Once again, the Daily Show punctures the pointless vapidities uttered by politicians — in this case, the phrase “small town values” that was flung about with fervent abandon at the Republican convention, by lots of people who seem to have never been anywhere near a small town.
I live in a small town, I like living here, and there are definite advantages to it — it’s easy to get to know other members of the community, the life style is a bit more laid back, and a lot of the hassles of just moving around are absent. But small town values? The ones the Republicans are worshipping seem to be the narrow insularity verging on xenophobia, the judgmental meddling in other people’s affairs, the backward-looking reverence for the good old days (which actually weren’t that good), the worship of ignorance, the easy way authority can personally intrude on people’s lives without oversight, except by a coterie of good old boys. They seem to overlook the schools in neglect, the churches sprouting everywhere like poisonous mushrooms, the alcoholism, the spousal abuse, the kids who just want to get through high school and flee to a city where something is happening, the elderly piling up and outnumbering the young and being shuffled off to cheap complexes, the despair of people caught in dead-end menial jobs with few prospects for going beyond. That’s also small town America, and when I hear a Republican singing the praises of small towns, I have visions of a walmartized wasteland where everyone goes to church. It’s not good.
But I still like it here — I’m just not blind to the flaws, and I’m not some beltway lobbyist who thinks the country is a place from a Currier & Ives postcard.
I’ve also been to New York, and I like big city values, too. Everytime I’ve been there, I’ve felt the people were just as friendly and open as the ones in Morris, if not more so, and that they were also more diverse and far less afflicted with small town myopia. New York, Los Angeles, and Chicago are also part of America…except to the Republican party, apparently.
I hope the Daily Show also did something on the empty buzzwords of the Democratic convention. If I ever hear “god bless” or “godspeed” again, I’m going to ralph on someone’s shoes.
The Daily Show skewer the Dem’s as good as they skewer the Republicans? I wouldn’t hold my breath. At best the Democrats get a gentle ribbing.
Here’s the sort of values I learned from the small (pop. 2000) town I grew up in: anti-intellectualism and disregard for intelligence and education, mindless conformity and severe persecution of those who are even slightly different, keeping quiet about any and all abuse adults commit against children, and sexual harassment and assault of females who don’t fit the norm of behavior and/or appearance.
That dude in the cowboy hat talking about gays and traditional marriage is SO in denial.
I grew up in a big city (Toronto, downtown), loved it. Five years ago, I bought this old (ca. 1865) house that needed some attention and now live in a very small village (pop 1500).
I like it here, mainly because nobody ever drops in and I can garden myself to death in my big backyard. I’ve met some very interesting people despite myself, it’s relaxing and quiet. People here are pretty open-minded overall but yeah, it’s like going back to the 1950s in a lot of ways – fine by me.
I miss the city in some ways. Mostly, I miss the aggravation, the noise, the stink – the information overload. Sometimes it’s a little too quiet around here for a city rat like me. On balance though, I wouldn’t say people here are any different, except there are some churches – which have dwindling congregations and have trouble putting bums in seats – just like the ones in the cities.
Wolfhound, I could not agree more!
Wolfhound, the man doth protest too much?
I think that when they talk about “small town values” they’re also expressing their yearning for easy solutions to simple problems they can handle intellectually. Everything has gotten so complicated and complex, so global and difficult — gosh, politics is hard.
If only it could all be like deciding whether or not the new sign on Lu-Ann’s Bar-B-Q is too big. That’s the value of small towns. You can keep your thinking local, and just do what’s best for you and the neighbor who looks just like you, because you sat next to each other in Mrs. Heims’ first grade.
Yes, nothing like a small town where the tallest thing in sight is the freaking church.
I recall a woman (she was white) extolling the virtues of Atlanta Georgia to a friend, who was black. When the friend inquired about the surrounding communities, the woman, clearly embarrassed by the question, awkwardly suggested that the friend avoid venturing too far from the big city.
Now there’s the on-the-ground reality of so-called small town values.
Of course, that was 20 years ago and a lot has changed. For starters, godless heathens like PZ have staged a quiet and steady invasion of small town America, making it possible to find pockets of reason in some of the darkest backwaters. And the Internet makes it possible to retain contact with reality-based communities, no matter where you live.
Thus I find myself drawn to rural America — not because of the sometimes frothing conservatism of country christendom, but something else. People really are friendlier, and there’s far less mindless consumerism and worshiping at the alter of the boob tube — two common afflictions of my more urban associates.
Still, rural America is far from perfect. That’s why I prefer to live in the country, but retain a connection and contact with the larger metropolis. You get the best of both worlds.
Depends on which small town where and how far they are from a major city. And who lives there.
Way down the road from where I used to live once and still have old friends, is a classic depressed logging town. There are 600 people, no bar but the little store sells alcohol. The people who settled it are a motley mix but many came from the south during the depression and speak English with an accent that can be hard to understand.
They are very religious. There are 3 or 4 churches, hardcore fundie.
They average a murder every year so so, astounding for a town of 600. Almost always domestic violence related. It is saturated with drugs, mostly methamphetamine but one kid died of a heroin overdose. Some are illiterate, many are alcoholics, teen age pregnancy is common, and incest is not unknown.
Sarah Palin and her brood would fit right in.
The last place we lived was a small town. I started planning our escape the day the kindergarten teacher sent me home a note telling me to “Stop teaching your child at home, that’s our job.” Because it’s not good to be different than your peers, even if it’s by being better than them at something.
I can see why the Republicans valorize small towns though. Insularity, suspicion of anyone different, nosy scolding of any “perverted” behavior – meaning anything outside of marriage to your HS sweetheart and having your alloted number of children. Sounds pretty familiar.
I don’t know the source of this story but it’s the one about the boy whose parents moved to a small town when he was 7 months old. The boy grew to manhood in the small town and lived there all his life, dying at the age of 84. On his gravestone, they wrote the words, “He was almost one of us.”
Whenever I hear the phrase “small-town values,” my mind skips to a soda-jerk named Gus down at the corner malt shop who has a pile of axe-mangled corpses in his basement.
I also think of Martial Law for some reason (That’s probably the result of too many UFO movies).
PZ is lucky to live in a small town with a college. Even with the typical town vs. gown infighting, the college tends to lessen some of the hard edges seen without a college. And the colleges provide entertainment via the drama clubs, bands, choirs, and the like. And the college library can afford books and subscriptions to magazines. Still, having a large city with easy driving distance would be a plus.
Could you please stop embedding John Stewart? Despite the chuckles I just get a worse and worse sinking feeling in my stomach. I want to cry …
Don’t know if the Daily Show did one on the whole “God bless” and “godspeed” thing, but Colbert did a pretty good bit on that in the “Better Know a Lobby: Atheism” segment. Didn’t that get linked here?
To be fair, we should note that sometimes the grain elevator’s taller.
On his gravestone, they wrote the words, “He was almost one of us.”
Heh. Yep. Believe I know that one. My parents moved to a smallish centre in rural Ontario when I was three. Lived there a few decades, in total, including a few years working around there after university…
But I’m still not from there, really. Doesn’t work that way, apparently.
I can’t say I mind. Don’t so much feel like I’m from there, either. My only complaint, now, about it, is the minor conversational annoyance, when someone asks me where I’m from.
And y’know, you don’t so much feel like you’re really from anywhere, when that was the deal. And seeing as it just takes too much explaining. I usually just say ‘oh, around’.
