Definitely agree about the rural stereo types. Unfortunately, the stereotypical rural Americans are ones that get most coverage, in both left and right media.
I do have to admit, I had to check my own implicit biases and assumptions related to baseball-capped white men with southern accents talking about guns, for the first minute into …
Definitely agree about the rural stereo types. Unfortunately, the stereotypical rural Americans are ones that get most coverage, in both left and right media.
I do have to admit, I had to check my own implicit biases and assumptions related to baseball-capped white men with southern accents talking about guns, for the first minute into the video, but got over it quickly as I listened to what he was saying ;-)
Michelle, thanks for a hearty, good morning laugh. Baseball-capped white men with southern accents talking about guns indeed. I thought that might happen, so I tried to head it off, by typing in Beau's line about “oh yeah, the hillbilly gonna school the liberals.”
Michelle, before I moved to Kentucky, we lived on a ranch out west and held summer picnics on the greens beneath the elm forest. The kind of work my daughters and I do, keeps us connected to people in the cities. Every time one of our city friends came to our picnic for the first time was hysterically funny.
The city folk had never seen real working cowboys, let alone black cowboys or vaqueros. And all the baseball caps, long beards, tattoos, cowboy boots, and work boots, oh my. Their kids were excited by all the animals (adorable) and that helped. But they would huddle together at a table, trying not to stare, but too intrigued not to stare. We're country friendly and someone always took it upon themselves to help the city folk out of their discomfort.
The most fun of all, was watching our city friends when they discovered they were in a crowd with doctors, former gang members, teachers, NASA and aerospace engineers, homemakers, farmers, geologists, chemists, a couple ex-felons, ranchers, lawyers, physicists, Walmart clerks, professors, homicide detectives, activists, luthiers, wind turbine technicians and executives, business owners, waitresses, and men and women with years of military service and the rank to prove it.
Did you know, that one of the biggest groups of musicians anywhere, are scientists and engineers by day. Something about the mathematical mind and music go hand in hand). I've heard them say, music is the language of math.
Come sundown, we lit a fire and out came the instruments – banjos, cellos, guitars, violins (depending on the music, violins are also fiddles), mandolins, and traditional handmade drums. The storytellers would start telling stories, and oh how we love talking politics. In a crowd like that, judging a book by its cover is gonna make you a fool – and I don’t blame folks for setting people up when talking politics.
People stayed until the wee hours of the morning or grabbed a sleeping bag or blankets and stayed the night (underneath the stars).
During the BLM protests, Americans finally saw black cowboys. Apparently, city people had no idea they existed. I doubt city people have any idea vaqueros are still with us. Its impossible to imagine horses can even move that way, or riders can use ropes that way – awesome. When I was young, I was an endurance rider (Arabs). Those are long races, on treacherous ground, with no trails and I did my last ride down the east side of the Sierras and into the desert 20 years ago. Did you know that the largest desert in the world, runs from Mexico, through the western United States and up into Canada?
Here in Kentucky, Churchill Downs and Keeneland are near enough to visit now. Racing is a rich man’s sport, and the horse farms here are positively stunning, but the owners are importing people from Mexico and South America, cause there aren’t enough skilled horsemen here anymore. Same thing happened with sheepherding out west. If ranchers did not import sheepherders from Peru, there would be no more sheepherding in America. The Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show is famous, but you’ve never seen a working dog, til you’ve seen a sheepherder’s dog moving huge flocks across mountains that reach more than 8,000 feet into the sky.
Oh dear, I do go on. All I’m really trying to say, is thank you for keeping an open mind. In my heartfelt opinion, stereotyping people is how Donald Trump got himself elected. Trump played stereotypes like a fiddle.
Definitely agree about the rural stereo types. Unfortunately, the stereotypical rural Americans are ones that get most coverage, in both left and right media.
I do have to admit, I had to check my own implicit biases and assumptions related to baseball-capped white men with southern accents talking about guns, for the first minute into the video, but got over it quickly as I listened to what he was saying ;-)
Michelle, thanks for a hearty, good morning laugh. Baseball-capped white men with southern accents talking about guns indeed. I thought that might happen, so I tried to head it off, by typing in Beau's line about “oh yeah, the hillbilly gonna school the liberals.”
Michelle, before I moved to Kentucky, we lived on a ranch out west and held summer picnics on the greens beneath the elm forest. The kind of work my daughters and I do, keeps us connected to people in the cities. Every time one of our city friends came to our picnic for the first time was hysterically funny.
The city folk had never seen real working cowboys, let alone black cowboys or vaqueros. And all the baseball caps, long beards, tattoos, cowboy boots, and work boots, oh my. Their kids were excited by all the animals (adorable) and that helped. But they would huddle together at a table, trying not to stare, but too intrigued not to stare. We're country friendly and someone always took it upon themselves to help the city folk out of their discomfort.
The most fun of all, was watching our city friends when they discovered they were in a crowd with doctors, former gang members, teachers, NASA and aerospace engineers, homemakers, farmers, geologists, chemists, a couple ex-felons, ranchers, lawyers, physicists, Walmart clerks, professors, homicide detectives, activists, luthiers, wind turbine technicians and executives, business owners, waitresses, and men and women with years of military service and the rank to prove it.
Did you know, that one of the biggest groups of musicians anywhere, are scientists and engineers by day. Something about the mathematical mind and music go hand in hand). I've heard them say, music is the language of math.
Come sundown, we lit a fire and out came the instruments – banjos, cellos, guitars, violins (depending on the music, violins are also fiddles), mandolins, and traditional handmade drums. The storytellers would start telling stories, and oh how we love talking politics. In a crowd like that, judging a book by its cover is gonna make you a fool – and I don’t blame folks for setting people up when talking politics.
People stayed until the wee hours of the morning or grabbed a sleeping bag or blankets and stayed the night (underneath the stars).
During the BLM protests, Americans finally saw black cowboys. Apparently, city people had no idea they existed. I doubt city people have any idea vaqueros are still with us. Its impossible to imagine horses can even move that way, or riders can use ropes that way – awesome. When I was young, I was an endurance rider (Arabs). Those are long races, on treacherous ground, with no trails and I did my last ride down the east side of the Sierras and into the desert 20 years ago. Did you know that the largest desert in the world, runs from Mexico, through the western United States and up into Canada?
Here in Kentucky, Churchill Downs and Keeneland are near enough to visit now. Racing is a rich man’s sport, and the horse farms here are positively stunning, but the owners are importing people from Mexico and South America, cause there aren’t enough skilled horsemen here anymore. Same thing happened with sheepherding out west. If ranchers did not import sheepherders from Peru, there would be no more sheepherding in America. The Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show is famous, but you’ve never seen a working dog, til you’ve seen a sheepherder’s dog moving huge flocks across mountains that reach more than 8,000 feet into the sky.
Oh dear, I do go on. All I’m really trying to say, is thank you for keeping an open mind. In my heartfelt opinion, stereotyping people is how Donald Trump got himself elected. Trump played stereotypes like a fiddle.
I love this. Speaking of Black cowboys - https://domflemons.bandcamp.com/album/black-cowboys
Domm is a nice guy. He came to an annual folk festival before he moved away. I took his class on rhythm bones.
Okay, I am officially jealous.
Dave, if we'd lived in the same region, I'm sure you and I would have met.