy staffer! and we love arlington.
next time, don’t be so assuming.
— arlington democrat - Oct 2, 09:20 AM - #Oh, yeah — conservative non profits, and the Hill, pay salaries that nowhere near cover the expenses of gtown existence. That’s where Mommy and Daddy come in! “Safety” always comes first, and we all know what goes down in Shaw and Co Heights.
— Love it - Oct 2, 10:39 AM - #I’m offended to see CP posting this type of dribble. Of all the things CP stands for, stereotyping isn’t one of them.
— rm - Oct 2, 11:21 AM - #This reads like it was written by somebody who’s hardly ever visited DC. The Republican scene extends “south to Alexandria and across the Potomac River to Northern Virginia”??? Ummm, it doesn’t take a cartographer to realize that Alexandria is both across the Potomac from DC AND part of Northern Virginia.
— MB - Oct 2, 01:44 PM - #wow, you people are so literal, get over it! This article is an attempt at satire and social critique (liberal elitist comment: the book Tale of Two Cities was itself a social critique).
Just because you don’t fit the mold, doesn’t mean this article raises interesting issues about the divided states of today’s politics and our inability to interact with people we don’t agree with. Stop crying and read between the lines.
— Tommaso - Oct 2, 04:30 PM - #Come on, Ben! This is the story you’ve been itching to write about the divided state of our fair city?? Referring to young gentrifiers as “pioneering hipsters”? As a DCer yourself, you didn’t think to bring up the racial divide here, despite using a term like segregation to describe the social habits of privileged politicos?
If there’s any reason why the Campus Progress blog went to hell, it’s because writers focused on this ridiculous nonsense (e.g. SoCap) at the expense of the useful, the interesting, and the challenging.
— For Student Power - Oct 2, 05:45 PM - #OK, see, this is the sort of partisan divisiveness that’s one of the many reasons I hate McCain and Bush. Imagine my dismay to see people on my side of the political spectrum do the very same thing. Not much good has ever come out of perpetuating stereotypes, and this article is no different. For the record, I subscribe to this page. I use the orange line. And I’m a grad student at the George Mason School of Public Policy. The last time I checked, Booz Allen Hamilton was not a conservative think tank or a Republican machine.
— Kripa - Oct 2, 07:29 PM - #And P.S. – the hipster lifestyle is extortionately expensive. You’re hard-pressed to find a hipster who can afford to live like one.
I understand the point of this article, and while it does, of course make sweeping generalizations, it is also losely true, though of course exceptions will always apply.
My problems with it are yes, acting like only the 20 somethings who moved here count. I was actually really interested in this because I thought it was going to be about how segregated nightlife is between white and black young people in this city.
I also wanted to add that the democrat youth are not only willing to move further east and north now, but also south. SW is up and coming as well as Eastern Market in SE expanded further SE down PA Ave.
Also, Sanitago, while you may have a point, its also important to make sure your presence with those “struggling masses” doesn’t have negative impacts on them – like raising their property taxes as more of these rich white folks move in.
— Erin - Oct 3, 09:33 AM - #Great to see that liberal values are alive and well, if a bit overly-PC as usual for the US. One of the defining differences b/w L and R is, IMHO, that the R can never criticize its own; too idealist, while the L makes a business of navel-examination. Keeping it real, folks!
— Clem - Oct 3, 12:29 PM - #RIP OFF!
— jeff - Oct 3, 02:56 PM - #www.wmagazine.com/ce…
Yea right. I lived on the Green line. Yellow line all the way.
— Ray - Oct 3, 04:30 PM - #I’m disappointed that Campus Progress wouls publish such drivel.
— Colin Bennett - Oct 10, 09:02 AM - #