It’s more of a “do as I please and others be damned” mentality where rules, policies, regulations, and even laws (like driving laws, etc.) are interpreted as suggestions that are there to follow when it suits my needs but not necessarily anyone else’s. That mentality is what results in seeing people behave as described in this thread and the picture that resulted. Things that happen here just simply don’t in other U.S. cities - Boston, New York, DC, Atlanta, Chicago, St. Louis, Dallas, Denver, Seattle, San Francisco, Los Angeles, take your pick - I’ve been to them all multiple times and I’m originally from the Northeast for perspective. As for some specific examples:

1. Driving to work one morning I passed a man walking down the sidewalk in nothing but a hospital gown that said INMATE on it and one of those orange industrial type extension cords wrapped around his neck. I feel that would warrant attention in other places. Here, nobody paid him the time of day.

2. I routinely encounter (on some roads) folks who drive down the wrong side of the road to avoid sitting in congested rush hour traffic to get to their next intersection and complete a turn.

3. Another driving scenario that is a favorite of mine are the I-95 Express Lanes that were opened a few years ago. Rather than build brand new lanes, existing lanes of the interstate were barricaded off with plastic orange poles screwed into the highway surface so that switching lanes between the express section and regular section was to be prohibited once you drove past the entrance area to the express lanes. But plastic poles are no match for Miami drivers. They simply swerve into the express lanes section, driving over the poles, once they have driven past the overhead toll collection device in the regular section, so they now can drive in express for free by bypassing the toll device. To make it more fun, they are swerving into the express lanes from a dead stop in the regular lanes during rush hour in front of cars traveling 50-70mph in the express lanes not expecting a car going 0mph to suddenly be in front of them. Numerous wrecks have occurred due to this. It got so bad that the DOT had to replace all the original poles (spaced 10 feet apart) with more rigid poles now placed 5 feet apart. These poles will damage your vehicle if you drive over them. There are also now constant signs that say DO NOT DRIVE OVER PLASTIC POLES - MINIMUM FINE $179. I revel in this example because I drive the HOV lanes in Connecticut that have no barriers at all - just a white solid line painted down the highway and a sign that says do not cross into the HOV lane. And everyone obeys the sign! Same in California. I laugh and think about that in Miami and how poles don’t keep people out, let alone just a sign. A solid concrete wall divider is the only acceptable solution here.

I have plenty more examples but that’s a flavor. The highly transient, multicultural melting pot with the heavy Caribbean and Latin American influence overrides what I call “typical American behavior and norms” we’re used to elsewhere in the country because frankly, the people living here are simply not Americans.

With the exception of the toll roads and switching Caribbean to Mexico, this describes Las Vegas pretty well.

Does MIA have people walking around public places dressed entirely in Reynolds Wrap "so the government can't read [their] thoughts?" We do.