2004-11-15
Noble Savage
Tom Wolfe's piece in the London Times pushes the utterly boring glorification of the values of rural America. As if the real America is only the heartland...It really is a variation of the myth of the Noble Savage. Why does Wolfe and the like assume that rural folk are more truthful, more in touch with reality, more honest than the urban folk -- including the liberal elite!?
As it is obvious from the graph data compiled by the NYTimes, urban areas voted Democrat and sub-urban and rural areas voted Republican. This distinction is not a bias of the liberal elite, it is plain fact. To call the majority of urban dwellers a liberal elite is at best stupid and at worse a means to denigrate the opinions of a very culturally and economically diverse group.
And again, why is Cincinnati more real, more moral than New York City?
Cincinnati is a place where people live a fiction of morality. No drinking allowed, but just cross the river to the Kentucky part of town to have your booze. Like many heartland places, it chooses the hypocrisy of fictional morality to reality. The 'moral' majority there prefers fiction to fact. That's why they believe that WMD was found in Iraq. That's why they believe in creationism. That's why they follow the Christianity of 9 commandments -- Christians for death penalty. That's why the rates of children out of marriage are much higher in rural areas than in cities. That's why drug and alcohol use is higher there too.
The problem is that their fictional way of life has real repercussions , often nasty. It was (is?) in this moral heartland, not far from Cincinnati in Indiana, that the KKK had its headquarters.
I like Urban civilization! And mostly because in cities people are used and enjoy diversity (or else they leave!). And from seeing so many different people one gets cynical about values such as morality and truth. Urbanites have a radar for hypocrisy. And that's what they don't like about places like Cincinnati!
Frank Rich tells it like it is: On 'Moral Values,' it's Blue in a Landslide
As it is obvious from the graph data compiled by the NYTimes, urban areas voted Democrat and sub-urban and rural areas voted Republican. This distinction is not a bias of the liberal elite, it is plain fact. To call the majority of urban dwellers a liberal elite is at best stupid and at worse a means to denigrate the opinions of a very culturally and economically diverse group.
And again, why is Cincinnati more real, more moral than New York City?
Cincinnati is a place where people live a fiction of morality. No drinking allowed, but just cross the river to the Kentucky part of town to have your booze. Like many heartland places, it chooses the hypocrisy of fictional morality to reality. The 'moral' majority there prefers fiction to fact. That's why they believe that WMD was found in Iraq. That's why they believe in creationism. That's why they follow the Christianity of 9 commandments -- Christians for death penalty. That's why the rates of children out of marriage are much higher in rural areas than in cities. That's why drug and alcohol use is higher there too.
The problem is that their fictional way of life has real repercussions , often nasty. It was (is?) in this moral heartland, not far from Cincinnati in Indiana, that the KKK had its headquarters.
I like Urban civilization! And mostly because in cities people are used and enjoy diversity (or else they leave!). And from seeing so many different people one gets cynical about values such as morality and truth. Urbanites have a radar for hypocrisy. And that's what they don't like about places like Cincinnati!
Frank Rich tells it like it is: On 'Moral Values,' it's Blue in a Landslide
# posted by Luis Rocha @ 22:19 
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Still upset with Tommy? well, I guess you do not want to hear what he said about life in the university (http://www.periodistadigital.com/object.php?o=35293)(Icouldn get an english version)...
I completely agree with you, but you know there are cities and cities...(Sevilla is the example of what it could be a cosmopolitan city of 1 million people like Copenhague and it is more like a 18th century village controlled by the Inquisition).
This idea of what is real people and not is applied to other cultures.. why is much more natural life of a tribe in the Amazons that ours? Is life without electricity better? or what about genders? why whatever a white male does is perverse but if done by a woman is just an art of liberation? anyway..
let us listen to music..
I completely agree with you, but you know there are cities and cities...(Sevilla is the example of what it could be a cosmopolitan city of 1 million people like Copenhague and it is more like a 18th century village controlled by the Inquisition).
This idea of what is real people and not is applied to other cultures.. why is much more natural life of a tribe in the Amazons that ours? Is life without electricity better? or what about genders? why whatever a white male does is perverse but if done by a woman is just an art of liberation? anyway..
let us listen to music..
Yeah, I know that there are cities and cities -- Cincinatti is one of the ones I complain about... Yeah! I hate the noble savage myth. Let them all go back to Nature and let us enjoy our cities!
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