# "Midwest" **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [June 7, 2010, 4:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/midwest/542247 "2010-06-07T04:46:29Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Chimera](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Chimera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chimera)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2010, 10:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/midwest/542247/81 "2010-06-07T22:42:19Z")
> [@MeanOldLady](#): > > If you drive five miles east of Los Angeles, you do not find yourself smack dab in the middle of Jesus town. Fives miles outside of Minneapolis, and you’ll be cold, terrified, and hoping you’ll make it out alive. Five miles outside of Minneapolis and you’ll still be in Suburbia. Hell, I’m in a suburb of 65,000 people and I’m roughly 7.5 miles in a straight line from the edge of Minneapolis. Twenty miles outside Minneapolis and you’ll still be in the outer suburbs. Another twenty after that and you’ll be driving through a mix of hobby farms and bedroom communities. Our metropolitan area encompasses seven counties and then some. As many as 13 if you count the bedroom communities where a lot of people commute into the cities from. We’re not ‘small town’, we’re not rural, we’re not hicks. As far as ‘Jesus town’, you have to go all the way up to St. Cloud or Cambridge for that. 😛 ---
**Author:** ![kushiel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/bbce88/32.png) [@kushiel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kushiel)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2010, 10:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/midwest/542247/82 "2010-06-07T22:51:48Z")
> [@MeanOldLady](#): > > If you drive five miles east of Los Angeles, you do not find yourself smack dab in the middle of Jesus town. Fives miles outside of Minneapolis, and you’ll be cold, terrified, and hoping you’ll make it out alive. I can take the cold. I know how to dress for it. However, bulletproof vests are not a normal part of the wardrobe here. You only have one bad neighborhood you have to watch out for here, I dunno how the hell you keep track of them all in LA. Also, I enjoy breathing fresh air and being able to get from work to home in 10-15 min no matter where I live in the city. Okay, I’ll concede seafood to you. Overpriced sushi because you’re landlocked in the middle of a large country sucks. But conventional meats are awesome here. Woo free-for-all on stereotypes! ---
**Author:** ![Cat\_Whisperer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cat_whisperer/32/4839_2.png) [@Cat\_Whisperer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cat_Whisperer)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2010, 10:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/midwest/542247/83 "2010-06-07T22:52:00Z")
> [@TBG](#): > > Complaining about the midwest not being far enough west is as stupid as complaining that the middle east isn’t far enough east. I mean shouldn’t it be in the middle of China or something? Not to mention the absurdity of calling countries on a round globe “east” or “west.” ---
**Author:** ![Face\_Intentionally\_Left\_Blank](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/face_intentionally_left_blank/32/288_2.png) [@Face\_Intentionally\_Left\_Blank](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Face_Intentionally_Left_Blank)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2010, 11:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/midwest/542247/84 "2010-06-07T23:46:04Z")
> [@Jackmannii](#): > > Given that Alaska and Hawaii are states (at least for now), maybe we should just refer to the rest of the country as the East. Or to solve that touchy “Midwest” thing, Minnesota can be renamed East Dakota.That’s how I regard **western Pennsylvania - Redneck Central for the northeastern U.S.** Everyone knows Central PA holds that title. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2010, 12:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/midwest/542247/85 "2010-06-08T00:03:09Z")
> [@kushiel](#): > > I can take the cold. I know how to dress for it. However, bulletproof vests are not a normal part of the wardrobe here. You only have one bad neighborhood you have to watch out for here, I dunno how the hell you keep track of them all in LA. It keeps life exciting. I usually get in two or three running firefights on the way home just for the aerobic benefit, and my daily _Ronin_-inspired car chase on the 10 helps me maintain my reflexes. About once a week I like to walk into the middle of a terrorist hijacking of a building, or get on board a bus that can’t go below 50 miles and hour or it will explode. It’s like step aerobics for action heroes, and plus it is a great way to meet and woo impossibly hot women. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![Face\_Intentionally\_Left\_Blank](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/face_intentionally_left_blank/32/288_2.png) [@Face\_Intentionally\_Left\_Blank](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Face_Intentionally_Left_Blank)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2010, 12:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/midwest/542247/86 "2010-06-08T00:15:07Z")
> [@spark240](#): > > Well, the Braves used to be in the National League West, while the Pirates were in the East. But the alignment is right now. > > It’s topography, not longitude. > > The first major division between the East and the (Mid)West are the Allegheny and Cumberland Mountains. Pittsburgh is west of the beginning of this first westward frontier; Atlanta is east and south. I’ll accept this as accurate, but stupid. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Beware\_of\_Doug](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/278dde/32.png) [@Beware\_of\_Doug](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beware_of_Doug)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2010, 12:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/midwest/542247/87 "2010-06-08T00:43:29Z")
