Posted on 10/02/2008 4:59:07 AM PDT by Kaslin
Americans disdain snobbery in all its forms except the most popular one: reverse snobbery. Joe Biden would never get up in front of a crowd and suggest that the citizens of Manhattan are morally superior to the residents of Possum Gulch, Ark. But Sarah Palin was happy to tell the Republican National Convention that the very best people come from the country.
"We grow good people in our small towns, with honesty, sincerity and dignity," she declared, quoting the late journalist Westbrook Pegler. "They are the ones who do some of the hardest work in America, who grow our food, run our factories and fight our wars. They love their country, in good times and bad, and they're always proud of America." Not like those idle, insincere, lying city folks who dare to suggest that America can sometimes be wrong.
But no one seemed to take offense. The myth of rural virtue and urban vice is an old one in this country, and it persists no matter what the changes in the landscape. And whatever questions Palin may face in her debate with Biden, her paeans to small-town virtue aren't likely to be among them.
Most Americans, it seems, can tolerate hearing of the superiority of the small town, as long as they don't have to live in one. You wouldn't know it from listening to country music stations, or to the governor of Alaska, but four out of every five Americans choose not to reside in rural areas.
Maybe if they ventured beyond the city limits more often, those people would not be so inclined to believe everything they hear about the merits of rustic hamlets, which harbor a full complement of social ills.
Not everyone in rural America gets high on fresh air and the smell of new-mown hay. Illicit drugs are nearly as common out there as they are in cities and suburbs.
In 2007, a survey of 8th graders by the Monitoring the Future project at the University of Michigan found that country kids were 26 percent more likely to experiment with drugs than middle-schoolers elsewhere. Overall methamphetamine consumption among adults and teens is more than 50 percent higher in the country.
The story with alcohol is worse still. "Relative to their urban counterparts, rural youth ages 12 to 17 are significantly more likely to report consuming alcohol," says a 2006 study by the Carsey Institute at the University of New Hampshire. Excessive boozing among adults, it noted, appears to be no less widespread in Mayberry than in Metropolis.
Nor is the countryside exempt from social problems often associated with the inner city -- such as, if you'll forgive me, out-of-wedlock births. The federal government apparently doesn't tabulate these births according to whether they occur in urban or rural areas. But it does break them down by state, and wide-open spaces are no guarantee of responsible sexual behavior.
The highest rates of births to unwed mothers are in Mississippi and New Mexico, both of which have high rural populations. The most urban states, New Jersey and California, do better than the average in out-of-wedlock births.
It's true that crime is much more common in the city than in the country. Is that because the sight of cattle grazing saps felonious impulses, or is it something else? Alfred Blumstein, a criminologist at Carnegie Mellon University, thinks the explanation is pretty simple. "It's a matter of social control," he says. "Small towns have networks of family and friends, and most everyone knows everyone else."
This deters crime in two ways. First, you don't want to damage your reputation among people who may ostracize you for doing wrong. Second, you don't want to rob someone who can easily identify you to police -- and in a small town, that limits your pool of victims. Crime is more common in cities because they offer a target-rich environment and much less chance of being spotted by someone who can tell the cops your name, address and 3rd-grade teacher.
One of these days, the 80 percent of Americans who live in more populated areas may tire of being obliquely insulted. Most urbanites and suburbanites don't think they're any better than their country cousins. But Palin might want to think twice before telling them they're worse.
Palin was just fighting back and her message is resonating with the non big city (liberal voting ) types
The small towns and country types have been getting dumped on and been the butt of jokes by the Big City elites for decades And if the boob that wrote this article doesn’t know that it is because he is one of the elites
That was seriesly clever! Welcome to FR, or welcome back, if you used to be somebody else!
“Sounds like this guy is searching for an excuse to complain about Palin.”
The Republican establishment is looking for a way to blame the outsiders if this turkey goes down the tube. It can’t be the establishments fault or else they would have to take the blame for being in the minority. It would be interesting to compare the Southeastern Conference with the Ivy League in self-made millionaires, excluding those that work for daddy’s friends or inherit it in both conferences. I would bet on the SEC particularly in football.
Living in Michigan I guess I should be a big ten fan but darn... I lived my youth in New Orleans and went to LSU so I am in total agreement with you!
Thank you for the insight into Sarah and what life is like there.
this whole country is becoming a moral sewer. Look at the abortion rates in this country-—well over twice as high as Western Europe. Look at the violent crime problems. We have kids bringing guns to school in order to kill as many classmates as possible. 13 year olds having kids, homeless people flooding our cities, teachers having sex with their students.... People making crystal meth in outhouses, everybody stepping over everybody to make as much money as they can. It makes my head spin.
Yet Americans are supposedly a devoutly Church going people. It sounds like alot people aren’t paying attention
Well, that's true if there are not the high paying jobs ( or jobs period ) within rural America; because States like mine are unfriendly to Big Business, so business is attracted to "another state or country (Ireland) more friendly". Infrastructure and access to easy access airports also come into play in attracting BB. Graduates are more often "pushed out" of a more rural state to make their living. A search for adventure is also expected at this "age of the game".
