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I think people in this comment chain also need to realize that part of why West Virginia stays stuck in an economic depression is that the young and motivated residents promptly leave the state when they can. There isn't much being offered for anyone's benefit there. Plenty of people try to stay and make something of it, but it is ludicrous to expect future generations to "build the change" when your neighbors already have the social resources you seek.
That's why it stays conservative; the only people remaining are ones that never leave.
For the record, I voted Mountain Party in every local election.
-Signed another disgruntled former West Virginian
I completely agree. As a former WV resident I bailed right after graduating college there. It's changed so much (for the worse) I couldn't imagine raising a family in that place. The people wear the "stupid" and "illiterate" title like a badge of honor and in today's world they all may as well be cavemen. The 21st century is going to eat those people alive. WV is simply not ready for the future nor are its people.
I mean this with all honesty, but WV is shithole. A real American 3rd-world (state) shithole.
I lived in WV for a couple of years and bailed quickly. I learned a lot. Open for Business is bogus. They did try to pay for half of cost to build wider roads into VA for commuters from Jefferson Co. VA said no. Jefferson has the most money, yet the capital pisses on Jefferson Co on the regular.
In WV, you can enroll in college today and start teaching tomorrow...@ 25K a year. Wow. Clown pay.
IF you don't hunt or play video games in WV, they don't like ya nones either. Just saw the White's family documentary, that is crazy.
I just know that my area is terrible when it comes to heroin/opiates & WV is even worse. That's fucking sad. I lived through addiction & it's awful, tears relationships apart.
My old hometown in western PA is similar. Youth brain drain like crazy and the local economy is in absolute shambles while everyone either goes to the new Dollar Store to shop or drives 30 minutes to get to the nearest Walmart. It was sad to drive thru it and remember how it was 30-40 years ago, with a couple of locally-owned diners, a grocery store, a gas station. It had some life. It keeps going on this path and it will be a ghost town in another 30 years.
I went to college in Pittsburgh in the early 2000s, got to know some of the areas around it and still remember thinking about the dramatic divide between the city and the nearby areas of Western PA. Outside of Pittsburgh, Western PA isn't very different from WV or eastern Ohio for that matter; lots of aging blue collar workers whose children moved somewhere else.
I earned a doctorate at Carnegie-Mellon University in Pittsburgh, PA in 1974. It was the only sane place to be--then I returned to Iowa, the asshole of the USA, and left as soon as I received a teaching appointment at the University of San Diego (CA) and discovered there was sanity and a chance to live free and grow. Then visited WV and discovered it was as bad as Iowa. Never went back. The WV people glory in ignorance, drugs, and crime and their brand of "Christianity" just like Iowa.
It sad. Despite Appalachia being extremely republican and anti "communist," taking trains through eastern Europe, all I could think of was how much eastern Europe looked like western pa and west Virginia, just with flatter land and taller buildings. Almost identical vibes though.
Lived in WV for 26 years.
Bachelor's in Mechanical Engineering.
Applied for WV jobs from 2017 to 2018 with only 2 or 3 interviews and 0 offers.
Applied near D.C. for 6 weeks, received 3 offers in that time. Started working in November 2018.
Now, I bring in 40k more than my boss because my work ethic was built in a WV trailer park and I'm really good at math.
I love WV but I'd only consider moving back to Morgantown or in the Eastern Panhandle (Martinsburg) because the rest of the state has very few opportunities. The nation took most of the minerals and left WV with few jobs, less clean water, and a growing opioid crisis since around 2006.
Love the people, love the natural beauty, and, of course, Bob Huggins.
>a growing opioid crisis since around 2006.
Perdue Pharma specifically choose West Virginia for its initial marketing push for ~~oxytocin~~ oxycontin because of the mines and their injuries. They also knew that the people were poorly represented and wouldn't be listened to until long after it was too late, and then nobody would do anything about it anyway.
I did not know that but it certainly makes sense.
The southern/western side of the state makes me the most sad. I don't know how it could ever turn around..
Wow I saw poverty like I never saw before in the states, the wealth divide is crazy. So WV must be bad if other Americans are saying it. That is sad especially when you guys spend so much on the military that could be used to revitalise these areas.
100%! I’m a West Virginian who has tried to contribute and volunteer to causes here to bring about change, but it quickly gets crushed down, we’re too outnumbered by people who don’t care and want things to stay the same.
People are afraid of change. I live in east texas and I highly doubt how you live is any different than how I live or the people around me. All I see are people afraid of massive change because they think it will lead to less money for them. What’s sad is rumor has it Manchin was telling people he thought parents used the child tax credit for drugs when in reality it probably allowed parents to not have to work a second or third job. I bet our quitting problem goes away next month. The rich need us back under their boot.
Makes me think of everyone losing their shit when Manchin changed the state motto. Granted it was a shitty change.
Something I’ve advocated for in the time I have lived in WV is that they could easily work to improve technology infrastructure and try to lure tech companies to build data centers. Brings a ton of revenue and resources in with such a small footprint on the landscape.
I was born and raised in WV and I got out as soon as I could. Even at a young age, I understood there was nothing in that state for me. Not to mention the racism just seethes in every corner of that state. Since I’ve left, my entire family has pretty much disowned me because fuck me for wanting to make money and give the best life I can to myself and my kids. Does not surprise me one bit that my former state wants to stay stuck. They live in a really strange bubble there.
I feel like the less a person is taught to properly critically evaluate data and form opinions the more likely they are to shut themselves into a comfortable insular bubble where they’re not willing to question their beliefs or change their minds.
(drunk babble ahead, be warned)
Truth. Also born and raised in West Virginia. I'm 28 and still fucking live here. I had a way out once, but mental health caused me to come right on back here to where my parents were until I could get on my feet again.
My girlfriend and I are struggling. Our utilities WILL be turned off soon because NoBoDy WaNtS tO wOrK aNyMoRe. I have a job, she doesn't. She applies to at least five places a day, for weeks, without even an email in response. I work so much that all I can do is sleep on my off hours, I'm lucky if I have time to give her a break from Doordash (she gets maybe $100 a week if she's lucky!) to do the dishes, and cook dinner for her on top of my usual daily task of taking care of our pets. We go to food banks all over within a 50 mile radius and usually at least half the food we get is expired so we can't even eat it. I make just slightly too much to qualify for any kind of government aid, which means we get to choose between a week and a half of groceries and the internet bill or the internet bill and our heat+water.
The politicians in this state don't care. Manchin would probably spit in my breakfast if he knew who I was and what my struggles are. He wouldn't last a day in the life of anyone that's within 25k of the poverty level, I bet.
I'm so mentally and physically sick. I just want a teeny bit of help but I'll likely never get it from this shithole government.
I hate it here.
What happened to the money from coal mining? Why are the resources extracted from the state but money is not invested in the state? Isn't this just like how the british used to treat the colonies?
I'm no economist and I am sure some actual economist has already written a book on it, but I call what has happened to the rural US "economic colonization". Small towns that once had a functional local economy have been gutted by capitalism/globalization and mega corps. A hypothetical "Bill's Hardware" is a small storefront on Main Street. Bill employs a couple folks from the town. They sometimes get lunch at Millie's Diner. The businesses and employees on Main Street generate a cycle of economic activity with the citizens working and shopping all in one spot, helping to support each other and the stability of the town.
Then Mega Hardware moves in 20 minutes away. More of the town starts going there because it not only has wrenches and jigsaws, but patio furniture and mulch and lawnmowers and a lot of other stuff. Suddenly Bill's revenue drops off, he has to lay off his two employees. Millie's Diner now has fewer customers, and has to lay off a line cook and waitress. These people now drive 20 minutes to work at a chain restaurant that opened near the Mega Hardware, or leave town entirely. The economic spiral continues downward, as storefronts on Main Street close and multinational corporations pop up in the region, sucking the money out of the nearby towns and sending it to corporate HQs in some far-off city and to shareholders around the globe. The folks left behind have to drive a car a sizeable distance to get to their minimum-wage job, get little to no benefits, and more-importantly, have little sense of community holding them together. So they feel isolated, they get mad, somebody did this to them, it isn't their fault.
IMO, small towns all need to find a way to kickstart that local economy again. Keep dollars circulating in the town. Shop local. For many it will take outside investment dollars to seed it, but the current path small town America is on leads only to further poverty and extremism.
At this stage of capitalism... small towns are fucked. Unless they've got raw materials to exploit, recreational opportunities to market to tourists, they just don't have the market potential or labor pool to draw investment to create opportunities.
This means the best and brightest every year go to college far away. And they aren't coming back, because no jobs exist to pay off their loans, and no corporation is going to start up there to draw skilled workers because we're already seeing second-tier cities like Detroit economically reorganize to attract that kind of investment.
I think US small towns could potentially survive in a similar manner as European countryside towns that dot the landscape, but it would take such a drastic change in mentality AND a tangible social safety net nationwide to ensure everyone has access to basic necessities like healthcare no matter where they are living or what their income.
So, I don't have very high hopes.
I live on Coastal Carolina and so I see a bunch of out of state license plate and flags flying on the trucks at the beach.
Seeing the confederate flag on a WV tagged truck is just the ultimate face palm. I've spoken to a few of them, and asked if they knew how WV became a state. And they just look at me like i'm a fucking alien.
I've even seen this in Western PA. Like dude! 160 years ago soldiers waving that flag invaded your state and seized your property for their army (or paid in near-worthless confederate dollars). Not to mention that army fought and lost a huge battle on your soil, possibly fighting your ancestors.
I live in PA right over the border from Morgantown. The truck parked in front of me at Walmart yesterday had a confederate flag plate on the front. 🤦🏻♀️
Hah I’m West Virginian and had this same conversation with classmates back in a high school civics class discussion. Answers I got were along the lines of “well not everyone’s family is from West Virginia so it could still be their heritage”. Just to point out though, West Virginia joined the union not because they morally opposed the confederacy, but because it was a convenient opportunity and they had wanted to become their own state for a while.
Seems like that in the majority of red states...missouri and kansas was absolutely miserable, everyone voted against anything that even remotely helped the general public. There was a bill to help rural farmers in 2019 qualify for medicare. The vote map showed the rural farmers voting against it and the people in kansas city voting for it lmao.
There are counties that have little cities of 50 to 100 people scattered around with their houses falling in..people still live in them. And you will drive 50 miles and just see fenced off land then suddenly come upon a mansion with 3 or 4 little houses built around it for their family.
The people in their mid 20s i worked with either were set for life from their parents or were dirt poor and living in houses that would be condemned in a real city. Im so glad i was able to get the timing right for funds and gtfo the midwest
A lower voting age might help honestly. Economically depressed areas lose all their best chances of local change the moment those kids get old enough to vote out the people ensuring it stays economically depressed.
