Reply #8: There's some fascinating history behind that [View All]

[RedLetterRev]

actually. I wasn't aware of a lot of it until I took up genealogy and started studying history a while back. A lot of that happened after the Civil War when the hillfolk -- most especially the southern hillfolk -- were rather ill-used by both sides as convenient cannon-fodder (does that sound familiar in modern-day terms, using the poorest to do the bidding of the more well-to-do?). When the hill-folk were trying to recover under the burdens of reparations, a few took to activities like selling 'shine to try to raise the money to pay the taxes so they wouldn't lose the land they'd held for generations.

The northern papers went wild with the stereotypes. Southern Appalachian people were categorically painted as slouching, criminal, slinking, stupid... well, you get it. These cartoonish figures were played up over and over until the images and terminology were made indelible in American vernacular -- like "kleenex".

Again, I'd highly recommend watching the PBS film "Prince of Dark Corners". It's fairly short and it's a great play. It shines a small light into that part of history and explains a little bit of why we have some of the images we do today.

Yeah, I'm a little bit of a history buff, but that's partly why I'm a thoroughgoing Dem :)