multiple Americas

[tielan]

May be relevant to the interests of my f-list!

Up In Arms
The battle lines of today's debates over gun control, stand-your-ground laws, and other violence-related issues were drawn centuries ago by America's early settlers.

I don't know how accurate it is from a viewpoint inside the US, but it's certainly a fascinating read from the outside!

Comments

[havocthecat]

It's one of those things where I wonder if more people who are inside this country don't already know this stuff? But, honestly, it's a very good thing to be putting down explicitly on paper (or the internet) too.

[tielan]

I suspect the people in the places ideologically farther out from the centres of power would say this is obvious, but you'd probably find a lot of the people in Yankeedom surprised by the idea.

[justhuman]

I'm from New Netherlands - I'm a Jersey girl and LOL, I always knew that New York City was the center of the universe.

I moved to The West when I was 13 and went to high school there. Some of my family still live there, but I moved back to the homeland as quick as I could. When I consider place I would want to move to, all of Yankeedom is on the list. Seattle (Leftcoast), is very high on the list. Also, Philly and the Northern border of Tidewater. I just spent a month working in the Northern edge of Tidewater - it was nice, but it was different.

What I'm saying is that the divisions in the country that the author presented made sense to me. I think that he didn't explore the idea that large urban areas might take on a different character than the rest of it's region. While the arguments about violence seem to make sense, they also seem a bit simplistic -- although that' might be the fault of the forum and simply not having enough time to explore the issue.

[beatrice_otter]

Having read Albion's Seed for a class--that's one of the books that did the research that this article cites--and having lived in three or four regions of the US I'd say it's fairly accurate. Most of Albion's Seed describes a few of the original settlement groups, what they were like and how they set up their society, and then the last chunk was about how they'd spread over time, tracking things like elections and how they related. It explained so much, although the author didn't allow enough for change over time. Because the cultural heritage is there, but it's not static, either.

I grew up on the Left Coast, college in the border between the Midlands and Greater Yankeedom, seminary in the border between the Midlands and Greater Appalachia, currently a pastor in the Far West. On the Left Coast, I am a conservative. In Appalachia, I am a liberal. My own beliefs and opinions don't change from place to place, but the context does. In my home town, unless my Dad is in the room I am regularly the most conservative person there. During seminary, I did field ed in a small country church where not only was I by far the most liberal person who regularly attended worship there, some of the members were concerned about the future of the church if someone as liberal as I was allowed to be a pastor. My dad, when I grew up he was always complaining about stereotypes about Republicans and how Democrats always accuse Republicans of wanting ridiculous things, of course nobody advocates for that, they're just creating straw man arguments and propaganda. But when I was in seminary, spending time in Greater Appalachia ... all that stuff that he thought was ridiculous accusations by Democrats to discredit Republicans? There were actually Republicans who believed in all that "ridiculous" stuff that my dad's Democrat friends were accusing him of thinking. But since Republicans in the Far West are different from Republicans in Greater Appalachia (and from Republicans in other parts of the country), and my dad's only ever lived in the Left Coast, he had no clue. He thought all Republicans were like him and the Republicans he knew, and they're not. Same goes for Democrats, by the way. Problem is, if you have only ever lived in one region of the country (as most people have), you don't understand that. So people talk completely past one another and don't even realize it.