Blog In defence of Toronto

A few days ago, a Tweet-baiting piece of Toronto bashing cropped up on Toronto Life’s website. Someone named Michelle Dean composed a trite little city-slagging symphony called I ♥ N.Y. (Not T.O.), which decried the Big Smoke as a city unsuitable for the “world’s starry-eyed dreamers.” Basically, Dean describes why she’s giving up on Toronto after 11 months and decamping back to New York City, a city she apparently finds much more conducive to dreamers and their starry eyes. Dean’s individual story is immaterial in a way, because her communiqué from somewhere between Toronto and NYC is of a piece with a whole wash of Toronto hate. 

It seems like people can’t stop diagnosing Toronto. The cover story of this month’s Walrus, by John Lornic, is “How Toronto Lost Its Groove.” Here, though, the cutesy title actually betrays lots of solid research and argumentation about how Toronto’s attempts at World Class City status have been tripped up, as well as a photo of a swan nesting in some trash. But Lornic’s piece (well-reported, relevant) is an exception. What’s analyzed (or at least identified), more commonly—be it on blogs or by heavy-lidded Hogtowners haurmphing in local bars—is the sense of lurking malaise that seems to taint enthusiasm for the city, forcing (young) people to look elsewhere. Dean writes, “I do not think I am particularly unique in my desire to be elsewhere.” And no, she’s probably not. 

There may be some truth in characterizing Toronto as being defined more by its aspirations to greatness than by anything actually great. And it’s easy to despair as the skyline becomes increasingly dotted by shoddily built condos, institutional record shops are shooed out of their spaces to make way for dollar stores, and brunch has somehow emerged as the cultural pillar of the city. And yes, our mayor leaves something to be desired in the lack-of-controversy department. Hogtown may lack the “romance” of New York City, but that’s fine. As serial curmudgeon and awesome dude Steve Albini once told Gothamist in an interview (which you should check out if you get at all aroused by Big Apple bashing), “New York is such a monolith that it’s pointless to have an opinion about it. It’s like bitching about the weather.”

The point is not that New York is better than Toronto. Sure, it probably is in a lot of important ways, especially if you want to feel like you’re “part of the action,” where your idea of “the action” can only happen in New York City. What rankles about these comparisons—besides them being kind of off-base: Explaining why New York City has more to offer than Toronto is like explaining why Toronto has more to offer than Regina—are all of the wild expectations. What does everyone who feels so oppressed by Toronto want from a city, exactly? Do they want it to wake them up every morning by whispering in their ears that they’re good and worthwhile and for sure going to make something of themselves? Do they want it to inform their identity so totally that they’d basically pay an insane cost-of-living tariff just to reside there? 

Living life, not just as an “adult” (where the term suggests some level of settling and compromise and peacemaking with mediocrity), but as a human being, demands some level of comfort, which is not the same as settling or compromise or mediocrity. It means being happy with what you have. And not just because other people in the world are starving and blah blah blah, but because part of being a human being is enjoying the things you’ve been afforded, and making them yours: in deriving pleasure from your day-to-day, no matter how banal your day-to-day may reveal itself to be when you put it under a microscope, or even when you compare it to the way you imagine the day-to-day of a New Yorker.

Toronto is a great city for enjoying the day-to-day, and not just because it’s “comfortable” or “practical” or “unromantic.” Excluding the glass-and-steel sprawl, it’s got a mess of good neighbourhoods: from Leslieville to Cabbagetown, The Annex, Bloordale, Parkdale, the Junction, and the large and still-livable stretches of Queen West. And as someone whose primary interest is filmgoing (or at least film-watching), there’s no place I’d rather be. Toronto has accommodated an upswing in indie rep cinemas in the past year or so, and managed to support a string of independent video stores and retailers while bigger names like Blockbuster hit the skids in the downtown core. TIFF too, while fun to make fun of as it becomes increasingly preoccupied with its own corporate branding, still offers up a spate of great films every year and also hosts screenings all year at the Lightbox. Toronto is not just suitable or “good enough” for these things. It’s great for them.

Even if Sonic Boom did get forced out of its old space on Bloor Street, there are still lots of great record stores in town. Sure, it’s not the same as going to New York and coming back with a bag full of expensive first-pressings you wouldn’t have been able to find anywhere else, but those kinds of experiences are precisely what makes New York (or any other city) nice to visit sometimes. There are parties and bands and those cool word-of-mouth Extermination nights and other fun stuff, and loads of smart, engaged, funny people right here. And, when the weather’s right, there’s nothing like biking out to Toronto Island and cracking beers and jokes on the Hanlan’s Point beach. What does New York have to compare to that?

The point about the livability of any city—and about fun, more generally—is that it’s what you make of it. Fun as an adult is basically the same as fun as a teenager; oscillating between watching the same VHS tapes for the 86th time in your parents’ basement or trolling the streets with your idiot friends trying to find a suitable set of bleachers to split a 40 of Alberta Premium under, and then seeing what trouble you can get into. It’s a mix of the homey, pleasant comforts, and the willingness to try new things with people you like. You’re never going to be happy if you base your whole life around hoping you’ll find yourself as part of some larger scene that you can absolve yourself into, or impatiently bopping from town to town, from indie-rock club to indie-rock club, with the quiet expectation that you’ll happen upon some group of kids who, like, layer tape loops of tubas and are totally the new Vampire Weekend, or whatever. 

Toronto may be a work in progress (which plenty of people find exciting, and opportune), but it’s also the sort of place that’s fun and diverse enough to attract a lot of people doing a lot of interesting things. Say what you will about Mayor Ford, but his election had a galvanizing impact on those who oppose his reign, and the widespread reengagement with civic issues over the past year or so has been incredible. Even better than this, a lot of people seem to finally be abandoning the Arts & Crafts, beardo, indie, handclap thing for real rock ’n’ roll bands (Teenage Kicks, Greys, et al), meaning that Toronto music is now good without also being noxiously adorable. And Bret Hart hosts comedy nights.

But if you’re still more interested in regarding yourself as a starry-eyed dreamer and living in cities possessive of greater narrative thrust, I heard New York has some pretty awesome graffiti that you can admire from the greasy porthole of your $12,000-per-month apartment.