Much ado and outcry have been heard in the air in the wake of Obama’s comments about small town life. His comments, though, were not at all elitist; what he says is just dead wrong. Folk in small towns don’t cling to religion, guns, and hostility towards immigrants. Folk in small towns have precious little interest in religion. In our little town of about 3000 souls less than 300 attend any church anywhere. And how does one ‘cling to guns’? Finally, there’s no more hostility towards immigrants here than there is in New York or San Francisco.
What, then, do small town folk cling to in reaction to the dismal economy and in light of their gross disinterest in religion? They cling to meth, pot, ATV’s, and beer. Obama wasn’t wrong that folk in small town are disgruntled and despairing- he was simply wrong in what they turn to in order to escape.
Brian said,
April 13, 2008 at 9:51 am
You are right, Jim. It’s the same way out here at the South Rim of the Grand Canyon.
Drew said,
April 13, 2008 at 10:19 am
I think your observation is right. What Obama was trying to say is that when people are facing depressions and disorder in their lives, they will cling to political ideologies that provide order. These usually come in the form of personal property rights and very specific and absolute ethical norms.
But I concur, living in one of the small town areas in central PA that he is referring to, that cheap beer and and pot become the sources to more or less just numb the sense of disorder. The result is a combination of politics that is apathetic and an ethics that is “easy” - that does not raise more questions.
One of the panelists on Meet the Press this morning hit the nail on the head though. He said that Obama can’t be running for sociologist in chief and that is the error he makes with such statements. In William James’ words, the man in the street does not care about political and sociological analysis at all. They want to ensure that their property is protected and that the government will not rob them.
Obama on Small Town Depression from a Pennsylvanian’s View · Notes From Off-Center said,
April 13, 2008 at 10:46 am
[...] I commented on Jim West’s blog, with whose analysis I agree, what Obama was trying to say is that when people are facing [...]
Chuck Grantham said,
April 13, 2008 at 3:14 pm
You forgot the tv and the video game(s) plugged into it, Jim.
Another vicious cycles concerns drugs and jobs. There are jobs (albeit not huge paying ones) to be had, but I’ve seen whole groups of applicants not get their foot in the door because they can’t pass drug screening.
And around the merry-go-round goes around….
Esteban Vázquez said,
April 13, 2008 at 4:36 pm
I agree with this as well, and particularly of the point about religion: this was certainly my experience while being a minister in three consecutive small (Midwestern) towns some years ago.
Looney said,
April 13, 2008 at 10:59 pm
I thought small town folk were all couch potatoes clinging to sports and Oprah.
Have you done any surveys on the prevalence of bitterness in your town? I thought they were only bitter about Sherman’s march through Georgia.
Judy Redman said,
April 13, 2008 at 11:23 pm
I think there’s a big difference between clinging to religion, or more specifically, clinging to particular (conservative) religious beliefs and attending church. Two examples:
My aunt, who comes from good Irish Presbyterian stock but only attends church for weddings, funerals and baptisms, refused to attend her daughter’s wedding ceremony because she married a Catholic in a Catholic church. When I was a minister in a small country town, the person who felt the need to knock on my door and tell me that I was going against God’s will in being female and ordained was not a regular church attender but someone who had given up on the institutional church decades before. There were, of course, many people in town who were opposed to the ordination of women, but the regular church-goers didn’t feel the need to be offensive about it.
I would differentiate between “religion” and “faith”, although that may well not have been what Obama meant.