Why is inital /ŋ/ considered hick-ish?
I noticed that there's a tendency to drop initial /ŋ/ in Wu (Shanghainese), but I always ascribed it to the proximity of the word to Mandarin:

我 
Mandarin: wo3 
Wu: (吾) ngu34
外 
Mandarin: wai4 
Wu: nga53

Whereas it is clearly voiced when it occurs in more language-specific words or single syllables (obviously):

硬 
Mandarin: ying4 
Wu: ngang53 
五 
Mandarin: wu3 
Wu: ng34
鱼 
Mandarin: yu2 
Wu: ng34