Sweet bacon-snorting Baby Jesus
There appear to be some folks on my friends list that think I'm vegetarian or vegan. I am not - I eat meat with gusto, love bacon, and want to someday raise/process my own meat animals. I love animals and respect their unique intelligences, and I believe food animals should be raised and killed as humanely as possible to accomplish the intended goal. I approve of hunting and fishing - frankly, those animals live better lives than many domestic livestock (or in some cases, pets) live. I grew up in a family (and married into a family) where respectful hunting is as close to an art form (and in some ways, a way of life) as you can possibly get.
There are also people that think I am overly religious because I say "Good lord", "Oh lordy" or "God bless it" a lot. I say this because half my family is from the deep south. Saying "Oh lord" is akin to saying "Oh my." You are not literally invoking the name of the Lord God himself (which in many circles would be considered sinful or blasphemous). When your grandfather sounds like the living incarnation of Boomhauer from "King of the Hill", you will understand.
I have my own beliefs, and I have grown up enough to realize that it's foolish to waste energy trying to make sure everyone you know conforms to what Enlightened Society believes is good and right. They are not hurting anyone and generally just trying to live their lives the way they believe is right, so I don't care. They give me the same amount of tolerance, and that's all I ask for.
So in many ways, my family and my own people get labeled as "rednecks" by everyone else, even if we don't share the common traits of the white trash people everyone loves to hate on (criminals, anti-social behavior, uneducated). Granted, there are some people in my family who I wouldn't want to be associated with in a debate about social issues, but that doesn't mean I approve of what they say.
They're my family - for better or for worse, I only get one of them.
My grandmother could have been labeled as racist as they come, but she is still my grandma. She is still one of my only links to a mother that died five weeks after I turned 12. Reviving my relationship with her has been one of the best things I ever did. I don't really have a relationship with anyone else on that side of the family, so without her that part of my heritage and my own past is lost forever. When she dies, I doubt I will ever speak to anyone on that side of my family ever again.
At 80-some years old, I am not going to waste what precious time I have with her dissecting her personal beliefs (however much I might disagree with them) and the way she was raised. I just want to talk to my grandma.
What I find funny is that there are people out there who hear the word "southern" and automatically think "redneck, racist, homophobic bible-thumper". People they don't want to know, that they've formed an opinion of before ever speaking to, meeting, or interacting with, because they live their lives differently and hold different beliefs.
Let us consult the dictionary, shall we?
STEREOTYPE:
a simplified and standardized conception or image invested with special
meaning and held in common by members of a group
BIGOT: a person who is intolerant of any ideas other than his or her own, esp on religion, politics, or race
Yep, that little old lady who goes to a Southern church, believes in Jesus, and has lost two out of her three children is totally worth your time and energy to hate because she just might have different ideas about the world than you do. She's southern, white, and Christian, after all! She probably hates your guts just for existing, right?
Maybe that lady has a gay relative. A son or a grandson. She might even be gay herself. Maybe her daughter couldn't get pregnant or didn't want to, so she adopted a black child, or an asian child, or a hispanic child, and she loves her grandchild with all her heart no matter what color he or she is.
Maybe she's decided that she doesn't have many years left, and she's not going to waste them attempting to control
people she doesn't agree with. Life's way too short, and she's got all eternity to figure out what's really right, if there is such a thing.
The sad thing is, I know people who would openly hate this woman just based on those three things- white, Southern, Christian, without ever having spoken to her.
After all, it's so much easier to hate from afar than to admit that YOU might be the bigot.
Yes, you.
You can call yourself progressive, conservative, feminist, traditionalist,green, libertarian, republican, democrat, non-discriminatory, vegan, pro-this or anti-that - whatever lets you sleep soundly at night.
But whenever you go "I hate people that _________" OH GUESS WHAT YOU'RE DOING. GUESS.
If you said "being a judgmental ass", you're correct!
Just like you wouldn't want to be judged by the most vocal (and insane) minority of a group YOU belong to, don't judge groups you don't belong to based on THEIR most vocal/insane minority.
I've spent a fair amount of time wondering to myself what I'd like people to take away from this entry, should they bother reading this far.
Approve of people whose opinions and deeds you consider abhorrent? No, I don't think anyone can actively stop such a social process. It's natural, and it's something everyone does. Some things should never be tolerated, no matter how much love we have in our hearts.
I guess my point in all this is that I wish people would have a bit more introspection for their own thoughts and motivations regarding other people. Consider whether it's "those people" who are the problem, or if it's really YOU that is the problem.
How much energy do you waste on things, people, and situations you have no control over, and that don't really hurt you or affect you in any way?