My recent trip to the land of unsweetened tea and grumpy service has led me to realize how proud I am to be a southerner. Sometimes I like to claim that I'm from Wisconsin, as I was born there, but recently I have warmed to the idea that I am a southerner at heart. I was raised in Alabama and Georgia, so I know well the reasons for your scoffs. However, though many take the redneck stereotype as the pinnacle of southern virtue, I see them more as court jesters than as having any real part in the formulation of southern pride.
I've also found that southern pride can't really be understood unless it has been lived. Unless you have been disgusted at someone's lack of pride in themselves and the work that they do, you may not understand why one should be proud in the first place. I encountered this in DC (at a "southern cooking" restaurant not less!). The server was a jerk, for one thing. On top of that, he had no pride in his work. Perhaps the excuse may be made that food service is nothing to be proud of (though I don't buy it), nevertheless, one should do one's work well and be proud to have done it.
Amen to that.
As I wrote in a previous post, Boston is the hub of exclusivity. I am afraid it is more spiteful than inspiring though.
P.S. An interesting bit on the origins of "the Seven Deadly Sins."
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