If moving to Jackson metro area, know this... (Ridgeland, Natchez: landscaping, job transfer)

[poptones]

Living in Texas don't make you a Texan anymore than moving to (or being born in) the South makes you a southerner. A GF of mine has lived here nearly 20 years and is still every bit a yankee, yet many of my friends consider me more of a southerner than some who were born here. Being "Yankee" is not about where you were born, it's about where you're at - and if you don't get that, don't bother asking - it's like trying to describe jazz.

Prescott Bush was a Conn senator; Bush the first was born in Conn as was his children. The "family home" is in Kennebunkporte Maine and Shrub attended school in Texas all of maybe 6 years. Shrub finished his last years of school at a fru-fru east coast boarding school then went onto Yale and Harvard... yep, sure sounds like a Texan to me.

Wearing a hat and driving a pickup truck don't make you a southerner... or a Texan.

[joanie55]

Originally Posted by poptones

Living in Texas don't make you a Texan anymore than moving to (or being born in) the South makes you a southerner. A GF of mine has lived here nearly 20 years and is still every bit a yankee, yet many of my friends consider me more of a southerner than some who were born here. Being "Yankee" is not about where you were born, it's about where you're at - and if you don't get that, don't bother asking - it's like trying to describe jazz.

Prescott Bush was a Conn senator; Bush the first was born in Conn as was his children. The "family home" is in Kennebunkporte Maine and Shrub attended school in Texas all of maybe 6 years. Shrub finished his last years of school at a fru-fru east coast boarding school then went onto Yale and Harvard... yep, sure sounds like a Texan to me.

Wearing a hat and driving a pickup truck don't make you a southerner... or a Texan.

I realize it's a individual thing. My mom was born in the south and moved to ST Louis when she was 23. Lived there until a couple of years ago and considers herself a St. Louisian. So, yes, I DO get that. So there is no need for you to attempt to explain jazz to me. And I do not to wish to argue about the various homes and roots of the Bush family either. Understand this, I don't like being talked down to and I don't anyone else does either. I'm done communicating with you.

[poptones]

Sorry to hear that as I kinda think you are OK, you're just being misled by the prejudices of a few who, I am wagering, just cannot be happy anywhere.

Your home is what you make it. The only place I have lived where I just could not accept it (besides Texas when I was a teen) and fit in was New York, and that was NOT the "New York" most folks seem to think of when you mention it: New York is not New York city, it's most cows and cheese and pastures and lots and lots of snow and ice and cold and I hated it not just because of that but because of all the stupid laws and insipid ways the government tries to run your life. I noticed you made a comment like that right here just a page or two back, which is why, after seeing this discussion go on for a while but biting my tongue, I took exception enough to comment again here. This is not a place the gov't tries to run your life and yes - we DO in fact still fight that particular part of the civil war here to this day! We take pride in defying government meddling as much as possible. You might call us Jeffersonian in our ideals - as not only in Davis, but that other Jefferson whose signature graces our Constitution.

If you come here expecting to hate it, looking for all the ways Mississippi is backward and then withdrawing from the community because you don't like the first ten folks you meet, then all you will ever know of the place is those ten people and the fear and isolation you yourself create. I am wagering you will find lots of folks on this board like that - not only in the Mississippi forum but in every last one of them. I hope you won't be one of them, because frankly you seem alright to me.

[supertrucker212]

Poptones of course there are problems everywhere. I just feel that MS is behind in many ways. You said so yourself in the last sentence that some need to evolve, (I personally think it's more than a few). Again there's a reason that's behind most states in many ways. Numbers don't lie. I will say this, the coast is different from the rest of the state in a good way.

[poptones]

Yeah, MS is behind in MANY ways...

We have not had thirty students killed in our public schools this year. Despite the fact guns are such a part of our culture school shootings are thankfully rare here. Hello, Chicago?

While cities like Los Angeles underwent a huge housing boom and many people made pretend fortunes playing with their monopoly money, the lack of a "playground" atmosphere here meant we didnt have to deal with ten thousand new people arriving every month looking for gold. A house here cost pretty much what the house cost a year ago, and no matter what MSNBC wants to tell you about how lousy the economy and housing market is, it's not any harder to sell or buy a house here than it was before the rest of the country fell apart.

