Anna Deveare Smith's OpEd piece made me mad, and then...

[maxsolomon]

i had a realization: Rural Conservatives HAVE NO IDEA WHAT CITY DWELLERS ARE LIKE. here's the relevant paragraphs:

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/09/opinion/09smith.html?ref=opinion

snip<Anonymous nurse, Western United States

When you come to the West, you have a different mentality. There’s an independence and an individuality here that you don’t get anyplace else, because when you’re in the city, you’re kind of like part of the hive. You know, people that take the light rail in to work and come back and live in these big apartment buildings and have restaurants and things and they’re fine with that.

Here, people are really, really proud, and they cherish their independence. And they cherish the fact that we are all individuals. And that’s what we’re afraid of, is that we’re going to lose our individuality and we’re just going to be part of the hive. If you’re just part of the hive, then what are you going to do? You’re going to cull out the weak links. You’re going to cull out the lady that’s on crutches and got diabetes, because she may be a good grandmother and she may be a good person, she lives by herself, and her house is paid for, but you know, her medicines cost a lot.>

1st off, i WISH i could ride light rail to my house, but i live in Seattle (also "out west") which is 40 years behind where a city should be in terms of public transportation.

2ndly, i know of NO urbanites who consider themselves "part of the hive". we also are "really, really proud" and "cherish our independence", and the "fact that we are all individuals". what makes you think we're that different than you? because we like "restaurants and things"? and you don't, rugged individualist?

3rdly, you pulled off the rare triple mixed-metaphor: bees inhabit hives, you cull sheep and cattle, and the weak link refers to chains, originally.

finally, methinks country folk need to spend some time in a residential neighborhood in a city - but i'd wager you're too scared. i spend LOTS of time in the country, talking to country folk, listening to their opinions (informed or not), respecting their "individuality", even though i know that rural america is a net benificiary of urban america's tax largesse. what i see in this quote is a mix of hubris and ignorance, which, i must admit, is as american as apple pie.

[T Wolf]

1. Methinks country folks need to spend some time in school so that they learn to speak

proper English and learn how to construct logical thoughts.

They obviously currently have neither skill.

But, in reality, they are hopeless and beyond any help. Better that they just stay out on the prairie and out of all normal human interaction - particularly those involving anything of significance beyond farm pest reports.

[Kerrytravelers]

2. Clearly, this lady hasn't been to LA. We have a pitiful attempt at public transportation.

We care about our neighbors. We help one another. We are independent people who can think for ourselves.

I love when people think they can lump all "city dwellers" into one mass identity.

[Warpy]

3. She's bought Palin's crap about "the real America," hasn't she?

You've got to love people who are that ignorant and provincial, they're so entertaining.

Actually, the GOP rank and file have largely bought into that old country mouse versus city slicker thing, but that's not because city people are Borg. It's because the GOP voter values hunches over knowledge and the gut over the brain, meaning the supposedly less educated and less sophisticated people feel valued by that party.

They are, as suckers.

Some of the suckers have confronted the harsh reality that they've been had and have awakened and are usually pretty angry about being used.

This gal adds silly romanticism to the usual sins and will likely keep her delusions into old age.

[corpseratemedia]

4. lots of good ol' cognitive dissonance there

If the people in big cities "cull weak links," why are they overwhelmingly Democratic (supporting of public option or single-payer health insurance?), and anti-war?

[maxsolomon]

5. and projection

maybe that's what she'd like to do.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

6. I've often thought that it would be good to have high school exchange programs

in which rural and urban kids spent a month or so in each other's communities.

Send a bunch of Minneapolis-St. Paul kids to stay with families in small towns in Colin Peterson country, and send the rural kids to stay with families in the city.

(The suburban kids would benefit from exposure to either environment or any environment that wasn't made up of tract houses, shopping malls, office parks, and megachurches.)

[kickysnana]

7. Excellent idea n/t