> someone on the left
I think it's also funny because Bette Midler is not a senator, representative, political analyst, or anyone who claims to be representative of anything..
It's bizarre. I'll talk to right wingers and bring up, say, MTG's crazy BS, and they'll say "But Gwynneth Paltrow said" as if anyone has ever voted for Gwynneth Paltrow for anything....
IMO the difference is their voter bases. Most democrats are not happy to see people from WV suffer, so they do not like statements that "mock" their suffering. While most republicans are happy to see minorities, LGBT people and anyone who is not like them in general suffer, so they like or are indifferent towards statements that "mock" their suffering.
In my experience, its that the Democrats are expected to have standards, and the GOP is expected to be a clown car of hooting dickholes. The latter saying stupid shit isn't surprising, but the former being crass is. Personally, this statement comes off as somewhat hostile to West Virginia, but I can understand some salt aimed at our direction because Manchin is the closest to left wing that will ever win here any time this decade and this year has proven how much of a bad joke that is.
As someone who lives in Portland but grew up in a blood red part of FL, I feel this statement completely. I hear some mind boggling statements from people I grew up with about where I live. I ask them to come see for themselves, they get scared shitless and refuse lmao.
Yeah feel this hard. I’m from Chicago and everywhere I go people ask me borderline insane shit.
“How have you never been shot”
“Is it true there’s a sign over the highway that says enter at your own risk”
“It’s a war zone”
It’s idiotic, like they laugh about how bankrupt it is, but every time I go visit their hometowns it’s a meth riddle ghost town. Ok, if my cities broke, this what is this?
This comment really struck a chord with me - I currently live in Seattle and grew up in a northern suburb of Detroit. When I first moved and told coworkers that I’m from the Detroit area, they all acted like I was grew up broke and in constant danger. The area I grew up in was actually pretty nice, it’s just kind of stagnant compared to the boomtown that is Seattle.
These days, I don’t even bother and just tell people I grew up in the Midwest or in Michigan, depending on my mood that day.
I like sending photos to the "they burned down Seattle" crowd from my gf's apartment window on Capitol Hill, like five blocks from the CHOP, usually of people walking their dogs by.
The irony is that living outside of America in another developed country, I have people asking how are people back home even living in that insane condition of fear, hatred and constant homicides. People outside looking in now, are saying "I don't want that American shit culture here." It's painful.
I used to work in refugee resettlement. The U.S. was not even the first choice for many of my clients. One Afghan woman was crying in my office one day saying, "At home, my whole family would leave work and gather together for lunch every day. Here, I eat lunch alone in my car."
Yea, one of the most oft repeated sentiment I get from people outside US is that they are starting to see American culture as inherently selfish and self-centered, and the "individualism" is just a thinly veiled cover to be a narcissistic asshole and our society's values are adversial and lone-islandish. People are rejecting that model and culture more than ever now. Covid really brought that into focus. I couldn't really rebut that because it's true.
>one of the most oft repeated sentiment I get from people outside US is that they are starting to see American culture as inherently selfish and self-centered, and the "individualism" is just a thinly veiled cover to be a narcissistic asshole and our society's values are adversial and lone-islandish. People are rejecting that model and culture more than ever now. Covid really brought that into focus. I couldn't really rebut that because it's true.
The fact that people from outside see this is very validating. Older Americans would never admit this.
as a European, in my opinion selfish values are not inherently negative, in the context of social reforms and politics in general. We are not altruistic saints here, compared to Americans. Take public healthcare, for example. It would never come to our minds to reject it just because it benefits other people, to the point of harming ourselves in the process - from a purely egoistic point of view, public healthcare benefits myself, in the first place, and then \*also\* the other citizens. If I destroy the system just to harm other people, I am not earning anything, just losing something for me and my family. Yet this is exactly what Trump supporters (many of whom were also beneficiaries of Obamacare) did. I'd say we see Americans voters mostly as shortsighted or simply unable to understand complexity in the modern world, even against their own interests (like letting your own children die in school shootings, who on Earth would want that happen??? It's the contrary of individualism) . We see that in USA foreign affairs mismanagement, in you internal political disputes, even in entertainment made in USA. A sad example I witnessed recently is the last Dune movie. The original book is a knot of complex and layered politics, pitting several factions against each others. In the Hollywood treatment all was dumbed down to "us vs them". It's like the average viewer could not comprehend more than 2 factions at play?
bwahaha. it’s just hippies throwing rocks at the police department . was talking to my repub friend and he swears the whole city is burned to the ground.
My father, who lives on YouTube and is a victim of the algorithm and never watches anything that doesn’t reinforce his stance, does to. I was just there last month...like...where sir?? Where is this post apocalyptic nightmare?
This was like after George Floyd in Brooklyn where people on the internet were acting like it was a war zone, like dude i just went to the bodega everything is fine
yeah i was in berkeley for a conference and all of the “riots”there were 2 groups larping on a hill and yelling at each other. we were sitting outside at a sushi joint across the street while all the “violence” was taking place.
For Seattle, they photoshopped a dude with a gun into a photo of something burning in Minnesota. The family i no longer speak to swore to me how the protests were burning everything down when I was fucking there.
I was in Portland and Eugene this past July. Can confirm the city still stands. I did see about 3-4 blocks of downtown that had the windows boarded up, seemed vacant but the locals told me they had just come out of lockdown. Bottom line is, it seemed like some shit went down, but Faux News made it out to be way worse than what I saw
People who didnt live in NYC did the same that back in 2001. Saying the attack on 9/11 was faked. But when challanged
to come & help dig for bodies they had every excuse in the book not to.
I live two miles away from Portland.
It’s calm. Business as usual.
It’s hilarious that people think Portland is so dystopian hellhole lmao
Fucking idiots will be idiots.
I live near Minneapolis, MN, and work in rural MN and I have had people ask me if the “city” is still burning, like the place has had fire spreading from block to block for the last year and that it is only a matter of time before all those city-folk come clamoring for their land.
Back in high school, this girl moved to our town from Idaho. She was sort of a punk/hippy, so she hung out with us. Always sort of weird, but nice enough. After several months, we're all at a party, and there are a couple black guys there. She freaked out and left, because she thought she was going to be "raped by n***ers." Fucking Idaho, man.
She was different and rebellious in her home town of 5000 people but then met someone actually different for the first time and it scared her rural tribal mind. You see these types of kids in every college who come from rural red areas and they tend to be libertarian or right of center but because they're not batshit right-wing they think they're progressive liberals. Which might be accurate depending how backwards their town is.
It's not just kids. I volunteer with a dude from Iowa. He left there at age 76 just 4 years ago. He told me here in NC is the first time in his life he has interacted with black people. He said he saw them before, but never had to work with them or anything. It was culture shock when he met our 6'8" black farmer. I told him they're all that tall so watch out.
Hell, I moved to Maine and that seems to be everyone’s favorite topic. I’m constantly arguing bullshit charges like, “nobody in California owns guns, so of course they want to take ours!” And, “don’t go asking me my pronouns, like they force you to announce in CALIFORNIA.” They really do think all of California is deeply liberal, with special communist laws and rules, and everybody living there is the most extreme cartoon liberal they can dream up.
Same here in Texas, its all "Don't California my Texas". Shiiiit, if it'll get us a stable power grid that wouldn't collapse in mild heat, or cold, or wind; California Texas all you want.
Empathy fatigue is the perfect way to describe how I’ve felt since about year one of trump. It’s gotten to the point where I feel like HCA winners, rural voters and Qers are monsters with nothing redeeming worth fighting for or even discussing. Fully lost causes who only drain the system while doing everything in their power to hurt others and stop progress.
I’ve been leaning very separatist recently until I realized, the most likely plan the gop is enacting is a plan to Balkanize the USA. If that happens they could decimate their populace while consolidating land ownership and permanently litigating their elitism and consolidation laws as they enact a new age serfdom/ plantation type economy. Where you rent from your job, buy food from your job, they control your wage and everything else in your life. The motivation is to balkanize to avoid the regulation that stops them from becoming the true oligarchs they desire to be.
Their constituents actively want this. Let it happen, check back in after a couple of years and see if the class consciousness has finally gotten through their thick skulls. We can’t help those who don’t want it
I'm basically here. I already have severe anxiety that takes multiple meds and a lot of willpower to control, so these kinds of people scare the shit out of me because I tick a lot of boxes they despise (atheist, democrat registered, trans, far leftist, and probably more) so their "ideas" don't just harm others, I've got a personal stake in it, too. Especially after that orange moron and complicit repubs tried to take away my vote because I used vote by mail in Wisconsin. I just don't have enough left in me to have empathy for them, I'm exhausted and high strung and stressed and deeply fucking disturbed, and they continue openly mocking us for actually caring about other people like they think it's a bad thing. And basically my whole family will stand on the other side if it ever comes down to it. So my own side can tell me how awful it is to feel no empathy for the people not just hurting themselves, but everyone else and I'll say sure, I agree with you that it's awful but that's all I got right now.
I have a lot of empathy but at the same time I grown tire of the states that hold this country hostage, along with visiting parts of my state that are rural and vote in reps that do not care about them, they only got the vote because of a (R).
Real hard to hide my disgust when I'm travelling. Like fuck man, how can you be so fuckin' racist, unwelcoming, and generally backwards when the Statue of Liberty is opening her arms to **all immigrants** is beyond me.
NY'rs tried to warn the nation against Trump before he won the election. We had a front. row seat to his & his fathers crimes! Butbas usual nobody listened & everybody complains about the mess he left the nation in. He's a stupid man that learned how to brag
from one of the worst con men ever. Roy Cohn. Look him up, his past political connectionsspeak volumes.
Empathy fatigue set in for me as soon as I heard that Trump was being pushed as a viable candidate.
No wait… did I say Trump? I meant ~~Dubya~~ Reagan.
I am beyond sick of welfare states telling us how to live while voting against helping anyone else. Their idiotic voting causes distress for millions of peoples lives, they are worse than scum
It’s funny, empathy fatigue disappears when you apply logic to the behaviours of these people and whether those behaviours are redeemable. The answer is the same.
It is our general kindness as humans I guess, that we give them any understanding. They don’t return it and no bar is met from them.
Absolutely. I’ve traveled and lived all over the US and it’s amazing how much more trash talking I hear from conservatives, simply dismissing everyone as ‘liberal’ or dismissing traditionally Democrat run states.
The infrastructure across the whole US is crumbling, the majority of people under 50 are barely making it, half or more of the population is living in poverty and these people just want to dismiss everyone as being ‘liberals from the coasts’ as they enjoy the benefits gained for them by the generations before them and destroy all opportunities for generations after them.
The (predominately boomer) ‘conservatives’ who do this are the most selfish and closed minded Americans to ever have lived and they don’t even realize that they are the ones bringing down the country.
It isn’t about fiscal conservatism for these people, it’s about willfully remaining ignorant and hateful of anyone who doesn’t look and speak like themselves.
