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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: Purgatory: Is there hope for the Bible Belt?
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cliffdweller
Shipmate
# 13338
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Janine:
Oh, Lawd.
What state was the too-truthful contestant from? California, wasn't she?
Hmmmn. I guess California, too, must be a hotbed of fundamental traditional Christians. How ironic that a Southerner beat her, over that question.
California has the most fertile soil on earth. Everything grows here-- from citrus fruit to wine grapes. And from the John Birch society to the SLA, from conservative whacko fundamentalism to whacko alternative space invader religions. We've got it all.
which is what makes it a fun place to live.
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"Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid." -Frederick Buechner
Posts: 11242 | From: a small canyon overlooking the city | Registered: Jan 2008
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Leaf
Shipmate
# 14169
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Posted
Originally posted by Seraphim: quote:
[On the factors shaping Southern culture:] Though there is a lot of diversity in the South it is for all that a distinct culture closely related to that of the Appalachians, and it is largely a Scots-Anglo culture, heavy on the Scots... The South at heart is agrarian Celtic. That tells you a lot about everything else.
This is in Malcolm Gladwell's recent book, Outliers. He discusses briefly how "cultures of honour" tend to arise in highlands or other marginally fertile areas, such as the Scottish borderlands (the source of much of the historic immigration to Appalachia). A funny bit of the chapter -- excerpt online here -- illustrates the different responses in southern and northern young men to being called "asshole".
If you're not from an honour/shame culture, its rules and values can seem alien.
On another point, Seraphim: quote:
One person in this thread wondered if the way Christianity seems to be dying out in so may places...so weakened in others might not in some way be the work of the Holy Spirit... I think Western Christianity has to essentially die away so that it can be reseeded, rerooted from Eastern Christianity.
Interesting inversion of my initial point. I was speculating that perhaps God got so tired of the way in which humans live religiously, that God would rather they lived in secular relationships of peace and justice. Maybe God prefers that God's children live together peaceably and well, instead of damaging each other with the toxic tribalism which shoots off from ALL religious systems, including Orthodoxy. So that would be the polar opposite of your point.
Posts: 2786 | From: the electrical field | Registered: Oct 2008
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Hiro's Leap
Shipmate
# 12470
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Leaf:
A funny bit of the chapter -- excerpt online here -- illustrates the different responses in southern and northern young men to being called "asshole".
Thanks Leaf, that was fascinating! I'd love to see the experiment repeated for various regions of the UK. Different professions would be interesting too - would accountants react differently to teachers?
Posts: 3418 | From: UK, OK | Registered: Mar 2007
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Campbellite
Ut unum sint
# 1202
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Mockingbird:
quote:
Originally posted by Padre Joshua:
But look at the EP closely. Note that Lincoln only frees those slaves within the territory held by the Confederate army at that time.
The President's power to emancipate slaves only applied where military law was in effect, since it arose from his power as commander-in-chief. So of course he had to spell out exactly where such places were. Otherwise he would have overreached his constitutional powers.
Not quite. The Emancipation Proclamation specifically states that it only applied to those "states and parts of states" that were then "in rebellion" against the government of the United States. In other words, it only applied to exactly those places where Lincoln had precisely zero ability to enforce it. See paragraphs 4 and 5 below.
quote:
Originally posted by Mockingbird:
The Civil War was a civil war, like it or not, believe it or not.
Only after the fact.
FWIW, the official name of that conflict according to the Union government, was the "War of the Rebellion".
Now, therefore I, Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States, by virtue of the power in me vested as Commander-in-Chief, of the Army and Navy of the United States in time of actual armed rebellion against the authority and government of the United States, and as a fit and necessary war measure for suppressing said rebellion, do, on this first day of January, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, and in accordance with my purpose so to do publicly proclaimed for the full period of one hundred days, from the day first above mentioned, order and designate as the States and parts of States wherein the people thereof respectively, are this day in rebellion against the United States, the following, to wit:
Arkansas, Texas, Louisiana, (except the Parishes of St. Bernard, Plaquemines, Jefferson, St. John, St. Charles, St. James Ascension, Assumption, Terrebonne, Lafourche, St. Mary, St. Martin, and Orleans, including the City of New Orleans) Mississippi, Alabama, Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, and Virginia, (except the forty-eight counties designated as West Virginia, and also the counties of Berkley, Accomac, Northampton, Elizabeth City, York, Princess Ann, and Norfolk, including the cities of Norfolk and Portsmouth[)], and which excepted parts, are for the present, left precisely as if this proclamation were not issued.
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I upped mine. Up yours.
Suffering for Jesus since 1966.
WTFWED?
Posts: 12001 | From: between keyboard and chair | Registered: Aug 2001
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Campbellite
Ut unum sint
# 1202
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Seraphim:
Getting Over It: Not very likely any time soon.
True story.
When I was in college (way up north) in Kentucky, I had a roommate who was from Cleveland, OH. He once asked me why we Southerners couldn't just get over it. Why were we so "obsessed" by the War.
I told Bob that it was quite simple. No other section of the country had ever been invaded by (what was then) a foreign power, and occupied by a hostile army which was intent on decapitating our nation.*
And the South WAS a nation in ways that the North at the time was not. We had (and still have) a strong sense of place, of common history and heritage, a flag, national songs, etc. The North in 1860 had... a flag.
