Not long after I moved to Boston seven years ago, I started hearing about the H-bomb phenomenon. Nothing to do with weaponry or anything, it’s the idea that mentioning that you’re a student at Harvard can have a chilling, intimidating effect on social relations, when you’re, say, at a party and trying to make new friends (or trying to find someone to go on a date with). “Harvard” has this mystique around it that gets associated with people who go/work there. “Ohhh, you must be really smart/rich/snobby/all of the above.” Watch as the veil falls between the Harvard person and the “common” person.

At last night’s NNB pub night, a couple of Harvard postdocs told stories about how they’ve felt the same effect at conferences or other places where they meet other scientists. (Being in a pub right across the street from the Longwood area in the company of other Harvard people felt like a safe place to be able to talk openly and to gain sympathy about this, rather than getting the predictable eyeball-rolls.)

They said that they go out of their way to not say their affiliation. “I’m from Boston.”

As one person put it, if people see that you’re from Harvard, they automatically think you’re a prick.

Where does this come from? Jealousy? Run-of-the-mill pettiness? A primordial urge to want to hate and take down the top dog? Is this any different from the Boston baseball fans who love to hate the NY Yankees? Does this happen in other parts of the world, like to the poor people at Cambridge or Oxford?