I care about character. And anyone who calls this East Tennesseean a racist better understand that East Tennessee tried to seceed from Tennessee when Tennessee seceed, that 35,000 East Tennessee men fought for the Union and then went from being Whig to promptly Republican. You know, the party of Lincoln.

For me I don’t care about skin color except for me that it makes each of us special in our own ways. I was born way after all of the civil rights movement (thank goodness). I am thankful that those walls were knocked down – don’t get me wrong I know racism does still exist but nothing like separate bathrooms and white people in the front of the bus and black people in the back of the bus, etc… God bless Rosa Parks and all people of all colors that fought this.

I also had my first choice of Ken Blackwell and Michael Steele and I would have liked them no matter what their color – because of their message, their passion, and they just stood out way ahead of the others to me. I liked Chip Saltsman too but I did not think the cd thing was the best move – but he did an awesome job with Huckabee’s campaign. I liked Saul A., I did not like part of what he spoke about the auto bailout but he is from Michigan and he and his family worked for the big 3 I believe I remember.

Anyways, southern bigotry does exist. Think about it, it was like Huckabee telling that story about cooking squirrels in popcorn cookers. I have older people in my family that eats squirrels – my granny was an awesome cook and it smelled good and she talked me into trying it – one bite and no more, back like 70 years ago when my granny was growing up on a farm and did not have a lot of money – this is how they ate – this is something she grew up on, I did not but I don’t see anything wrong with it if they like it ; ) but you would have thought that this was the end of the world. Yet, in other areas of the nation people eat different exotic stuff that I would not want either – but do they get made fun of? NO. This bigotry does exist – and I don’t like it either.

This was the hard, sad truth I ran up against when, young and ambitious, I spread my business wings. The moment I picked up a phone and had someone above the Mason-Dixon line on the other end, I got treated like the village idiot.

I’d attended a small but academically tough liberal arts university (Furman) in South Carolina. I wasn’t stupid, and somehow I even managed to fool a few of those standardized tests into thinking I had an above-average IQ.

I was braced for the sexism I encountered (a whole other story), but the Southern thing really hit me hard. The New Yorkers I worked with took about two years of working with me to get over their preconceived idea that I was Ellie May Clampett. To them, anyone with a Southern accent was a hillbilly; they could not distinguish education or even what part of the South I might have hailed from.

(The funny thing about this was that when I started college in SC, they told me that I “talked like a Yankee”, as I was from Virginia!)

Eventually, I learned to use people’s underestimating me as a secret weapon. And as people got to know me, they’d open up and tell me all kinds of things they thought about Southerners, stuff that made me just crazy.

I still run into that today. I travel a lot, all over America, and sometimes to Europe. Overlaying my Virginia accent is now a bit of Texas, after nine years here. I’ve learned that ignorance isn’t geographic. There are people who will stereotype you based on your age, sex, accent, weight, skin color, religion, nationality, or haircolor everywhere.

And 99 times out of 100, they are dead wrong.

To be be absolutely fair, I have a lot of liberal friends who are aware of the condecension toward white southerners and also think it’s dumb and silly.

White southerners are so far removed from slavery and are almost completely removed from those implicit in Jim Crow, it’s ridiculous to assume Southerners are racist.

When I was in Europe last fall, and Europeans asked me where they should visit stateside, I often told them the south is probably the most welcoming, warm, friendliest place in the entire country. Most of the time they appreciated the information, but you got some liberal Europeans shocked I’d ever suggest anyone go to the South.

Otherwise the only issue i have with the south is the stars and bars. There is only one American flag that you pledge alliegence to. The other flag should be seen for the anti American trash it is and burned everywhere its found.

For anyone to take “pride” in such a thing or even allow it around them,, then they got it coming to them.. When i see people who talk such nonsense about their confederate heritage, I feel like i’m seeing a video tape from al-quaeda. So, don’t take it personally if i view a state who flies that flag or espouses it’s confederate heritage as an equal to a terrorist state that cries out “death to America”. They are one and the same to me.

