What Kind of Wine Snob Are You?

[Anton_D]

Does one have to be a snob to be an enthusiast?

I collect stamps - it doesn’t mean that any stamp I don’t collect is lousy, it’s just that there is a direction to my enthusiasm.

I like to think of wine as an enthusiasm more than an act of snobbery.

Except for that Caymus 40th…sometimes, even an enthusiast runs into a bad apple.

[Lyle_Fass]

@mike pobega

I had much more to say on this but will limit it for now due to lack of time.
I personally do not see the use of the term snob as anything other than derogatory. It literally means someone who puts up his nose to others and I would never think I am, nor hang out with such persons myself. I have spent much of my lifetime avoiding wine snobs. Once we get past that, there is some entertaining aspects of this written piece that made me smile and certainly much holds certain truisms.
I have a question for the author:
Was the line below tongue-in-cheek? THIS is snobbery.
It’s because some wine is better than other wine because it comes from better dirt.

This was my favorite bit that made me smile:
There is a phenomenon that I also have noticed with these two types of snobs. The traditional wine snobs usually cannot drink any of the spoofy stuff. Like me. I’d rather have a beer than drink spoofy wine. But the spoofy wine people can drink traditional wine and enjoy it and make intelligent comments on it so maybe I have something to learn from the spoof crowd.


from Wiki:
A snob is a person who believes a correspondence between status and human worth. The term also refers to a person who believes that some people are inherently inferior to him or her for any one of a variety of reasons, including real or supposed intellect, wealth, education, ancestry, power, physical strength, class, taste, beauty, nationality, fame, extreme success of a family member or friend, etc.[citation needed] Often this form of snobbery reflects the snob’s personal attributes.[citation needed] For example, a common snobbery of the affluent is the belief that wealth is either the cause or result of superiority, or both.[citation needed] Both definitions are used as a pejorative.

Thanks for the interesting read though on an otherwise dull morning. Next time, use your spell-checker…

The line below was not tongue in cheek at all. It is known that some vineyards produce better wine that others. That is not snobbery. That is fact.

Glad I could make you smile . . . .

[Lyle_Fass]

@Dave McCloskey

I nominate this for Post of the Year. Very entertaining and informative!

If I had to assign one of these snob categories to myself it would be #6. I’ll go out on an limb and say most of the Francophiles here fit in the #2 category.

Thanks Dave…I love writing pieces like this…

[Lyle_Fass]

@Alan Rath

Lyle, I enjoyed this, a good read. Now a serious question: In which snob category were you in back in 2007 when you wrote this:

99/04 Lager-Meredith Syrah Mt. Veeder - Too oaky. Really nasty. Had the '04 today and much better but still crappy CA syrah. Not too oaky and pretty pure. But in general avoid these if you see them.

Hmm…def new world/old world at that point. I hated the '99 but did not mind the '04 but the '99 was so awful that it made me like the '04 less. I have matured.

[Lyle_Fass]

@Pat Burton

There is a subcategory missing to #1. The anti-point snob. They feel the use of points in any capacity diminishes the discussion of wine. These people are so against the discussion of points that they insert themselves into any discussion involving points to tell you their feelings, but otherwise refuse to contribute to the actual discussion of wine.

good one!

[Chris_Seiber]

One you find often around here is the “Just Drink Beer Snob.” This is the one who dismisses as unsophisticated the idea that you could drink wine with anything other than the most conventional wine-pairing foods.

And if he would reluctantly allow that you could drink with anything outside the most conventional foods, he’ll insist that it can only be super-obscure varietals, rose or sparkling wines. “Hmm, I suppose if you absolutely had to have wine with your Korean BBQ, maybe a sparkling Grechetto Bianco from a cool vintage wouldn’t be so horrible, but really, you should just have a craft beer.”

[Lyle_Fass]

@David Glasser

@Harris Goldberg

I think you can know what you like and not be a snob. Sorry, having an opinion on what you like is one thing, denigrating others because they dont have the same opinion or you feel you know more… well, thats a snob. Nothing to be envied about… JMHO

I’m bringing this back because I think it gets to the heart of what it means to be a snob. It’s that feeling of superiority, whether expressed or just internal. One can have preferences without feeling others are wrong or inferior just because their preferences differ. That’s not snobbery.

