Sampiro, it is increasingly rare to encounter someone who has the appreciation for the complexity of Southern culture.
There have been so many points in this thread that I have whole-heartedly agreed with I can’t even recap.
Well done, sir. You handled the situation perfectly.
As frustrated as I often am regarding some of the attitudes in this area, it is home and for all it’s flaws it has charms that no other place can ever compare to for me.
Beg pardon?
Are we insulting Michigan now? Shall I find some statistics and compare our fine states’ literacy rates? Or can we agree that insulting anyone’s home isn’t very nice?
I know some wonderful people from Alabama. But somehow these internet discussions always seem to prove that the much-vaunted southern gentility ain’t what it used to be. But my hat is off to you, Sampiro. Sounds like you showed real class.
Wow Sampiro, I had no idea you were from Alabama. Who do you have helping you with the computer to post this board? Do they have, like, case workers who specialize with helping southerners? Are there computers at the lie-berry where you work, or is it not possible to run computer cables across a dirt floor?
I didn’t take it as insulting Michigan so much as pointing out the beam in the other fellow’s eye.
Sampiro, you’ve managed to sum up almost perfectly my own attitudes toward the South. There’s plenty in our present and in our history to hate; but there’s also a lot to love about the region. I don’t mind outsiders who give a nuanced, considered critique of the South’s problems. Indeed, I think that their critique is invaluable: some problems of one’s culture are almost invisible from the inside.
But the non-Southerners (or Southerners, for that matter) who discard nuance in favor of sneering contempt for the South: those folks get up my ass in all the wrong ways.
Daniel
I grew up in southern West Virginia, so I know something about stereotypes. When I was about 14 or 15 my scout troop was traveling to South Carolina, and we stopped at a hotel in Charlotte for the night. The desk clerk asked where we were from, and when told WV he leaned over the counter and looked at our feet, just checking that us dumb hillbillies were actually wearing shoes, I suppose. Not the best idea, given that our scout master was a retired Marine gunny. Even without using profanity he was able to put a quite effective verbal beat down on the condescending little twit.
You did your Mama proud, Sampiro. Showing class no matter what the situation is real courtesy.
Having moved around all my life, I’ve discovered that a lot of how well people adapt to different areas is how well they’re able to recognize that there are different ways to view the world and society. Some people are only able to view it through the single filter of their upbringing, for example, whereas others are able to adapt to the local worldview and fit in almost anywhere. If you’re able to adapt, you can fit in comfortably almost anywhere with a little practice – learning at least the basic local customs pays off huge dividends. The people who only have one way to view anything are shutting themselves off from most of the rest of the world.
I tend to be a chameleon since, having moved around so much, I like fitting in wherever I am and so find myself adopting everything down to the local accent as quickly as I can. My hubby, who grew up in Minnesota, tends to view a lot of things through his childhood filters, but as an adult he’s moved around and lived in so many places far more exotic than I have that he’s also extremely adaptable (although not as far as accent; he’s pure Minnesota). But I have many friends who utterly fail to grasp the idea that different people look at things differently; I had one friend from California visit me when I lived in Georgia who ever after became known as my “loud friend” to my Georgia folks because she totally failed to notice that the local speaking style was much gentler than hers. Simple things like that can really stand out.
It sounds like your professor and bimbo wife are single-filter folks. It’s their loss. You, however, can be so realistic about the society you grew up in and love that I suspect you’d be happy almost anywhere because you’re capable of looking at even things you love from varying perspectives. !
My wife (Louisiana born and bred) will castigate someone by saying, “Oh, bless his tiny little heart.” If she says that about you, just slink quietly hour of the room.
er, “hour” = “out”
Hee! Please tell me this is a verbatim transcription of the exchange.
For my part, I love these threads. I am a NY yankee to the bone. Travelling for me typically means crossing a large body of water: I have never been south of DC for longer than a day or two save a brief trip to Disneyworld. I know absolutely goonisht about the subtleties of southern culture or its local or regional distinctions. Posters like Sampiro, Left Hand of Dornkess, Nocturne, and even Liberal have really stimulated my interest in southern society and culture.
Thanks again, and please keep it coming!
Oh, thank you. I can’t tell you how irritating it is when they come down to South Carolina and look down their noses. I mean, yeah, we’ve got plenty of problems, but we do wear shoes and I can count all the way to twenty as long as you let me take my shoes off. Why on earth anybody would move to a place for which they harbor such utter contempt I will never know.
But what really gets me is inter-regional snobbery. You wouldn’t believe those jackasses from Charleston when they come up here sometimes. “Well it’s just not like it is in Charleston!” “Oh, there’s so much more to do in Charleston.” I think it’s because they’re embarassed that Charleston smells like dead fish and tourists.
I think it’s a matter of context and as near as I can tell, “Well bless your heart,” has three meanings. A person of reasonable intelligence should be able to tell whether it means, “I sympathize with your plight,” “Apologize or my second will be speaking with yours,” or "Just how dumb are you?"and if he can’t, well, bless his heart.
Reminds me of my Mother-in-Law. She keeps going off about people from “down here”. People from “down here” are all ignorant. People from “down here” have no culture. People from “down here” are all stupid. I think she thinks she has a sympathetic ear with me due to my political leanings, which no one from “down here” has.
It’s only because I love my wife that I haven’t reminded her in the middle of a rant to remind her that her daughter married someone from “down here”, and that her grandson is from “down here”.
It’s amazing how such a simple phrase can provide such inspiration for a Call of Cthulhu adventure.
Daniel
As a lifelong midwesterner, the weird part to me about contempt for the south is that it seems like the south - whatever its problems - has always been a cultural center for the United States. It sure seems to me that, for instance, the south has had more than its share of great writers. There aren’t many Americans novelists who stand up to Mark Twain or William Faulkner, for instance. Jazz owes much to the south - it began, to a large extent, in New Orleans (though I’m not sure if y’all southerners count that as really in the south; I’m not quite sure how far the south extends.) I mean, I wouldn’t want to eat the food but besides that there’s a whole lot to be said for southern culture.
I was in Pittsburgh for the first time recently, for a wedding. I really had no expectations at all for the city one way or another (I knew little about it) and I was so surprised at how beautiful the place is. Truly remarkable.
It’s a bit like the comment of Harry Lime (Orson Welles) in The Third Man:
The violence, the multiculturalism, the isolation, the heat- everything combines to create some pretty impressive fusions.
Goody, a Sampiro thread!
I’m pure Yank, but I’m so sick of folks “up here” making fun of folks “down there.” Especially when they then get all confused about the North-South culture divide (usually 'round election time). :rolleyes:
I’m a southern mutt, and I pretty much lost my hick accent when I went to college. Northerners ask me if I’m from Ohio nowadays. Dayum, ah need to start puttin in those extry syllables ever oncet in a wall.
One time I contacted a lady at a Minnesota printing company. She was very heavily accented, and we were dicussing an error in a job description. She summarized the situation with “EYE GUESS BETWEEN MEYE NORTHERN ECCENT END YOUR SOUTHERN ECCENT WE WERE GOIN TO GET SOMETHING WRANG.”
Bless her heart.
Learn something new every day. Gotta love the Dope.