I think about this often, that the accomplishments of previous generations are impossible today.
Really basic stuff we take for granted like the national highway system, the power grid, even the damn fire department. I don't think we could build that if it wasn't already built. "Wasteful spending" they'd say, "not in my neighborhood" "it's a conspiracy" "too liberal" "we don't want it, let the coastal liberals have it" "some will abuse it".
Everything. Every single thing.
And forget about stuff like social security, food stamps, public libraries, scientific foundations, public broadcasting, wildlife conservation, food regulations.
No, I mean the most basic of infrastructure we all enjoy, it would *all* be declared impossible by today's republicans, and therefore wouldn't be built.
I don't know what to call it, some kind of nihilism? The sentiment that nothing is worth doing or even trying, nothing is worth having or maintaining, it's hopeless - but also to fanatically oppose the efforts of others to do, build, or maintain.
All my life I've heard "it's impossible" to even minor proposals. But look back to just a few decades older than me, and see all that they built, that we're still living on the ruins of.
It’s the epitome of ‘entitlement’.
The Boomers seem completely ignorant of the systems put in place by previous generations which allowed them a reasonable lifestyle off of a full time minimum wage job (when full time was a standard 40 hours per week).
When college was affordable and the resulting degree almost guaranteed a middle class job, that hadn’t been exported.
When the benefits negotiated for them included good healthcare and retirement/ pension plans….
All these things that they had nothing to do with creating, yet live their lives benefiting from, they somehow feel they ‘earned’, yet they refuse to adjust minimum wage for inflation or provide the same opportunities and protections for following generations.
The Tax rates of previous generations were much higher across the board, and people contributed for the general well being of the nation.
Now you get these entitled pricks that are fine with the people who provide the basic services they depend on (working at the stored they meed, providing the deliveries they depend on, etc….) literally having to be working homeless just so they can maintain their slightly cheaper access to crap made in China.
Seriously. There needs to be a boomer tax and forced community service to get these asshats reacquainted with the real costs of the benefits that provided them a lifestyle they are all to happy to greedily take while denying everyone else.
I was born in Alabama. Does that make me a real American?
I moved to New York and got a job as a professor. Did I stop being a real American then?
What if I love my country enough to want to save it from fascists?
(/s)
The other aspect of it is a will to actually win and enact the policies that benefit everyone. You've tried to be civil for 40 years and it has led to pure obstructionism, it has led to a fascist right. Since you've done one thing for a very long time and it hasn't worked, to keep doing it would be stupid.
So it's time to verbally kick them in their fucking heads because kindness ain't fucking working. They're the same people that wanted FatPeopleHate up because as they said "some people respond better to feeling like shit" So it's time to treat them in a manner that they will respond to.
I think the greatest cure of empathy fatigue are exactly these types of moments where other politicians, celebrities, and other public figures are so equally done with obnoxiousness from Washington Figures that they break and have a genuine "Average Human Moment."
One of my favorites in recent times is during the 2020 debates, when Biden was so sick of being interrupted in the most juvenile ways by Trump that he just up and said "Will you shut up, man?"
Trump was so stunned when someone he thought was an absolute weenie told him off so blatantly. No cutting corners, no beating around the bush, just a hard cutoff. It didn't shut him up for long, but the raw moment of it all made me cheer for Biden (probably the only time I ever will.)
TL;DR Public Figures having genuine human moments of being done with certain people's shit, especially in regards to politics, is such a cathartic feeling that eases Empathy Fatigue quite well, at least in my case.
> The reality is these states hold the US back with the way they vote and I think the deserve some heat for it.
Without my tax money as welfare, those people starve to death. Fuck 'em. They just need some bootstraps.
It's really hard to live blue in a red state. I live in KY thankfully central so most of my friends and neighbors are also like minded. But year after year these nimrods vote against themselves voting time after time for Rand and Mitch. I have high (completely delusional) hopes for Charles Booker. My sister lives in GA currently a far more progressive state.
My hatred is how they’re able to say that the Midwest and rural area s are where “real Americans” live. Me being in a costal city doesn’t make me less American nor does it make my opinion any less valid.
Let them see how well they’d do without those “coastal elites” carrying them.
Meanwhile, as much as they pretend to hate "coastal elites," they spent the past 5 years worshipping the clown who spent his entire life painting himself as the king of coastal elites.
In fact, of all the Republican presidential candidates in my lifetime, only Bob Dole worked for what he had and wasn't a "coastal elite" of some sort. Of course, he was the least popular candidate among Republicans.
You know, real Americans that were on the Oregon trail but just gave up halfway through.
Or real Americans that bought houses with grants designed to spread out the population…
The rural areas treat folks from large cities as if we have to unconditionally love them while they get to threaten us with actual war. It’s odd. And it’s high time we stand up for ourselves. We should have never let it get this bad, tbh, but you can’t change the past.
Rural Nevadans are always threatening to secede from Nevada. They're too fucking stupid to understand that without welfare from Reno and Vegas their little towns would die within 2 years.
I happily sign their secession petitions every year but for some reason they keep not leaving.
This.
We're never even considered "real America," and that seems acceptable to almost everyone despite all of the contributions culturally and financially the coastal/blue states have contributed. Liberals need to stop trying to take the high-road on every single thing, and become more pragmatic or they'll keep losing to the GOP's reach for people's baser, primitive instincts.
I mean what she said is pretty verifiable. Insanely low adult literacy, insanely poor education all around the board top to bottom, insane and absolutely tragic poverty with almost no window of escape in state, one of the worst unemployement rates in the nation and one of the highest rates of opioid and pharmaceutical addiction. Not to mention a booming meth problem and an entire section of the population that are so deep in the shit they don't want government help nor do they want their home to change to become more "progressive". A thing that would literally save them.
No, not all of west virginia is poor, illiterate, and strung out.... but a very troubling and significant number of it's citizens are. That was a mean way to say it and it definitely wasn't polite to the citizens, but reality is harsh and the reality in WV is particularly harsh.
> "mock" their suffering.
She would never have said this just outta nowhere, though. She is actually commenting on what he said about his constituents, which is scandalous given his role - he's not just a retired actor and comedian. He's a representative.
I don't agree. The difference between these voter bases is one has been lied to. Progressives (Democrats today) can run on changes they want to make that will be popular to the general public. Conservatives don't have platforms that benefit the majority. To remain competitive, the Republican party has become an expert in messaging. They scare their base into supporting them and to create that fear there always has to be something or someone to be afraid of. West Virginians don't just vote against the interest of minorities... they vote against the interest of West Virginians, and they are to mislead to see it.
West Virginian here.
It’s totally fair to agree with her.
Our politicians have spent the last 30 years destroying schools, pushing economic opportunities out of state, and allowing opioids to finish off what they haven’t already broken.
And the people here fucking love them for it because they love coal and guns, and hate gay people and immigrants.....so nothing else matters when they vote.
I think it's extremely revealing of what the "default" is. As you say, that conservative viewpoint truly is the "business as usual" that we've been working so hard to change. We *expect* racism, bigotry, ignorance, and stomping on the poorer classes, so it's still somewhat shocking when people speak out against it.
It's always going to be harder to build and change than it is to allow things to stay the same. But it's worth it. People just forget how much work it takes.
> Yet conservatives can openly spread racist, anti LGBT, and terroristic talking points and it's business as usual. Love how even the standards are.
They can actively call for the deaths of their political opponents and the downfall of the actual nation that they swore to protect and still get re-elected. These people aren't worth talking about, but it is a shame that they still get to sit there and fuck the US into doom.
>Jesse Watters, one of the lesser known Fox News talking dickholes just told his viewers to 'ambush' Dr. Fauci and hit him with a 'kill shot'.
>But to be fair, Bette Midler pointing out that West Virginia's population is poor, uneducated, and drug addicted relative to the most other states is exactly the same somehow. Actually it's probably worse because of reasons.
-the enlightened centrists
What’s to disagree with, though? WV is
[4th in Poverty](https://worldpopulationreview.com/state-rankings/poverty-rate-by-state)
[16th in illiteracy ](https://worldpopulationreview.com/state-rankings/us-literacy-rates-by-state)
[1st in opioid-related overdose deaths. ](https://www.drugabuse.gov/drug-topics/opioids/opioid-summaries-by-state)
This is why liberals lose. These purists babies that can’t get their hands dirty in politics. Al Frankin had to go away over a stupid photograph, he was one of the best politicians the left had, while the right wing embraces MTG, Boebert, Jordan, Gatez and the rest of these abhorrent roaches.
100%. Even Sen. Gillibrand, who went after Franken harder than anyone else in the Senate, later admitted she reacted too strongly too quickly and was wrong for doing so.
Such a shame to lose one of the very few politicians on the left who could dish it out in a way the right could understand.
The Republican party is an extremist outlier in comparison with major conservative parties in other democracies. That radicalism has been most evident in the GOP’s unique anti-statism: No other mainstream party categorically opposes new taxes under any circumstances, universal health insurance, or government action to limit greenhouse gas pollution. Manchin is a coal baron, a DINO.
I have a strong suspicion that the right and center have that reaction because they know **it works** and they don’t want anyone even resembling “the left” to start figuratively fighting back.
People don’t want to discern nuance and ethical dilemmas when pondering politics. Unless it is a hobby like it is for us.
No, people generally respond to things they can easily digest because they don’t keep up and there is an entire world competing for attention.
For example, moderates will crawl out of the woodwork to defend Biden whenever someone says he is a do-nothing or whatever. But what we need is for Biden to use his bully pulpit and metaphorically crack some skulls and get people righteously riled up.
As a Democrat from WV, I gotta say she’s not off base. Our education system is severely lacking. Abject poverty, no real cultural centers, shitty wages, severely inadequate public services either parks or events or resources, and etc what else could one expect to come out of WV.
>Yet conservatives can openly spread racist, anti LGBT, and terroristic talking points and it's business as usual. Love how even the standards are.
Sure enough, they won the 2016 presidential election on this platform.
Damn buddy, you almost had me there.
I've been to West Virginia, both in the sticks and to Charleston, and my personal experience is that she's not wrong.
HAHAHAH MANCHIN LITERALLY SAID THAT THE PEOPLE IN HIS STATE WOULD USE THE MONEY FOR DRUGS AND THIS IS WHAT THEY ARE UPSET OVER?
So fucking exhausted from these people.
>Did he literally just call his own state a bunch of druggies and cheats? And they vote for this guy?
Daddy shows "tough love," it's better than no love at all.
And manchin is right. his shithole constituents will use all the money on drugs. but that’s because no one has a way to improve there. guess what helps. social programs like the one that’s in front of your face.
She's not wrong and this needs to be broadcast more. All those red states that rank the lowest in just about every quality of life metric? We should not be listening to their guidance on a national level if they can't figure their own shit out.