That said, Lyle’s post was fun and has a lot of truth even if applied to “wine lovers” as opposed to “snobs.” I’m sure I’ve fit most of those categories at different times.

Glad you and a lot of other people got the whole idea that it was supposed to be fun/truthful/poignant all at the same time. Kind of like a “roast” on Comedy Central, except I am roasting wine snobs/lovers/enthusiasts/whatever name makes you comfy . . .

[Cliff_Rosenberg]

@Chris Seiber

One you find often around here is the “Just Drink Beer Snob.” This is the one who dismisses as unsophisticated the idea that you could drink wine with anything other than the most conventional wine-pairing foods.

And if he would reluctantly allow that you could drink with anything outside the most conventional foods, he’ll insist that it can only be super-obscure varietals, rose or sparkling wines. “Hmm, I suppose if you absolutely had to have wine with your Korean BBQ, maybe a sparkling Grechetto Bianco from a cool vintage wouldn’t be so horrible, but really, you should just have a craft beer.”

I’m a different kind of beer snob – though, I confess, I must plead guilty to the above on occasion as well. Since I completely buy into the pastoral fantasy of wine as a connection to the soil, I’d rather drink beer than industrially made wine. I can find a couple of wines around $10 I like, but it’s much harder than it used to be.

[Mike_Evans]

@Cliff Rosenberg

@Chris Seiber

One you find often around here is the “Just Drink Beer Snob.” This is the one who dismisses as unsophisticated the idea that you could drink wine with anything other than the most conventional wine-pairing foods.

And if he would reluctantly allow that you could drink with anything outside the most conventional foods, he’ll insist that it can only be super-obscure varietals, rose or sparkling wines. “Hmm, I suppose if you absolutely had to have wine with your Korean BBQ, maybe a sparkling Grechetto Bianco from a cool vintage wouldn’t be so horrible, but really, you should just have a craft beer.”

I’m a different kind of beer snob – though, I confess, I must plead guilty to the above on occasion as well. Since I completely buy into the pastoral fantasy of wine as a connection to the soil, I’d rather drink beer than industrially made wine. I can find a couple of wines around $10 I like, but it’s much harder than it used to be.

I know it became much harder for me when Clos de Briords and Clos Roche Blanche broke the $10 barrier.

[Robert_B]

Which one of the snob categories applies to the one that gets mad about a gift with no thought at all? If you talk to me for at least 60 seconds about wine, I will give you a long list of very affordable wines that I drink. I have no problem drinking most wines from Chateau Ste. Michelle. You can find their wines everywhere and they are always affordable. If you want to take it up a notch, you can talk to me for 120 seconds and I will give you another long list of wines that would cost a little more. I have no problem drinking most wines from Sterling or Robert Mondavi. By the way, in the 120 seconds I would likely tell you about a couple of wineries that I do not like. A good gift is in the effort.

[Jim_V_a_n_P_e_l_t]

@Robert B.

Which one of the snob categories applies to the one that gets mad about a gift with no thought at all?

It’s hard to get mad about a gift that misses the mark, wine or otherwise. I’m more worried that a bottle of wine I gift to someone else will in some way miss the mark. What if the bottle is flawed (corked, premox, etc.) and the person wonders why I gave them a crap bottle? What if the mature cab I gave isn’t something they have an appreciation for? These worry me more than “what am I going to do with this bottle I was just given”…I seem to always find some use.

[Harris_Goldberg]

I agree with a lot of what you say. Let’s face it, the geeks here SHOULD know somewhat more than the guy buying Gallo at the Safeway. That’s not an issue. Denigrating those that enjoy something we find basic or simple, however you would say it, that to me is what makes a snob. I have friends who like wine. They may not no all the nuances that people discuss here, but they like what they like. I’ve opened up Saxum for them and they loved it, not knowing really what it is. Now they might put it up there with Apothic Red, but as long as they enjoy it, I’m cool with that.