One of the many stories of the War of Y*nkee Atrocities tells of two wounded soldiers at Second Manassas, one Union, one Confederate. The Union soldier asks, "Why are you people fighting this war?" The Southerner replied, "Because y'all are here."
* It was the Union's express military intent to kill the military and political leadership. The South had, and in some ways still has a class structure. Kill off the ruling class and you prevent another insurrection.
quote:
Originally posted by Seraphim:
Being clanish: (for what its worth here is a list of my own ancestral family names of various greats and grands going back to the mid 1600s: Hawkwold, Anderson, Henson (a couple of swedes I know), Manning (yes of Archie and Eli Manning fame...we've a common Mayflower ancestor 400 years or so back), Wyndam, Newsome, Cole, Matheeny, Flannagan, Ellis, Bruce, Pierce, Peavy, Burns, Varnado (a Huguenot I think), Black, Harrell, Moore)
Oh sh*t, we might be related! ![[Eek!]](eek.gif)
My folks were at Jamestown before those Y*nkee upstarts arrived on the Mayflower.
shut up Rugasaw. ![[Razz]](tongue.gif)
The only reason any of us are here is because the native peoples had lax immigration laws.
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I upped mine. Up yours.
Suffering for Jesus since 1966.
WTFWED?
Posts: 12001 | From: between keyboard and chair | Registered: Aug 2001
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rugasaw
Shipmate
# 7315
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Seraphim:
Native American's: One little known fact about the Confederacy outside the south is that the Native American tribes of the South were given non-voting representation in the CSA Congress. And it was not like the South had been easy on the Native Americans. The Cherokees received a really raw deal. They were civilized by white standards, lived in log cabins, had their own writing system, were largely Christian, and had become excellent gunsmiths....in less than a generation in the early 1800s they were reduced from prosperity to begging door to door for food. They even won redress for their grievances in the US Supreme Court but President Andrew Jackson refused to enforce the decision. And for all that, bad as it was, when the CSA was formed most of them threw their lot in with the South rather than the Union.
One of the footnotes of history that gets overlooked is that the almost genocidal campaigns against the indians of the west by the Union in the 1870s had as its impetus pay back for the Indians support of the South. It was Shermanesque Union revenge and pre-emptive vengeance on the Indian nations for the friendliness shown by Southeastern Indians towards the Confederacy. We even had a few Native American CSA generals, Chief Joseph Boudinette is one of the Cherokee (I think). Here is a little historical tidbit worthy of savor on the subject: Cherokee Declaration
One should note that the Cherokees were divided on the Civil War. The standing government supported the North. It was only to diminish the tribe that the US government after the war decided that all the Cherokees fought for the South.
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Treat the earth well, It was not given to you by your parents. It was loaned to you by your children. -Unknown
Posts: 2716 | From: Houston | Registered: Jun 2004
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Seraphim
Shipmate
# 14676
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Posted
quote:
It was only to diminish the tribe that the US government after the war decided that all the Cherokees fought for the South.
Interesting. The more things change the more they remain the same. Historically speaking the US (union) has allies...and it has allies, and some allies are more equal than others...the others are all too often, shall we say disposable. It's a sad thing to have to admit...but its true, so far as i can see.
There is an interesting thing to me though with respect to Native American relations and the Deep South.
Growing up you were not considered "white" if you had any other race in you going back 3 or 4 generations...the one drop rule. But socially that did not apply to those with Indian heritage if they looked white. To have other admixtures was considered tragic in varying degrees...but to have an Indian ancestor was considered very cool.
I think...I don't know but I think this was for two reasons. We admired the Indians for fighting us tooth and nail. They had made very honorable (tenacious/even terrifying) enemies when they were enemies. Secondly, if anyone was natually connected to the land we live in it was the Indians. It was theirs first, their place names were found everywhere. So given that Southerners highly valued rootedness, connectedness to the land they farmed, to have indian blood was to be super connected past any gainsaying. It mean you belonged where you were the way others could not hope to belong.
And that reminds me of the rootedness of the Cheddar Man and his descendants. A few years ago a 9000 year old skeleton in a cave in Cheddar England was genetially mapped, and swabs were taken from the local populace to see if he had any descendants left in the area. It turned out he actually did, one school teacher took the dna test and came back a mitocondrial match for the Cheddar man, establishing thereby the oldest known continuous biological lineage in the world. That man and his family belonged in Cheddar in a way no one else there could.
Posts: 354 | From: Hattiesburg, MS | Registered: Mar 2009
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rugasaw
Shipmate
# 7315
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Posted
Sorry to not have all my points together. Dinner called.
Quick note about Cherokees. If you ever hear anyone say that all Cherokees agree with each other you have met someone who knows nothing about the Cherokees. At any given time half the nation is at odds with the other half.
quote:
Originally posted by Seraphim:
Also, it is still not unusual for the better part of the teachers in the local schools to also be sunday school teachers in local churches. Bibles are pretty much in evidence in every classroom, either on the class bookshelf or on the teacher's desk or in the teacher's lounge. And that is true from kindergarten to high school. It is actually in college where a southern child will first meet an educator who is not at least a nominal Christian, if not an active one.
