Why "Jersey girl" is a slur:

[holly_evolving]

"And what are people afraid of? Fighters. They are afraid of people who have worked hard to be where they are. So they recoil. They call them “brash” and “uncouth.”"

http://bexgams.tumblr.com/post/511223892/the-jersey-girl

Comments

[thegreyeminence.livejournal.com]

I don't think I've ever heard “Jersey girl” — or Jersey anything else for that matter — used as an insult. At least, not beyond what any other state gets. Maybe I wouldn't notice an insult even if one were intended. Like many people in New Jersey, I like our bad reputation.

The usual attack on New Jersey is that we're not classy, and worse, that we don't even want to be. We're among the richest and smartest in the country, but stubbornly middle class. New Jersey is the new-money family from the suburbs that moved into the mansion next door to Massachusetts and Connecticut, and then put pink flamingos all over the front yard. They think we should be ashamed, and it drives them absolutely bugfuck that we're not.

I think we're like Texas, New York, or California, in that we're proud of the features the rest of the country hates about us. (Try convincing a Texan that size isn't everything.) That's a sharp contrast to states like West Virginia or Florida, who hate the national stereotypes about them.

[holly-evolving.livejournal.com]

I think you're by and large right. There is one stereotype, however, that bugs the hell out of me: that NJ is a dirty, industrial hellhole. I'll grant that if your entire experience of NJ is the Turnpike, that yes, it's pretty ugly. But 78, 287, 295, hell, even the Parkway shows plenty of countryside. I live in a small suburban neighborhood completely surrounded by farms, and I'm 45 minutes from Trenton. I have to remember to keep my mouth shut every time I hear the phrase "Dirty Jersey."