I have seen many posts that belittle others that don’t understand the things that geeks take for granted, and I hope I never do that…

Happy Holidays!

@brianmcbrearty

@Harris Goldberg

I think you can know what you like and not be a snob. Sorry, having an opinion on what you like is one thing, denigrating others because they dont have the same opinion or you feel you know more… well, thats a snob. Nothing to be envied about… JMHO

Undoubtedly true but…

We do know more! We definitely know a TON more. What the hell are we doing around here if we don’t know more??!!

Look, I appreciate your sentiment. And just as I insulted Mike, I’ll insult you, Harris. You’re being the better person. I’m envious. But it would be disingenuous of me to pretend I don’t think I have better taste than the average person in the Safeway wine section.

They and everybody should drink what they like but

The idea that there’s no disputing taste is a conundrum. It’s not an absolute truth, though it’s probably wisdom. My perspective is that if your dirt is different, then it’s not merely different, it’s also necessarily better or worse. And since I have better taste, I’ll decide which. THAT’s a Level Six Snob.

But if you… not you… if “one” feels denigrated by that, then there’s something missing from this equation because it’s got no correlation to “human value” as the wiki, I think, put it.

[Jay_Miller]

@brodie thomson

@Mike Schieffer

@Robert Dentice

Great, well written article - I am also guilty of what I would call the record collector/Unicorn snob. This wine was made from 200 year old vines planted on the top of Mount everest and it is the only known planting of grape x in the world and only 12 bottles exist and the winemaker has never been seen in public…

You have that, too?? Damn, I hope that fellow from Malaysia didn’t sell me a counterfeit. On the plus side, he did give me a great deal on some old DRC.

If you mean Rudy K, he is Indonesian not Malaysian.

Counterfeit counterfeiters! Where will it all end?

[Mark_Golodetz]

The wine snob is such a cliche, even more so thirty years ago when wine was much more intimidating and there was so little literature, and no Internet to learn from.

Now we are so sophisticated, we are even subcategorizing the type of snobs we are. We are happily continuing to allow ourselves to be labeled as snobs, and letting our tastes define us. Part of any interest is refining what you do, what you like and sharing with friends. If you develop a taste for certain types of wine, and decide you don’t like others, why is that a bad thing?

[Walt_Hoehler]

Mark, I think the ‘snob’ part enters the picture when you believe everyone else should share your palate preferences. That only the wines you like are ‘good’ while most/all others are not.

I termed it “type 7” on page 1 of this thread.

[Chris_Seiber]

One of the definitions of “snob” in Webster’s is “one who has an offensive air of superiority in matters of knowledge or taste.”

There is some vague line we probably all, in some instances, cross where we go from “I understand this subject and know what I like” across to “and that makes me better than these other people.” Maybe when the wines we don’t like and the people who like those wines start getting derided with a significant and emotional disdain.

Of course, a real snob usually has no ability to be self-critical about his snobbery. Those of us who can discuss this about ourselves are probably not beyond redemption.

[brianmcbrearty]

Are we not really hitting the wall on this?

[e_chin]

Here’s another good reason for being a wine snob. Well not in my case at least

https://www.foodandwine.com/news/wine-tasting-engages-your-brain-more-any-other-behavior

[Tantina_A]

Here’s another good reason for being a wine snob. Well not in my case at least

https://www.foodandwine.com/news/wine-tasting-engages-your-brain-more-any-other-behavior

Really interesting article and fun thread to resurrect! I know after I really concentrate on tasting wine and writing notes I am mentally exhausted lol. It is so much more fun to just drink So that article makes sense.
I’m a quality snob for wine and many other things too.

[Mike_Grammer]

that being a connoisseur is a good thing. It means you know what you like and can discern differences between things to assess quality and preference.

FIFY When my dad was traveling with me in Bordeaux and Burgundy and he talked about knowing what he liked, the substituted word was one that more than one vigneron or presenter used.

liked the post a lot, hadn’t seen it when originally posted. I’m definitely not 1-4. Maybe a little bit of 5 and a little more than a little 6—at least that’s what I hypnothetically believe of myself!

Salud,

Mike