Not in Texas. The majority of teachers are at least nominally Christian but by no means are all.
quote:
Originally posted by Seraphim:
And of course if conversation risks straying into gossip, it can be made better by affixing "Bless his/her/their heart(s) to anything you feel compelled to say...and it is thereby known nothing mean spirited is intended.
I think it means I can insult you all I want but it's OK because I say bless your heart.
Campbellite, I've gotten over the various atrocities committed. Just go on back to the casino and spend your money. ![[Biased]](wink.gif)
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Treat the earth well, It was not given to you by your parents. It was loaned to you by your children. -Unknown
Posts: 2716 | From: Houston | Registered: Jun 2004
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rugasaw
Shipmate
# 7315
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Seraphim:
There is an interesting thing to me though with respect to Native American relations and the Deep South.
Growing up you were not considered "white" if you had any other race in you going back 3 or 4 generations...the one drop rule. But socially that did not apply to those with Indian heritage if they looked white. To have other admixtures was considered tragic in varying degrees...but to have an Indian ancestor was considered very cool.
I think...I don't know but I think this was for two reasons. We admired the Indians for fighting us tooth and nail. They had made very honorable (tenacious/even terrifying) enemies when they were enemies. Secondly, if anyone was natually connected to the land we live in it was the Indians. It was theirs first, their place names were found everywhere. So given that Southerners highly valued rootedness, connectedness to the land they farmed, to have indian blood was to be super connected past any gainsaying. It mean you belonged where you were the way others could not hope to belong.
This is only true if one did not look like talk like or act like a Native American. The cynic* in me says that the coolness of having a Native American ancestor is that the Native Americans are our countries original mystics. It is cool to be related to a mystic. It is not cool to be a mystic.
*Maybe I am not over it after all.
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Treat the earth well, It was not given to you by your parents. It was loaned to you by your children. -Unknown
Posts: 2716 | From: Houston | Registered: Jun 2004
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Barefoot Friar
Ship's Shoeless Brother
# 13100
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Campbellite:
The only reason any of us are here is because the native peoples had lax immigration laws.
![[Killing me]](graemlins/killingme.gif)
OTOH, some nations had pretty negative opinions about the white invasion. Chiricahua Apache come to mind.
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Do your little bit of good where you are; its those little bits of good put together that overwhelm the world. -- Desmond Tutu
Posts: 1621 | From: Warrior Mountains | Registered: Oct 2007
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Janine
The Endless Simmer
# 3337
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Posted
Brings to mind the way, in some areas, every other fishbelly white person claims to be a descendant of a "Cherokee princess".
Sheesh. 'Em Cher-kee princessus musta dropped 'em some litters.
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I'm a Fundagelical Evangimentalist. What are you?
Take Me Home * My Heart * An hour with Rich Mullins *
Posts: 13788 | From: Below the Bible Belt | Registered: Sep 2002
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Seraphim
Shipmate
# 14676
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Posted
quote:
I think it means I can insult you all I want but it's OK because I say bless your heart.
Pretty much...just make sure your tone of voice is sincere.
quote:
Brings to mind the way, in some areas, every other fishbelly white person claims to be a descendant of a "Cherokee princess".
It ain't just a white thing...plenty of black families lay claim to distant cherokee princess ancestors
Posts: 354 | From: Hattiesburg, MS | Registered: Mar 2009
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Janine
The Endless Simmer
# 3337
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Patrick the less saintly:
Rednecks are invariably white, poorly educated, working class (although by no means necessarily poor)... not responsible for what he's doing... does like his Falstaff beer... Drives a... pickup truck... got a gun rack...
Too bad you used such a dated old song to illustrate your... erm... point. Here's a better one: Gretchen Wilson's "Redneck Woman".
quote:
... rednecks invariably being the sort for whom the broadest possible interpretation of the 2nd must always take precedence over such mundane factors as common sense...
What's the problem? You don't usually drive around with the things loaded. You might want to stop off after work at a particularly good spot as the dusk falls, to pick off a few rabbits or squirrels for the family.
quote:
... in stereotype always and in fact not infrequently, is known to lash out irrationally whenever (his) world view is challenged...
Oh, Lord. Like everyone, everywhere else floats lightly and sweetly as a cotton-candy butterfly into the accepting arms of Change, at all times. ![[Roll Eyes]](rolleyes.gif)
<... skipping over the bit congratulating the ignorant rednecks for being so very modern as to arrest white murderers of a black victim, yet damning them because they dare to put murderers to death...>
quote:
... Redneck culture is deeply wrapped up in the Stars and Bars flag... often seen... on pickup trucks in less salubrious parts of the American South...
That must make all parts of the American South unsalubrious. Gee, thanks.
quote:
The irony of this is lost on them, as, in fact, is all irony...
Duuuh, yeah. And Sarky-chasm too. And, like, adding without taking one's shoes off.
quote:
Younger rednecks... have their own prejudices, which are as acceptable in their culture as they are unacceptable in most of the developed Western World... homophobia... xenophobia... anti-immigrant terms...
Hmph. Just because they haven't been exposed to you... or is it because they've been exposed to you? How much time have you spent in the American South, and what did you do to the poor rednecks? ![[Paranoid]](graemlins/paranoid.gif) Were you tossing peanuts at them through the bars again?
quote:
... Gun culture... Rednecks almost invariably hunt...