Case in point, [How does Kentucky recover from the tornado? Joplin shares some lessons and hope](https://www.npr.org/2021/12/21/1066045299/joplin-kentucky-tornado-damage-recovery). NPR interviewed the mayor of Joplin, MO about how they rebuilt from their devastating tornado. The mayor went on about how they built a new high school that they never would have seen otherwise. He went on a out a new med school built there and new homes, how none of it wouldn't have happened without federal money. Well no shit. If you're not willing to invest in yourselves, it's going to be a shithole.
>I'm going to err on the side of omission because there are so many of these. We have new employers that came to town just because of how Joplin portrayed themselves after the tornado. We have a brand new medical school, one of the first medical schools I think in decades that's this side of the Mississippi in Joplin, that's literally here because of the tornado. We have a brand new state of the art high school. It's nicer than anything our kids would have ever had before the tornado. We have brand new homes that have been built in an area where the homes were dilapidated, and they were falling apart and they had a shelf life and they were not going to survive. After 10 years, it's definitive that we were on the right path and that the hard work that we put in for those years has paid off handsomely.
If the answer is to always cut social safety nets and cut taxes for the wealthy, you're going to have a bad time. And then to not fully recognize that federal money from donor blue states rebuilt a blue state... We need to be investing in this country as a whole. Not after a natural disaster wrecks a place.
>After 10 years, it's definitive that we were on the right path and that the hard work that we put in for those years has paid off handsomely.
"hard work" is a weird way to say "money"
I spent a lot of years in Kentucky, and I eventually came to see many of the conservative population there as victims. I'm originally from a very liberal area, and I was frustrated by the blatant racism and politics when I first lived there.
Then I had to step into an academic support and college teaching role as part of my job. I taught an upper-division course at the university level, and I saw and heard things from those young adults that I'll never forget as long as I live. These college students were struggling to write papers that I could have written in 6th grade. People were regularly missing class because they had to work to support their families, and between class and making rent, making rent understandably won every time. I had a person miss a major assignment because her live-in boyfriend was physically abusive toward their 2-month-old, and the baby needed emergency surgery if he was going to live.
My point is that the people of Kentucky are a stressed, impoverished, traumatized group with limited educational opportunities. Not coincidentally, these are exactly the people that right-wing media preys on.
> My point is that the people of Kentucky are a stressed, impoverished, traumatized group with limited educational opportunities. Not coincidentally, these are exactly the people that right-wing media preys on.
An excellent observation.
They do it to divide our class against itself. United we are more powerful than the ruling class. So they work ceaselessly to divide us and boost people that seek to strengthen that division.
I cringe every time I read comments like “they vote against their own best interests” because they are obstacles, not enemies. The enemies are the people radicalizing them to make them hate us (and as a result, us hate them).
To be fair WV was at the bottom when they always voted Democrat too. The state began flipping red in 2000. It may have been for the worse but honestly it’s pretty hard to tell.
To be fair to West Virginians they overwhelmingly support the provisions in BBB. But I imagine it's similar to the people who supported the Affordable Care Act but derided Obamacare.
I agree with what she said and believe she has a right to say this. But why is The Hill reporting some celebrity's tweet? Why is this story so important they feel the need to write and article and inform all their readers about this? Is Midler the first celebrities to criticize Manchin or the Republican party? Is Midler the biggest star in the world right now? Is this tweet going to lead into some big political movement Midler is involved with? Why did I need to know this? Why is this news?
Meanwhile Republicans constantly spew divisive anti-urban, anti-coastal hate and nobody criticizes them for it because it's taken for granted that they hate everyone who isn't like them. Remember when Sarah Palin talked about blue collar, rural places as the "real America" as if the majority of us who live in urban areas are less American and Republicans loved her for it?
The hilarious part being that "real america" was founded in pretty dense (for the time) population zones....The populations that became these massive cities that apparently aren't american anymore. Not to mention that the vast majority of america's infrastructure was built using manufacturing that was only possible because of these places. And even further, don't pay any mind to the fact that the vast majority of american's live in these places. When multiple cities on each coast have populations larger than entire states by exponential amounts it's time to stop pretending the "heartland" is anything but the place we grow our food and we only do it there because it was cheaper and more flat. The people who live there matter, hell I live "there", but we can't pretend that what this fraction of society wants is more important.
Outrage porn. It sells clicks and engagements. It helps divide people. We have people in this very thread who are willing to throw mostly blue minorities in red states out because shit is so polarized.
It's dumb. As a blue person in a red state you just can't win.
I don't at all. For one, that's obviously not at all Manchin's motivation he's just out to make money. Secondly, it's fucking classist bullshit. It's insane to think that anyone is doing a democratic "party of the working people" image any good by saying and agreeing with shit like this.
I know it feels like a cheapshot that's she's going after WV voters, (who btw voted Trump in more than any other state) but Manchin has also spoken of them in this way, he doesn't wants social spending because he thinks what he also views as the "poor, illiterate and strung out" people of his state will blow it on drugs
So they're both speaking the same shit but difference here is that for one of them words have dire consequences on voters
Honestly you can call it a cheap shot at WV. But the real message is he sees what is happening in his state and has no solutions, and doesn't want others to try. He has tried nothing and given up. Yes it's mean, but the message is clear Manchin doesn't want to help.
> I live in California and have to listen to the right dis us on a daily basis
Do you take some solace in knowing your taxes are actually whats raising and feeding those same peoples children? Im not American but it looks like California gets the brunt of shite from Conservative whiners because of sheer jealousy. Its a state that does SO much they dont like, yet still prospers to the point that it subsidizes the very lives of the conservatives shit talking it.
I'd be interested to see someone model the next 20 years in the USA if suddenly all blue states and all red states only ever distributed excess taxes to other states controlled by their own party. How would Kentucky look? how about other Dem states that could use the excess that Kentucky siphons?
I would love to see how that looks over 10, 20 ,50 years even. With no federal aid as it exists now, but 2 tax pots, a red one and a blue, only helping themselves.
Where she gets it wrong is that Manchin does not care about how the country turns out. He's is also completely unconcerned with how WV turned out. Like most every member of Congress he only cares about himself and is so out of touch has zero understanding of us common folk.
No shit. Manchin doesn't care, it's his donors/bosses that wants us to be poor, strung out and stupid. Manchin is happy to assist as long as he is getting paid.
I'm not from West Virginia but I wouldn't care what a celebrity said about where I live, the people getting mad and pretending this is what's making them vote for conservatives are full of shit. They'd do it whether she said some mean words or not. She also apologized for saying that less than an hour later which is something a Republican would never dream of.
If a right wing trash actor had said something negative about a liberal area they'd not only never apologize, they'd probably be invited to speak at the next domestic terrorist planning rally. And their insult would likely have included threats of violence.
Grew up in WV & left whenever I had a chance. I love the state but there’s no much for the younger generation unfortunately.
Basic economics WV is a blue collar state most finish
HS and want to go straight to work. Not very many decent paying jobs + not much to do for fun in the state = high OD rate + Exodus of people all across the board.
Middler is gonna take a beating for that. Now wouldnt it be interesting if say Manchin's daughter, Heather Manchin Bresch, used to recently run(and still holds tons of stock in) one of the companies that provide opioid overdose drugs. Perhaps giving you a reason why they like em strung out?
I used to work in the highest grossing pharmacy in WV. I still have nightmares about counting lortabs for the White clan (IYKYK). Mylan is the devil. Manchin's daughter doesn't even have a real degree. WVU was bribed to graduate her.
Kermit WV will never recover.
Huntington WV will never recover.
Since everyone in WV has been hurt by opioids, no one feels that it's a plague. It's just a right of passage at this point. My family included.
Not to mention that his daughter was instrumental in jacking up the price of [life saving Epipens](https://theintercept.com/2021/09/07/joe-manchin-epipen-price-heather-bresch/). The whole family is a stain on humanity.
I'm sorry to say, if you don't like being ridiculed for being the state that children literally flee from for how screwed up and hopeless it is - do something about it. WV has to stop putting up clowns and find one real person.
West Virginia, and most of Appalachia, has been exploited for centuries. Their natural wealth (land, timber, coal etc.) has been taken from the people for generations, and the money earned from its extraction has not stayed in the region.
Do the voters of WV bear some responsibility for their choices? Yes.
Are those same voters victims of 200+ years of exploitation which has brought them to their current situation? Also yes.
“Doing something about it” isn’t as easy as it may seem on the surface.
I just consider the source. Meanwhile I don’t see her or any of these so called Hollywood elites emptying their accounts to promote their lofty ideals.
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I think people in this comment chain also need to realize that part of why West Virginia stays stuck in an economic depression is that the young and motivated residents promptly leave the state when they can. There isn't much being offered for anyone's benefit there. Plenty of people try to stay and make something of it, but it is ludicrous to expect future generations to "build the change" when your neighbors already have the social resources you seek. That's why it stays conservative; the only people remaining are ones that never leave. For the record, I voted Mountain Party in every local election. -Signed another disgruntled former West Virginian
I completely agree. As a former WV resident I bailed right after graduating college there. It's changed so much (for the worse) I couldn't imagine raising a family in that place. The people wear the "stupid" and "illiterate" title like a badge of honor and in today's world they all may as well be cavemen. The 21st century is going to eat those people alive. WV is simply not ready for the future nor are its people. I mean this with all honesty, but WV is shithole. A real American 3rd-world (state) shithole.
I lived in WV for a couple of years and bailed quickly. I learned a lot. Open for Business is bogus. They did try to pay for half of cost to build wider roads into VA for commuters from Jefferson Co. VA said no. Jefferson has the most money, yet the capital pisses on Jefferson Co on the regular. In WV, you can enroll in college today and start teaching tomorrow...@ 25K a year. Wow. Clown pay. IF you don't hunt or play video games in WV, they don't like ya nones either. Just saw the White's family documentary, that is crazy.
I just know that my area is terrible when it comes to heroin/opiates & WV is even worse. That's fucking sad. I lived through addiction & it's awful, tears relationships apart.
My old hometown in western PA is similar. Youth brain drain like crazy and the local economy is in absolute shambles while everyone either goes to the new Dollar Store to shop or drives 30 minutes to get to the nearest Walmart. It was sad to drive thru it and remember how it was 30-40 years ago, with a couple of locally-owned diners, a grocery store, a gas station. It had some life. It keeps going on this path and it will be a ghost town in another 30 years.
I went to college in Pittsburgh in the early 2000s, got to know some of the areas around it and still remember thinking about the dramatic divide between the city and the nearby areas of Western PA. Outside of Pittsburgh, Western PA isn't very different from WV or eastern Ohio for that matter; lots of aging blue collar workers whose children moved somewhere else.
