I haven't been to the south, but from my experience in watching true blood, houses and scenery are kinda pretty. And the sounds of the animals and insects in the night... Too bad that comes with extreme humidity and mosquitos though.
I admit that I had to check to see if I was considered a "southerner" and phew...right above the cut off line so I can officially talk shit and participate in this thread!
I'd like to add my list of grievances:
-camo everything
-not enunciating words
-that hillbilly in the heartburn commercials (here's an idea-if you have heartburn, don't eat fried shit all of the time)
-Blake Shelton
I will add when I think off more...
I hate the south because my state California has to bail out the 'Southern Red Trump States" yet these same states hate California because of "Reasons" with origins coming from Sacramento, Bay Area, LA and San Diego. We can't even fund our own state and we have to bail out other states.
https://apnews.com/article/2f83c72de...cdbc0d3b6bc08c
WASHINGTON (AP) — Republican leaders have spent months promoting the myth that red low-tax states are subsidizing blue high-tax states because of the deduction for state and local taxes.
An Associated Press Fact Check finds it’s actually the other way around. High-tax, traditionally Democratic states (blue), subsidize low-tax, traditionally Republican states (red) — in a big way.
Republicans are trying to eliminate the deduction as part of the sweeping tax package working its way through Congress. They added back a deduction for up to $10,000 in property taxes, in a concession to Republicans from high-tax states such as New York and New Jersey. California Republicans are pushing to extend the deduction to local income taxes, too.
It is true that taxpayers in high-tax states benefit the most from the deduction. However, these states send far more tax dollars to Washington than residents in low-tax states.
In fact, most high-tax states send more money to Washington than they get back in federal spending. Most low-tax states make a profit from the federal government’s system of taxing and spending.
HOUSE SPEAKER PAUL RYAN:
— Ryan said the rest of the country is “propping up profligate, big-government states.”
— “States that got their act together are paying for states that didn’t,” the Wisconsin Republican said.
TREASURY SECRETARY STEVEN MNUCHIN:
— “We are getting the federal government out of the business of subsidizing states. That is going to impact high-tax states.”
THE FACTS:
Connecticut residents paid an average of $15,643 per person in federal taxes in 2015, according to a report by the Rockefeller Institute of Government. Massachusetts paid $13,582 per person, New Jersey paid $13,137 and New York paid $12,820.
California residents paid an average of $10,510.
At the other end, Mississippi residents paid an average of $5,740 per person, while West Virginia paid $6,349, Kentucky paid $6,626 and South Carolina paid $6,665.
Low-tax red states also fare better when you take into account federal spending.
Mississippi received $2.13 for every tax dollar the state sent to Washington in 2015, according to the Rockefeller study. West Virginia received $2.07, Kentucky got $1.90 and South Carolina got $1.71.
Meanwhile, New Jersey received 74 cents in federal spending for tax every dollar the state sent to Washington. New York received 81 cents, Connecticut received 82 cents and Massachusetts received 83 cents.
California fared a bit better than other blue states. It received 96 cents for every dollar the state sent to Washington.
On average, states received $1.14 in federal spending for every tax dollar they sent to Washington. That’s why the federal government has a budget deficit.
___
http://personal.tcu.edu/swoodworth/cultureofhonor.html
Culture of Honor: The Psychology of Violence in the South. By Richard E. Nisbett and Dov Cohen. Colorado: Westview Press, Inc., 1996. 119 pp.
In Culture of Honor, professors of Psychology, Richard Nisbett and Dov Cohen set forth to provide an explanation for the higher levels of violence found in the South. To account for this pattern of violence, the authors argue that the South, “had and to a substantial degree, still has, a type of culture of honor” (xiv). The “culture of honor” places utmost importance on the ability to respond to social insults and economic challenges. According to Nisbett and Cohen, in a “culture of honor,” a reputation for strength and toughness held great economic value (xv). Nisbett and Cohen identify three other major explanations for increased Southern violence, including higher temperatures, the tradition of slavery, and greater poverty. Yet, the authors maintain the importance of honor as independent of, and perhaps greater than, any of the other explanations (3).
Using anthropological precedent, Nisbett and Cohen demonstrate that the rural South held commonalities with other honor-based cultures, such as the Navajo and Celts. According to Nisbett and Cohen, honor-based cultures develop in response to economic precariousness and minimal state protection against theft of property (4). Herding societies often demonstrate these characteristics in that a loss of a herd represented a loss of entire wealth (5). The Scotch-Irish, descendants of Celtic herdsman, developed rural herding communities along the Appalachians and in the South. In the low-population frontier region, the state held little power to command compliance with the law, and thus, citizens created their own system of order based upon retaliation and honor (xv). The geography and low-population densities of these Southern areas further “culture of honor” tendencies in the South.
Nisbett and Cohen conducted studies and field experiments to provide further evidentiary support for the idea that a type of “culture of honor” still exists in the South. Census and crime reports depicted the idea that the homicide rate of the South remains high in relation to the rest of the country (10). Additionally, Nisbett and Cohen found that laws and social policies of the South were more lenient with regard to self-defense, gun control, corporal punishment, and capital punishment. The authors assert that these two archival studies portray a greater Southern acceptance of violence for protection, honor, and maintaining control. Additionally, Nisbett and Cohen administered controlled laboratory experiments to document Southerners responses to insult. Based upon their findings, the authors concluded that Southerners respond to insults in different ways than Northerners (xvi).
Although they primarily focus upon males, Nisbett and Cohen briefly examine the role of women in the promotion of the “culture of honor.” During their research, the authors found that Southern women exhibited similar attitudes toward violence that Southern men did (88). Nisbett and Cohen believe women play a part in the “culture of honor” through their role in the socialization process, as well as active participation (87). By teaching ideas of honor to their sons and enforcing the notions upon their husbands, women further the “culture” through social conditioning (86).
