Frackin' news again.
Oh what will you give me?" say the sad bells of Rhymney.
Is there hope for the future?" say the brown bells of Merthyr.
Who made the mine owners?" say the black bells of Rhondda.
And who robbed the miners?" say the grim bells of Blyna.
You know, I was just rendered so utterly speechless by the whole Schrödinger's Miners nightmare Tuesday night, the media united in sticking unsubstantiated rumor in the headlines as soon as possible--but more to blame than the reporters are the mine officials themselves who sat on the real information for almost three hours.
I thought I wouldn't come across anything on this issue that made me sadder. But then there was this post by bellatrys, which collects particularly vile things said about West Virginians, Southerners (not that WV'ans actually are southerners, really, I suppose) and rural working-class people in general--but bellatrys rightly connects it to horrible things she saw being said about striking NYC transit workers and others on lefty, liberal blogs, of all the worst places to see them.
So what's up with that? Tell it to me, if you can. I'm at least partly an, er, Appalachian-American, I guess the PC term would be, by geography of upbringing if nothing else. I have a degree and I don't have the accent, but I've known "those people" all my life, and the vast majority of them would never, never in a million years suggest that you brought your own horrible death on yourself by (maybe) voting the wrong way.
A crash course in mining and labor activism in the region wouldn't go amiss either for some of these people. "Which Side Are You On?" was written in Harlan, KY, after all.
Is there hope for the future?" say the brown bells of Merthyr.
Who made the mine owners?" say the black bells of Rhondda.
And who robbed the miners?" say the grim bells of Blyna.
You know, I was just rendered so utterly speechless by the whole Schrödinger's Miners nightmare Tuesday night, the media united in sticking unsubstantiated rumor in the headlines as soon as possible--but more to blame than the reporters are the mine officials themselves who sat on the real information for almost three hours.
I thought I wouldn't come across anything on this issue that made me sadder. But then there was this post by bellatrys, which collects particularly vile things said about West Virginians, Southerners (not that WV'ans actually are southerners, really, I suppose) and rural working-class people in general--but bellatrys rightly connects it to horrible things she saw being said about striking NYC transit workers and others on lefty, liberal blogs, of all the worst places to see them.
So what's up with that? Tell it to me, if you can. I'm at least partly an, er, Appalachian-American, I guess the PC term would be, by geography of upbringing if nothing else. I have a degree and I don't have the accent, but I've known "those people" all my life, and the vast majority of them would never, never in a million years suggest that you brought your own horrible death on yourself by (maybe) voting the wrong way.
A crash course in mining and labor activism in the region wouldn't go amiss either for some of these people. "Which Side Are You On?" was written in Harlan, KY, after all.