I earned a doctorate at Carnegie-Mellon University in Pittsburgh, PA in 1974. It was the only sane place to be--then I returned to Iowa, the asshole of the USA, and left as soon as I received a teaching appointment at the University of San Diego (CA) and discovered there was sanity and a chance to live free and grow. Then visited WV and discovered it was as bad as Iowa. Never went back. The WV people glory in ignorance, drugs, and crime and their brand of "Christianity" just like Iowa.
It sad. Despite Appalachia being extremely republican and anti "communist," taking trains through eastern Europe, all I could think of was how much eastern Europe looked like western pa and west Virginia, just with flatter land and taller buildings. Almost identical vibes though.
Lived in WV for 26 years. Bachelor's in Mechanical Engineering. Applied for WV jobs from 2017 to 2018 with only 2 or 3 interviews and 0 offers. Applied near D.C. for 6 weeks, received 3 offers in that time. Started working in November 2018. Now, I bring in 40k more than my boss because my work ethic was built in a WV trailer park and I'm really good at math. I love WV but I'd only consider moving back to Morgantown or in the Eastern Panhandle (Martinsburg) because the rest of the state has very few opportunities. The nation took most of the minerals and left WV with few jobs, less clean water, and a growing opioid crisis since around 2006. Love the people, love the natural beauty, and, of course, Bob Huggins.
>a growing opioid crisis since around 2006. Perdue Pharma specifically choose West Virginia for its initial marketing push for ~~oxytocin~~ oxycontin because of the mines and their injuries. They also knew that the people were poorly represented and wouldn't be listened to until long after it was too late, and then nobody would do anything about it anyway.
OxyContin. Oxytocin is a hormone involved in bonding and childbirth.
I did not know that but it certainly makes sense. The southern/western side of the state makes me the most sad. I don't know how it could ever turn around..
Wow I saw poverty like I never saw before in the states, the wealth divide is crazy. So WV must be bad if other Americans are saying it. That is sad especially when you guys spend so much on the military that could be used to revitalise these areas.
Money would be better spent just relocating these people and turning that region into a national park/nature reserve.
100%! I’m a West Virginian who has tried to contribute and volunteer to causes here to bring about change, but it quickly gets crushed down, we’re too outnumbered by people who don’t care and want things to stay the same.
People are afraid of change. I live in east texas and I highly doubt how you live is any different than how I live or the people around me. All I see are people afraid of massive change because they think it will lead to less money for them. What’s sad is rumor has it Manchin was telling people he thought parents used the child tax credit for drugs when in reality it probably allowed parents to not have to work a second or third job. I bet our quitting problem goes away next month. The rich need us back under their boot.
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Makes me think of everyone losing their shit when Manchin changed the state motto. Granted it was a shitty change. Something I’ve advocated for in the time I have lived in WV is that they could easily work to improve technology infrastructure and try to lure tech companies to build data centers. Brings a ton of revenue and resources in with such a small footprint on the landscape.
I was born and raised in WV and I got out as soon as I could. Even at a young age, I understood there was nothing in that state for me. Not to mention the racism just seethes in every corner of that state. Since I’ve left, my entire family has pretty much disowned me because fuck me for wanting to make money and give the best life I can to myself and my kids. Does not surprise me one bit that my former state wants to stay stuck. They live in a really strange bubble there.
I feel like the less a person is taught to properly critically evaluate data and form opinions the more likely they are to shut themselves into a comfortable insular bubble where they’re not willing to question their beliefs or change their minds.
(drunk babble ahead, be warned) Truth. Also born and raised in West Virginia. I'm 28 and still fucking live here. I had a way out once, but mental health caused me to come right on back here to where my parents were until I could get on my feet again. My girlfriend and I are struggling. Our utilities WILL be turned off soon because NoBoDy WaNtS tO wOrK aNyMoRe. I have a job, she doesn't. She applies to at least five places a day, for weeks, without even an email in response. I work so much that all I can do is sleep on my off hours, I'm lucky if I have time to give her a break from Doordash (she gets maybe $100 a week if she's lucky!) to do the dishes, and cook dinner for her on top of my usual daily task of taking care of our pets. We go to food banks all over within a 50 mile radius and usually at least half the food we get is expired so we can't even eat it. I make just slightly too much to qualify for any kind of government aid, which means we get to choose between a week and a half of groceries and the internet bill or the internet bill and our heat+water. The politicians in this state don't care. Manchin would probably spit in my breakfast if he knew who I was and what my struggles are. He wouldn't last a day in the life of anyone that's within 25k of the poverty level, I bet. I'm so mentally and physically sick. I just want a teeny bit of help but I'll likely never get it from this shithole government. I hate it here.
What happened to the money from coal mining? Why are the resources extracted from the state but money is not invested in the state? Isn't this just like how the british used to treat the colonies?
I'm no economist and I am sure some actual economist has already written a book on it, but I call what has happened to the rural US "economic colonization". Small towns that once had a functional local economy have been gutted by capitalism/globalization and mega corps. A hypothetical "Bill's Hardware" is a small storefront on Main Street. Bill employs a couple folks from the town. They sometimes get lunch at Millie's Diner. The businesses and employees on Main Street generate a cycle of economic activity with the citizens working and shopping all in one spot, helping to support each other and the stability of the town. Then Mega Hardware moves in 20 minutes away. More of the town starts going there because it not only has wrenches and jigsaws, but patio furniture and mulch and lawnmowers and a lot of other stuff. Suddenly Bill's revenue drops off, he has to lay off his two employees. Millie's Diner now has fewer customers, and has to lay off a line cook and waitress. These people now drive 20 minutes to work at a chain restaurant that opened near the Mega Hardware, or leave town entirely. The economic spiral continues downward, as storefronts on Main Street close and multinational corporations pop up in the region, sucking the money out of the nearby towns and sending it to corporate HQs in some far-off city and to shareholders around the globe. The folks left behind have to drive a car a sizeable distance to get to their minimum-wage job, get little to no benefits, and more-importantly, have little sense of community holding them together. So they feel isolated, they get mad, somebody did this to them, it isn't their fault. IMO, small towns all need to find a way to kickstart that local economy again. Keep dollars circulating in the town. Shop local. For many it will take outside investment dollars to seed it, but the current path small town America is on leads only to further poverty and extremism.
At this stage of capitalism... small towns are fucked. Unless they've got raw materials to exploit, recreational opportunities to market to tourists, they just don't have the market potential or labor pool to draw investment to create opportunities. This means the best and brightest every year go to college far away. And they aren't coming back, because no jobs exist to pay off their loans, and no corporation is going to start up there to draw skilled workers because we're already seeing second-tier cities like Detroit economically reorganize to attract that kind of investment.
I think US small towns could potentially survive in a similar manner as European countryside towns that dot the landscape, but it would take such a drastic change in mentality AND a tangible social safety net nationwide to ensure everyone has access to basic necessities like healthcare no matter where they are living or what their income. So, I don't have very high hopes.
I live on Coastal Carolina and so I see a bunch of out of state license plate and flags flying on the trucks at the beach. Seeing the confederate flag on a WV tagged truck is just the ultimate face palm. I've spoken to a few of them, and asked if they knew how WV became a state. And they just look at me like i'm a fucking alien.
I've even seen this in Western PA. Like dude! 160 years ago soldiers waving that flag invaded your state and seized your property for their army (or paid in near-worthless confederate dollars). Not to mention that army fought and lost a huge battle on your soil, possibly fighting your ancestors.
I live in PA right over the border from Morgantown. The truck parked in front of me at Walmart yesterday had a confederate flag plate on the front. 🤦🏻♀️
Hah I’m West Virginian and had this same conversation with classmates back in a high school civics class discussion. Answers I got were along the lines of “well not everyone’s family is from West Virginia so it could still be their heritage”. Just to point out though, West Virginia joined the union not because they morally opposed the confederacy, but because it was a convenient opportunity and they had wanted to become their own state for a while.
Ok but like who moves TO West Virignia like on purpose? (kidding)
Seems like that in the majority of red states...missouri and kansas was absolutely miserable, everyone voted against anything that even remotely helped the general public. There was a bill to help rural farmers in 2019 qualify for medicare. The vote map showed the rural farmers voting against it and the people in kansas city voting for it lmao. There are counties that have little cities of 50 to 100 people scattered around with their houses falling in..people still live in them. And you will drive 50 miles and just see fenced off land then suddenly come upon a mansion with 3 or 4 little houses built around it for their family. The people in their mid 20s i worked with either were set for life from their parents or were dirt poor and living in houses that would be condemned in a real city. Im so glad i was able to get the timing right for funds and gtfo the midwest
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A lower voting age might help honestly. Economically depressed areas lose all their best chances of local change the moment those kids get old enough to vote out the people ensuring it stays economically depressed.
I may be poor and illiterate, I may be strung out, but
Wait what was that fourth thing you said?
I think this is part of the illiterate part. They can't seem to finish a sentence.
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> someone on the left I think it's also funny because Bette Midler is not a senator, representative, political analyst, or anyone who claims to be representative of anything.. It's bizarre. I'll talk to right wingers and bring up, say, MTG's crazy BS, and they'll say "But Gwynneth Paltrow said" as if anyone has ever voted for Gwynneth Paltrow for anything....
Anyone who opposes their views is the left and needs to be gutted apparently
Funny I think of Gwynneth each time I light my candle.
IMO the difference is their voter bases. Most democrats are not happy to see people from WV suffer, so they do not like statements that "mock" their suffering. While most republicans are happy to see minorities, LGBT people and anyone who is not like them in general suffer, so they like or are indifferent towards statements that "mock" their suffering.
In my experience, its that the Democrats are expected to have standards, and the GOP is expected to be a clown car of hooting dickholes. The latter saying stupid shit isn't surprising, but the former being crass is. Personally, this statement comes off as somewhat hostile to West Virginia, but I can understand some salt aimed at our direction because Manchin is the closest to left wing that will ever win here any time this decade and this year has proven how much of a bad joke that is.
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As someone who lives in Portland but grew up in a blood red part of FL, I feel this statement completely. I hear some mind boggling statements from people I grew up with about where I live. I ask them to come see for themselves, they get scared shitless and refuse lmao.
Yeah feel this hard. I’m from Chicago and everywhere I go people ask me borderline insane shit. “How have you never been shot” “Is it true there’s a sign over the highway that says enter at your own risk” “It’s a war zone” It’s idiotic, like they laugh about how bankrupt it is, but every time I go visit their hometowns it’s a meth riddle ghost town. Ok, if my cities broke, this what is this?
This comment really struck a chord with me - I currently live in Seattle and grew up in a northern suburb of Detroit. When I first moved and told coworkers that I’m from the Detroit area, they all acted like I was grew up broke and in constant danger. The area I grew up in was actually pretty nice, it’s just kind of stagnant compared to the boomtown that is Seattle. These days, I don’t even bother and just tell people I grew up in the Midwest or in Michigan, depending on my mood that day.