As to insularity, xenophobia, yeah, that’s all true enough, too. I’m not saying there aren’t and weren’t some awfully decent and interesting people around–there certainly are and were–but those places, the ugly stuff does get stifling fast. Anti-intellectualism, general discomfiture with anyone a bit different either in colour of skin, mother tongue or way of thinking, they have a way of hanging heavily in the air in places like that. Occasionally, I wonder about why it works that way. I guess maybe larger centres grind it off people, more… they have to get along, because everyone’s bouncing around in the same pool, and it’s just less practical for a few to get all domineering and nasty when there’s that many more big fish around. And you learn to appreciate differences more when you experience them more.
Anyway, I seriously have never missed it. In my less charitable moments, I’ll say about the country: it’s nice, if you can just avoid the people who live there.
So, when’s the new Obama ad coming out that says: “Do you live in a city that’s big enough for the posts of mayor and dogcatcher to be held by two different people? If you do, then there’s something you need to know about the Republicans: They don’t think you’re a real American. They don’t think you have real values. [insert clips about “small towns” from Republican convention] They don’t represent you. They don’t care about the problems you’re facing. This November 4th, vote for a candidate who will put the WHOLE nation first, not just the country. One Nation, Indivisible. Obama/Biden, ’08”
Sven Dimilo @ 17
Of course, and a building of tangible worth!
Add to small-town values the high demand for powerful narcotics and amphetamines. As we know, self-reliance leads to self-medication.
#19
I would really appreciate the dems doing this, I have pretty good values despite the fact that I have always lived in places big enough to have non volunteer fire departments. I don’t know why the vast majority of the country that lives in cities and suburbs takes this crap.
Probably because they all realize that “small town values” are the coded way to say white christian values.
“Stop teaching your child at home, that’s our job.”
My jaw broke a few tiles on my floor when I read that statement…
Not that Louis,
My mother always felt like an outsider in out hamlet. It was so big an occasion when the neighbours (one of the other old families – like my fathers) invited her for coffee one evening. It’s etched in my memory – which is poor. I think it must have been after then death of my grandparents, so that’s … probably some ten years after she moved in.
Tim Kreider on small towns:
And yes it’s the Republican base, one which hates knowledge and that which is so perfect for the type of reality-denying idiots who like to deny life. The same thing occurs in the suburbs that they love so much.
In a city where every step will be past a person of a different religion, race, sexual orientation, it’s much harder to push an us vs them worldview or deny obvious realities. The fact that anyone who can flees from those towns to the first city they can illustrates this problem and breeds more resentment for those who are stuck staying.
That’s not to say that there aren’t exceptions (artist communes, university towns, etc…).
I grew up in a small town in the 1950s and 60s. I remember the white picket fences, mowing Mrs. Fenner’s lawn for five bucks and a glass of cold lemonade, and how the butcher gave a hotdog to every kid who entered his store. I also remember how Lennie was beat up regularly because he was smart but not athletic, how Sarah used to come to school every Monday with bruises on her arms and neck, and how everyone except his dad and his dad’s deputies knew that the sheriff’s son jacklighted deer on a regular basis.
I don’t watch soap operas on television. They remind me too much of the small town where I grew up.
Speaking of small towns…
http://www.boston.com/ae/music/articles/2008/07/15/new_england_reaps_the_farm_aid_show/
When did “godspeed” become common Christian saying? When I was growing up, I associated it with Rennaissance Fair types.
#22
I think you’re right. If I remember right: “small town values” as a talking point and the urge to leave things to their morality stemmed from conservative southern defenses of lynchings and opposition to Civil Rights movements.
I could be wrong about that, but I’m pretty sure they were at the very least heavily used in defense of both of those.
reminds me that winston churchill once said that: “the traditions of the royal navy are these – rum, sodomy, and the lash.”
How many people live in small towns anyway?
Just looked up some statistics on google and 80% of the US population is described as living in “metropolitan” areas.
Sounds about right. The USA is a highly urbanized country.
Partly because I am a misanthrope and generally try to ignore people anyway, and reallymostly because I am an amateur astronomer in a big city (and have no car), I wish wish wish I lived out in the country, where I might be able to roll a telescope out my back door and actually see the stars at night.
Of course, I am a business-hatin’ Commie pinko for questioning the GOD-GIVEN right of my fellow corporations I mean humans to light-pollute with abandon.
Bleah I say bleah I will bleah.
Godspeed is how Andrew Schlafly often ends his screeds.
Small town values combined with global fire power is what Europeans find so scary about us.
There are over 300,000 churches in the U.S. To put that in perspective, there are less than 14,000 McDonald’s restaurants in the U.S. which people often criticize for being “on every corner.”
Thanks to our k-12 educational systems, the rural population abhors the ambitious individual who excels in a specific area and constantly fights society’s effects to be (reined into the fold), This is changing tho thanks to the power of knowledge do to availability thru the web or net
“Small town values combined with global fire power is what Europeans find so scary about us.”
Precisely. Voting our would-be bar-buddies to be the ones with their fingers on the buttons. Swell idea, excellent leadership criteria. Ugh.
will the speeding dog please either slow down (it’s too dangerous) or leave the planet (and that its followers along)?
Small town values vs. Big city decadence, example; Meth vs. crack cocaine.
In big cities, people don’t wander around with guns shooting defenseless animals.
In big cities, residents don’t assume that everyone who hasn’t been there for generations is garbage.
In big cites, it is not as easy for a single family to dominate politics and impose it’s right-wing, crap vision on everyone else.
In big cities, politicians don’t tell new residents to leave if they don’t like the environment-and-health-destroying industry on the other side of town.
Inkadu #28 asked “When did “godspeed” become common Christian saying? When I was growing up, I associated it with Rennaissance Fair types.”
Maybe the Dems are just big fans of Godspeed You! Black Emperor, and like promoting their music?
Personally, I’m not surprised the Reps are appealing to “small town values”, as that’s where their voters are. Even in the south, the cities are Democrat strongholds, and in the north, the more remote areas lean to the right.
2004 election map by county.
Somehow, whenever I see one of these picture perfect small towns, I always flash back to Harvest Home or American Gods and wonder if there’s some deep, dark secret behind what happens to the troublemakers in that town.
Our oldest son taught himself to read during the summer before kindergarten – the only way we could have prevented it would be get rid of all the books and magazines. Then his first-grade teacher said: “You shouldn’t have taught him to read, he’ll get bored. But don’t worry, they usually even out with the rest of the class by third grade.”
I live in “small town values” country. Clearfield County, PA. Let’s see… Last year our local firebug burned his trailer up again, and was later arrested for tying a neighbor to a chair in his own house, shooting him in the stomach with a .38, and burning the building down around him as he died. We’re also the town that had the guy beat his ageing mother-in-law to death and read the bible over her as she expired. There’s a crazy guy (literally) who works at the strip mine up the road who periodically goes off his meds and last time he did, he flattened his ex-wife’s trailer with a Cat D-9. Drinking and driving is a local sport and there’s the usual number of teen pregnancies, bar-fights, and robberies per capita. Dope isn’t too much of a problem; by which I mean to say it’s just as available and widely used as everyplace else. And our local small town politicians are just as corrupt – they threw a guy off the town council the other day for banging his secretary in the copy room, and another city official was directing tax-funded projects to his brother-in-law. And, of course, there’s myself with my unfortunate criminal history of shooting .45s at ATVs that I find trespassing on my land. In short, it’s paradise.
If you read your history, it’s instantly apparent that humans have been pretty much doing the same kind of stuff since the dawn of recorded history. During the middle ages there was plenty of drinking, wenching, cheating, cussing, and stealing – and as usual the political class and the clergy were right in the middle of it. As Van Halen said: “Everybody wants some.”