And your problem with that is?...
Well, no, it's not that they all hunt. Who has time to go hunting when he could be parked in his recliner watching football on TV, with the air conditioner set to "cyclone", blowing a cold breeze up one pajama leg and out the other?
The point is, though, that everybody knows how, and has the tools to do it. You never know when you might be invaded by outside forces of Nature or of Man, and have the economy break down at least temporarily, and have to fend for your family from the land.
quote:
... and are criticized for their unsporting methods by other hunters...
Who criticises whom? For what, exactly?
quote:
... Fundamentalist Protestant Christianity...
- Fundamentals = basics, common ground
- Protestant = no thank you, religious figures, I'll stand before God on my own two feet with Jesus alone vouching for me
- Christianity = following the Way, the Truth, the Light. You got a problem with that, take it up with Jesus.
quote:
... A machismo that identifies their lifestyle with manliness and urban lifestyle, particularly that of urban intellectuals, with effeminacy...
Urban intellectuals would strike me as effeminate, too, dropped suddenly into a rural or nearly rural atmosphere and asked to provide a living for themselves with an assembly line job, or a farm job, or by living from the land. Heck, they'd strike me as more feminine than that there little Gretchen Wilson (see video above).
quote:
... A belief that said effeminate urbanite intellectuals are out to get them (rednecks hate and fear the government, but for entirely different reasons than do liberals and radical leftists)...
It ain't paranoia if they really are out to getcha. (I suppose only liberals and radical leftists have the mental wherewithal to work up a good, sensible, reasonable hate&fear of over-the-top government?)
quote:
... A conception of justice based on the idea of 'an eye for an eye' (the vast majority of rednecks will be in strongly favour of capital punishment, hence the disgusting enthusiasm shown for it by both Bill Clinton and George W. Bush)...
We'd all like to see the sensibilities of Jesus tempering government power with mercy to balance the justice. Ya gotta admit, though, in the case of the truly violent repeat offender, there's no recidivism after the gas chamber...
As for ol' Bill Clinton, him neglecting to squelch the death penalty was one of the few things i found not disgusting about him.
quote:
... Social, political, and religious conservatism...
Yup.
I live South of the majority of rednecks, but they do travel down this far for work, school, vacations... And of course the Appalachian hill folk on Mama's side of the family give me a rounded insight beyond just a Cajun POV. So I do think I have a good grasp of what being a redneck is.
So, Patrick-the-less, did you get your degree in Redneckology from a school over there in the UK? Or are you from the Bible Belt originally? Is your jaundiced view of my neighbors due to experience among them, or did you read it off the back of a breakfast cereal box?
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I'm a Fundagelical Evangimentalist. What are you?
Take Me Home * My Heart * An hour with Rich Mullins *
Posts: 13788 | From: Below the Bible Belt | Registered: Sep 2002
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Hiro's Leap
Shipmate
# 12470
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Janine:
So, Patrick-the-less, did you get your degree in Redneckology from a school over there in the UK? Or are you from the Bible Belt originally?
He's from Texas but now studying in the UK.
I tend to think of Patrick as the anti-Maxc. If the pair of them were disarmed and locked in a room together you'd see some fascinating subatomic physics.
Posts: 3418 | From: UK, OK | Registered: Mar 2007
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Amos
Shipmate
# 44
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Seraphim:
quote:
I think it means I can insult you all I want but it's OK because I say bless your heart.
Pretty much...just make sure your tone of voice is sincere.
quote:
Brings to mind the way, in some areas, every other fishbelly white person claims to be a descendant of a "Cherokee princess".
It ain't just a white thing...plenty of black families lay claim to distant cherokee princess ancestors
I'm pretty sure also that I know a distant relative of yours from the Newsome branch. She's black too.
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At the end of the day we face our Maker alongside Jesus--ken
Posts: 7667 | From: Summerisle | Registered: May 2001
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Twilight
Puddleglum's sister
# 2832
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Seraphim:
A few years ago a 9000 year old skeleton in a cave in Cheddar England was genetially mapped, and swabs were taken from the local populace to see if he had any descendants left in the area. It turned out he actually did, one school teacher took the dna test and came back a mitocondrial match for the Cheddar man, establishing thereby the oldest known continuous biological lineage in the world. That man and his family belonged in Cheddar in a way no one else there could.
Wow. Just think how many famines, plagues and wars they made it through, always leaving one fertile survivor.
The first three days of this thread, I kept thinking, "Where's Janine?" Glad she finally made it.
Twilight - German/Scottish/Cherokee Princess
Posts: 6817 | Registered: May 2002
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Janine
The Endless Simmer
# 3337
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Hiro's Leap:
quote:
Originally posted by Janine:
So... did you get your degree in Redneckology from a school over there in the UK? Or are you from the Bible Belt originally?
He's from Texas but now studying in the UK.
I tend to think of Patrick as the anti-Maxc. If the pair of them were disarmed and locked in a room together you'd see some fascinating subatomic physics.
If I wanted to be meanspirited, I'd say -- bless their hearts -- that's they'd get along like anti-matter and it-don't matter.
