One of my high school teachers recalled attending college in Texas in the 1980s. He was met with a lot of hostility from the locals, who told him to go home and find a school in the north.
Flash forward to recent times when I’ve started traveling around the country more extensively. I’ve never encountered anything remotely like that in the places I’ve been- MD, VA, NC, SC, FL, TN. Have the south’s attitudes changed over time, or was it that we were just visiting and spending money instead of trying to live there, or was it a Texas think he encountered, or was his experience an outllier even then.
FWIW, by far the rudest, most hostile people I’ve encountered have been in the Northeast, especially NJ, NY and MA. Not everyone or even the majority of course, but more than my area and a lot more than the south. The only non-friendly people anwhere in the south I’ve encountered were at a Waffle House somewhere in the NC mountains of I-40, and they were just teens that didn’t want to actually do any work.
There used to be a popular bumper sticker “we don’t care how you did it up north”. Seemed unnecessarily hostile to me, since I’ve never gone up to a southerner and suggested a better way of doing things vis a vis the north, not to mention that some ways of doing things are better than others and you should always keep an open mind.
The rudest people I’ve encountered are in the Southwest. They were also young people who didn’t want to do any work. Several times I’ve come into a business establishment only to be completely ignored. Fortunately, there were other restaurants/motels next to such establishments, and I figure that if I don’t get served in a couple minutes, I can just go next door rather than trying to get their attention since this is probably an indicator that their service is sub par in other ways.
All I know is that even way up here in the great white tundra of Northern New England, I’ve seen guys walking around rebel flag belt buckles, hats and tshirts proudly claiming that the “South will rise again!”
I’ve never seen a guy with a tshirt that says, “The North Won, So STFU.”
As for the OP, having been born in the south (though not the deep south) and lived in various places - including the deep South, New England, the Midwest, and the desert Southwest, I’ve never noticed this attitude particularly by Southerners toward Northerners.
That said, I have noticed it in small towns with people from “away” - and I’ve noticed that in both the South and in New England. I had less opportunity to see it in the other areas I’ve lived.
This NYCer went to college in Virginia, and never encountered any hostility, Virginians are proud of the quality of their public universities and that they attract students from all over the US.
I encountered a little casual antisemitism, but nothing for being a yankee.
My cousins went to UT – and yeah, they are a little zealous in their school pride (hook em horns) but Austin is a very cosmopolitan place – I think your second-hand story is less than 100% reliable or there may be missing details.
That said, there is no difference in rudeness levels between north and south. Both contain both wonderful and rude people.
That’s not getting OVER…that’s getting under. And it sure does change opinions!
Seriously, though, here in South Carolina the local ball team has ‘Go Back to Ohio’ night, God help me. It’s tongue in cheek but there’s a certain amount of ‘we’re being invaded’ going on here.
If you want to figure out more of it I heartily recommend the book Confederates in the Attic by Tony Horwitz. It’s an accidental exploration of the still unresolved issues of culture and history between the south and the rest of the country. It’s worth a read.
My view is if you’re a dick Southerners will let you know. If you’re a dick and a Northerner then your Northern heritage will be blamed for your dickishness.
Northerner here, lived in the south for close to 10 years. I get some mild-ribbing now and then, but it’s almost always in jest.
Frankly, I noticed a lot more razzing toward southerners while growing up in the north, but I think that just had to do with the fact that southerners got stuck with all the bum stereotypes (marrying cousins, eating fatty foods, burning crosses, etc.), which kids will of course take much pleasure in poking fun at.
I have lived in Arkansas my whole life and the only time I have heard any sentiments approaching the ones from the teacher in the OP has been when people who are from other parts of the US make fun of the people in the south (and that was maybe two or three times total in high school).
Never really encounted it, despite being from New England and living in some pretty “southern” places in the South.
The closest thing I’ve seen is that some Southerners seem to get really uptight about people joking about their states, but don’t really seem to have trouble joking about states from other parts of the country.
I lived in Massachusetts, CA, VT and Utah before moving south, and heard the usual jokes both from natives and outsiders that the states in question was full of Massholes, hippies, redneck-hippies and polygamists respectively. And while you probably don’t want to walk into a bar in Boston during a Patriots game and start calling everyone a Masshole, in general, people from those states take jokes about the stereotypes in stride.
In the South, they still make those jokes about other states, but a sizable chunk of the population gets really pissy if you turn around and start joking about, say, Texas being full of violent cowboys or Alabama being full of inbred hicks.
I remember shortly after the 911 attacks when a young Alabama native in the armed forces was interviewed. “We ain’t gonna let them %&#$@!@ terrorists go around killing our yankees!”
I first started going down south in the 1970"s. In the cities I was never aware of any predjudice but in the country folks it was still alive and well. Very nice people but if they new you were a Yankee you kind of had to prove yourself. Since about 1990 I haven’t really seen much of it. This year I spent some time in Tennessee, in the country. I got a lot of good natured razzing about being yankee and felt there was still some undertones present.