The quintessential “small town” and “good old days” appears to be the 50’s. At least, in the lizard-brains of these morons who talk about it like it was a golden age. My aunt, who used to hang with the hot-rodders at the Dairy Queen when she was a teen-ager used to tell me of razor-fights, drunken beatings, date rape, dope parties, and all the good things that make life worth living. There were gays, child-molesting clergy, and (of course) lots and lots of alcohol. Maybe what people are really longing for is “small town” america before the gays came out of the closet and the black people kept to the back of the bus…?
When someone talks about small town values, what they’re really saying is “I am a chucklefuck who is trying to sell fantasy to other chucklefucks.”
@#11:
My mom, who has taught in over a dozen different schools, mostly in urban areas, would kill to have students who were taught one bloody thing by their parents.
Our small towns make wine and are havens for gay men and women who give the places “flavor”.
In the throes of an optimism-lobe seizure, one might speculate that “godspeed” is code for “some deity’s taking the piss.”
A couple friends of ours moved from Oakland to Atlanta some years back, and the price they got for their modest city house was enough for a somewhat more lavish place in the suburbs there. One of their small kids batted a ball over the neighbor’s picket fence, and when their dad reached over to retrieve it, the neighbor’s dog rushed out and bit him. The neighbor apologized profusely, and said, “I dunno know what happened. He’s never bit a white man before!”
This is partially why I am very annoyed about growing up in a small town; I was learning about physics, electricity, and genetics before I was 6 years old thanks to having an engineer and a biologist in my family and being very curious. I feel like I was prevented from getting the best education I could because there were no non-religious schools in the area aside from the public school. I’m still a bit angered by the educational system “teaching me” about Mendelian genetics when I was already familiar with many molecular basis for gene expression. I also don’t think I had a single evolution lecture in my high school; I learned about that from my uncle… Small-town values are all about reducing educational levels to the least common denominator.
From now on, this should be the law:
anyone who uses the phrase “small town values” should, without trial, be required to read both WINESBURG, OHIO and “The Lottery.”
At least, PZ, you could elucidate your notion of small town values. You know what they are. The point of the satire was that, not only could these people not render a definition of small town values, they had no concept about just what made them special and why the republicans should have dominion over the concept, like they claim with family values, patriotic values, moral values, and everything else.
It’s just another piece of pablum they swallow like a big blue pill before they descend down the rabbit hole.
The cartogram of the 2006 election makes it even more apparent that
#51 (oops, pressed post by mistake)
… the high population counties lean left, and the low population “small town” counties lean right.
I can assure you that that phenomenon is not restricted to small towns!
I won’t say exactly where I live, but I do live in a small town. I like it here, but I’m a hermit, reclusive writer surrounded by lots of cats. ;) I also agree with commenters here talking about “outsider” status. I have it, since I was not born here nor has my family grown up here over several generations. This is the kind of town where some of the people will look down on you because the locals didn’t know your parents. There’s not much to do here, but there is also not much crime. We used to leave our doors unlocked all the time. The economy in the area is also in the tank. Some of the locals have some really backwards views, but I’ve lived in larger cities and counties where the locals also had some really backwards views. I love the ocean and the “Currier & Ives” look the town has, but I can’t imagine staying here much longer. I grew up in a large, working class, blue-collar county, so I see good points and bad points of both large counties/cities and small towns.
Sherlock Holmes’ take on “small town values”:
From The Adventure of the Copper Beeches
Raven wrote,
I did as well, and found that >70 million live in just 10 metropolitan areas.
Obama is right, the Republicans are completely out of touch with America. The only thing that saves them is the electoral college in which the majority doesn’t really rule.
#22,
Exactly right.
Some of my relatives used to live in a small town in the upper midwest.
The town has been losing population for decades. Periodically it buys up abandoned houses and tears them down to keep the place from looking like a ghost town. The average age is 60. The local school was built to hold hundreds of students and now has less than 100.
Some of the smaller villages around have just disappeared.
They all bitch about the federal govmint a lot. Which is odd because roughly half the income in the area is federal transfer payments of one sort of another, agriculture programs and so on. Basically the feds pay them a lot of money to keep a few people living there.
This area at least doesn’t have the social problems of drugs, alcohol, and poverty that a lot of rural areas end up with.
I grew up in a small town:
Terrible school systems, racial intolerance, Wal-Mart moving in driving out other businesses and then jacking their prices, poverty, a rampant drug problem that put the state capital’s inner city to shame, and a teenage pregnancy rate so high you can count the ones not knocked up at least by 3 years after graduation on one hand.
I also worked in a nice and wholesome Bob Evans on Sundays just in time to see all the church people come in.
I worked with a prostitute, a 20 year old woman with 4 kids and pregnant with the 5th, a guy with a major drug problem, and another who drank the milk out of the carton…at work.
Yay, for all those wholesome values.
I think the whole “Big City vs. Small Town” thing is a bit of a false dichotomy. I live in a smallish town in a very red state but it is also the home of a fairly large university. Because of that, there are some things here that are probably not available in other towns of similar size. This place is not exactly a bastion of progressive thought, but it’s also not a place of close-minded xenophobia. I grew up in a small town in the Colorado mountains, which despite being a popular resort, was a rather bigoted and small-minded place, but it was also incredibly beautiful so people flocked to it, complaining all the while about what a bigoted and small-minded place it was! Each place is different; stereotypes always distort as much as they reveal. Personally, I like my little ‘microlopolis’ despite its flaws. People here have a wonderful willingness to be non-participants in my life, something I did not find during the time that I lived in a large city. On the other hand, they certainly do a share a bit of indifference to innovation and originality.
@ #1 — I think this is because the democrats, for all their faults, are not nearly as vicious and paranoid as the republicans.
I grew up in a big city (NY) and lived in the greater Los Angeles area for another 18 years before moving to rural NW California.
Life is way easier in a small town – takes much less emotional energy to live here than in a city. And, this is a pretty tolerant place by and large.
You know, kcrady in #19 is right — the GOP’s view of small town life reminds me of all those Democrats who kept saying “But everyone I know voted for McGovern!” after the ’72 election. Except the difference is that people like the small town narrative.
Where does one go with this? I’m not saying that we can turn the message to “let’s help the cities and let those xenophobic, Wal-mart-crippled cesspools rot” — small towns are necessary because farmers can’t bus in their crews from the city. But it’s time for us to take note of the Urban Archipelago Dan Savage wrote about after the ’04 election and start reminding people that the bulk of our population has no experience of “small town values” and is holding up an ideal that never existed.
Exactly. Many conservatives remember 1950s small town America as shown in the iconic representation of Leave It To Beaver and Father Knows Best. These conservatives confuse the fictional shows, with their overly rosy portrayal of white, middle-class, American family life, with what the 1950s actually were.
I spent my first 16 years in New York City. To McCain and Palin, that is Sodom, and Washington DC is Gomorrah. Although ever since McCain cheated on his wife with the stripper known as “The Flame of Florida” he has no trouble preaching “family values” while living in one of his 7 houses nearest to Gomorrah.
Now I live in a town within 5% of the population of Galveston, albet we have earthquakes, forest fires, and copycat crimes from the Rodney King riots, instead of hurricanes.