> [@Shot From Guns in re Arugulagate](#): > > He should have just called it rocket lettuce. Then the land-grant schools would have wasted millions trying to make fuel out of it. ---
**Author:** ![Munch](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/munch/32/5281_2.png) [@Munch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Munch)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2010, 12:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/midwest/542247/88 "2010-06-08T00:46:03Z")
> [@Beware\_of\_Doug](#): > > Any state qualifies as part of the Midwest where: > > - jazz is not played outside high schools > - people pull into or out of parking spots at less than 15mph > - lamb and veal are thought of as specialty meats > - 9 out of 10 people walking on any residential street have dogs > - there is more than one Dr Pepper-like soft drink available, but less than four > - a Honda built in Tennessee is considered a foreign car, but a Chevy made in Korea is not This is a really weird list. Excluding Kansas and Missouri (the development of jazz being profounded influenced by Kansas City, and jazz clubs being incredibly easy to find there)? I don’t even know what the Dr Pepper thing is - restaurants carry Pibb or Pepper - why would they carry both? Also, people in the Midwest don’t walk - why would they be on the street with a dog (or was that a “the only people that walk are the ones out walking their dog” comment?). I’d imagine a great portion of the rest of the country qualifies with not knowing where their cars are built. ---
**Author:** ![Beware\_of\_Doug](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/278dde/32.png) [@Beware\_of\_Doug](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beware_of_Doug)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2010, 12:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/midwest/542247/89 "2010-06-08T00:47:09Z")
> [@Slithy\_Tove](#): > > No ethic food? Here’s the dinner menu at [Mader’s restaurant in Milwaukee.](http://www.madersrestaurant.com/menu-dinner.html) Here’s [Tony Paco’s in Toledo.](http://www.tonypacko.com/menu.php) “Our Delicious Hungarian Menu” at Packo’s begins with “Chili and Chips.” 😕 ---
**Author:** ![Indistinguishable](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/90ced4/32.png) [@Indistinguishable](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Indistinguishable)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2010, 12:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/midwest/542247/90 "2010-06-08T00:49:44Z")
I was being low-key about it, but, yeah, those are both straight-up white people food; granted, they’re at least nominally German and Hungarian white people food, as opposed to plain American white people food, and yeah, those are technically ethnicities, of course, but still, not the sort of thing I think of when I think “ethnic food”. It was amusing to me to see them offered as definitive counterexamples. ---
**Author:** ![Visual\_Purple](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/5daacb/32.png) [@Visual\_Purple](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Visual_Purple)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2010, 1:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/midwest/542247/91 "2010-06-08T01:09:48Z")
My part of the Midwest has had immigration from Mexico for about a hundred years. “Ethnic” foods other than Mexican styles may come off as exotic–although we have a good supply of Thai restaurants–but the oldest local Mexican restaurant serves several dished that have jalapenos as a primary vegetable. Yum…hot. It also serves tongue tacos. On the other hand, Mexican food in Cleveland was bland and awful. (Not only is Pittsburgh east of Atlanta, so is Cleveland–slightly.) ---
**Author:** ![MeanOldLady](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/meanoldlady/32/10737_2.png) [@MeanOldLady](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MeanOldLady)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2010, 1:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/midwest/542247/92 "2010-06-08T01:52:23Z")
> [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](#): > > Actually, most of the freaky Jesus types can be found right on Hollywood and Sunset, screeching out doom and destruction to passers-by, which is why most residents know to take the north/south streets in and out of the area between Fairfax and Western. Well yes, there are street preachers, but you know goddamn well the difference between there being street preachers on Wilshire and Vermont, and being in Jesus Country. > [@Shot\_From\_Guns](#): > > LA sprawls a hell of a lot more. You can’t just call the city limits the “end” of it. Yes I can. The city of LA has limits, and even when you leave them, you are not in CrazyLand until you approach the Orange Curtain, or worse yet, central CA. I know people from the outside like to think of LA as everything south of Bakersfield, but even if that were so, you have to go quite a ways out from Los Angeles before you get into Crazystan. You have to go six blocks outside of where I live to get there. > [@kushiel](#): > > Also, I enjoy breathing fresh air and being able to get from work to home in 10-15 min no matter where I live in the city. Fresh… air…? What the hell are you talking about? ---
**Author:** ![Slithy\_Tove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slithy_tove/32/18248_2.png) [@Slithy\_Tove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slithy_Tove)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2010, 1:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/midwest/542247/93 "2010-06-08T01:57:56Z")
We’ll just have to agree to disagree if German and Hungarian cuisine constitues “ethnic,” or qualify as “bland” by association with white people. But even blander food than the blandest cream of mushroom and shoestring potato chip cassarole is found far beyond the Midwest. You haven’t eaten bland until you’ve eaten poi. ---
