Let Us Put This Out There So The 76ers Prez & Everyone Else Can Hear: “New Philadelphia” Is A Pejorative (And This Jersey Is Fugly)

Someone on Twitter said this looks like Packer Park and now we cannot unsee that.

BY JOEY SWEENEY | In this new era of Philly as a city one transplants to — 7,500 New Yorkers moved here just from February to September of this year, for example — we natives have noticed a thing: There are moments when you can see the transplant tip their hand, and get a flavor for how they really think about the new city they have taken on. 

The good ones come to this place with an abiding humility, fully aware that Philadelphia has an entire set of folkways one has to parse; navigating this isn’t always easy, but make no mistake — it’s part and parcel of the your job description as “Philadelphian.” If there is an overarching moral directive in all of this, it is one that is based in a kind of theoretical courtesy: Don’t assume.

As in, don’t assume that just because you’re here now that this is to be accepted as a universal good. And don’t assume that you get to rebrand the city in the image of whoever you’d like to be selling it to. 

For example, consider this interview with Chris Heck, president of the 76ers, which ran today on the sports uniform fan site Uni-Watch. It should have been a softball discussion of a new 76ers uniform that debuted online this week. Given the nature of our city, our people, our folkways, even this uniform was a source of controversy, but Heck, a native of Washington, D.C., turned it into something else entirely when he showed not just his hand, but potentially that of the whole 76ers organization in terms of how they regard, well, us.

We actually don’t use the term “Philly,” because we think it’s lazy and undersells the city, and sometimes I think “blue collar” does the same thing. We refer to it as “New Philadelphia.” Blue collar’s important for the city, but it’s not the only component. New Philadelphia is about the arts, it’s about culture, it’s about education, it’s about diversity. We like that narrative more than the blue collar hockey thing. Which isn’t a slight on it, but we think we’re more than blue collar.

That’s one (exceptionally classist) way of looking at it. Another way of looking at it — and what many (including myself) see when they hear the term is this:

“New Philadelphia” is the tidal wave of tax abatement, shit design and shit construction that continues to steamroll whole neighborhoods as we speak.

“New Philadelphia” is some white boy in Fishtown telling you how to eat pho.  

“New Philadelphia” is the totally gross realtor who knocked on my father’s door the day Joe Biden won just to see if, oh, I dunno, he’d be interested in selling a house that’s been in the family for generations. 

“New Philadelphia,” my friends, is spaghetti with ketchup. It’s bullshit. And everybody knows it. 

Granted, Old Philadelphia had (and continues to have) big, big problems. But here in Philly, we (most of us, anyway) give everyone a fair shake, but we don’t need you to tell us what this place is. We live it. And it’s only new to you.