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Bias against Southerners misses the mark
Pasco Times ^ | July 11, 2005 | RICHARD COX

Posted on 07/14/2005 6:10:21 AM PDT by robowombat

Bias against Southerners misses the mark By RICHARD COX Published July 11, 2005

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Does prejudice exist in Pasco County, an area with a very diverse population and seemingly very progressive?

I am certain that African-Americans, Hispanics and people from other countries, the poor and homeless, as well as members of certain religious faiths, experience treatment different from the mainstream populace. However, I am a member of a minority who has experienced attitudes and reactions from many individuals who assume that I am intellectually and socially challenged.

A very large percentage of the population of New Port Richey in particular is from the Northeast. I personally like the outspokenness, mince-no-words attitude, the ability to criticize as well as accept criticism without being offended, that seems to represent the culture in which Northerners grew up.

My family members seem to have the disadvantage of being born and living most of our lives in the South, in our case, Tennessee. I grew up in Knoxville, a city that many people seem to associate only with the fanatical behavior of our college football fans, and my wife is from a small city near Chattanooga.

There still seems to be a stereotype that some people associate with Tennesseans. When those individuals heard the distinct accent of my wife, my stepdaughter, and myself, it seemed to conjure up that redneck image one might associate with the humor of Jeff Foxworthy and other Southern comedians. That image is of a culture of ignorant hillbillies (certainly due to inbreeding!), barefoot, living in a shack with no indoor plumbing (but certainly an outhouse in back), having a dog living under the front porch, and owning an overgrown lawn populated with broken-down, dilapidated automobiles. And, yes, we all chew tobacco and sit on the front porch swing playing the banjo. Everyone also flies a Confederate flag and reminisces about the War Between the States.

I first noticed this attitude when my stepdaughter, an honor student, came home from middle school several days in tears because several other students harassed her daily, calling her an ignorant redneck and hillbilly among other derogatory terms. My wife and I have experienced the sudden change in facial expressions from many when they hear our accent. They seem to associate our accent with ignorance, and speak in simpler terms so that we can understand what they are saying. Telephone conversations often produce the same reaction.

I beg to differ. Tennessee is the home of several major universities, four major metropolitan areas with all the drug and gang problems associated with other large cities, and the most visited national park in the United States. Oak Ridge, in the Knoxville area, probably has as high a percentage of residents with doctorate degrees as any city in the United States. Tennessee has a musical heritage equal to none, and it is not exclusively country or bluegrass genres. Many nationally prominent politicians are from my home state, including three former presidents.

Tennessee has produced many famous musicians, actors, scientists and other intellectual and talented natives.

Well, to set the story straight, rural areas of most states have their own populace and dwellings that approach this stereotype.

My wife and I grew up in your average suburban neighborhoods, we both graduated from major universities and had successful professional careers, and, to risk seeming boastful, are probably as intelligent and knowledgeable, if not more so, than the average American. Believe it or not, East Tennessee, the section of the state we are from, fervently supported the Union during the Civil War.

I have noticed in the Pasco Times notices of meetings for various groups from areas of the Northeast and from other countries. Perhaps Southerners in our area should form a similar group. With apologies to an African-American group with a similar title, we could call our group the NAASF, the National Association for the Advancement of Southern Folks, Pasco County Branch. I hope there are enough local Southern residents available to attract to our organization.

--Richard Cox, a retired middle school science teacher and department head, lives in New Port Richey


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Miscellaneous; Philosophy; US: Florida
KEYWORDS: accent; bigotry; dixie; greatname; pasco; tennessee; thesouth
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To: halieus
Texans are the most friendly, honest, laid-back, down-to-earth, smart, no-nonsense, practical, and real people I've ever met. (At least here in the Austin area, and if you discount the insane libs.)

By all means, discount the insane liberals -- they certainly do!

421 posted on 07/18/2005 1:51:20 AM PDT by lentulusgracchus ("Whatever." -- sinkspur)
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To: bourbon; stainlessbanner; PeaRidge; Gianni; Arkinsaw; 4ConservativeJustices; nolu chan; ...
Unfortunately, now many conservatives uncritically embrace "meritocratic" concepts despite the liberal elitist heritage of those concepts.

Fallows's point was that ideas about what constitutes "merit" has become distorted by the dominant (Yankee) culture and is becoming a mandarinical dead end. After all, mandarinism damn near killed Chinese civilization.

This may not be the best thread on which to have this discussion, but I am not one of those conservatives who thinks that credentialism or its supporting structures is the last bastion of academic rigor or a properly conceived liberal education.

Well, actually, it is, because philosophies of education are tied to philosophies of government and society, and one of the subjects Yankee assailants of the Old South like to work over is Southern education, damning it for its shortcomings as measured by Northern ideas and norms. They do this constantly, through the medium of university-level "history" and "sociology" courses that treat regional differences in American history, the Civil War, Reconstruction, et cetera. A current "distance education" (TV lecture) series being aired by the University of Houston on the topic of "the history of the South [as lied about by an ideologically committed enemy]". The lecturer informs us that the South is his "adoptive home", and then proceeds to lecture Texas students about its history in a manner that convinces any fairminded listener that the South is his "adoptive home" in the same way that a cow is the "adoptive home" of a botfly or a cutworm. It provides him his living, his meat and drink, and in return he does his best to kill it and return it to the dust of the earth.

That's your immigrant Yankee history professor for you.

422 posted on 07/18/2005 2:12:33 AM PDT by lentulusgracchus ("Whatever." -- sinkspur)
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To: TexConfederate1861
I served in the US Navy, with pride, and took the Oath, but if the US attacked my state, I would have considered that oath null & void.

You still haven't answered my question. You claim your loyalty is to state over country. If you state refused to support or participate in the Iraq war then would you support that decision?