Yesterday afternoon at the closest high school to my home, after I’d taught Homeroom, Chemistry, Biology, Anatomy & Physiology, there was an interesting conversation I overheard between two staff employees. One was on the signs that we are Last Times or End Times. The other was on how Angels are made of Light, but Satan is made of Fire. I like both of these staffers. One is sincere about family values, and may quit to spend more time with his 4 children, including the 1-month-old. The other can read Arabic and tell me things about Abrahamic religion that I did not know, while happily stocking the school library with donated books including a very fine Science Fiction section. See what Fred Clark says on his blog about the single keyword in Sarah Palin’s nonanswer to dancing around her not knowing the definition of “Bush Doctrine” — the keyword is “worldview.” That codes for the far, far right evangelical focus on the war between churchgoing armies of God and the Satanic Liberal Pointy-headed-professorial minions of the Jew- and communist-dominated Media, against whom Sarah Plain declared war in her acceptance speech.
Small-town values? I like David Letterman’s take on Wasilla. “A town so small it only has one store: Bed, Bath, and Waaaaay Beyond. Pick up the book ‘Fun Things to do in Wasilla.’ It has one entry: ‘you’re doing it.'”
My original comment: if you put lipstick on a dinosaur, Noah still won’t let it on the Ark.
I live in a small, rural town in the US, and I agree with folks who have mentioned the benefits of small town life. However, the xenophobia is very strong, and the average resident in my town doesn’t seem to see any benefits of diversity. Does anyone have any ideas on how to breakdown the cultural barriers in the rural areas, and get the population to see the benefits of diversity? The individuals who are in the minority already knock themselves out to be as nice and helpful as possible to coworkers and neighbors.
Does anyone have a link to a clip that’s viewable from a Canadian IP address? :(
Here’s another take on “the good old days”.
I have a friend who was born in 1942. In 1961, at 19, he was working his way through University doing landscaping. He managed to stick a dirty garden fork in his hand. Two days later, the hand was horribly inflamed and odd white tracks were crawling up his arm. He went to his doctor, who looked soberly at it, and prescribed him a course of penicillin, and instructed him to come back in a week. At the second visit, after the hand and arm had been inspected and approved as recovered, the doctor fixed his eye on my friend and said the following:
“Mel if you had come to me 15 years ago with the blood poisoning you showed me, we’d have had your arm off at the elbow before the evening, and even then you’d have had a 50% chance of dying. I used to see this happen all the time. As far as I’m concerned, you can keep the ‘good old days.'”
Hairhead here: those who long for the good old days have forgotten what they were really like.
That Sherlock Holmes piece is a classic. It’s the first thing I thought of when I read this post.
It’s very true in a lot of places around the world. That’s why people predict a majority of the population moving to urban areas in the next few decades. It’ll never happen the opposite way.
I retired in 1998 to a small town in the Bible thumping belt. No family or friend connection here. We picked it because it is a lovely area and land cost were low. In 1999 a plaque of the 10 commandments was installed in the county court house. Finally got up enough nerve to question its being there. Went to the court house to get information about its placement. Two days later a county commissioner shows up at my place. Long story short, he listed a few things that might happen if I go forward with trying to have the 10 Cs removed. Small town values means Constitution and Bill of Rights do not apply.
“Does anyone have any ideas on how to breakdown the cultural barriers in the rural areas, and get the population to see the benefits of diversity?”
This is a good question, and I don’t intend to belittle it by being all snarky and cynical, but the first thing that came to my mind was: money.
I don’t think the “salt of the earth” small-towners ‘n’ fundies ‘n’ all truly care about the Baby Jebus and all anywhere near as much as they care about the green. Their souls (whatever those are) are up for the highest bidder.
Small town values?Reminds me of that episode of “Torchwood” in which the Torchwood-team discover a tradition of cannibalism (“our harvest”,they call it)in a picturesque village in the Welsh countryside.I think the ep was called “Countrycide”.Don’t watch it if you’ve got a delicate stomach..
Well, the “small town” I grew up in was a hotbed of good old-fashioned first-generation American Catholic blue-collar pro-union liberalism. We had a couple of Republicans in the family (by marriage) and among the parents of my classmates, but most of those Republicans were at least slightly to the left of Nelson Rockefeller.
For real political diversity, we did have a chapter of the John Birch Society — “American Opinion” bookstore and all that. It occupied a tiny storefront in the poorest part of town, and very rarely had anyone in it besides its founder. People sort of humored him. I mean, this was New England, and if some guy wanted to put John Schmitz bumper stickers in his window, it was his own business.
By the way – Wasn’t Palin the mayor of “the second largest city [they have a cathedral?] in Alaska, I think“?
Make up your mind! Is it small or big?!
It’s good to be “from” a small town.
I wanted to be “from” my home town as soon as I could and left when I was 14 returning only for short visits under duress.
Some of the small town values I don’t miss the most:
– Relating all my achievements to how lucky I am, not how hard I work
– Making sure all my friends are white christian conservatives
– Living by the rule of “No sooner done than said”
– Never outing perverts and bigots (not making noise)
– Not marrying across social or religious lines
– Trusting leaders and teachers to do good for me
– Not letting my kids explore books, their own thoughts and life
– Never asking why
Benny:
“Probably because they all realize that “small town values” are the coded way to say white christian values.”
That sounds about right, and would go some way towards explaining why those “small town values” tend to get inflicted on the much higher percentage of people who live in larger towns. I think there might be a not-entirely-insidious side to it, too. People really swallow that Leave it to Beaver view of small-town life, and think that it really is an ideal. They just don’t want to actually live in any of those small towns, partly because they’re so boring, and partly because there are no jobs there.
Still, it would be nice if Obama would flag up that point in some campaign ads. Make people think a little. Oh wait – no, making people think, that’s got to be an election-killer.
Marcus:
“And, of course, there’s myself with my unfortunate criminal history of shooting .45s at ATVs that I find trespassing on my land.”
Sounds entirely justifiable to me. Next time, aim for the fuel tank.
[Obligatory disclaimer: Yes, I’m kidding; no, I don’t advocate the death penalty for vehicular trespass. However, I also don’t like ATVs very much.]
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle:
“Think of the deeds of hellish cruelty, the hidden wickedness which may go on, year in, year out, in such places, and none the wiser.”
Makes me wonder how many small-town folk read mystery novels with exactly that premise.
Alien:
“Reminds me of that episode of “Torchwood” in which the Torchwood-team discover a tradition of cannibalism (“our harvest”,they call it)in a picturesque village in the Welsh countryside.”
I wonder how many other plots they ripped off from The X-Files.
Aren’t there a lot of Texans today who think that god’s peed on them?
Does anyone have a link to a clip that’s viewable from a Canadian IP address? :(
http://watch.thecomedynetwork.ca/the-daily-show-with-jon-stewart/full-episodes/september-5-2008/#clip90641
Video: ROTFL!
The Whore Babylon, my friend. It is written.
Well said…
LOL! Seriously. You explain two massively disturbed hominicidal maniacs, and then you say… X-D
What’s a Cat D-9? A gun?
PZ wrote,
Hey, I have a good friend named Ralph.
FIXED.
Oh I hate that “small town values” talk it is meaningless with just enough a associations with the phrase for you to make up anything you want to to mean. Just another B.S. catch phrase like “family values”. All so F%$#^&%^g Norman Rockwell good. All so selective of reality. Is it really just “code ” for us vs. them?
I find it just as bad as “the remember the good old days” crap that gets sent to my e-mail it is a phony unreal sentimental fantasy that has nothing to do with the reality of the past but everything to do with the “remembered” safety and ignorant bliss of childhood when we did not now much about how the world worked or what was going on in it. I think the mania of the fundamentalist is wanting that imagined safety of childhood dreams to be real at all costs combined with cynical exploitation by truly sick people. Same goes with the conservative political movement which says a lot of nice sounding democratic crap but only enable power in action.