**Author:** ![Indistinguishable](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/90ced4/32.png) [@Indistinguishable](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Indistinguishable)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2010, 2:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/midwest/542247/94 "2010-06-08T02:04:04Z")
Just to clarify, I didn’t claim it was bland; I’ve never had German or Hungarian cuisine. It’s just not what I’m accustomed to using the phrase “ethnic food” to mean, though as I indicated, the very concept of “ethnic food” as a distinct subset of all cuisine is problematic. ---
**Author:** ![Rilchiam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/2bfe46/32.png) [@Rilchiam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rilchiam)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2010, 2:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/midwest/542247/95 "2010-06-08T02:38:08Z")
> [@MsWhatsit](#): > > You sure they didn’t say “Mennonite thing”? Because otherwise, the explanation is that they are insane. :smack: I bet that’s it. Either she said “Mennonite” and he heard “midwest(ern)” **or** she implied that most if not all midwesterners are Mennonites. Thank you. ---
**Author:** ![Cat\_Whisperer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cat_whisperer/32/4839_2.png) [@Cat\_Whisperer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cat_Whisperer)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2010, 2:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/midwest/542247/96 "2010-06-08T02:55:05Z")
> [@Rilchiam](#): > > :smack: > > I bet that’s it. Either she said “Mennonite” and he heard “midwest(ern)” **or** she implied that most if not all midwesterners are Mennonites. Thank you. Just to muddy these waters a little further, my mom is Mennonite and I was raised in a Mennonite town, and I’ve never heard of Mennonites refusing toys. Maybe they were confusing Mennonite with Amish. ---
**Author:** ![whiterabbit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/cab0a1/32.png) [@whiterabbit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/whiterabbit)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2010, 3:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/midwest/542247/97 "2010-06-08T03:16:08Z")
> [@MeanOldLady](#): > > Fresh… air…? What the hell are you talking about? Mmm. _inhales fresh cool mountain air_ That’s what fresh air is. Coming in my window. The birds are making a racket! (Sorry. Couldn’t resist.) From what I have heard about Minnesota food, I am happy to avoid much of it. No offense, but I like food with flavor. I do not make tacos with browned unspiced hamburger and mayo. (I wasn’t there. My mom was.) And then we have abominations such as lutefisk. _shudder_ But pass me some hotdish and bars for dessert and I’ll be a happy camper. ---
**Author:** ![Rilchiam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/2bfe46/32.png) [@Rilchiam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rilchiam)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2010, 4:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/midwest/542247/98 "2010-06-08T04:56:15Z")
> [@Cat\_Whisperer](#): > > Just to muddy these waters a little further, my mom is Mennonite and I was raised in a Mennonite town, and I’ve never heard of Mennonites refusing toys. Maybe they were confusing Mennonite with Amish. Except that Amish are in PA and Ohio, and I’m not accepting them as midwestern. Even if they are, Amish live in the rural areas, with few to no near neighbors who aren’t Amish. They’re not likely to be on gift-exchanging familiarity with non-Amish, and if they are, no way would it get to that without the non-Amish knowing toys wouldn’t be acceptable gifts. (And I think with the Amish, it’s no “English” toys, not no toys period.) ---
**Author:** ![straight\_man](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/straight_man/32/3027_2.png) [@straight\_man](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/straight_man)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2010, 5:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/midwest/542247/99 "2010-06-08T05:39:51Z")
> [@Cat\_Whisperer](#): > > Just to muddy these waters a little further, my mom is Mennonite and I was raised in a Mennonite town, and I’ve never heard of Mennonites refusing toys. Maybe they were confusing Mennonite with Amish. Amish are a [subset](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amish) of Mennonites, and far from a unique one. There are lots of small, luddite Mennonite groups in the Midwest, and in fact I’ve met a handful in my life. So, it’s very possible. (But yes, the bulk Mennonites are fairly indistinguishable from other Protestants in terms of lifestyle. Other than the pacifism and hymn sings, I mean. 😃 ) ETA: Rilchiam has a point, though, such groups tend to be somewhat inward-facing. But I think that varies a lot, too. ---
**Author:** ![missred](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/missred/32/14096_2.png) [@missred](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/missred)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2010, 9:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/midwest/542247/100 "2010-06-08T09:48:40Z")
> [@Rilchiam](#): > > Except that Amish are in PA and Ohio, and I’m not accepting them as midwestern. Even if they are, Amish live in the rural areas, with few to no near neighbors who aren’t Amish. They’re not likely to be on gift-exchanging familiarity with non-Amish, and if they are, no way would it get to that without the non-Amish knowing toys wouldn’t be acceptable gifts. (And I think with the Amish, it’s no “English” toys, not no toys period.) Hate to break it to you, but Amish are much more widespread than PA and OH. They have traditionally been in those states as well as IN, KS, IA, IL and WI and parts of Canada. In more recent years, settlements have expanded in KY, TN, WA, ID and the Dakotas. In Indiana, at least, they live side by side with their English neighbors in rural areas and many work in factories with them. That said, I would want to be on a very familiar level with them before offering gifts. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/midwest/542247.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/midwest/542247.md?page=6)