Americans or enemy states?
by digby
Here’s a funny little joke from a conservative legislator in Missouri
Due to the large number of jobs moving from California to Texas, Texas has compiled a “Californian to Texan” translation guide,” the post reads.
The 31 phrases on the list are:
California to Texas:
- Arsenal of Weapons – Gun Collection
- Delicate Wetlands – Swamp
- Undocumented Worker – Illegal Alien
- Cruelty-Free Materials – Synthetic Fiber
- Assault and Battery – Attitude Adjustment
- Heavily Armed – Well Protected
- Narrow-Minded – Righteous
- Taxes or Your Fair Share – Coerced Theft
- Commonsense Gun Control – Gun Confiscation Plot
- Illegal Hazardous Explosives – Fireworks for Stump Removal
- Nonviable Tissue Mass – Unborn Baby
- Equal Access to Opportunity – Socialism
- Multicultural Community – High Crime Area
- Fairness or Social Progress – Marxism
- Upper Class or “The Rich” – Self-Employed
- Progressive, Change – Big Government Scheme
- Homeless or Disadvantaged – Bums or Welfare Leeches
- Sniper Rifle – Scoped Deer Rifle
- Investment For The Future – Higher Taxes
- Heathcare Reform – Socialized Medicine
- Truants – Homeschoolers
- Victim or Oppressed – Criminal or Lazy Do-For-Nothing
- High Capacity Magazine – Standard Capacity Magazine
- Religious Zealot – Church-Going
- Reintroduced Wolves – Sheep and Deer Killers
- Fair Trade Coffee – Overpriced Yuppie Coffee
- Exploiters or “The Rich” – Employed or Land Owner
- The Gun Lobby – NRA Members
- Assault Weapon Fiscal Stimulus – Semi-Auto (Grandpas’s M1 Carbine)
- Same Sex Marriage – Legalized Perversion
- Mandated Eco-Friendly Lighting – Chinese Mercury-Laden Light Bulbs
As a Californian I don’t honestly find all of those to be offensively stereotypical toward me. For the most part, I don’t mind being mocked all that much for my sunny, kooky culture. But ask yourself what the reaction would be if a list like that came from me instead of a conservative. I would certainly be attacked from the right as bigoted — and also by many liberal Texans who would chastise me strongly for labeling Texas (and all of the South) with negative images.
I know there are rude liberals who think nothing of evoking Southern stereotypes and screaming “let ’em secede” and the like. But I think what differentiates between the right and left on this is that there is rarely any serious blowback from anyone against right wingers for tearing down liberals, while liberals even fight among themselves over the rightness of insulting conservatives.
I think maybe that’s because liberals are forced to acknowledge that their brethren live in every state (although it sometimes takes a southern liberal to get in their face about it), while conservatives seem to believe that blue states are foreign enemies.
See, to me the funny thing about this list is that the patron saint of every thing conservative, Ronald Reagan, was from California.
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