423 posted on 07/18/2005 3:42:31 AM PDT by Non-Sequitur
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To: TexConfederate1861
Oh Yea? I seem to recall Yankees surrendering FIRST....at Ft. Sumter.

And individual units did surrender at other times during the rebellion as well. But it was the south who raised tossing in the towel to a high art, surrendering whole armies at Vicksburg and Donalson and Appomattox and North Carolina...

424 posted on 07/18/2005 3:44:48 AM PDT by Non-Sequitur
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To: wardaddy
you're in denial as usual

Now there's a case of the pot calling the kettle black.

425 posted on 07/18/2005 3:45:38 AM PDT by Non-Sequitur
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To: WKB
FWIW MS has the highest per capita death rate for soldiers in Iraq than any state in the union north or south of the M\D line

How do you figure?

426 posted on 07/18/2005 3:47:43 AM PDT by Non-Sequitur
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To: Non-Sequitur
Snip

http://www.militaryproject.org/article.asp?id=279
Fresh Meat For The Imperial Slaughterhouse;
Mississippi Guard Unit Mobilized

July 08, 2004 By Mark Thornton, The Star-Herald, Kosciusko, Mississippi
The Kosciusko unit has 56 soldiers.


The 155th, which is known as "Dixie Thunder," was put on alert in May. It is the largest military support group in the state. The last time the 155th was mobilized was in November 1990, for Operation Desert Storm. The soldiers trained at bases in Texas and California for several weeks, but the war ended before they were deployed.

As of last week, 14 Mississippi soldiers had been killed in the War on Terror -- the highest per capita rate in the country.t


Stats may have changed since then but we still rank among the top 5
427 posted on 07/18/2005 4:46:50 AM PDT by WKB (A closed mind is a good thing to lose.)
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To: Non-Sequitur; TexConfederate1861
If you state refused to support or participate in the Iraq war then would you support that decision?

Connecticutt, Massachusetts, Rhode Island & Providence Plantations and another state did so during the War of 1812.

You inferred on thread that their refusal to do so was acceptable.

428 posted on 07/18/2005 4:57:05 AM PDT by 4CJ (||) OUR sins put Him on that cross. HIS love for us kept Him there.(||)
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To: Non-Sequitur; TexConfederate1861
[edit] Connecticutt, Massachusetts, Rhode Island & Providence Plantations and another state did so during the War of 1812.
429 posted on 07/18/2005 4:58:25 AM PDT by 4CJ (||) OUR sins put Him on that cross. HIS love for us kept Him there.(||)
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To: lentulusgracchus
Yankee assailants of the Old South like to work over is Southern education, damning it for its shortcomings as measured by Northern ideas and norms.

So they remove God from our classrooms, and insist that our children could have abortions and practice homsexuality. They whitewash history, and smear the finest men this country ever had to cover their culpability in the war. I guess Yankee assistance explains why children today graduate being unable to read English, when previous generations knew Latin and Greek as well.

430 posted on 07/18/2005 5:02:47 AM PDT by 4CJ (||) OUR sins put Him on that cross. HIS love for us kept Him there.(||)
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To: FreedomCalls

Those are Cities.........


431 posted on 07/18/2005 5:05:58 AM PDT by Red Badger (HURRICANES: God's way of telling you it's time to clean out the freezer...............)
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To: 4ConservativeJustices
You inferred on thread that their refusal to do so was acceptable.

Where?

432 posted on 07/18/2005 5:25:24 AM PDT by Non-Sequitur
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To: WKB
As of last week, 14 Mississippi soldiers had been killed in the War on Terror -- the highest per capita rate in the country.

I believe that they are wrong. As of the most recent count 31 service personnel from Mississippi have been killed. Eleven have been killed from Vermont. The population of Mississippi is over 4 times greater than Vermont - 2.8 million as opposed to 620,000. That would seem to me to show that Vermont, a Yankee state, has made a greater sacrifice per capita than Mississippi.

433 posted on 07/18/2005 5:33:57 AM PDT by Non-Sequitur
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To: Tennessee_Bob
rotflmRao!

free dixie,sw

434 posted on 07/18/2005 5:45:41 AM PDT by stand watie (being a damnyankee is no better than being a racist. it is a LEARNED prejudice against dixie.)
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To: wardaddy
fwiw, one of my most treasured possessions is a US War Dept. recruiting poster from WW2.

the full-color poster shows the US & CSA flags, with staffs crossed. the caption reads:

JOIN THE ARMY & HELP THE SOUTH WIN THEE WAR!

free dixie,sw

435 posted on 07/18/2005 5:56:20 AM PDT by stand watie (being a damnyankee is no better than being a racist. it is a LEARNED prejudice against dixie.)
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To: Non-Sequitur
Where?

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-backroom/1311758/posts?q=1&&page=1201#1207

436 posted on 07/18/2005 6:11:39 AM PDT by 4CJ (||) OUR sins put Him on that cross. HIS love for us kept Him there.(||)
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To: Dan from Michigan

Now, that's funny!


437 posted on 07/18/2005 6:21:11 AM PDT by bourbon (It's the target that decides whether terror wins.)
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To: Non-Sequitur

I believe that they are wrong




Now THAT IS funny.
I'll be laughing the rest of the day.


438 posted on 07/18/2005 6:52:45 AM PDT by WKB (A closed mind is a good thing to lose.)
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To: stand watie; bourbon; wardaddy

Ya'll please read 426,437 and 433


Can you believe this guy?


439 posted on 07/18/2005 6:59:21 AM PDT by WKB (A closed mind is a good thing to lose.)
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To: stand watie; bourbon; wardaddy

427


440 posted on 07/18/2005 7:00:17 AM PDT by WKB (A closed mind is a good thing to lose.)
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