> I think a lot of coastal elites have no idea what they're talking about when they speak about the extreme danger of being different in middle-America.
Here's a counterargument (counter-anecdote, really): I'm different in other ways (foreigner), I found living in middle-America a nightmarish experience of prejudice and outright hate. Being cat-called once is child's play compared to living in the mid-west while foreign.
One can be gay (and of the white majority) and not broadcast it, whereas when you're not-white, you're foreign. You can speak with a flawless accent, play varsity baseball, drink Bud at the bar and cheer for the home team, but in the eyes of the bigoted, you still aren't anything beyond your skin color.
This is not to discredit what other discriminated people have to undergo, but as someone who is not white, there's an extra burden to living in middle-America.
Grew up Illinois. Got into one fight middle and one in high school because people taunted me over my race (I'm Chinese).
And while roadtripping throughout the Midwest, sometimes people would toss racial epithets at you in the most indirect way; e.g. Just a mutter as they pass you. The only time I felt directly threatened was while stopping for gas in rural Indiana, and again that was with a group of teenagers who probably had nothing better to do.
Even with all this, I don't regret my upbringing in the Midwest. It's fostered an understanding of the inequalities that exist in America. And as I get to the age of potentially having kids, I wonder if I want to move back to let them experience this as well.
Normal looking, upper middle class Christian white man here from Fort Wayne, IN who's lived in 4 major cities Boston, Philadelphia, WAsh DC, and St. Louis and a mix of others Augusta, GA, Princeton, NJ, Ann Arbor, MI.
City vs. not is the key distinction. Racists/sexists/etc. exist in equal numbers in less populated parts of every state. Interestingly, the immigrants who primarily live in cities tend to be similarly racist/sexist as the Americans in less populated parts. My point is to challenge the idea that middle america is relatively bad.
We can clearly see that's your point, but it's a mystery to me why you think your experience outweighs that of the parent (though the nonsequitor about immigrants offers a depressing clue).
Did I say my point was better than the parent? I didn't. They're point is equally valid. I was simply arguing my case.
As for the "non sequitur", it was exactly NOT a non-sequitur. What I meant is to point out an unfortunate irony thats it's human nature to discrimate. The people in middle america were once immigrants. The current immigrants in cities in my wide variety of experiences have surprised me with their discriminatory tendencies. I've been at several well known universities so it's not an education thing either.
> My point is to challenge the idea that middle america is relatively bad.
Gotcha. I'm glad you're challenging me because it's making me refine my thoughts.
Middle America often denotes the Midwest, but this is the wrong connotation and I shouldn't have used it.
Middle America is any region in America where there's a stagnation of thought due to lack of new people and new ideas. Urban or rural, Midwest or coastal. And next time, I'll use the term "homogenous towns" to avoid this ambiguity over geography.
Here's a counterargument (counter-anecdote, really): I'm different in other ways (foreigner), I found living in middle-America a nightmarish experience of prejudice and outright hate. Being cat-called once is child's play compared to living in the mid-west while foreign.