Evolve? Is that what the rest of the country is doing? Our patriots understood that by making the Constitution as general as possible it became a stronger document. Seems to me much of what's going on in the rest of the country today is a desire to "evolve" ourselves right out of that protection. Resisting federal meddling often means taking the bad with the good... most of us obviously still think the tradeoffs worth it. We'll be watching to see how that "evolve" works for the rest of the country when the west coast states decide to secede and become their own economy, taking nearly a quarter of the federal GNP with them...

[socaldude101]

To the OP and other posters that have bashed Mississippi for crime, potholes, unfriendly people, racial problems, segregated communities, cliques, unkept property, corrupt and good ole boy police and politicians, bad schools, religious zealots, have and have-not mentality, blah blah blah - get a grip!! All those things you list in your posts describe the exact same place I live ... Southern California! I suspect those same descriptions could be used for any community.

In my state we have large segregated communities like Watts (blacks), West Hollywood (gays), East Los Angeles (hispanics), Little Siagon (Vietnam) and on and on. We even segregate our rich into Bel Air and Beverly Hills. We also have the worst roads in the nation yet pay some of the highest taxes! We also have some of the worst schools too! Most of Southern California looks like a ghetto and we are not only rude to each other we are rude to all visitors as well. When you meet someone from California the first thing that crosses their mind is 'what can I get from you?' It's expensive, over crowded, polluted and you can spend most of your adult life lost in traffic on a freeway somewhere. By the time the traffic clears up I have already forgotten where I was going in the first place! I guess that is considered progressive though! Thank god for that!

My point is that there is no utopia on earth - every place has its problems it's just the place you are at the time seems to have the worst of problems because that is where you are ... lol. I have family in Mississippi and have visited Mississippi many times and can say that Mississippi is no better or worse than anyplace else in America. Basically it pays to 'Bloom where you are planted'. The energy you spend wallowing in what is wrong is better spent discovering what is right with an area!

[joanie55]

We also have some of the worst schools too! Most of Southern California looks like a ghetto and we are not only rude to each other we are rude to all visitors as well. When you meet someone from California the first thing that crosses their mind is 'what can I get from you?'

Are you sure you're not describing southeast Florida? LOL. I DO get your point. I take someone of an exception to the "bloom where you're planted" remark though. Some plants bloom much better in some environments than they do others.

[poptones]

I lived in LA a couple of years and, while I did like it I agree with socaldude and Joannie55100%. I've lived in other cities but more than any other place one can feel that "what can you do for me?" I can understand it - people move to LA for a reason and one never knows who one might meet or where, so the upside of this of course is that people (at least in my experience) tend to be very polite. Of course, I lived in West Hollywood and then in Silverlake, both very trendy areas well part of "the industry." LA is surrounded by many parks overlooking the city and people up there tend to be very polite but you can also sense the urging to leave once they decide you cannot really do anything for them. I would describe it as "hungry" - LA is the hungriest place I ever lived.. it's no wonder people there so often get chewed up and spat out.

I live in Mississippi and I would not say at all we have the worse problems - if I felt that I would have left. I VERY much miss the food in LA - fresh veggies and fruit pretty much year around, perfect weather 11 months of the year (December is always kinda grey) and opportunity around every corner... but that hunger just gets to be too much for me. For all the stereotypes about it being "laid back" I find the place just wayyyyy too type-A!

Gtreat food though. Man I miss Toi, and Dar Magreb, and Fatburger, and the orange tree blooming under my balcony, and the lemon tree outside my kitchen window...

Oh, wait.. isnt this the Mississippi forum?

[auntbee]

Originally Posted by poptones

What?

Have you read this discussion?

Of course I read all of the discussions. I may be old, but I'm not stupid! Your comments about the RNC and the Republicans sure sounded like politics to me.

[poptones]

Yeah, ok. And what of the other messages before and after DO NOT look like politics to you? I mean, specifically when someone says outright our politics is a "good ol boy network" how is that NOT about politics?

Perhaps you were just offended by MY comment because you still pine for the Royal Bushes? Sorry if the truth offends, but the fact is our governor was PLACED here by one of the most corrupt regimes to ever lead this country... look it up; there's way too much evidence for this to be mere opinion.