Republicans have done a good job creating code words and phrases.
“small town values” / “family values” = White, Christian values
elitist = Uppity black (with the N-word not so tacitly implied)
liberal = communist
any references to San Francisco = gay orgies
any references to Hollywood = hetero orgies and decadence
New York = white, Jewish elitists.
mainstream media = anti-American
Andrew Campbell @ 1,
Have you seen the show? Have you talked to the writers? Are you aware they give an equal amount of air time to guests who are usually considered “conservative” as they do to “liberal” ones. Do you know the political leanings of the talent? No? Of course not! I have and do.
You’re still stuck in the great “liberal media” lie of the 1980’s. You thrive on feeling like a “martyr”, like so many of your ilk. Check out the book “What Liberal Media” by Eric Alterman if you dare. I suspect you won’t. It might not fit with your myopic views. As has been said many times “Reality has a liberal bias.”
You’re pathetic. If you actually cared about this country you’d take the time to look up the truth. But you don’t. You just care about your own pet beliefs. That’s probably why science irks you so much. Science doesn’t care about any of our pet beliefs. It stomps on them all the time. Can’t handle it? Go back into the dark-ages and shut your mouth. The rest of us will deal with the reality you can’t.
And what counts as a “small town” in the US anyway?
This reminds me of that congressman Colbert had on his show. The one who was pushing for the 10 commandments in schools, but when asked, couldn’t even name tham all.
It’s a truism that Republicans don’t have principles, they have bumper sticker slogans. Apparently this is an excellent way to call them on their bullshit. Just play stupid and ask them to explain whatever their talking point means.
What’s a Cat D-9?
That was effin’ funnier than a Canadian pimp!
I think of “godspeed” as a kind of archaic term, but not any more religious than other uses of “god” in everyday vocabulary, like “oh my god” (or “OMFG!!1!”), “goddamn”, “for god’s sake”, etc.
or OH GOD, OH GOD, OH GOD
oh sorry. Whoops. Wrong blog.
“And what counts as a “small town” in the US anyway?”
Depends on your perspective, I think. I grew up in Idaho, and so to me, a “small town” is one where you drive through on the highway and all the businesses are on the main drag, and pretty soon you’re out of it again. Less than a thousand people. The handful of 20,000+ population municipalities in Idaho are large towns (except Boise, which is the only full-fledged “city”). Yet I think in places like California or New York, they would be considered “small towns”.
I agree with Rey Fox, the definition of a small town will vary depending on state and/or area. In very rural areas, 2,000 or less. Closer to major cities, 25,000 or less.
Then you can have the micro towns where there is a church, bar, general store/gas station, and post office on each of the four corners of a crossroads, with just a house or two visible.
I wonder where Dover, Pa. fits on the small town values spectrum.
Small town, population about 2,000
http://www.city-data.com/city/Dover-Pennsylvania.html
Dahan @ #81
Wow, you sure can tell alot about me from the 3 sentences I wrote. Perhaps you should snatch Randi’s million before it’s too late?
I’ve been watching the Daily Show since before the 2000 election. I’m a big fan of it. But to say that it isn’t biased in who gets made fun of more is dishonest. There is a reason why the show is so popular among Liberals and Democrats, it’s very good at spotlighting the hipocrisy and absurdity of the right. I was refering to one show only, The Daily Show, not to some conspiratorial “Liberal Media”. Get a grip.
And where do you get the idea that science ‘irks’ me? Because I make a comment that isn’t in lock step with the rest of the commenters here I must be some religous zealot troll? If you really want to know what I think of science, please check out my blog
http://cosmicafterthoughts.blogspot.com/
I haven’t updated in a while, but you can see what side I’m on here (PZ has even linked to me a few times in the past).
Patiently awaiting your apology,
Andrew Campbell
Yeah I know about small town values. That’s the reason why they lock the cows up in a shed at night.
What is the definition of a small town virgin? It is a 13 year old girl who can outrun her 17 year old brother…
<lightbulb position=”above head”> Oh, a caterpillar. English is becoming more and more monosyllabic. Soon it will be indistinguishable from Classical Chinese ;-)
Church and bar next to each other? Reminds me of the Simpsons movie… when doom is announced, a crowd of people runs from the bar to the church, and another crowd runs from the church to the bar… :-D
I just came across an article and it appears that the republicans are almost waiting with baited breath for the liberal left and atheist’s to attack the small town approach that they conveyed so strongly during the RNC.
Here is an excerpt from an article written by William Kristol, where he alludes to this:
So what we will see in the next days and weeks–what we have already seen in the hours after her nomination–is an effort by all the powers of the old liberalism, both in the Democratic party and the mainstream media, to exorcise this spectre. They will ridicule her and patronize her. They will distort her words and caricature her biography. They will appeal, sometimes explicitly, to anti-small town and anti-religious prejudice. All of this will be in the cause of trying to prevent the American people from arriving at their own judgment of Sarah Palin.
http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/015/500wrhjq.asp?pg=1
I really hope Obama wins this election. The republicans will lie and manipulate their way to the White house as long as the bible thumping 51% of the country keeps believing all the smoke being blown up their asses.
I grew up in small town (8,000 people) Australia and, once I reached my mid-teens, couldn’t wait to get out. It sounds pretty much the same as many of the US towns you’ve described – and I’ve been back maybe twice in 17 years. Now I live in one of Australia’s state capitals (over 1 million people) and wouldn’t willingly live anywhere smaller again.
Most of my experience with the scary rural US comes from reading Stephen King – and let’s not forget Deliverance…
These two stories from last night’s Bill Moyers Journal were quite good, and you can watch them online:
“Media Analysis”
http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/09122008/watch2.html
“Rage on the Radio”
http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/09122008/watch.html
Boys Don’t Cry – disturbing film based on a true story:
“If I ever hear “god bless” or “godspeed” again, I’m going to ralph on someone’s shoes.”
Interestingly, or not, my political “awakening” dates to my hearing the phrase “family values” back in the late 80s and realizing that I was experiencing a small concatenation of words that acted like a black hole of meaning, sucking all content out of the word-scapes surrounding it. No one would explain the phrase — it could not be explained — they simply repeated it. And hearing this phrase again and again and being unable to locate its referent, I looked up from my Ph.D. work and there on the teevee was the vacuous, grinning phizz of George Bush I. And I was sore afraid.
Of course, it has just gotten worse. These days the Large Bullshit Collider that is the neocon smoke machine has spawned dozens of content-free verbal vacuoles. Content and meaning are … inconvenient.
WOW some of these comments really hit home @44,48,54, and many others.Great post PZ. Great post people!
I grew up in Chicago, which, by anyone’s standard, is a big city. I was lucky to have lived in a few different neighborhoods as a child. At first we lived in a public housing project that was integrated. We learned about racism at an early age. The racists were the white people who lived in the area surrounding the project.
When I was 10 we moved into an eastern european, totally Catholic neighborhood. Suddenly the racists were all around me. Everyone who was not just like everyone else was suspect. We were barely accepted because we were white and Catholic. The kids in the neighborhood never knew a black person, a Jew, or a Protestant, but they knew they hated them. A woman who lived down the street was a Lutheran. The kids on the block were told never to speak to her. She and I became good friends. The kids almost never left the neighborhood. I had been introduced to the rest of the city at an early age and I was able to visit the museums and other cultural institutions by myself at an early age.
I went to an ethnic Catholic grade school. One of the nuns was upset because a parent had complained about something she did. She told us that, since she never asks about what we do at home, our parents had no right to ask about what happens in school. This attitude was totally acceptable to most of the parents.