I do have to say -- lest PTLSaintly thinks I was casting asparagus on the manliness of city folk... one can be an Intellectual and a Dazzling Urbanite and still be quite the man.
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I'm a Fundagelical Evangimentalist. What are you?
Take Me Home * My Heart * An hour with Rich Mullins *
Posts: 13788 | From: Below the Bible Belt | Registered: Sep 2002
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Lietuvos Sv. Kazimieras
Shipmate
# 11274
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Posted
This thread seems to have become "Revenge of the Rednecks" or "Southerners Slamming Cynics into Silence". The Southern apologist responses have been incredibly heavy-handed and hellish.
Posts: 7328 | From: Delaware | Registered: Apr 2006
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Zwingli
Shipmate
# 4438
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Posted
LSK you must be reading an entirely different thread. What I saw was some grossly insulting stereotypes of Southerners and "rednecks", then various responses pointing out the complexities of the region and explaining why Southerners might view the world the way they do. I haven't seen any similar insults directed at Northerners or Brits though; the response of the Bible-Belters has been quite restrained, given some of the outright bigotry hurled in their direction in the OP and other early posts.
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Beeswax Altar
Shipmate
# 11644
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Lietuvos Sv. Kazimieras:
This thread seems to have become "Revenge of the Rednecks" or "Southerners Slamming Cynics into Silence". The Southern apologist responses have been incredibly heavy-handed and hellish.
Again, did you read Patrick the Less Saintly's posts?
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Losing sleep is something you want to avoid, if possible.
-Og: King of Bashan
Posts: 8411 | From: By a large lake | Registered: Jul 2006
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Bullfrog.
Prophetic Amphibian
# 11014
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Posted
What Matins said.
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Some say that man is the root of all evil
Others say God's a drunkard for pain
Me, I believe that the Garden of Eden
Was burned to make way for a train. --Josh Ritter, Harrisburg
Posts: 7522 | From: Chicago | Registered: Feb 2006
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Twilight
Puddleglum's sister
# 2832
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Zwingli:
I haven't seen any similar insults directed at Northerners or Brits though; the response of the Bible-Belters has been quite restrained, <snip>
Thank you for noticing, Zwingli. No one will ever know how hard I had to work to resist a "funny" response to this:
quote:
You guys still have beauty pageants?
![[Big Grin]](biggrin.gif)
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RuthW
liberal "peace first" hankie squeezer
# 13
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Lietuvos Sv. Kazimieras:
This thread seems to have become "Revenge of the Rednecks" or "Southerners Slamming Cynics into Silence". The Southern apologist responses have been incredibly heavy-handed and hellish.
All the stuff about some people belonging to a place, with the implicit corollary that everyone else does not belong there and should get the fuck out, makes me glad I've never been east of Texas or south of Virginia. But perhaps that's the intent.
ETA: I'll cry me a river for the stereotyping of Southerners on these boards just as soon as Californians stop getting written off as loonies.
[ 05. May 2009, 15:19: Message edited by: RuthW ]
Posts: 24453 | From: La La Land | Registered: Apr 2001
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Leaf
Shipmate
# 14169
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Posted
RuthW: Again, if I may, Malcolm Gladwell: "The 'culture of honour' hypothesis says that it matters where you're from, not just in terms of where you grew up or where your parents grew up, but in terms of where your great-grandparents and great-great-grandparents grew up and even where your great-great-great-grandparents grew up. That is a strange and powerful fact."
Reminds me of something I once heard about Prince Edward Island: If you were born on the Island, but one minute after birth, you were moved away and grew up somewhere else, you will always be "from the Island" and accepted as local. If you were born somewhere else, but one minute after birth, you were moved to the Island and spent your whole life there, you'd still be "from away" and suspect.
Hey, what can I say? It's not my cultural legacy, and I'm guessing not yours either, RuthW. ![[Smile]](smile.gif)
Here is what intrigues me. Would it be true to suggest that The Stereotypical Southern US Man might have more in common with The Stereotypical Afghan Tribesman, than with The Stereotypical Northern US Man? Imagine the meeting: "Wow! You think guns are great, foreigners should fuck off, and women should mind their place? Me too! Come here, bro!"
Posts: 2786 | From: the electrical field | Registered: Oct 2008
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Sine Nomine
Ship's backstabbing bastard
# 66
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Leaf:
Would it be true to suggest that The Stereotypical Southern US Man might have more in common with The Stereotypical Afghan Tribesman, than with The Stereotypical Northern US Man? Imagine the meeting: "Wow! You think guns are great, foreigners should fuck off, and women should mind their place? Me too! Come here, bro!"
Oh absolutely. No question about it. You've captured it in a nutshell. I feel a deep and abiding connection with my brothers in Afghanistan I could never hope to feel with a guy from Ohio or New Hampshire.
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Precious, Precious, Sweet, Sweet Daddy...
Posts: 16639 | From: lat. 36.24/lon. 86.84 | Registered: Dec 2002
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Leaf
Shipmate
# 14169
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Posted
With all due respect, Sine Nomine, you may not exactly fit the mold of The Stereotypical Southern Man as caricatured in my post.
I don't think I can fit any more understatement into that statement.