When it comes to stereotypes, having an Italian background is an excellent education!

A theme I hope to develop more- now that their totem of evil, GWB, is off the stage, the left desperately needs a substitute. Their ersatz religion needs a demon to be exorcised during their cultic ceremonies.

Rush Limbaugh, white Southerners, Republicans who dare to vote “No” on legislation supported by The One (the noive!)- stay tuned.

Maybe GC someday. But then you will have hit the Big Time. Mazel tov!

Or maybe, just maybe, we are getting caught up in another ploy of the liberals. Where are the majority of the red states? In the southeast. Therefore, attack the southeast, or “southerners” in general. (just like they attacked Rush Limbaugh the other day.) Now it’s bad enough if the liberals do it, but in comments above, it sounds like we are doing it to each other. What is the point of that? To lower our standards and behavior to those of the scummy libs? I think not! United we stand, divided we fall. I don’t know if it’s within human nature to just all get along [group hug] but lets pick our battles – we can be black, yellow, red, white, male, female, Ph.D or GED, rich, poor – it doesn’t matter. What does matter is that we stand together on the principle of small government and fiscal responsibility. And those that don’t accept that ideal, well, they are the “other”.

As I’ve remarked previously in these pages…

If you think The Beverly Hillbillies was a satire directed at Southerners and mountain folk, guess what?

The joke’s on you, sport.

Using my crackberry since I am still without satellite service.

It’s interesting that GWB is identified as an ignorant Southern dolt because of his accent when the man comes from one of the most elite Northeastern liberal icon Families in the country. I mean you can take the elitist out of the NE but you cannot make him drink.

Southerners cannot be taught to drive on ice and snow, its not in their genetic makeup; but neither can a Northerner be taught to appreciate grits! We are different – it would be nice if people learned to live with it.

Red-lining is a Northern invention. Socialism as government policy is a New England liberal elitist “We can make it work” conception.

Maybe the fact that a much greater proportion of Southerners choose military sevice over liberal elites IS a sign of mental deficiency. For some reason, Southerners seem to believe this country is worth fighting [and YES even dying] for. How dum is that!

I’ve always been facinated by American regionalism and culture. As a life long Yankee, I can assure you there is a tremendous amount of prejudice against the South. I think the historical, regional and partisan divide make it obvious, but prejudice and bigotry exists everyhwere.

Up here, there is the dangerous prejudice of the vile psuedo-intellectual elites and then there is the visceral prejudice of defensive, culture conscience, ethnic and geographic groups. And you can witness it all without ever mentioning the South.

they are trying to divide the party. Maryland is below Mason Dixon every time I check. Steele is fresh, something we need. I was for Blackwell then Steele too. And don’t buy this “Steele is the most moderate, crap” it is just whining, Steele is likely the best man for the job at this point, he could not likely do worse than his predecessor.

Some years back sitting in a Sunday School class in Columbia, SC, I used the term “Yankee” in the conversation, (not the lesson!)
I noticed a really sweet couple in the class that moved from Ohio had a bit of a puzzled look on their face.

I looked Nick in the eye and explained. There are some folks that come here from the north, contribute to the neighborhood, blend end and make this a nicer place to live, we call them neighbors.

Then there are those form up north that move here, become major nuisances, always tell us how they did it up north and just generally become a pain in the neck.
Those I call “Yankees.”

The fellow recently of Ohio looked me in the eye intently and said, “You know, I know people like that.”

BTW, if you are a RS’er, I consider you a “neighbor,” no matter where you hail from.

Regards

I never tell my fellow North Carolinians “how we did it up North”.

Maybe I’m a little unusual, but I don’t enjoy being the laughingstock.

recognizing this? This has been going on for at least 100 years.

I love pecan pies. Southerners sure know how to make excellent pecan pies. Mike, since you’re from South, you’ll have to send me some up to Maryland. I know you wouldn’t want to ruin the famous reputation of Southern hospitality, now would you? Just kidding, though….

