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Robo
Formerly Roboman, still
awesome
 
Join Date: Jul 2004
Location: Portland, OR
 
2014-11-30, 16:52

I've been meaning to make a post about the weird things I've noticed since moving to the Midwest, as a "coastal liberal elitist" person.

One of the things I've noticed the most is that people seem, in general, to be less used to dealing with lines in an efficient way. I've probably tweeted about this more than once, but it happens to me every time I get fast food: I get in line behind someone at the soda (sorry, pop) fountain, and they examine all the available options, and then pour a little bit of one, and then sample it, and then they dump it and try a different one, and then they fill their cup, and then they reach over and grab the lid and put it on their cup while they're still blocking the entire fountain, and then they grab a straw and then unwrap it and then put it in their drink, and then they suddenly become aware and they turn around and they're always, always, surprised to see that there is someone in line behind them.

Heaven help you if the restaurant has a Coke Freestyle machine.

The slower laid-back pace of life is what people say they always like about small towns, but there's a place for that and it's not in the line in front of the soda fountain. We aren't having some charming little personable small-town moment there, they're just being slow. Nobody in a big city is stunned to find people in line behind them, so you do what you need to do and move on. You unwrap your straws at the table.

Another thing that I've noticed is that, if you are a white guy like I am, people just assume that you're both Christian and Conservative. Random people, like customers in your check-out lane, will just start talking to you about about politics, and they'll say some fairly extreme things fully expecting you to agree with them and not even considering the possibility that you wouldn't. It's happened to me multiple times but it still feels a little surreal. In Vegas and Oregon people didn't just assume I was anything, Democrat or Republican, I guess because there's more diversity in larger cities. But there seems to be this weird assumption here that if you're white you're on "our side," and that liberalism is just something for brown people. The differences in political opinions between Oregon and the Midwest was something I knew about, of course, but I was still taken aback by how direct it all was. Like, there is literally no doubt in peoples' minds that I'll disagree with whatever they have to say, no matter how incendiary. It actually really bothered me for a while, like I was worried I was somehow giving off racisty vibes, but I eventually realized it was just election season in the Midwest. (My favorite was the lady who loudly declared that she was so incensed by socialized medicine, it almost made her want to move to Canada! And I was like, ohmigod, these people actually exist.)

In a similar vein, it's common to walk into a Taco Bell or Burger King and then notice that they're playing Christian praise & worship music (Sirius XM The Message is a particular favorite). And it's not like I turn into Atheist Hulk or melt like a witch or anything, but it just feels like something that would be unusual elsewhere that nobody bats an eye at here. It's not that everyone with an Burger King franchise in Oregon is a heathen or something, there's just more of an awareness of diversity and being neutral that isn't present here. Here everyone just assumes that you're Christian, unless you "look like a Muslim," and questions like "What church do you go to?" are common, because of course everyone goes to church. And customers in Nevada or Oregon never got offended when I wished them "happy holidays," but here people straight-up correct you. "NO. Merry CHRISTmas." It's just odd, like wishing everybody their own happy holiday is somehow biased, you have to specifically reaffirm the chosen faith of the majority to be "fair." (That it's rather impolite to tell others the "proper" way to wish you well never seems to occur to people; I always think "actually, now I don't hope you have a happy holiday, so I guess you've succeeded?")

Hmm, I didn't mean for this to be so political (and I didn't even get to the gay stuff!). Oh well. Merry Fucking Christmas, everyone.

and i guess i've known it all along / the truth is, you have to be soft to be strong
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