Posts: 2786 | From: the electrical field | Registered: Oct 2008
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Seraphim
Shipmate
# 14676
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Posted
An Afghani man would try to "subjugate" a rural southern woman at his peril (ask a southern man), cast iron skillets and pinking shears have other uses than cooking or sewing if called for...and more than a few southern girls know their way around the business end of a shotgun...and if she has brothers...well, nuff said.
But that said there are come points of commonality. Don't forget most Southern Baptists, indeed most Baptists of whatever stripe from the south are tee totallers. There are still many dry counties in the south where it is illegal to sell anything stronger than beer.
And where I grew up beer drinking was something only done by people of lapsed morals. Relatives who drank at all were a scandal to the family. I remember being shocked as a child to learn that my father had even once tasted beer when he was in the Army serving over in Germany.
My grandparents, and my mother won't allow it on their property let alone in their house. And when it was still possible they would not even shop at stores which sold beer.
That in itself is an interesting local fault line in the Southern social landscape. We've both a tradition of whiskey and moonshine as well as complete abstinence from alcohol living more or less side by side.
If the southern folk could get over the bed sheets for clothes aspect of Afghani dress they might well enjoy a tall cold mason jar of iced tea together on the front porch, swatting flies and swapping horse and hound dog stories.
[ 05. May 2009, 16:47: Message edited by: Seraphim ]
Posts: 354 | From: Hattiesburg, MS | Registered: Mar 2009
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New Yorker
Shipmate
# 9898
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Leaf:
Here is what intrigues me. Would it be true to suggest that The Stereotypical Southern US Man might have more in common with The Stereotypical Afghan Tribesman, than with The Stereotypical Northern US Man? Imagine the meeting: "Wow! You think guns are great, foreigners should fuck off, and women should mind their place? Me too! Come here, bro!"
Rather a hellish statement.
A stereotypical Southern male would say that yes, guns are great, but not for robbing and murdering others. He might lament the changes to his homeland brought by foreigners, but he's not going to tell them to f.o. He might very well have beliefs about the role of women in society, but if a woman does something that he does not consider appropriate, he's not going to stone her to death.
Posts: 3193 | From: New York City | Registered: Jul 2005
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Lietuvos Sv. Kazimieras
Shipmate
# 11274
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Posted
The thing is, it seems to be some of the Southerners here who are painting Southerners in some of the most stereotyped, caricatured colours.
Posts: 7328 | From: Delaware | Registered: Apr 2006
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Max.
Shipmate
# 5846
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Hiro's Leap:
I tend to think of Patrick as the anti-Maxc. If the pair of them were disarmed and locked in a room together you'd see some fascinating subatomic physics.
If you mean that you think of Patrick as the Anti-Max. then it may surprise you that Patrick and I are actually friends in real life.
Max.
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For the sake of His sorrowful Passion, have mercy on us and on the whole world.
Posts: 9716 | From: North Yorkshire | Registered: May 2004
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Lietuvos Sv. Kazimieras
Shipmate
# 11274
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Posted
Max, dear, have you noticed there's a shipmate now called "Macx"? He's rather to the right of Patrick and I suspect of you.
Posts: 7328 | From: Delaware | Registered: Apr 2006
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Seraphim
Shipmate
# 14676
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Posted
There is a quote from I Claudius that is apropos many a Southern household and its natural patriarchy:
"Augustus ruled Rome, but Livia ruled Augustus."
In many Southern homes if you were a child prone to getting in trouble, the one you feared to cross most was not Daddy, it was Mama.
That said, Mama wrath was for most day to day misbehavior (it could be hard to stay out of trouble). Daddy wrath was special and hard to provoke, but it was the worst mentally because it was reserved for only the most shameful and wayward of offenses. You knew you had done wrong when Daddy was mad. When mama was mad however, sometimes Daddy understood...a guy thing, and served as a refuge from the storm to keep it from growing out of proportion.
Posts: 354 | From: Hattiesburg, MS | Registered: Mar 2009
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Lietuvos Sv. Kazimieras
Shipmate
# 11274
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Sine Nomine:
No. You had some imaginary stereotype in mind. Three of them in fact, which is quite a pile of 'stereotypical'. Quite a pile period, actually.
About as clear as one of Shelley Von Strunckel's horoscopes in The Times. Care to expand upon that?
Posts: 7328 | From: Delaware | Registered: Apr 2006
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Barefoot Friar
Ship's Shoeless Brother
# 13100
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Seraphim:
There are still many dry counties in the south where it is illegal to sell anything stronger than beer.
Dry counties or municipalities in Alabama don't even allow the sale of beer. Even several "wet" counties have laws which prohibit the sale of alcohol on Sunday. (Tuscaloosa County, home of the University of Alabama, is one.) I currently live in a wet county, but the municipality is dry. Which means that people have to drive about 5 miles up the road to the next city.
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Do your little bit of good where you are; its those little bits of good put together that overwhelm the world. -- Desmond Tutu
Posts: 1621 | From: Warrior Mountains | Registered: Oct 2007
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Sine Nomine
Ship's backstabbing bastard
# 66
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Lietuvos Sv. Kazimieras:
The thing is, it seems to be some of the Southerners here who are painting Southerners in some of the most stereotyped, caricatured colours.
Yes, there's nothing worse than a faux good ol' boy.
They tend to have pick-up trucks where the bed liners are totally clean.
