Here we go back to the regular articles, if you remember last time it was a regular episode I was defending my homeland of the American South by tearing apart the wikipedia article on it. Now we are going to continue that and go more into the actual culture than we are the view of the people and the like. Now we have a lot to cover so better to just jump up and Let’s Hammer This In!
Opening up, we have a better part of their stint on the religious demographics on the South. The problem with the statistics they are using on this is they are horrifically out of date. They make it out as if an approximate 83% of the south are forms of Protestant faiths (primarily Baptist variants), 12% Catholic, and 5% everything else because ‘muh Bible Belt’. Now while the Bible Belt is a bit of a thing and I would consider Kentucky and Tennessee to be the buckle of it, the demographics and openness of various religions have diversified over the past 30 or so years. They aren’t even going by the data gathered by the US. Census about 10 years ago. This is because if you look into state quick facts, which is likely what they used for half of the info in this article (lets pick a random one say…. South Carolina,) rhey don’t even delve into those facts unless you try to find the last recording of those statistics which is 2010. (Full Disclosure I was a one of the census takers that year).
So what does the actual religious make up come up to be? Here is the problem; No matter how you try to search for it using the Census search they won’t tell you. Here, try for yourself, if you have better luck please put it in the comments. Though if you look at a study Oxford did, you get a bit clearer of a picture with them showing the influx of Muslims and Asian religious groups since the year 2000. But I think you know where I’m gonna really go here to break the narrative – Paganism! Not only is there yours truly, but there are enough to hold regular gatherings all throughout the region! Not to mention, there are also Mosques and Synagogues in even smaller towns in the area and Pagan priests and priestesses on religious councils in a surprising amount of cities. Moving on.
To simpify this I am showing where the article links to, to go more into depth on the “Southern Drawl.” Now, while I along with many others have met many people with these particular accents there have been just as many who don’t carry them. For the longest time I’ve had people think I was from Illinois because I didn’t sound like a ‘proper Southerner.’ Sure I grew up on the border of Illinois and Kentucky (Paducah, KY specifically) but this isn’t relegated to just Paducah. Its more the nature of the larger cities becoming more cosmopolitan and in need of an even tone of speech. In fact if you look more into the Wikipedia articles provided they will try to hide it, but come with the tone of the South being stereo-typically ignorant even though a handful of the best schools in the country have always been in the South. Why do you think segregation in schooling in particular was a big deal during the time of Jim Crow laws?
In short, the American South had become a hotbed of innovation and the Southern Democrats that were in charge during those times didn’t want their ‘unwashed’ to have a shot at working hard enough to get their pie. It sounds like elitists always end up being bigoted assholes intent on keeping everything for themselves and not letting anyone else have a chance at earning anything. No wonder they like communism so much. Now here the article goes into various regional differences and talk about how Virginia was the capitol state of the Confederacy (no wonder its Governor wants to get rid of the Confederate monuments so much) but those could each be an article unto themselves. I’ll keep those in mind, but for now lets skip down a bit shall we?
Now if you look at this the common thread is the ‘white trash’ and ‘hillbilly’ stereotypes. The lazy bum cousin kissers and inbreeders. Now I joke about this being just ‘Eastern Kentucky’ at times but there are very small and I mean VERY small pockets of incestuous happenings through out the South typically in remote and cut off counties and townships where industry and culture has been long dead or dying. Thing is this stereotype couldn’t be further from the truth, as one of the biggest things I’ve learned growing up and why many Southerners buck the narrative is the lesson of hard work being paramount to success. Meritocracy is king and queen in the American South. Though there is an explanation where that stereotype of lazy white trash came from – hookworm! Working out in fields and mines with minimal protection and a shit healthcare system for the longest time led to a horrible parasitic epidemic because they would latch on inbetween the toes of worn out shoes and start sapping energy away from normally hard workers. This also explains how the ‘drawl’ developed,
However this article would have you believe the laziness comes from tobacco chewing and consumption which (while not a healthy one) bring actually a sort of calming agent to take away some of the difficulties from the hard work performed. I have to disclose here that while I’ve never smoked, myself, I have lived with smokers nearly my entire life, current and former. That’s actually why I don’t smoke but I will say this – smoking didn’t make any of them ‘lazy bums.’ If they were lazy there were some extenuating circumstances – my mother was lazy because she got married at 17 when she was effectively still an irresponsible child and as such never really grew out of her irresponsible nature. Smoking didn’t make her lazy, I’d say gynocentrism made her lazy. But out of the whole of my experience she was one of few exceptions that I can speak about when it comes to hard work.
They then end it with the art of the American South, which is frankly hard to be wrong about since there is physical evidence they can’t deny about it. Overall though I think its clear whats going on here. They see a disenfranchised group (Southerners – Black, brown and white) who are hard workers that aren’t being allowed to work hard and instead are subsisting on welfare checks that are rarely enough, and are sick of being insulted getting ‘uppity’ and wanting a decent life again and that scares them.
Here is a fun fact as well, one of the people with the worst Southern Drawl I work with is from Detroit, Michigan. Also he is a Vietnam vet (something else the far left doesn’t like) and is as goofy as I am. Also one of his exes is black. I know, I’ve met the woman. This kind of breaks a lot of those narratives doesn’t it? So does racism exist in the South? Sure it does, but it’s restrained to those aforementioned incestuous communities that have been far removed from the rest of the world for far too long. As such, what we are learning here is summed up in one concept: actual bigotry and incestuousness go hand in hand, whether that is genetic incest or ideological incest. The separation of ideas by silencing free speech will only make everything worse!
Well that was fun! Hope this article helps a lot with killing demonization of human beings and get us to actually break down the things that truly divide us in this realm. Next week I’ll jump into something more entertainment related again so until then Please Remember to Game Freely!
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Interesting read. I see quite a bit of that about my own home region as well, the Pacific Northwest. There’s an odd trickle down chain of perceptions. Outsiders think the entire Pacific Northwest is basically the far left lunatics that is basically a small minority of the urban population only. Then the cities tend to think of the rural areas as backwards hics, intellectual and cultural throwbacks. And the Rural areas think of the city folk as morons that have good intentions but no practicality, and that people outside the region don’t even know they exist.
It even goes down to cultural things, like I’ll watch the Food Network (Or used to when I had TV) and the few times they mentioned the Pacific Northwest they said “Pacific Northwest food is all about fish”. Which is actually… very incorrect. Cattle is big here. Dairy and beef far outweighs fish in the general diet.
Lazy stereotyping I suppose goes all around. It’s why I like to travel when I can. There’s no substitute for boots on the ground level information. And traveling is why I’m leery of anytime someone claims cultural/intellectual superiority over another group. Just been too many places, met too many people to believe it as a general rule.