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True story: My last USAF assignment was Mountain Home AFB, Idaho. We lived in Boise and I commuted the 50 miles to the base. My wife (now an American citizen) went through 9 kinds of heck dealing with the then INS to get her Green Card. Our furniture was almost 4 months in arriving from our overseas assignment. My wife has her Master's degree and is a teacher by trade. But she wasn't able to teach yet because of the INS difficulties.
Two comments. In N. Idaho, I would see racist tracts and graffiti left in a good number of the restrooms. It was pretty uncomfortable.
I have lived in a few military towns and found that said communities were probably the most tolerant communities I have been in.
Location: A voice of truth, shouted down by fools.
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Everyone stereotypes.
I am on a private message board that has a large contingent (perhaps a majority) of members from Europe. They are completely condescending about the US. They hope we fall, they despise our cultural norms and values, they laugh off the state of our economy, they love our misery. Forget WWII and the Marshall Plan. We are to fall.
They are just as prejudiced as some hardened toothless redneck types I've run into. Except that they cloak all of the negative comments as "being more enlightened" and "having a better, broader view of things".
I sort of had that experience when I lived in the Bay area for a couple of years out of college (I am from Dayton.)
People everywhere are ignorant and parochial, even the supposed cool ones.
What makes a designation of "being ignorant" stick is being considered uncool - not well dressed, not sexually liberated, not affluent, and not hip.
If you're cool you can be as much of an ass as you like and more people will believe you.
So, stereotypes come down to being a kind of popularity contest. The more people who believe the stereotype, the more it sticks.
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