However:
Again, a specific "Age Group" comes into play, as many older Americans return to more rural areas "in population, closer to the cherished dreams and memories of their roots; etc, after having achieved success, and tired of a "subdivision" Orange Cty lifestyle mentality. Lifestyles often found not affordable; as Peter has been robbing to pay off Paul for so long, for this empty suit stressful kind of success..well we know, in most cases; all about what happens there.
Then there is "relaxation time or back to reality" residency; as I like to call it, which would show different numbers. Diane Feinstein, for example, may service her constituents in California; but where might you find her "out fishing"?, in the more rural state of Maine. I could name many other notable city mice joining their country brothers and sisters escaping to for vacations and even buying homes in these areas to "recharge"or retire. Log and timber homes offering that flavor of country living are now "the vacation home to build" if a celebrity or power broker. Tom Brokaw and wife own a rural restored barn free of most what most would expect to contain luxury amenities. Brokaw says he still "remains connected to the place that raised him". He and wife Meredith returned to South Dakota to celebrate their 40th Anniversay. Brokaw wrote in his memoir: A LONG WAY FROM HOME: Growing Up in the American Heartland- "As a man who could afford to celebrate this event anywhere he chose, it is fitting that he returned to his roots for this."
Remember back to the 1930's, the "grand old camps" of the Adirondacks were owned by great Industrialists. How often does one hear, "Go pack up the kids, Honey, we're going to the city for some R&R!
Even County music has become more popular than ever; with crossover rock/pop artists joining their ranks $$$, so can't get more "down-home" in message than that.
As far as the use of drugs and alcohol come into play, I guess you have to "define" rural: "Connecticut is burdened by the issues of alcohol and drug trafficking and abuse. According to the Alcohol Epidemiology Program of the University of Minnesota, substance abuse is one of the youth's problems in Connecticut. Alcohol specifically ranks as the most accessible to young people."
One State's rural might be another State's "suburb". One local police official told a friend, also educator, that it's not often he has to worry about trouble coming from kids living in our farm families. Many Hollywood hucksters, the Internet, celebrities, for example; can highlight and promote a "cool" and "edgy" lifestyles of living fast and playing hard.It's just more "redundant copy" by those oblivious to their own hypocrisy, more often placing the blame on Conservative leaders for "dividing Americans".
But all the "funded" studies in the world, and all the 60 minute-type investigative television newsmagazines will not take away the fact that most Americans still continue to live under the old "grass roots" teachings that grandmother would refer to as, "Use Your Head" or "Common Sense".
hahahaheheheheophohohohohohhahahahah!
The liberals snub her as being from a small town and laugh that makes her unqualified to be President. If there is any snobbery it is from the left. Fact is, she is not Ivy League and pro-life, so they hate her.
non-standard spelling of the word that means female dog.
Well, the biggest difference between now and back in the day was that back then chances were that you’d never come home again. Today’s economic migrants (the legal ones) can hop a plane and be home for the holidays and never be further than a phone call. Most of the Indians (dot, not feather) that I know go home for a month out of the year.
Again, I think young people tend to want to leave small town America, to see the lights of Broadway, as it were, but then realize the city is no place to raise a child and want to move back home later. And there is nothing wrong with that.
I'm sure that's an issue to some extent, especially when it comes to problems like theft. However, my grandparents had plenty to say about vice in small towns back in the "good old days." They were in the medical profession and saw it all.
As someone who was born, raised, and has lived in big cities his entire life, I agree with Sarah. Just got back from visiting my girlfriend up at their family farm in central NY. Nothing but small towns around there. The people everywhere are some of the nicest, engaging, generous, and just real people I’ve ever met and have made me feel incredibly welcome. Meanwhile, I’ve lived in city apartment complexes with hundreds of people in close proximity, and I’ve never met my neighbors. That being said, I still like living in cities, but because of the conveniences they provide, not because of general populace.
If country folks seem a little condescending towards the masses in the large urban areas it may be because of things like this. All people are created equal, and there are many fine conservatives in large urban areas, just as there are many detestable liberals in the country. However, there is a reason that a national elector map by county shows bright blue spots floating in vast seas of red. Comparing the politics of Iowa or Oklahoma with what they debate in Boston or San Fransisco only proves that the difference is real, great and most likely irreconcilable. I work in a first tier city. But I raise my family at the outer edges of the suburbs. There are valid reasons for that, and valid reasons for rural residents to be a little smug at times. Their brethren in the city certainly are.
Brilliant and true.
I tell northerners I’m from Mississippi and the stereotypes are in full force. Never mind I am often better educated and traveled.
Many are bigots too arrogant to see their own bigotry.
Are there no editors anymore?
If you are going to print a paragraph-length quote, the entire paragraph has to be that quote. You can't skip from the quote to something else without being clear about it.
Sarah Palin said absolutely nothing negative toward city folks during her RNC speech. To "paraphrase" her statement to say something it in no way said is just dishonest.
No one seemed to take offense, because no offense was given. The only person saying anything negative about City Folk is Steve Chapman, the lying little twit.
In other words, all the better folks stayed back home.
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