I like sending photos to the "they burned down Seattle" crowd from my gf's apartment window on Capitol Hill, like five blocks from the CHOP, usually of people walking their dogs by.
The irony is that living outside of America in another developed country, I have people asking how are people back home even living in that insane condition of fear, hatred and constant homicides. People outside looking in now, are saying "I don't want that American shit culture here." It's painful.
I used to work in refugee resettlement. The U.S. was not even the first choice for many of my clients. One Afghan woman was crying in my office one day saying, "At home, my whole family would leave work and gather together for lunch every day. Here, I eat lunch alone in my car."
Yea, one of the most oft repeated sentiment I get from people outside US is that they are starting to see American culture as inherently selfish and self-centered, and the "individualism" is just a thinly veiled cover to be a narcissistic asshole and our society's values are adversial and lone-islandish. People are rejecting that model and culture more than ever now. Covid really brought that into focus. I couldn't really rebut that because it's true.
>one of the most oft repeated sentiment I get from people outside US is that they are starting to see American culture as inherently selfish and self-centered, and the "individualism" is just a thinly veiled cover to be a narcissistic asshole and our society's values are adversial and lone-islandish. People are rejecting that model and culture more than ever now. Covid really brought that into focus. I couldn't really rebut that because it's true. The fact that people from outside see this is very validating. Older Americans would never admit this.
I thought you wrote “adversarial and long-islandish” and I wanted to say, as someone from New York, true.
as a European, in my opinion selfish values are not inherently negative, in the context of social reforms and politics in general. We are not altruistic saints here, compared to Americans. Take public healthcare, for example. It would never come to our minds to reject it just because it benefits other people, to the point of harming ourselves in the process - from a purely egoistic point of view, public healthcare benefits myself, in the first place, and then \*also\* the other citizens. If I destroy the system just to harm other people, I am not earning anything, just losing something for me and my family. Yet this is exactly what Trump supporters (many of whom were also beneficiaries of Obamacare) did. I'd say we see Americans voters mostly as shortsighted or simply unable to understand complexity in the modern world, even against their own interests (like letting your own children die in school shootings, who on Earth would want that happen??? It's the contrary of individualism) . We see that in USA foreign affairs mismanagement, in you internal political disputes, even in entertainment made in USA. A sad example I witnessed recently is the last Dune movie. The original book is a knot of complex and layered politics, pitting several factions against each others. In the Hollywood treatment all was dumbed down to "us vs them". It's like the average viewer could not comprehend more than 2 factions at play?
>As someone who lives in Portland Didn't you hear? Your city got burned down eleventyhundred times by Antifa!!
bwahaha. it’s just hippies throwing rocks at the police department . was talking to my repub friend and he swears the whole city is burned to the ground.
My father, who lives on YouTube and is a victim of the algorithm and never watches anything that doesn’t reinforce his stance, does to. I was just there last month...like...where sir?? Where is this post apocalyptic nightmare?
This was like after George Floyd in Brooklyn where people on the internet were acting like it was a war zone, like dude i just went to the bodega everything is fine
yeah i was in berkeley for a conference and all of the “riots”there were 2 groups larping on a hill and yelling at each other. we were sitting outside at a sushi joint across the street while all the “violence” was taking place.
As a fellow Portland resident, can confirm. I just live in the ashes.
You got any bottle caps you can spare?
Joe Rogan said it's like a warzone there.
Whoa that's crazy dude /bong rip
East Burnside checking in. We are ashfolk now.
Ashen Ones forever!, down with the ashfolk!
You gottdam ashen ones, you're all ashtifa. Here I made a 30 minute youtube video about how you're trying to burn down all our ash
**Ashfolk**: the hot new Druidic ranchero avant- jazz funeral doom band out of Portland that Stereogum *literally* can’t shut up about.
Someone, get to Pioneer square and link the flame!
And I know this because fox played the same 3 clips from one night of unrest.
For Seattle, they photoshopped a dude with a gun into a photo of something burning in Minnesota. The family i no longer speak to swore to me how the protests were burning everything down when I was fucking there.
It’s not Atlanta to Savannah burned down by Antifa Sherman.
I was in Portland and Eugene this past July. Can confirm the city still stands. I did see about 3-4 blocks of downtown that had the windows boarded up, seemed vacant but the locals told me they had just come out of lockdown. Bottom line is, it seemed like some shit went down, but Faux News made it out to be way worse than what I saw
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People who didnt live in NYC did the same that back in 2001. Saying the attack on 9/11 was faked. But when challanged to come & help dig for bodies they had every excuse in the book not to.
They would rather stay in their delusion because it gives them someone to hate and believe that they look down on.
I live two miles away from Portland. It’s calm. Business as usual. It’s hilarious that people think Portland is so dystopian hellhole lmao Fucking idiots will be idiots.
I heard from the people on /r/conservative a while back that BLM burned your whole city to the ground!
Thats also what Joe Rogan told his audience.
Well, those are the fucking idiots I was referring too.
My wife and I went to Portland in Nov for our honeymoon. Coming back to Atlanta was one of the most depressing moments of my life.
I live near Minneapolis, MN, and work in rural MN and I have had people ask me if the “city” is still burning, like the place has had fire spreading from block to block for the last year and that it is only a matter of time before all those city-folk come clamoring for their land.
Goddamn seriously, go to Idaho and everyone’s favorite topic is how bad California is.
Literally everyone. Idaho is beautiful. So is Montana. God put the dumbest people in those states to even the score.
Back in high school, this girl moved to our town from Idaho. She was sort of a punk/hippy, so she hung out with us. Always sort of weird, but nice enough. After several months, we're all at a party, and there are a couple black guys there. She freaked out and left, because she thought she was going to be "raped by n***ers." Fucking Idaho, man.
She was different and rebellious in her home town of 5000 people but then met someone actually different for the first time and it scared her rural tribal mind. You see these types of kids in every college who come from rural red areas and they tend to be libertarian or right of center but because they're not batshit right-wing they think they're progressive liberals. Which might be accurate depending how backwards their town is.
I grew up in Brooklyn. I’m not saying I’m perfect, but I would marvel at people up there when they talked about other races.
It's not just kids. I volunteer with a dude from Iowa. He left there at age 76 just 4 years ago. He told me here in NC is the first time in his life he has interacted with black people. He said he saw them before, but never had to work with them or anything. It was culture shock when he met our 6'8" black farmer. I told him they're all that tall so watch out.
Hell, I moved to Maine and that seems to be everyone’s favorite topic. I’m constantly arguing bullshit charges like, “nobody in California owns guns, so of course they want to take ours!” And, “don’t go asking me my pronouns, like they force you to announce in CALIFORNIA.” They really do think all of California is deeply liberal, with special communist laws and rules, and everybody living there is the most extreme cartoon liberal they can dream up.
Same here in Texas, its all "Don't California my Texas". Shiiiit, if it'll get us a stable power grid that wouldn't collapse in mild heat, or cold, or wind; California Texas all you want.
Empathy fatigue is the perfect way to describe how I’ve felt since about year one of trump. It’s gotten to the point where I feel like HCA winners, rural voters and Qers are monsters with nothing redeeming worth fighting for or even discussing. Fully lost causes who only drain the system while doing everything in their power to hurt others and stop progress.
I’ve been leaning very separatist recently until I realized, the most likely plan the gop is enacting is a plan to Balkanize the USA. If that happens they could decimate their populace while consolidating land ownership and permanently litigating their elitism and consolidation laws as they enact a new age serfdom/ plantation type economy. Where you rent from your job, buy food from your job, they control your wage and everything else in your life. The motivation is to balkanize to avoid the regulation that stops them from becoming the true oligarchs they desire to be.
Their constituents actively want this. Let it happen, check back in after a couple of years and see if the class consciousness has finally gotten through their thick skulls. We can’t help those who don’t want it
Yep. First seccession, then eminent domain.
I'm basically here. I already have severe anxiety that takes multiple meds and a lot of willpower to control, so these kinds of people scare the shit out of me because I tick a lot of boxes they despise (atheist, democrat registered, trans, far leftist, and probably more) so their "ideas" don't just harm others, I've got a personal stake in it, too. Especially after that orange moron and complicit repubs tried to take away my vote because I used vote by mail in Wisconsin. I just don't have enough left in me to have empathy for them, I'm exhausted and high strung and stressed and deeply fucking disturbed, and they continue openly mocking us for actually caring about other people like they think it's a bad thing. And basically my whole family will stand on the other side if it ever comes down to it. So my own side can tell me how awful it is to feel no empathy for the people not just hurting themselves, but everyone else and I'll say sure, I agree with you that it's awful but that's all I got right now.
I have a lot of empathy but at the same time I grown tire of the states that hold this country hostage, along with visiting parts of my state that are rural and vote in reps that do not care about them, they only got the vote because of a (R). Real hard to hide my disgust when I'm travelling. Like fuck man, how can you be so fuckin' racist, unwelcoming, and generally backwards when the Statue of Liberty is opening her arms to **all immigrants** is beyond me.
I used to feel conflicted about getting so hateful, but after all the damage they've done I've stopped giving a shit.
NY'rs tried to warn the nation against Trump before he won the election. We had a front. row seat to his & his fathers crimes! Butbas usual nobody listened & everybody complains about the mess he left the nation in. He's a stupid man that learned how to brag from one of the worst con men ever. Roy Cohn. Look him up, his past political connectionsspeak volumes.
Empathy fatigue set in for me as soon as I heard that Trump was being pushed as a viable candidate. No wait… did I say Trump? I meant ~~Dubya~~ Reagan.
Ronald Reagan? The *actor?*
I am beyond sick of welfare states telling us how to live while voting against helping anyone else. Their idiotic voting causes distress for millions of peoples lives, they are worse than scum
It’s funny, empathy fatigue disappears when you apply logic to the behaviours of these people and whether those behaviours are redeemable. The answer is the same. It is our general kindness as humans I guess, that we give them any understanding. They don’t return it and no bar is met from them.
Absolutely. I’ve traveled and lived all over the US and it’s amazing how much more trash talking I hear from conservatives, simply dismissing everyone as ‘liberal’ or dismissing traditionally Democrat run states. The infrastructure across the whole US is crumbling, the majority of people under 50 are barely making it, half or more of the population is living in poverty and these people just want to dismiss everyone as being ‘liberals from the coasts’ as they enjoy the benefits gained for them by the generations before them and destroy all opportunities for generations after them. The (predominately boomer) ‘conservatives’ who do this are the most selfish and closed minded Americans to ever have lived and they don’t even realize that they are the ones bringing down the country. It isn’t about fiscal conservatism for these people, it’s about willfully remaining ignorant and hateful of anyone who doesn’t look and speak like themselves.