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Precious, Precious, Sweet, Sweet Daddy...
Posts: 16639 | From: lat. 36.24/lon. 86.84 | Registered: Dec 2002
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Sine Nomine
Ship's backstabbing bastard
# 66
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Lietuvos Sv. Kazimieras:
quote:
Originally posted by Sine Nomine:
No. You had some imaginary stereotype in mind. Three of them in fact, which is quite a pile of 'stereotypical'. Quite a pile period, actually.
About as clear as one of Shelley Von Strunckel's horoscopes in The Times. Care to expand upon that?
I was replying to leaf but there were cross posts. It didn't seem important enough to bother editing.
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Precious, Precious, Sweet, Sweet Daddy...
Posts: 16639 | From: lat. 36.24/lon. 86.84 | Registered: Dec 2002
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Presbyopic
Shipmate
# 10596
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Seraphim:
There is a quote from I Claudius that is apropos many a Southern household and its natural patriarchy:
"Augustus ruled Rome, but Livia ruled Augustus."
In many Southern homes if you were a child prone to getting in trouble, the one you feared to cross most was not Daddy, it was Mama.
That said, Mama wrath was for most day to day misbehavior (it could be hard to stay out of trouble). Daddy wrath was special and hard to provoke, but it was the worst mentally because it was reserved for only the most shameful and wayward of offenses. You knew you had done wrong when Daddy was mad. When mama was mad however, sometimes Daddy understood...a guy thing, and served as a refuge from the storm to keep it from growing out of proportion.
In my limited experience, Southern Mamas also have the very best and imaginative descriptions of punishments as well.
My old friend from Arkansas used to tell me of the many and varied ways her mother threatened to transport her into next week but my favorite of all " Girl, I'll rip off your haid, an' spit down the hole"
Posts: 699 | From: USA | Registered: Oct 2005
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Lietuvos Sv. Kazimieras
Shipmate
# 11274
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Posted
Yes, well, in Austin, TX a chap who was the respondent to a suit by Child Protective Services on which I was consulting once got in a spot of bother after saying that if the judge gave him any trouble he would tear her head off and shit down the hole. Sometimes such creative threats aren't such a good idea.
Posts: 7328 | From: Delaware | Registered: Apr 2006
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Max.
Shipmate
# 5846
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Lietuvos Sv. Kazimieras:
Max, dear, have you noticed there's a shipmate now called "Macx"? He's rather to the right of Patrick and I suspect of you.
Oh wow - Dogs and Big Guns?
Yeah - I don't like either of them so I think he is probably to the right of me. Last night I dreamt that we all got together, redistributed wealth around the world, created a "World Government" and destroyed all borders making countries, countries.
Ahh....
Max. (Lives in the North-Centre of the World)
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For the sake of His sorrowful Passion, have mercy on us and on the whole world.
Posts: 9716 | From: North Yorkshire | Registered: May 2004
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Gamaliel
Shipmate
# 812
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Posted
Bigotry in the OP, Zwingli? What calumny ...
It was a deliberately provocative opener. Nothing more. I'm genuinely intrigued and trying to understand. It was inevitable that I'd be seen as some Yankee-lovin' pinko Brit but that was never my intention. A plague on both their houses if you ask me ...
Seriously, I'm both impressed by some of the Southern restraint shown on this thread. It genuinely has been from some folks. But equally, being 'Gamaliel' and generally aiming for the 'middle way', I've been put off by some of the Yankee and UK prejudices shown here. And appalled by some of the attitudes expressed by our gun-totin', rootin'-tootin' Southern cousins.
But I'm glad Janine showed up. I like Janine. If anyone's going to get me to wrap myself in a Confederate flag, eat grits and crawfish and run around New Orleans, Tallahasee, Little Rock Arkansas and whereever else hollerin' 'Yee-haw! Is we goinna whup them Yankees! Son-of-a-gun-we'll-have-big-fun-on-the-bayou ...' then it'd be Janine.
![[Overused]](graemlins/notworthy.gif)
For the record: Southern music is cool. Whether Cajun, Zydeco or Johnny Cash. So is Southern literature (sorry, 'lidewadjure').
And I'm glad that Southern folks seem so 'down home' and friendly. Bless their hearts.
And Robert E Lee and Stonewall Jackson seem a darn sight more attractive individuals - for all their faults (yes, they had some, like everyone else), than those ranged against them ...
Heck. Give them their due.
And it probably is true that dudes up there on the East Coast and over in Californi-ay and up there in Washington State and Oregan and Seattle and all could do with tightening their little-biddy Bible Belt buckle a bit.
Just as those Southern folks maybe ought to untighten theirs.
But who's to say?
And who's to say (outside of the US) whether a Southern victory in the Civil War would've been better than a Northern one. A colleague of mine who is a bit of a US Civil War geek (yes, we have some over here in the UK) admires the Southern war effort but is mighty glad they lost. He feels the US would've descended into an appalling nightmarish reactionary dark age. But then, those Puritan New Englanders weren't always known for sweetness and light. As indeed neither we were over here in Blighty when we were at the height of our powers.
Interesting thread, y'all.