In a relatively short work, Nisbett and Cohen provide an analysis of the role of “honor” upon the level of violence in the South. Although their argument may not necessarily be new, Nisbett and Cohen use unique methods to provide evidence for their thesis. Nisbett and Cohen combine research techniques from the study of history, sociology, psychology, anthropology, and ethnology. Yet, while an interesting approach, some historians might find the authors’ reliance upon social science experiments and interpretations a bit disconcerting. Additionally, surveys and field experiments, no matter how controlled, do not always yield the most accurate or representative results. Nevertheless, the authors contribute speculative, theoretical questions concerning the ongoing future for the “culture of honor” in the South, which provides a foundation for further contemporary study.
Joi-lee Beachler
Culture of Honor: The Psychology of Violence in the South. By Richard E Nisbett and Dov Cohen. 1999
Richard E Nisbett is the Theodore M Newcomb Distinguished University Professor of Psychology and co director of Culture and Cognition Program at the University of Michigan. Dov Cohen is assistant professor of psychology at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. The coauthors of Culture of Honor desire to show that the south is more violent than the north. The authors will claim that the greater violence is limited to situations where personal insults arise or threats to home and property. Using laboratory experiments, the psychologists determined that southern men responded with greater anger, higher testosterone and cortisol levels when directly insulted than do northern men. They also conducted field experiments that demonstrated southern peoples were more accepting of other people who felt it necessary to kill foes who insulted their honor, more so than northern men. According to Nisbett and Cohen this pattern of sensitive reaction to insults and threats is found world wide in those types of people who were herdsmen or those who keep animals as a source of living.
Their reasoning for such behavior is based on the herdsman’s worry over losing all of their wealth from those who would seek to steal it from the fields. The herdsmen’s tough stance to insults was often shown to others in order to counter theft. An account witnessed in many forms of research found in southern history. As the south in the United States is made up of herdsmen from Scotland, Ireland it seems clears to assume that they personified the thesis stated by the psychological study. The northern men were from England, Holland and Germany and were mostly farmers who held a more docile approach to insults according to the authors.
The 144 pages are full of intriguing and ingenious experiments bent on testing the violent nature of southern regions as well. It appears to turn the anti subculture theorists developed to explain violent southerners on their historical heads. The author’s methods seem to be diverse in order to obtain objective reasoning in their conclusions and they have hit upon groundbreaking results where social history is concerned. They explored the social, historical, and scientific data in all of their conclusions in developing the thesis and it appears irrefutable.
In my view, the book is first rate and should be read by any one who is exploring the issues surrounding honor in the south. The thesis establishes the interaction found in economics and the individual behavior and validates much of the research that has long claimed the southern society was more violent.
Jeff Tucker
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf...70490500300126
https://mypages.valdosta.edu/mwhatle...vity/honor.htm
Here is more if you want to see the research on this
The southern United States was settled by herdsmen from Scotland and
Ireland. The northern United States, in contrast, was settled by farmers from England,
Holland, and Germany (Nisbett and Cohen, 1996). Herding, more than farming,
places an individual at risk for losing his entire resource base to theft. Additionally,
the South was a low-population frontier region well into the 19th century. In frontier
regions, the state has little power to command compliance with the law, and the
residents must create and enforce their own system of order. According to Nisbett and
colleagues (e.g., Nisbett and Cohen, 1996), a system of order that commonly
develops under these circumstances is defined by “the rule of retaliation”: If you
cross me, I will punish you.
According to Nisbett and Cohen (1996, p. xv), “to maintain credible power of
deterrence, the individual must project a stance of willingness to commit mayhem and
to risk wounds or death for himself.” He therefore must be unwaveringly vigilant for
affronts that could be construed by others as disrespect. In a culture of honor, when
someone allows himself to be insulted or disrespected, he gives the impression that he
lacks the strength to protect what is his. With little or no formal government presence
to punish selfish behavior—including massive theft of property that could destroy a
herdsman economically—the individual must respond with violence or the threat of
violence to any affront.
JL, stop. You're totally misunderstanding the temperature of this thread and trying to make it all seriously and political, when that's not what it's about.
You know you're a southerner when you think it's appropriate to put a bathtub or toilet in your yard and plant flowers in it.
Are they southern?
Have you heard this joke?
One day these two fine southern ladies were sittin' on the front porch having some iced tea. One of the women sticks out her hand for the other woman to see, and in her long southern drawl says "Look at this ring my husband gave me. Isn't it nice?"
To which the other woman replies, "Oh that's nice, that's real nice."
The first woman then says , "And just last month he took me on one of them Caribbean cruises."
The second woman again replies, "Oh that's nice, that's real nice."
"Well sweetheart doesn't your husband ever buy you nice things or send you nice places?"
"Oh", the second woman responds, "When we first got married he did send me to etiquette school."
"Why'd he do that?" the first woman asks.
To which the second fine southern woman replies, "Well you see, before, when someone told me about the jeweler their husband gave them, or the trips he sent her on, I would have just said I don't give a crap, but now I say that's nice, that's real nice."
I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but.....
If she isn't from the South then probably not lol. It's a term they use down there which is laced with pity towards the person they're saying it to and it's eventually become code to really mean, "You're wrong. You're an idiot. How have you made it in life this long being so dumb".
Not only that, it's all about it's context. If you're in the middle of debating something or calling someone out or discussing something that is a hot button and it's used, it's meant to be insulting. Otherwise it's a term of endearment.
Angie, I was joking when I said "hate to be the bearer of bad news". I'm positive that she didn't mean it in a negative context
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