I saw all the doom and gloom tweets, but didn't realize most of the cause boils down to policy decisions. Call your elected officials and tell them you don't want to die an avoidable early death.
And this "states vs federal" power struggle in America (not my country) basically guarantees that there will be variance across states. The division of powers made sense in the old days, but in today's day and age it's crazy that there are not more standards set across the board at the federal level.
It's not my battle to fight, but it is depressing to see America squander so many opportunities to make things better.
> If state standards aren’t allowed and California wants tougher environmental standards on California land, but Texas doesn’t, you force a showdown, a loser, and simmering resentment for decades.
Federal standards are in the interest of all citizens, whether or not they frustrate some state politician or not shouldn't even count as an objection.
I don't care if the Texas government is happy, but I do care if the people in Texas are healthy. Maybe that's just me though.
Going one level higher up the chain doesn’t gain anything other than further separating people from policy makers.
The problem is that people in the 21st century still feel bound by an 18th century agreement. I guess the alternative is another civil war, so that might be why the agreement lasts, no matter how shaky and dubious.
"Haha guys look at the poor dumb hicks who don't know what's best for them"
That seems to be the identity of the modern south, various flavors of denial and defiance. Those who defy the stereotype tend to leave, or cluster in/around the better developed urban areas. I've met a lot of awesome people who immigrated from the south, but not many living there outside of a major metro.
The South has educational problems, lack of opportunities, a lot of poverty, health problems, and different cultural values when compared with the rest of the country. This is a fact, it’s not a “yikes” to state this.
It’s not entirely willful, but it’s also not a completely unavoidable state of affairs either. A lot of it is cultural - when you’re in that environment, it’s normal to you. But at the same time, the people making up the culture as a whole are not helpless individuals incapable of understanding things like diabetes or obesity
My experiences are just anecdotal evidence that supports the objective stats.
Respect is earned, and sometimes, when lots of people tell you you're wrong, it's useful to have the humility to consider they might be right.
The South ties its wagon to the wrong horse year in and year out. No one forces them to do that.
Fixating on the patronizing tone is exactly the type of error that gets these outcomes.
No, this is largely a myth. [0]
[0]: https://mises.org/wire/no-red-state-economies-dont-depend-gr...
Or is this a, “because the coasts are patronizing, we don’t need to discuss these issues.”
Seems like the latter to me but I’d be interested to hear if it’s the former.
Cultures do change themselves over time, but it may be painfully slow, and sometimes they don't change.
I'm not condescending or judging. We're all human biologically, and culture is not a simple matter of individual responsibility, it's a collective and historical phenomenon. Individuals may be able to rise above their culture, but in some cases the path can be longer and steeper. Would I be the same person if I were born in a different place? If I were born in a different time? Of course not. We've all been shaped by our culture.
In any case, it's difficult to help when relevant help is rejected, e.g., ACA subsidies. Moreover, there's an underlying conflict of values and even religion that pervades the politics, seeping into seemingly unrelated issues such as health and economics, and undermining the possibility of agreement or compromise. It's difficult to be kind, sympathetic, understanding, patient with someone when that someone goes out of their way to try to take away civil rights that you care deeply about. At a certain point, you need to fall back to self-preservation.
I have never heard any proposal from the patronizing coastal elites to cut off funding for Southern welfare states.
. . .
We can factually and objectively demonstrate how the south is lagging. This isn't some moralistic "lol those dumb hayseeds wear shitty clothes", there is a measurable, concrete divide in things like healthcare and scholastic outcomes.
People are dying early, considerably so. dying Child mortality is notable higher. Standardized test scores are just lower, and by non-trivial numbers.
Of course everyone knows this, but grace and empathy is much harder than condescension and schadenfreude.
I doubt that anyone is innocent of condescension.
Here's an article about "No-Respect Politics" from 20 years ago: https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/opinions/2002/07/26/n...
"But they started it" "They do it too" "They are meaner"
'They they they' is the problem.
You're using quotes, but I said none of those things.
> 'They they they' is the problem.
The problem is as vaidhy suggested. You said grace and empathy is much harder than condescension and schadenfreude, but it becomes even harder when grace and empathy are met in return with condescension and schadenfreude. If you're acting in good faith, how much can you stand to be humiliated? It takes two sides to come to the table. Trust must be built mutually. Otherwise it's like talking to a brick wall.
Furthermore, a lot of this is an explicit problem. Poverty is high in the south and poverty correlates strongly with less access to healthcare, or healthcare avoidance to avoid the cost.
The South obviously has a unhealthy diet, but the inner cities are dramatically poorer than blue state cities with even more crime to match (St. Louis in particular). It's not a blue/red thing. It's more income and culture driven.
I disagree with that.
[0]https://twitter.com/Eric_Alterman/status/1634971075334508544
I don’t know many Louisianans working at FOX NEWS HQ in NYC…
I'm pretty sure they know that already.