Gamaliel
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Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.
http://philthebard.blogspot.com
Posts: 15997 | From: Cheshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2001
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Loquacious beachcomber
Shipmate
# 8783
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Sine Nomine:
No. You had some imaginary stereotype in mind. Three of them in fact, which is quite a pile of 'stereotypical'. Quite a pile period, actually.
Personally, I don't like stereotypes, especially when they are played way too loudly, often from passing cars or pickup trucks.
And I must say that I do quite like southerners.
I just wish they would stay off the beaches and out of the restaurants when I visit Florida.
And especially, when I visit the beautiful, white beaches off Mobile, Alabama.
The beach there is way too small to simply walk away toward the sunset and ignore them.
And the bar and motel parking lots, where they sit on the roof of pickup truck cabs, drinking beer and shouting "Yeehaw, Y'all! always make me a little uncomfortable.
It's too bad they can have some sort of zoo-like enclosure for them to hang out in, so that tourists could look at them when they chose to, but still have the beaches to themselves.
Oh, I realize that "Bubba's Barbecue Pit and Beer Bucket Bar" comes close to filling such as function, but you know, they can still get out of there.
Any time they want to, I expect.
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TODAY'S SPECIAL - AND SO ARE YOU (Sign on beachfront fish & chips shop)
Posts: 5954 | From: Southeast of Wawa, between the beach and the hiking trail.. | Registered: Nov 2004
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Crœsos
Shipmate
# 238
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Gamaliel:
And who's to say (outside of the US) whether a Southern victory in the Civil War would've been better than a Northern one. A colleague of mine who is a bit of a US Civil War geek (yes, we have some over here in the UK) admires the Southern war effort but is mighty glad they lost. He feels the US would've descended into an appalling nightmarish reactionary dark age. But then, those Puritan New Englanders weren't always known for sweetness and light. As indeed neither we were over here in Blighty when we were at the height of our powers.
Interesting thread, y'all.
Gamaliel
I guess it depends on whose perspective of "better" is used. It's a bit tangential to the thread topic, but I suspect you'd get a radically different answer from today's descendants of the white Confederacy than if you could ask the forty percent or so of the Confederate population held in chattel slavery as of the 1860 census.
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Humani nil a me alienum puto
Posts: 10706 | From: Sardis, Lydia | Registered: May 2001
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Gamaliel
Shipmate
# 812
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Posted
Right-on, Croesos.
But as we've been reminded, the war wasn't just about slavery. That was tacked on.
I quite like all the Americans I've met. Be they from the North Eastern coast, the South, the Mid-West or over in California or up from the Pacific North West. I've met Oklahomans and Virginians, North Carolinans and South Carolinans, Kansas folk as well as Texans and people from all points of the compass.
Not sure I've met anyone from Idaho, though.
Has anyone in the US ever met anyone from Idaho?
Gamaliel
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Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.
http://philthebard.blogspot.com
Posts: 15997 | From: Cheshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2001
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Beeswax Altar
Shipmate
# 11644
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Posted
quote:
originally posted by Leaf:
Here is what intrigues me. Would it be true to suggest that The Stereotypical Southern US Man might have more in common with The Stereotypical Afghan Tribesman, than with The Stereotypical Northern US Man? Imagine the meeting: "Wow! You think guns are great, foreigners should fuck off, and women should mind their place? Me too! Come here, bro!"
So, you are suggesting that men in the North don't like guns, welcome outsiders with open arms, and always treat women with respect?
You haven't met Northern Man have you?
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Losing sleep is something you want to avoid, if possible.
-Og: King of Bashan
Posts: 8411 | From: By a large lake | Registered: Jul 2006
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Crœsos
Shipmate
# 238
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Gamaliel:
Right-on, Croesos.
But as we've been reminded, the war wasn't just about slavery. That was tacked on.
Gamaliel
Only if you ignore the Confederacy's clearly stated Declarations that slavery was indeed at the heart of their proposed revolution. Slavery may have been peripheral as far as the Union was concerned, but the Confederacy cast it as the "Cornerstone" of their struggle.
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Humani nil a me alienum puto
Posts: 10706 | From: Sardis, Lydia | Registered: May 2001
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Sine Nomine
Ship's backstabbing bastard
# 66
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Matins:
You haven't met Northern Man have you?
It wasn't 'the Northern Man'.
It was 'the Stereotypical Northern Man' which apparently is a whole different kettle of fish.
I'm thinking 'the Stereotypical Northern Man' abhors guns and violence, consistently votes Democratic, wears sweaters with leather patches on the elbows and always lets the woman climb on top.
...Oh!...and is a member of the Book-of-the-Month Club.
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Precious, Precious, Sweet, Sweet Daddy...
Posts: 16639 | From: lat. 36.24/lon. 86.84 | Registered: Dec 2002
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Lietuvos Sv. Kazimieras
Shipmate
# 11274
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Posted
In my neighboring state, the Commonwealth of Pennsylavania, the population is extremely conservative outside of Philadelphia and some of the immediately contiguous counties. Pittsburg is allegedly a more liberal bit as well, but I think it's just that the Democratic Party has managed to maintain a following there. I don't know if one could exactly describe the people as redneck, but socially very conservative and seemingly a bit racist would be consistent with my experiences and observations of that classically Northern state.
Posts: 7328 | From: Delaware | Registered: Apr 2006
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