I am not from South, but I’ve visited Southern states, and one thing I notice the most is they’re FAR MORE friendly than most up north. And TONS of Bibles, too! As a born-again Christian, I like that. But not humidity!

But I do agree with you that there exists some form of bigotry toward South in general. It also exists here in Maryland. Some people here usually refer in scorn to South as Jesusland, and that can get tiresome, to say at least. I recall a story where a person rushed to ask a fellow Southerner on what he thought of Al Gore picking Joe Libermann as his VP, and Joe is Jewish. That kind of question implied that this fellow Southerner is a racist if he thought Al Gore did wrong in picking Libermann as his VP. You can guess what happened after that….

First of all, there is the south and there is the deep south. The deep south, mississippi, ala, la, ark, and parts of georgia as well as the florida pan-handle still have significant racial issues.

The south in general to include kentucky tenn, virginia, and the carolina’s and most of florida is a very different place.

I currently live in Mississippi and am very shocked by the cultural value that individuals and groups put on “being southern”. They do not consider anyone outside of the regions identify in my characterization of the deep south to be southern. In fact, I have had many discussions with people from mobile who say that parts of northern ala are not the south. I mean, what the hell is wrong that people feel the need to reject others as outsiders at such a high level. I try to reminded them that “you really can not afford to subdivided”. “Pretty soon, there will only be one of yall left”.

The political reality is that the rest of the country is “smarting” from what it perceives as a religious movement, that originated in the deep south, and is taking the blame for some current poli-dynamics. I’m not going to argue the merits of this. I’m not contending the deep south is a bad place. I have met many warm people who embraced me even thou I was an outsider. Even thou I was more of an economic conservative and not a social conservative. Unfortunately, the haters are a lot louder.

My friends complain about the “way the rest of the world views us” and I try to urge them to speak up and drowned out the haters. The problem is that speaking loudly has a negative cultural connotation. They tend to tolerate the haters and enact quiet social sanctions on them instead of confronting them. I have mixed feelings about this because I am an outsider. I want the rest of the world to see the kindness of my friends. I want them to see those southerners too. But, asking them to change their cultural values is probably not my place as an outsider. Although I advocate it, I still respect their eye-rolling / smiling responses, “oh, well I’ll be, we just haven’t thought of handling it that way”. “Some might find that ugly”. Interpretation-fuck you yankee (in the nicest way possible).

Point being, whatever peeps can do to show the world my friends and not the haters would help with the national perception. My friends, and others like them, maybe a slight majority, are not going to stand up and announce-look and me.

I’m Texan.

Everything north of the Red River is Canada, everything east of the Sabine talks funny, everything south of the Rio Grande is dirty, and our natural western border was lopped off and turned into New Mexico, but we don’t like to talk about it. Just kidding…kinda.

To paraphrase a funny article on Cracked I read recently, we’re the closest thing this country will ever have to vikings, and that counts the actual Vikings who play in Minnesota, also known as somewhere up in the middle of Canada….and I hear their best player is a Texan anyhow. =p

Anyhow, we’re made fun of more, and treated worse than anybody in the entire country no matter where we go, be it foreign or domestic. The worst people think about people from the deep south is that they are stupid and racist. They think that about us too, but add on a whole lot of extra stuff as well.

Listening to other people, it’s difficult for me to even consider myself an American at times because they darn sure don’t consider us American. It’s difficult to eat at the same table with people who hate you. I’m pro-USA because Texas is part of it, but much like the Québécois in Canada and the Bayern in Germany…you don’t really feel at home or even welcome at times in your own country when you leave your own territory. We don’t let that stop us from doing whatever we danged-well please (we are us, after all), but we do notice.

…your mother, without taking the Marlboro from her mouth, tells the State Trooper who pulled her over to kiss her *ss.

Pittsburgh PA and Los Angeles CA are the two most racist places I’ve ever been. And that’s counting Atlanta, Shreveport, Memphis, and Dallas.