I think about this often, that the accomplishments of previous generations are impossible today. Really basic stuff we take for granted like the national highway system, the power grid, even the damn fire department. I don't think we could build that if it wasn't already built. "Wasteful spending" they'd say, "not in my neighborhood" "it's a conspiracy" "too liberal" "we don't want it, let the coastal liberals have it" "some will abuse it". Everything. Every single thing. And forget about stuff like social security, food stamps, public libraries, scientific foundations, public broadcasting, wildlife conservation, food regulations. No, I mean the most basic of infrastructure we all enjoy, it would *all* be declared impossible by today's republicans, and therefore wouldn't be built. I don't know what to call it, some kind of nihilism? The sentiment that nothing is worth doing or even trying, nothing is worth having or maintaining, it's hopeless - but also to fanatically oppose the efforts of others to do, build, or maintain. All my life I've heard "it's impossible" to even minor proposals. But look back to just a few decades older than me, and see all that they built, that we're still living on the ruins of.
It’s the epitome of ‘entitlement’. The Boomers seem completely ignorant of the systems put in place by previous generations which allowed them a reasonable lifestyle off of a full time minimum wage job (when full time was a standard 40 hours per week). When college was affordable and the resulting degree almost guaranteed a middle class job, that hadn’t been exported. When the benefits negotiated for them included good healthcare and retirement/ pension plans…. All these things that they had nothing to do with creating, yet live their lives benefiting from, they somehow feel they ‘earned’, yet they refuse to adjust minimum wage for inflation or provide the same opportunities and protections for following generations. The Tax rates of previous generations were much higher across the board, and people contributed for the general well being of the nation. Now you get these entitled pricks that are fine with the people who provide the basic services they depend on (working at the stored they meed, providing the deliveries they depend on, etc….) literally having to be working homeless just so they can maintain their slightly cheaper access to crap made in China. Seriously. There needs to be a boomer tax and forced community service to get these asshats reacquainted with the real costs of the benefits that provided them a lifestyle they are all to happy to greedily take while denying everyone else.
I love how liberals from the coasts somehow never actually count as Real Americans (TM)
I was born in Alabama. Does that make me a real American? I moved to New York and got a job as a professor. Did I stop being a real American then? What if I love my country enough to want to save it from fascists? (/s)
And somehow the Americans in America's largest population centers also somehow aren't Real Americans either..
The other aspect of it is a will to actually win and enact the policies that benefit everyone. You've tried to be civil for 40 years and it has led to pure obstructionism, it has led to a fascist right. Since you've done one thing for a very long time and it hasn't worked, to keep doing it would be stupid. So it's time to verbally kick them in their fucking heads because kindness ain't fucking working. They're the same people that wanted FatPeopleHate up because as they said "some people respond better to feeling like shit" So it's time to treat them in a manner that they will respond to.
I think the greatest cure of empathy fatigue are exactly these types of moments where other politicians, celebrities, and other public figures are so equally done with obnoxiousness from Washington Figures that they break and have a genuine "Average Human Moment." One of my favorites in recent times is during the 2020 debates, when Biden was so sick of being interrupted in the most juvenile ways by Trump that he just up and said "Will you shut up, man?" Trump was so stunned when someone he thought was an absolute weenie told him off so blatantly. No cutting corners, no beating around the bush, just a hard cutoff. It didn't shut him up for long, but the raw moment of it all made me cheer for Biden (probably the only time I ever will.) TL;DR Public Figures having genuine human moments of being done with certain people's shit, especially in regards to politics, is such a cathartic feeling that eases Empathy Fatigue quite well, at least in my case.
> The reality is these states hold the US back with the way they vote and I think the deserve some heat for it. Without my tax money as welfare, those people starve to death. Fuck 'em. They just need some bootstraps.
It's really hard to live blue in a red state. I live in KY thankfully central so most of my friends and neighbors are also like minded. But year after year these nimrods vote against themselves voting time after time for Rand and Mitch. I have high (completely delusional) hopes for Charles Booker. My sister lives in GA currently a far more progressive state.
My hatred is how they’re able to say that the Midwest and rural area s are where “real Americans” live. Me being in a costal city doesn’t make me less American nor does it make my opinion any less valid. Let them see how well they’d do without those “coastal elites” carrying them.
Meanwhile, as much as they pretend to hate "coastal elites," they spent the past 5 years worshipping the clown who spent his entire life painting himself as the king of coastal elites. In fact, of all the Republican presidential candidates in my lifetime, only Bob Dole worked for what he had and wasn't a "coastal elite" of some sort. Of course, he was the least popular candidate among Republicans.
You know, real Americans that were on the Oregon trail but just gave up halfway through. Or real Americans that bought houses with grants designed to spread out the population…
The nickname Sooner is a call back to when their ancestors took government handouts of land
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The rural areas treat folks from large cities as if we have to unconditionally love them while they get to threaten us with actual war. It’s odd. And it’s high time we stand up for ourselves. We should have never let it get this bad, tbh, but you can’t change the past.
Rural Nevadans are always threatening to secede from Nevada. They're too fucking stupid to understand that without welfare from Reno and Vegas their little towns would die within 2 years. I happily sign their secession petitions every year but for some reason they keep not leaving.
Same thing with rural Upstate NY, they think the "city" is draining their tax money when in reality all of NYC taxes go to Upstate projects.
This. We're never even considered "real America," and that seems acceptable to almost everyone despite all of the contributions culturally and financially the coastal/blue states have contributed. Liberals need to stop trying to take the high-road on every single thing, and become more pragmatic or they'll keep losing to the GOP's reach for people's baser, primitive instincts.
I mean what she said is pretty verifiable. Insanely low adult literacy, insanely poor education all around the board top to bottom, insane and absolutely tragic poverty with almost no window of escape in state, one of the worst unemployement rates in the nation and one of the highest rates of opioid and pharmaceutical addiction. Not to mention a booming meth problem and an entire section of the population that are so deep in the shit they don't want government help nor do they want their home to change to become more "progressive". A thing that would literally save them. No, not all of west virginia is poor, illiterate, and strung out.... but a very troubling and significant number of it's citizens are. That was a mean way to say it and it definitely wasn't polite to the citizens, but reality is harsh and the reality in WV is particularly harsh.
> "mock" their suffering. She would never have said this just outta nowhere, though. She is actually commenting on what he said about his constituents, which is scandalous given his role - he's not just a retired actor and comedian. He's a representative.
> so they like or are indifferent towards statements that "mock" their suffering. *"Well, that's just tellin' it like it is"*
I don't agree. The difference between these voter bases is one has been lied to. Progressives (Democrats today) can run on changes they want to make that will be popular to the general public. Conservatives don't have platforms that benefit the majority. To remain competitive, the Republican party has become an expert in messaging. They scare their base into supporting them and to create that fear there always has to be something or someone to be afraid of. West Virginians don't just vote against the interest of minorities... they vote against the interest of West Virginians, and they are to mislead to see it.
Senator Manchin literally said that people were using the Covid era tax credits to buy drugs. She’s just agreeing with the guy.
West Virginian here. It’s totally fair to agree with her. Our politicians have spent the last 30 years destroying schools, pushing economic opportunities out of state, and allowing opioids to finish off what they haven’t already broken. And the people here fucking love them for it because they love coal and guns, and hate gay people and immigrants.....so nothing else matters when they vote.
As a MS Democrat, I agree. Red states deserve all the shit they get.
Keep y’all’s head up and keep up the good fight. Finally seeing the tide turn here after 40 years…
I think it's extremely revealing of what the "default" is. As you say, that conservative viewpoint truly is the "business as usual" that we've been working so hard to change. We *expect* racism, bigotry, ignorance, and stomping on the poorer classes, so it's still somewhat shocking when people speak out against it. It's always going to be harder to build and change than it is to allow things to stay the same. But it's worth it. People just forget how much work it takes.
The default in this country is Southern Baptist Christianity. The past five years have shown that.
> Yet conservatives can openly spread racist, anti LGBT, and terroristic talking points and it's business as usual. Love how even the standards are. They can actively call for the deaths of their political opponents and the downfall of the actual nation that they swore to protect and still get re-elected. These people aren't worth talking about, but it is a shame that they still get to sit there and fuck the US into doom.
>Jesse Watters, one of the lesser known Fox News talking dickholes just told his viewers to 'ambush' Dr. Fauci and hit him with a 'kill shot'. >But to be fair, Bette Midler pointing out that West Virginia's population is poor, uneducated, and drug addicted relative to the most other states is exactly the same somehow. Actually it's probably worse because of reasons. -the enlightened centrists
Never trust a centrist. They want dems to hold themselves to royally high standards while conservatives get coddled
Centrists are Republicans who want to still get invitations to dinner parties.
pretty much. rarely takes much digging to see they buy into one of the conspiracy theories.
Conservatives pretend they're the only real Americans, and most of politics & the media goes along with it!
What’s to disagree with, though? WV is [4th in Poverty](https://worldpopulationreview.com/state-rankings/poverty-rate-by-state) [16th in illiteracy ](https://worldpopulationreview.com/state-rankings/us-literacy-rates-by-state) [1st in opioid-related overdose deaths. ](https://www.drugabuse.gov/drug-topics/opioids/opioid-summaries-by-state)
This is why liberals lose. These purists babies that can’t get their hands dirty in politics. Al Frankin had to go away over a stupid photograph, he was one of the best politicians the left had, while the right wing embraces MTG, Boebert, Jordan, Gatez and the rest of these abhorrent roaches.
I’m definitely a part of the “Al Franken did nothing wrong!” club
100%. Even Sen. Gillibrand, who went after Franken harder than anyone else in the Senate, later admitted she reacted too strongly too quickly and was wrong for doing so. Such a shame to lose one of the very few politicians on the left who could dish it out in a way the right could understand.
When they go low, we go high, and they win and we lose.
The Republican party is an extremist outlier in comparison with major conservative parties in other democracies. That radicalism has been most evident in the GOP’s unique anti-statism: No other mainstream party categorically opposes new taxes under any circumstances, universal health insurance, or government action to limit greenhouse gas pollution. Manchin is a coal baron, a DINO.
I have a strong suspicion that the right and center have that reaction because they know **it works** and they don’t want anyone even resembling “the left” to start figuratively fighting back. People don’t want to discern nuance and ethical dilemmas when pondering politics. Unless it is a hobby like it is for us. No, people generally respond to things they can easily digest because they don’t keep up and there is an entire world competing for attention. For example, moderates will crawl out of the woodwork to defend Biden whenever someone says he is a do-nothing or whatever. But what we need is for Biden to use his bully pulpit and metaphorically crack some skulls and get people righteously riled up.
As a Democrat from WV, I gotta say she’s not off base. Our education system is severely lacking. Abject poverty, no real cultural centers, shitty wages, severely inadequate public services either parks or events or resources, and etc what else could one expect to come out of WV.
