East Texas Rednecks

[Frodo2008]

Originally Posted by LAnative10

Ive been to the Longview/Tyler somewhere between 20 and 25 times and my father grew up in Longview until he moved to Carson, California when he was 15. My mother grew up in Waco and met my father at UCLA (at a club for Texans). Waco isnt in east Texas, so Ill leave it out for this conversation.

I have seen some things in the areas around Longview that may have seemed "racist". I have on a couple of occasions "white power" bumper stickers and T-shirts, there was one time when I was younger when they had a Klan rally. But guess what? I can direct you to cities within 30 miles of Los Angeles, San Francisco, Las Vegas, and Phoenix where I have seen similar things. My grandparents who live in Longview are (brace for it) Socialists and Athiests. They also have many friends who know about it.

So are they racist people in East Texas? Absolutely. Is it unique to East Texas or the South? Absolutely not.

Yeah you said what I said just in different words. There are plenty of racist people in northern MI and Boston. Both places are a ways away from east Texas.

[mrkool]

So just who should we *really* be afraid of?...
The white racists/rednecks, or the folks who are committing the vast majority of the violent crime in east Texas (and everywhere else) ??

What is worse; racist talk, symbols, and "redneck" attitudes... or murder, rape, and armed robberies?

[TexasHorseLady]

What I find myself wondering is, is it any greater a prejudice to paint an entire region and all (or the majority of) its people with one brush than it is to paint an entire race (or the majority of its people) with one brush?

I suspect that prejudice is prejudice and will find something, anything, to be its target. If a particular target (race) ecomes politically incorrect, it will move on to something or someone else to be the target (in this case, "East Texas Rednecks" or East Texas in general), since prejudice is not at all about the target and is all about the person expressing the prejudice.

[Griffis]

I haven't read through this whole thread, but I just feel like I gotta say this.

I have lived all over the country (born in Texas.) I've lived in Minnesota, Wyoming, Oklahoma, Arizona, Louisiana, spent 2 years in Chicago, and have spent significant time in California, Oregon, some areas of New England, and am now living in a rural area of upstate New York, about 100 miles from NYC.

I've found good and bad people in all those places. People of all kinds.

But I'[ve lived in some places (or maybe it was just the particular groups of people I hung around) where folks seemed to be most interested in being perceived as cool (and of course judging who else was "cool enough".)

Where people were worried about making sure they were wearing the right shirts and shoes and listening to the right bands to be considered "hip." Where the main thing was being part of the "scene."

I've also been around some pretty elitist art crowd people. I'm something of an artist myself, but in some circles a lot of foolishness is wrapped up in art--again, people wanting to be "hip" or shocking just for the sake of that.

I would take hanging out with some down-to-earth folks that some people might consider "rednecks" over some hipster scene people with pretentions of coolness ANY DAY.

[Griffis]

Originally Posted by TexasHorseLady

What I find myself wondering is, is it any greater a prejudice to paint an entire region and all (or the majority of) its people with one brush than it is to paint an entire race (or the majority of its people) with one brush?

I suspect that prejudice is prejudice and will find something, anything, to be its target. If a particular target (race) ecomes politically incorrect, it will move on to something or someone else to be the target (in this case, "East Texas Rednecks" or East Texas in general), since prejudice is not at all about the target and is all about the person expressing the prejudice.

Well spoken.

I always tell people the nicest, most real and some of the wisest people I've ever met are in Texas, or from there. In a lot of ways, it's just a "no-nonsense" state of mind that is very appealing.

To a lot of people who only know of Texas through the movies or cultural references, I think they have the idea that a lot of Texas is composed of slightly inbred types with missing teeth and coonskin banjos and seas of trailer parks.

It's an unfortunate stereotype, and it's in no way any less prejudicial than judging an entire race.

[swamp nurse]

I come from a long line of Wiccan witches and southern voodoo root workers and there are Mennonites and Mexicans and Blacks and Indians and hillbilles and Cajuns and gays and Christians all in my family and we are all Southern rednecks except a couple of Midwestern rednecks and all of us had no problems in our lives and are happy healthy folks that are accepting of others. Not one of us would live out of the redneck regions of the South. The only family member that has had problems is my cousin that was born and raised in L A, CA as she for some reason never learned to relate to people in a simple everyday way, but she is learning as she has found herself living in RedNeck Country USA. I've traveled far and near but I prefer living home in the South with rednecks. I've seen rednecks world over in one form or another. The is a difference between "Redneck" and "White Trash" same as there is a difference between "Black" and its derogative counterpart or "Jew and its counterpart". Redneck is one of those terms that can be taken in a positive or a negative tone and for that matter "White" is offensive to some of us as "Euro or Caucasian" is more appropriate.

In my experience I have always had happier moments is the company of rednecks from the south and everywhere else for that matter and I've had a few negative times but I've had a worse ratio of good to bad times with east coast conservatives from blueblood families and with west coast liberals and with yankees from the Great Lakes and so forth with foreigners to American soil. The curse of the redneck seems to be ignorance but ignorance can be changed and learning be done. With the so called upper class educated classes igroance is there but the curse seems to be with arrogance and that usualy is more difficult to humble.

My best friend is a lesbian Black Christian Belle from the hills of Oklahoma and she is far more redneck then my gay Cajun-Hillbilly Christian witch self from the bayous of Arkansas; and we both are happier in the redneck woods of EAST TEXAS and the entire Red River four state area than anywhere on God's great creation...planet Earth.

from the words of my California liberal left wing cousin:"Been there, did it ,done it and even really like it." . May it be home soon.