All of the men on the block were active alcoholics, except my father. He was a dry-drunk. During the summer, when our windows were open, we could hear the screams of wives and children being beaten by their drunken husbands and fathers. That was acceptable behavior in the neighborhood.
I left the neighborhood as soon as I graduated from high school and never regretted it.
The point of all this is to show that you can have “small town values” in a big city, too. You can also find well-established liberal neighborhoods.
Wowbagger @ 97
The more realistic and scary scenarios are more depicted in the movie Deliverance than in rural settings of King’s novels. Appalachia is a world unto itself where the gene pool may at times be stressed and life does take on many facets of this extreme rural backwardness.
Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth, and Adelaide each have over a million people, and I see that Perth has pushed ahead of Adelaide. If I had to live in one of Australia’s large cities then I would choose Adelaide, after reading up on it and especially it’s surrounding area.
As a matter of related interest: I’m an Astronomy lover, and each day I check “Astronomy Picture Of The Day” on the web, and for Friday, September 12, there is a night view of Perth, with Venus, Mercury, and Mars hanging in the sky above the city. Quite a sight with the three planets above Perth’s skyscrapers.
I always liked Lou Reed’s take on small towns:
“There is only one good use for a small town
You hate it and you’ll know you have to leave”
Please, can it get any stupider?
An Obama ad picking this small town stuff up should not directly insult these values, but maybe look more for something with the punchline
“Hate is not a small town value”
Aren’t small-town values rum, buggery and the lash? Oh wait, that’s the Navy‘s values.
Holbach,
I live in Adelaide – and yeah, it’s a good place to live. It has over a million people but it’s sometimes hard to tell that it’s that big.
Wowbagger @ 107
I had an instinct it was Adelaide. So my choice seems to be confirmed by your living there. I also read an article on Adelaide in The New York Times a short while ago and did print it but cannot place it at the moment. The article was very praiseworthy about Adelaide. I like cities because I love architecture, art and natural history museums, historic sites, and all the other amenities that cities offer. After all, our great architecture (ART DECO!) great art museums and such are in the cities, not out in the sticks. Cities are the epitomy of human habitation throughout history, and when they are maintained infrastructurally, crime prevented and controlled, and encompassed with civic pride, they can be truly pleasant places to live. I have been to all of our major cities and have found things to admire and detest, but all have their uniqueness. The same applies to the major Canadian cities. On a par with Adelaide, I would choose Ottawa to live as the ideal Canadian city.
Holbach,
I just found and read the article you mentioned – and it’s spot-on. But as much as it is an cosmopolitan, urban centre you can choose to live ‘rural’ and only be an hour’s drive away from the city.
Interestingly, the most recent census data says that, despite all the churches, it’s one of the least religious capital cities in Australia – and this is reflected by the fact many of the churches aren’t used for religion anymore. Near me there’s one that’s a bridal shop and another that’s the rehearsal space for a community theatre company – I’ve rehearsed there and it’s quite strange since it’s an old catholic church with a lot of the creepy, death-worshipping decorative stuff still there.
As a teen in the 70’s, my weekdays were spent in the greater boston area, but I spent a lot of weekends shuttling to Newburyport, coincidentally while discovering HP Lovecraft stories like Shadow Over Innsmouth, and reading proto-Steven King pop-horror like Tom Tryon’s *The Other*. During a cross-country trip in this same era, I met many swell folks from the heartland who tempered my horrific Lovecraftian paranoia of small town USA, but most of these people just wanted to get the hell out.
I heard a very similar story. Except is was a baby born in NY, grew up in a small town in Maine, lived there his entire life, died at a very ripe old age, his obituary read “N.Y man dies at 96”.
Yes,yes it can; when his very next statement is “I don’t think anyone should have special rights based on who they have sex with”. Completely missing the point that the heterosexuals’ right to marry is a special right based on who they have sex with. Thick as a brick.
I heard a very similar story. Except is was a baby born in NY, grew up in a small town in Maine, lived there his entire life, died at a very ripe old age, his obituary read “N.Y man dies at 96”.
Yes,yes it can; when his very next statement is “I don’t think anyone should have special rights based on who they have sex with”. Completely missing the point that the heterosexuals’ right to marry is a special right based on who they have sex with. Thick as a brick.
Ahhh small Town USA isn’t that bad. Sure you have your overly zealous religious types but there is charm in some small towns. Some of the best BBQ joints are in small towns, there’s always interesting old buildings and churches if you are a photographer. People generally are very nice and willing to help strangers. Small towns get knocked around by those from big towns but honestly they aren’t that bad. On a typical weekend where I’m not at the office or some other obligation I drive around rural South Carolina looking for good spots for interesting photos. I never have any problems with locals. Some towns can come off as intimidating but usually turn out not to be. I’ve lived in NC, WY, CO, GA, TN living in small towns in WY and CO and visiting small towns frequently in the others and it’s the same everywhere. Yes you have your conservative values that don’t jive with mine but the people are generally nice and if you take the time there is usually interesting history and culture there.
I personally like both large town and small town experiences. I’d hate to limit myself to any one type of life experience.
I have 17 friends :)
And that’s counting my wife and myself. The last couple of weeks I have been mostly lurking here as I was standing as a candidate for one of the many local government elections held here across NSW, Australia yesterday.
My primary vote was only 17, but the encumbent mayor eclipsed the field. I believe I will receive a high preferential flow on, but I could be totally wrong. 9 will be elected from the field of 13. The counting system is a “first” and is pretty confusing, so I will just have to wait.
http://vtr.elections.nsw.gov.au/result.aspx?areaname=gloucester
This is rural shire and I think qualifies as a small town (or small cluster of towns and villages – and the mayor is not the dog catcher). The mix of people however runs counter to much mentioned here. I have spent many years in both small towns and large cities, both with their own character. I am most fortunate to live here and despite the often polarised views in the community, the town seems to progress (and get along) well. What I find most encouraging is that the whole field was composed of independents bringing their own views to the table. Whatever the eventual outcome (watch the link above) I think the local area will be well represented.
I spent many of my formative teen years in another small town and couldn’t wait to get out. I hope to make this town one that kids don’t feel the need to flee.
Unfortunately, this is one poll that is neither pointless, nor possible for the crew here to crash :) (please don’t try)
I won’t bore everyone with my platform etc unless requested, but I would call it far from conservative, nor was I the only candidate with a similar platform (alt energy, education etc). Then again, that may be why I only polled 17 primary votes ;) time will tell.
cheers
peter
I’m from a small town and I think I turned out alright: I’m gay, liberal and atheist.
Of course, I had to LEAVE the small town to have any sort of normal life.
I’ve met good and bad people in small towns and cities, but I feel a million times safer in the city.
Oh, man … don’t ralph on shoes. Toss cookies, heave, retch, up-chuck, hurl, woof. Whatever. But don’t ralph. There are those who have had to live with being ralph their entire lives. Me, for example. It hasn’t been pretty. Prettier, though, than what my brother had to go through as a lad … his name’s Gerd.
Can you be more generic? …Hilarious :D
Gerd??
You you guys still talk to your parents?
Few bits from my home town, since everyone is dropping in with this stuff:
1. Our Sheriff department helped out by sending people to some of the messes that happened in LA, including the riots, I think. When they got there the “locals” had hand guns and a few single shot rifles, ours had assault rifles, and enough ammo to start a small revolt. Ironically, this was a good thing, since the local police where getting their asses shot by people that don’t give a frack about the niceties of only having “small arms”. But you can take the fact that some town with 1,000 people in it owned more guns in a maybe 20 person Sheriff department than the entire fracking city of LA at the time.