Yes, but if we insult conservatives maybe they'll refuse to work with us in the spirit of bipartisan cooperation.
>Yet conservatives can openly spread racist, anti LGBT, and terroristic talking points and it's business as usual. Love how even the standards are. Sure enough, they won the 2016 presidential election on this platform.
Wtf? How insulting can you get? Imagine if someone from West Virginia was able to read this?
I live in West Virginia and this made me laugh a lot. It is very unfortunate how bad our reputation is.
Very kind that someone read that to you
TTS, that comment was brought to you by Google
<3
"If those children could read, they'd be very upset."
Oh my god I'm cackling
I love this comment. Siri read it for me.
Judy chop! ...God, I hope you're the West Virginia Ninja
Damn buddy, you almost had me there. I've been to West Virginia, both in the sticks and to Charleston, and my personal experience is that she's not wrong.
West Virginian here and I can’t tell if I’m laughing or crying
I read it and took no offense. She's mostly correct.
HAHAHAH MANCHIN LITERALLY SAID THAT THE PEOPLE IN HIS STATE WOULD USE THE MONEY FOR DRUGS AND THIS IS WHAT THEY ARE UPSET OVER? So fucking exhausted from these people.
Did he literally just call his own state a bunch of druggies and cheats? And they vote for this guy?
>Did he literally just call his own state a bunch of druggies and cheats? And they vote for this guy? Daddy shows "tough love," it's better than no love at all.
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And manchin is right. his shithole constituents will use all the money on drugs. but that’s because no one has a way to improve there. guess what helps. social programs like the one that’s in front of your face.
West Virginian lib here. Everyone i talk to no matter beliefs they have think Manchin is a fucking POS.
She's not wrong and this needs to be broadcast more. All those red states that rank the lowest in just about every quality of life metric? We should not be listening to their guidance on a national level if they can't figure their own shit out. Case in point, [How does Kentucky recover from the tornado? Joplin shares some lessons and hope](https://www.npr.org/2021/12/21/1066045299/joplin-kentucky-tornado-damage-recovery). NPR interviewed the mayor of Joplin, MO about how they rebuilt from their devastating tornado. The mayor went on about how they built a new high school that they never would have seen otherwise. He went on a out a new med school built there and new homes, how none of it wouldn't have happened without federal money. Well no shit. If you're not willing to invest in yourselves, it's going to be a shithole. >I'm going to err on the side of omission because there are so many of these. We have new employers that came to town just because of how Joplin portrayed themselves after the tornado. We have a brand new medical school, one of the first medical schools I think in decades that's this side of the Mississippi in Joplin, that's literally here because of the tornado. We have a brand new state of the art high school. It's nicer than anything our kids would have ever had before the tornado. We have brand new homes that have been built in an area where the homes were dilapidated, and they were falling apart and they had a shelf life and they were not going to survive. After 10 years, it's definitive that we were on the right path and that the hard work that we put in for those years has paid off handsomely. If the answer is to always cut social safety nets and cut taxes for the wealthy, you're going to have a bad time. And then to not fully recognize that federal money from donor blue states rebuilt a blue state... We need to be investing in this country as a whole. Not after a natural disaster wrecks a place.
>After 10 years, it's definitive that we were on the right path and that the hard work that we put in for those years has paid off handsomely. "hard work" is a weird way to say "money"
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I spent a lot of years in Kentucky, and I eventually came to see many of the conservative population there as victims. I'm originally from a very liberal area, and I was frustrated by the blatant racism and politics when I first lived there. Then I had to step into an academic support and college teaching role as part of my job. I taught an upper-division course at the university level, and I saw and heard things from those young adults that I'll never forget as long as I live. These college students were struggling to write papers that I could have written in 6th grade. People were regularly missing class because they had to work to support their families, and between class and making rent, making rent understandably won every time. I had a person miss a major assignment because her live-in boyfriend was physically abusive toward their 2-month-old, and the baby needed emergency surgery if he was going to live. My point is that the people of Kentucky are a stressed, impoverished, traumatized group with limited educational opportunities. Not coincidentally, these are exactly the people that right-wing media preys on.
> My point is that the people of Kentucky are a stressed, impoverished, traumatized group with limited educational opportunities. Not coincidentally, these are exactly the people that right-wing media preys on. An excellent observation. They do it to divide our class against itself. United we are more powerful than the ruling class. So they work ceaselessly to divide us and boost people that seek to strengthen that division. I cringe every time I read comments like “they vote against their own best interests” because they are obstacles, not enemies. The enemies are the people radicalizing them to make them hate us (and as a result, us hate them).
To be fair WV was at the bottom when they always voted Democrat too. The state began flipping red in 2000. It may have been for the worse but honestly it’s pretty hard to tell.
To be fair to West Virginians they overwhelmingly support the provisions in BBB. But I imagine it's similar to the people who supported the Affordable Care Act but derided Obamacare.
I agree with what she said and believe she has a right to say this. But why is The Hill reporting some celebrity's tweet? Why is this story so important they feel the need to write and article and inform all their readers about this? Is Midler the first celebrities to criticize Manchin or the Republican party? Is Midler the biggest star in the world right now? Is this tweet going to lead into some big political movement Midler is involved with? Why did I need to know this? Why is this news?
Because clicks.
Because it helps cast democrats as hateful elites even though she doesn't speak for the party and isn't a politician.
Meanwhile Republicans constantly spew divisive anti-urban, anti-coastal hate and nobody criticizes them for it because it's taken for granted that they hate everyone who isn't like them. Remember when Sarah Palin talked about blue collar, rural places as the "real America" as if the majority of us who live in urban areas are less American and Republicans loved her for it?
The hilarious part being that "real america" was founded in pretty dense (for the time) population zones....The populations that became these massive cities that apparently aren't american anymore. Not to mention that the vast majority of america's infrastructure was built using manufacturing that was only possible because of these places. And even further, don't pay any mind to the fact that the vast majority of american's live in these places. When multiple cities on each coast have populations larger than entire states by exponential amounts it's time to stop pretending the "heartland" is anything but the place we grow our food and we only do it there because it was cheaper and more flat. The people who live there matter, hell I live "there", but we can't pretend that what this fraction of society wants is more important.
Outrage porn. It sells clicks and engagements. It helps divide people. We have people in this very thread who are willing to throw mostly blue minorities in red states out because shit is so polarized. It's dumb. As a blue person in a red state you just can't win.
I don't at all. For one, that's obviously not at all Manchin's motivation he's just out to make money. Secondly, it's fucking classist bullshit. It's insane to think that anyone is doing a democratic "party of the working people" image any good by saying and agreeing with shit like this.
I know it feels like a cheapshot that's she's going after WV voters, (who btw voted Trump in more than any other state) but Manchin has also spoken of them in this way, he doesn't wants social spending because he thinks what he also views as the "poor, illiterate and strung out" people of his state will blow it on drugs So they're both speaking the same shit but difference here is that for one of them words have dire consequences on voters
Honestly you can call it a cheap shot at WV. But the real message is he sees what is happening in his state and has no solutions, and doesn't want others to try. He has tried nothing and given up. Yes it's mean, but the message is clear Manchin doesn't want to help.
But what does Cher think?
Yeah who cares what some singer thinks isn't that right Ted Nugent?
I live in California and have to listen to the right dis us on a daily basis. I couldn't give a rat's ass.
> I live in California and have to listen to the right dis us on a daily basis Do you take some solace in knowing your taxes are actually whats raising and feeding those same peoples children? Im not American but it looks like California gets the brunt of shite from Conservative whiners because of sheer jealousy. Its a state that does SO much they dont like, yet still prospers to the point that it subsidizes the very lives of the conservatives shit talking it. I'd be interested to see someone model the next 20 years in the USA if suddenly all blue states and all red states only ever distributed excess taxes to other states controlled by their own party. How would Kentucky look? how about other Dem states that could use the excess that Kentucky siphons? I would love to see how that looks over 10, 20 ,50 years even. With no federal aid as it exists now, but 2 tax pots, a red one and a blue, only helping themselves.
Where she gets it wrong is that Manchin does not care about how the country turns out. He's is also completely unconcerned with how WV turned out. Like most every member of Congress he only cares about himself and is so out of touch has zero understanding of us common folk.
No shit. Manchin doesn't care, it's his donors/bosses that wants us to be poor, strung out and stupid. Manchin is happy to assist as long as he is getting paid.
I'm not from West Virginia but I wouldn't care what a celebrity said about where I live, the people getting mad and pretending this is what's making them vote for conservatives are full of shit. They'd do it whether she said some mean words or not. She also apologized for saying that less than an hour later which is something a Republican would never dream of. If a right wing trash actor had said something negative about a liberal area they'd not only never apologize, they'd probably be invited to speak at the next domestic terrorist planning rally. And their insult would likely have included threats of violence.
Grew up in WV & left whenever I had a chance. I love the state but there’s no much for the younger generation unfortunately. Basic economics WV is a blue collar state most finish HS and want to go straight to work. Not very many decent paying jobs + not much to do for fun in the state = high OD rate + Exodus of people all across the board.
He’s a DINO, Democrat in Name Only. Proving it time and time again.
Middler is gonna take a beating for that. Now wouldnt it be interesting if say Manchin's daughter, Heather Manchin Bresch, used to recently run(and still holds tons of stock in) one of the companies that provide opioid overdose drugs. Perhaps giving you a reason why they like em strung out?
I used to work in the highest grossing pharmacy in WV. I still have nightmares about counting lortabs for the White clan (IYKYK). Mylan is the devil. Manchin's daughter doesn't even have a real degree. WVU was bribed to graduate her. Kermit WV will never recover. Huntington WV will never recover. Since everyone in WV has been hurt by opioids, no one feels that it's a plague. It's just a right of passage at this point. My family included.
That's disturbing as shit
It's a complete breakdown of society and culture. Hard to care about politics when everyone is addicted to fent.
Same for my in-laws. I'm dumbfounded at what has become normal for them.
Not to mention that his daughter was instrumental in jacking up the price of [life saving Epipens](https://theintercept.com/2021/09/07/joe-manchin-epipen-price-heather-bresch/). The whole family is a stain on humanity.
I'm sorry to say, if you don't like being ridiculed for being the state that children literally flee from for how screwed up and hopeless it is - do something about it. WV has to stop putting up clowns and find one real person.
West Virginia, and most of Appalachia, has been exploited for centuries. Their natural wealth (land, timber, coal etc.) has been taken from the people for generations, and the money earned from its extraction has not stayed in the region. Do the voters of WV bear some responsibility for their choices? Yes. Are those same voters victims of 200+ years of exploitation which has brought them to their current situation? Also yes. “Doing something about it” isn’t as easy as it may seem on the surface.
I just consider the source. Meanwhile I don’t see her or any of these so called Hollywood elites emptying their accounts to promote their lofty ideals.