Whitebread, Vermont

Jock-O-Rama on the brain,
Redneck-a-Thon drivin' me insane.
The future of America is in their hands,
Watch it roll over Niagara Falls

--Dead Kennedys, "Jock-O-Rama"

Last weekend, Annie and I took a road trip from Boston to northern Vermont and (briefly) Ayer's Cliff, Quebec to get her American work visa. The scenery was beautiful (except for the I90-to-I93 interchange), the conversation was enjoyable, and the border guards on both sides of the imaginary line were quite pleasant. Sure the American guards were heavily armed, but they seemed nice enough and I felt like it was pretty unlikely that they were going to shoot anyone. They were even relatively friendly to the two guys in the car behind us, one of whom was dressed in pyjamas and the other of whom looked like a skinhead, as they claimed that they visited "a couple of spots" in Quebec and were doing "nothing really" in the car that "belonged to this other guy's mom, I think, or something". I bet the border police even warmed up their hands before the cavity search.

For the most part, the trip was totally incident-free...well, unless you count the unplanned detour that took us 3/4 of the way to Hartford instead of back to Boston. Turns out it's a bad idea to fall asleep just before an important Interstate intersection when your girlfriend is driving. :) The only other bad part of this trip was lunch.

So around 12:30, we were getting really close to the border but needed to get gas. Since gas is cheaper in the US and I get paid the equivalent of $10/hour, we decided to stop in a tiny little town just off the highway. Actually "town" probably isn't the right word, since I didn't see any houses, just a couple of gas stations, a Ford dealership, the McDonald's, and a veterinary clinic that shared a building with a diner. We decided to eat at the only restaurant not directly attached to a place where they incinerate dead animals. We parked the car, Annie very happy about the prospects of a McChicken meal with a diet coke, me somewhat nervous about the health laws in a town that lets vet clinics and greasy-spoons cohabitate.

As soon as we walked into the lunch-rush-packed McBuilding, we both felt instantly uncomfortable. For Annie, I think it was because every other person in there was white and a lot of the kids were openly staring at her. For me, it was because a significant fraction of the people (males AND females) were wearing NASCAR jackets and/or NASCAR hats and were talking with what honestly sounded like Alabama accents. Even if I hadn't walked in holding hands with my Korean-Canadian girlfriend, this place would have freaked me out...I think I got almost as many stares for my spikey hair as she did for her straight black hair. Anyway, we both felt incredibly uncomfortable so we slammed down our McFood and got the hell out of there as quickly as possible.

Now, I should say that we didn't really feel any animosity or "we don't serve your kind here" vibes from these people. It was more like we were a spectacle, something that they never see, something different that didn't quite fit. And even though I'd never go back to that town, I think the experience was educational for me because now I think I understand a little bit about what makes a state "red" instead of "blue" (Republican vs. Democratic for the non-politcal-junkies).

I think towns like that one make up the majority of the population in the red states, and I'm sure that towns like that one don't make a lot of use of the Democrat checkbox on their voter registration forms. They're relatively isolated, homogenous, conservative...they know how things have always been, and are maybe a little bit afraid of things changing...ideas that go against their view of the world or how things should be makes them uncomfortable...they go to church (nothing wrong with that), listen to the minister (nothing wrong with that), and probably don't question anything that he or the President tells them (everything wrong with that). And right now in the United States, people like this make up slightly more than 50% of the country's population, so the direction of the country is in their hands.

The problem is that the world is a complicated, interconnected, rapidly changing, shades-of-grey kind of place. People may want things to stay the same forever, or for everyone to share their values or ideas of what's important for a country, but that's simply not possible anymore (if it ever was). Politicians that cater to voters like this may be able to win an election based on demographics, but when they implement policies or start wars that embody this way of thinking it sets the country back years or decades. I think that people in the red states and towns are hard-working, intelligent people who appreciate the truth...they just need leaders to stop treating them like children, and level with them about the future. Things will continue to change, everyone needs to adapt, the solutions aren't simple, and they're going to have to get used to seeing people that don't look like themselves at the McDonalds.

Well I was born in a small town,

And I can breathe in a small town.

Gonna die in this small town,

And that's probably where they'll bury me.

--John Mellencamp, "Small Town"