2. Our biology teacher (whose course I sadly never took) was left alone by the local churchies, since one day when the showed up, she invited them to the back yard for lemonade, then proceeded to keep them sitting their for a one hour lecture on evolution. lol
3. One week after some lady babbled about how he own daughter would “never” do drugs, and only a small number of out of control “outsiders” where responsible for the rising drug problem (sort of true, there wasn’t any other towns on between California and Nevada that they could ship them through, which where not even more vigorously policed..) But anyway, a week later, like 20 high school kids, both boys and girls, the owner of the local laundromat and two other adults where arrested for a)public sex, b) drug sales, c) drug abuse, and d) in the case of the adults, probably a few cases of child molestation. Seems some old lady’s washing machine broke, and she remembered the town still had a laundromat, so took her wash there, to find naked kids, snorting coke, and screwing each other, in the shop. This was ***one block*** from the police station, on the other side of the street, directly beside the towns video store, and behind one of its groceries, with only the large number of defunct arcade machines obscuring the windows kept it from being in “direct” public view.
Oh, and, when we decided we needed to move, to take care of my ailing grandmother, who lived in Escondido, my father jokingly suggested to the neighbor that a nice “black couple” was going to buy our house. 24 hours later there was an identical for sale sign on their lot.
As for other things, like teen pregnancies, etc.. Well, we did have one idiot that got drunk the night of the high school Disney Land trip, as well as a few that managed to either get expelled at the last minute, or failed to pass, resulting in them not going. And I do know of at least one, maybe two, members of a senior class, with.. 30 people in it (I think we only needed one chartered bus), who where pregnant during the trip.
I think the town had to be pretty liberal though. For a town of 1,000 people, we only had… 4-5 churches (I never bothered to try to count them)? Who knows, maybe they where scared the Indians from the reservation, which cut a line through the middle of town, would go on a rampage and burn them down, or something. They tried that once, and it was defused, when it was pointed out that tribal leaders that nearly 100% of the people in the town owned guns, and there wouldn’t be any Indians left to revolt a second time, if they actually tried anything.
But, the town was a bit of a tourist trap too, with people traveling through to reach the ski resort, so “some” mixing happened. It didn’t change the fact that I think I saw a total of 3 black people in 20 years I lived there, and two of those where 2 years before I went to college, and ***everyone*** blamed every thing they saw happen on the news, or which seemed to spill over into our town, as, “The stuff those *outsiders* brought with them, since it would have never happened ‘before’ they showed up!”
I would say, I was relatively lucky, in that, for the most part, the bigotry was usually beneath the surface, or fairly benign, but it was “still” there, along with the prejudices against people that *might* actually have some hope the get out of the hell hole via any avenue except a sports scholarship (which was the *only* thing the grade school PE couch gave a shit about, and the high school ones, went as far as to threaten to expel both students “and” teachers that refused to waste and hour at every fracking pep rally).
the backward-looking reverence for the good old days (which actually weren’t that good),
Exactly! The good old days? Nine year old children digging coal? Eight year old children… um… digging coal next to the nine year olds? Ha!
Rev.
Perfectly normal in Germany, where we were spawned. Not so much in Utah, where we were raised.
We’ve forgiven our parents.
Wowbagger @ 109
That’s the article, and glad you agree with it. I did find my copy which I had put with articles on New Zealand.
I had read that Adelaide was the least religious city in Australia despite the amount of churches. As an atheist, this is a fact that is noteworthy. It would be ironic if one of those defunct churches was turned into the Adelaide Atheist Community or whatever appropriate. I hope you don’t make the mistake of moving elsewhere; you have a nice city to live and hang around in!
Good. And this is no shit. I actually went to school with a girl named….
wait for it…
Dorkus
Quiet Desperation @ 120
A good book that describes the realities of the “Good Old Days”:
“The Good Old Days- They Were Terrible!”
by Otto L. Bettmann
I grew up in a small town (though not in the US, Australia isn’t all that different).
I find this nonsense about small town “values” insulting.
There’s plenty to like about living in a small town, and plenty to like about living in a city. But this “small town values” nonsense is a terrible furphy.
Its an excuse to place their own nasty little prejudices on a pedestal, and that’s an abuse of the good people of small towns.
I think what people are saying is there ain’t no damn difference in human values nomatter where you reside.
If I ever hear “god bless” or “godspeed” again,
It doesn’t bother me when directed at me personally by someone because it means something to *them* and they though enough of me to say it.
@ Holbach: FYI, it was a quote from “The Young Ones”, a British comedy.
I’m already quite thankful to live in the era I do.
Each Republican meme, in this case “small town values”, is a well researched wedge demonstrating power to drive votes to their side.
Their words are only weapons in a war for votes.
Discuss the words at your leisure.
Discount the speaker at your peril.
Had the thought at work, and badly, as usual, wished I had the talent to draw it.. Picture this: An elephant stands on the tip of one foot, on the very top of a cross, scared and cringing away from a small mouse, minding its own business, while eating cheese, which just happens to be sitting on a book called “Darwin”. A thought bubble comes from the elephant, dreaming of how the world “should” work, in which all the mice are stuck in cages, and the elephant sits on a gilded throne. The caption, “Join the Republican party, and finally put those damn mice where they belong!”
That is the third of fourth rethink on it, but, I think the idea is basically funny and accurate. You’ve got irrational xenophobia, escape to the church to escape it, equating their worst fears with evolution, and a megalomaniacal “solution” to the perceived problem. Mind, if you could work in the idea that “the past was better than now” too, somehow, just to complete the picture, but I am too tired to think how at the moment. lol
I hate small towns, mostly because I grew up in several of them. For most of my childhood I didn’t even live in a village. I lived outside one! I had a shitload of relatives all over the place. Of course I knew all of my neighbors. Too well. Meaning: I couldn’t get away with shit. I hated it!
And talk about NOTHING to do! Ugh! Boring! It’s okay when you’re a kid to live on a farm–so much to explore! But as an adult? Forget it.
And I don’t know what someone upthread was talking about with people in cities watching more TV. What nonsense. People in small towns usually watch a lot more TV because there’s nothing else to do. Who has time to watch TV when you have libraries, bookstores, movies, concerts, museums, art galleries, amusement parks, political meetings, malls, restaurants, bars, strip clubs (if you’re into that sort of thing)? What are you going to do on a Saturday night in Hole in the Road, TX? Watch the cows sleep? GIve me a break!
The only advantage to living in a small town was that I could pretty much count on having the library to myself, anytime I chose to visit it. We had a beautiful new library in one 70K town where I lived, and some days, I’d be the only visitor for hours at a time. The downside, of course, was that it meant a whole shitload of morons were piled up outside of that paradise.
And that’s where I had to live, until I could escape.
I will never go back. Never.
Did anyone notice that they all said “I’m *from* a small town.”?
If it’s so f*cking great in small town America, why the f*ck don’t they stay there?
Because, like anything else these scum defecate from their mouths, they don’t believe it either….
At #43, decrepitoldfool wrote:
Our oldest son taught himself to read during the summer before kindergarten – the only way we could have prevented it would be get rid of all the books and magazines. Then his first-grade teacher said: “You shouldn’t have taught him to read, he’ll get bored. But don’t worry, they usually even out with the rest of the class by third grade.”
I grew up in a home where no one read books and certainly didn’t buy them, but I still somehow managed to teach myself to read before first grade. So, when I got the first grade primer, I was bored to death with “See Spot run. Run, Spot, run.”
