In my 30+ years of life in the Bay Area living in 11 cities here, the most distinct and strange archetype of young person I encounter is those who grew up in Palo Alto First off, they almost universally loathe their parents and feel victimized by them. They’re left wing but extremely machiavellian, they have the violent agitator belief system of disenfranchised revolutionaries with the jaded aloofness of an aristocrat class. Bizarre combination and very recognizable, so many times in my life I encounter the archetype and later learn they grew up in PA, and it immediately is obvious in hindsight There’s no parallel to it in the Bay Area, it’s like there’s something in the water. Kids from affluent areas of the East Bay, SF, Los Gatos/Saratoga all have subtle distinctions but generally have pretty similar, chill, moderate-left, high achieving cultures. For some reason the affluent Palo Alto area is has this little isolated subculture of young people full of hatred with a super high rate of sociopaths