That's interesting, because my roomate at Campus Lodge one year was from downtown detroit, and he agreed with me %110. It's not just me, but I knew you were gonna suggest that. You will meet nicer, humble people walking down Jefferson Ave in Detroit than you will any part of this lousy city
Hmmmm...interesting. I can say that the east side of Orlando (UCF, and Winter Park) has a totally different culture than the west side (Disney, theme parks, etc.). Somehow I've always ended up in a part of town that had a mix of locals, college people and transient professionals. Maybe it was because no one sect dominated the others in sheer terms of population that my experience has been so different than yours. I'm thinking out loud here. I will say that if you do end up in any part of a city where there is an obvious majority culture, and you are not of it, that you can end up noticing douchebags everywhere.
And as you report, even in the midst of a big city, there are points at which you realize you have found a very nice "pocket" of people. It's probably the areas that are overtly "public" (e.g. downtown, retail areas, highway developments, etc.) that have the highest density of assholes in any city, in any region. People are generally not very personal and sometimes even put offish (as in New York, "don't fucking talk to me because you're wasting my time" mentality) in areas where they do not have to deal with others but in the few seconds they are in proximity of one and other.
The resort areas of Florida are actually quite the opposite though. People are nice because they want you to stay and spend money, whether you're a local or not, you are contributing to their economy. I know when I go to Miami, I stay in the same hotel every time. The first time I stayed there my wife and I were both impressed at how nice the staff was, and even the surrrounding merchants. But when we returned, and greeted the staff by name, they immediately bumped us into "family" status. We didn't even go out last time we went, we just partied with the staff in the hotel restaurant/bar and had a great time.
But in all honesty, my judgements are most likely skewed from the norm, because I am totally a people person. I've been travelling around my whole life, so I know how to show up anywhere and win people over and turn strangers into acquaintances. I've had no choice but to master doing that, and at this point, it's part of who I am, I know no strangers.
I've been told it's a cultural difference between social behaviors in the Midwestern folk vs. Floridians in general. That seems to be the best answer i've come across. And my social skills were adequate in Michigan, so don't see what happened here. In my view, the asshole-ish nature of this wretched place just proliferated onto me
I used to be such a nice guy, too, believe it or not.
I lived in Indiana for 2 years, and in Missouri for 2 years. Both had extremely nice people. Midwest farmers are awesome. Their daughters are hot too.