I was delighted when we finally moved on to a second, thicker reader, but I thought the stories at the front of that book were pretty boring too, so I started to read the more difficult–and much more interesting–stories in the back of the book. Alas, the nun who taught the class caught me and told me that reading ahead of the rest of the class was a sin.
I decided to keep sinning, and would surreptitiously read the back-of-the-book stories when the nun wasn’t looking.
Which is why I’ve been destined for hell since the first grade.
And, BTW, the rest of the class never caught up to me. I was always the best reader in the class. OTOH…spelling. I still have trouble with spelling.
At #71, Julie Stahlhut wrote:
Well, the “small town” I grew up in was a hotbed of good old-fashioned first-generation American Catholic blue-collar pro-union liberalism.
Hey, me too.
Although I was still fairly young, I remember how excited my dad and his fellow mill workers were when Kennedy was running for President. Imagine a Catholic president–even though JFK had one major flaw. He was Irish, and not descended from Eastern or Southern European immigrants as most of the families in my town were.
The mills are now closed, and the town is slowly rusting away, and most of the folks there are still mighty suspicious of Republicans.
My dear, elderly, hardly well-educated mom can’t even stand to watch Fox news. And she “talks back” to the McCain campaign spots on TV.
Palin : “We grow good people in our small towns”
What do you mean Ms Palin ?
1. We don’t grow as many good people in the cities ?
2. Despite what city people think, we also grow good people in our small towns ?
3. there are proportionally more good people in our small towns than in the cities ?
4. We grow good people all over America, including in our small towns ?
5. People go more to Church in small towns (because people have little to do) therefore one finds generally better people than in the cities. Republicans tend to get higher scores in small towns, therefore, the GOP is the party of the good people of America ?
6. I don’t know, was just saying this because it was written on the teleprompter, and anyway, I knew they’d applaude because it doesn’t mean anything ?
7. Whatever. If the dems attack what I said, I’ll find a way to wiggle myself out of this and to call them “elitists” ?
8. I’m from a small town, so obviously I’m a good person ?
Please take this pointless poll if you haven’t yet;
Pharyngulites and the election (I : Sept.11-18 2008)
I live in a small town and the second description is spot on. There is nothing wondrous or magical about this place. It is heavy handed with religion, closed mindedness, drug and alcohol addiction, poor educational system, nosey-ness and rumor mongering, the folks are hypocritically judgemental. The only good thing about a small towns are the aerial shots in TV commercials. OK so why don’t I move? I happen to have a good job in the medical field and at my age it isn’t feasible to start over. I just endure the daily crap. My standard comeback when asked how I like a small town is ” What used to be quaint is now just annoying”.
PS: and the one thing that just causes me to grind my teeth is the way they speak the language. For a Northeasterner who grew up in a place that valued education and cultivated proper use and syntax of the English language, these “folks” have bastardized the language to a point where it is nearly imperceptible as the King’s English. Dang it!
@123 – yes, Rev, but in all fairness – wasn’t it spelled “Dorcas”?
I had a childhood friend named Carmelita Tang.
I grew up in a small town, though it has grown a bit over the years. When I was younger I had long hair and extreme allergies that made me itch all the time. I was banned from going over many of my friends houses because it had become rumored that I was a “junky.”
The funny part was, I did not drink, smoke, or take drugs then, and still do not, but my friends whose parents banned me?…not a single one didn’t drink and do drugs. Not a one.
Oh, and, of course, our local “pot-dealer” was a son of a cop from the town.
Here is another one. Things were disappearing from boats in the harbor, and many of the kids from the town were getting the blame (the long haired punks). The police started a patrol of the waters, but the thieves were still getting away with stuff each week.
Finally, one of the boat owners got mad and hid in his boat with a gun and waited for the thieves to show. To his surprise, it turned out the thieves were, of course, the local patrol cops. The patrols stopped after that, and so did the disappearances of boat equipment.
I am sure there are many other small town values I can remember, but what are yours? :)
Well, obviously it’s much easier to make room for the pods and wats in the countryside. Can’t have have nosy landlords peeking in on your ungodly experiments.
I love “godspeed,” actually. It always makes me wonder: can he outrun a cheetah?
That was a pretty shitty thing for the teacher to say! I was reading at a 4th grade level when I entered grade school and my kindergarten and first grade teachers thought I was a “miracle.” They both used me to read to the class while they caught up on lesson plans (or maybe just the morning newspaper…who knows?). I probably was bored, but instead of ignoring or stifling my ability or knocking my parents for encouraging me, they found a way to use my ability to both of our benefit. After first grade I was placed in an accelerated reading program and sat in on the upper classes’ reading sections. Thankfully, I never did “even out.”
Stupid, uncreative teachers…I hope your son learned to excel in spite of them, decrepitoldfool.
I grew up on a farm outside of a small town (population, 850 people). Sure, it wasn’t (and isn’t) perfect, with some of the problems already outlined above. But, there were a lot of little bright spots, too. People supported this nerdy kid with an interest in science. The local librarian helped out with endless interlibrary loan requests for scientific monographs. A radiology tech at the clinic let me get skeletal specimens x-rayed for free, for a science fair project! Etc., etc. And, when I went on in science fair competition, the sign in town usually reserved for athletic accomplishments had a “Congratulations, Andy!” after a trip to ISEF. I don’t think I would have had such a shot at a career in science had it not been for my small-town upbringing, and the support network that came with it.
Humm. You know I don’t remember, but I’m sure that’s very likely.
Is there some significance to that spelling?
A lot of bigotry against rural America in this thread.
I did 6 years in Stillwater, Oklahoma and have earned my opinions the hard way. There’s a range of types mixed in with the salt of the earth out there (to be sure, the salt of the earth are well represented). Same is true of suburban and urban stuations I’ve lived in, just different ranges of different types.
The thread is about the GOP’s flogging of the small-town trope; if their schtick was instead the bravery and the nobility of the urban poor, a similar stock of anecdotes and opinions would ensue. Sometimes stereotypes come to life before one’s eyes. The WalMart in Stillwater is a good spot if you’d like to experience that.
Yeah. I am reminded of the joke made in Rat Race, where they end up in a museum, looking for a bathroom, and find two skin heads talking about the great and wondrous fact that Hans Barbie was a two time winner at Ballroom Dancing, or something like that. If someone made a joke about small town values, its would come “real close” to being just as sick.
You simply can’t claim that small town values mean only the “nice” things. Doing so smacks of someone whose entire perception of small towns comes from watching Andy Griffith on the TV, in NY City, when 8, and never having lived in one, never mind set foot near one for longer than needed to garner political support on the way to a real city. Who cares if small towns have 1 church for every 20 fracking people, if the people there have a murder rate of 1:600, per year, when there are only 600 people in the town, and *cities* probably have no where near that kind of death rate, even including accidents.
You don’t get to claim that you want to restore America to “small town values”, then ignore that “small town” means *both* the nice lady down the street who bakes kids cookies, **and** the source of the story that they made into “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre”. Even if they intend to mean the former, the existence of the later makes what they are saying arrogant, ignorant, and indefensible, in the sense of being based in **any** way on the real world, instead of some gibberish fantasy world in their heads.
Oh, and, in case its not obvious, also insulting to people from big cities.
Probably. Some small antelope, I think the springbok, is called Antidorcas in Scientific.
Dorcas from the Greek for gazelle. A minor New Testament figure. I think Peter raises her from the dead in Acts.
Also the name of a character in The Book of the New Sun, by Gene Wolfe.