On Being Midwestern: The Burden of Normality • Hacker News Board

Re: On Being Midwestern: The Burden of Normality

#61

Post by Veelox » Thu, Nov 16, 2017, 4:51 PM UTC

I grew up in the Midwest and moved to Silicon Valley. I think that people here don't understand what this author describes as "Midwestern history is a study in racial quarantine." I would go as far as to say that racial is the wrong word to describe what happens in the Midwest.

I think that communities in the Midwest have tighter cultural restrictions on what it means to be "one of us." This can be affected by where you live, where you work, where you go to church, where your kids go to school, what kind of car you drive, what you do for fun, how you dress, even how you talk. Midwesterners are happy to accept someone who matches them in all these areas regardless of skin color. This is why you get backlash from them when you call them racist because the criteria they use is not skin color its all the other stuff.

Yet on the other hand, most PoC in the Midwest have a culture that is different on most of the above. So when a white Midwesterner doesn't treat a black Midwesterner that speaks, dresses, even walks differently as a part of the community is it racism? I would say no since it isn't about race but is about culture. But on the other hand, when most white people do this to most black people, it sure does start to look like it.

This puts the Midwest in a really hard place because just about any white person can claim (truthfully) they are not being racist. Yet, the outcome of the collective actions of all of them end up with a pretty strong divide that is mostly along racial lines.

Does anyone have suggestions on how to fix this? One option would be to have the cultures integrate so there are not sub communities for PoC. This doesn't seem to have worked. But the other option is that you expect Midwesterners to treat people from outside their community the same as people inside their community. That isn't going to happen. So it seems like it is an impossible situation.

Re: On Being Midwestern: The Burden of Normality

#62

Post by losteverything » Thu, Nov 16, 2017, 4:52 PM UTC

Strahler and Strahler's college text charted how people like their own region and dont like others as much. Perceptions are strong

Having 50% midwestern life and 50% east coast, i size up the people first before i say im from (midwest state) or (eastern state).

Also, rent a car with same-state plates when you move into a new house from out of state. Most of your neighbors will make assumptions about you if the state plate is different. Once you get cars registered put on the new plates and return the rental.

Where are the new neighbors from?

"New York" "Montana" "Florida" "Massachusetts" "Iowa" "Utah" "California"

Pushy,outdoorsy,poor or old, liberal, farmers, Mormon, nutty

Re: On Being Midwestern: The Burden of Normality

#63

Post by ashark » Thu, Nov 16, 2017, 4:54 PM UTC

Veelox wrote: post #51

domparise wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Speaking also as a Midwesterner, I would disagree. I was born and raised in Michigan, and have not really left much other than to couch hop and envy the lives of my friends who've moved out to the coast. I feel that the contempt the author descends into is self-inflicted, and may representative of the culture and authors midwestern upbringing. From what I've observed, midwesterners are brutally humble, almost to a fa…

The part the I think was closest to the truth is that the Midwest does not have a strong collective culture like the East, South, West, or Southwest. They are much more likely to identify as part of their state or city more than the Midwest as a whole.

Part of it's the size of the area in which the inhabitants consider themselves Midwestern, and the lack of unifying landforms (a mountain range, an ocean) to give them common experiences, I think.

For instance, it seems like when the Midwestern region comes up[0], people usual mean the upper midwest and especially the Lakes states, which is weird to me as someone who's lived in Missouri, Oklahoma, Kansas, and Iowa, because down here we don't really mean to include Lakes states when we say "Midwestern". I mean, there's stuff there. Outdoors stuff. That's worth doing/seeing. That you can reach in less than one entire day of travel by car. Doesn't seem too Midwestern to me, or to have much to do with my experience of Midwesterness (I gather they'd disagree, which is my point). The Lakes states, including Minnesota and Michigan and at least the northern 1/3 of Illinois (and certainly anything East of Illinois) are a Western extension of the East from our perspective.

[0, EDIT] by which I mean when the region comes up in articles, or on the Internet generally.

Re: On Being Midwestern: The Burden of Normality

#64

Post by ph33t » Thu, Nov 16, 2017, 4:54 PM UTC

An observation ... just the fact that many here treat the "midwest" as one place in their comments speaks of maybe misunderstanding/ignorance or even arrogance. As a person who has lived in Wisconsin (suburban and rural), Minnesota (urban and suburban), and Chicago, there is an absolutely astounding difference in people, attitude, and culture in all 3 areas. Granted none are really like the east or west coasts, but they are all vastly different places to live.

Re: On Being Midwestern: The Burden of Normality

#65

Post by rayiner » Thu, Nov 16, 2017, 4:55 PM UTC

m_mueller wrote: post #35

rayiner wrote: post #7

> In a 2015 essay for Slate, “The Rust-Belt Theory of Low-Cost High Culture,” reporter Alec McGillis marveled at the cheapness—and, it seems, the mere presence—of good orchestra and museum tickets in interior cities: One fact of history that’s often overlooked is that patronage has left an incredible legacy in places like Cleveland, Detroit, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, etc. For example, one of the finest collections of…

Wait, is Philly considered Midwestern, not East Coast?

I mentioned Philly and Baltimore because although they’re on the east coast, they are port cities that suffiered along with the decline of the rust belt and never recovered. Philly is one of the poorest large cities in the US, but used to be very rich.

Re: On Being Midwestern: The Burden of Normality

#66

Post by Veelox » Thu, Nov 16, 2017, 4:55 PM UTC

sp332 wrote: post #42

humanrebar wrote: post #6

> ...humility is one of those words, like authenticity or (lately) resistance, that serves mainly to advertise the absence of the thing named... Humility is having a realistic view of your own abilities and worth while being OK with it. It's not a vacuum of self-worth or something. We have other words for that. To illustrate, it's not humble for LeBron James to say he's bad at basketball. It would be humble for him t…

I think it just meant that someone who claims to be humble is probably bragging. Not that no one is humble.

I see humility as having a proper understanding of your own ability without arrogance. If I am at Thanksgiving dinner and my mom tries to brag that I am the best programmer in the state it is humble to correct her in saying that even though I have a great job, there are a lot of things I still cannot do.

Re: On Being Midwestern: The Burden of Normality

#67

Post by Karrot_Kream » Thu, Nov 16, 2017, 5:02 PM UTC

mark_l_watson wrote: post #3

Nice read! My wife and I just moved to Urbana/Champaign Illinois 4 months ago for my new job, and the Midwest really is different (from Arizona and California where we lived before). People are really nice, food is great, very inexpensive place to live, and there is real natural beauty here if you look for it. Anyways, we are delighted with this area.

Of all the things I appreciated about the Champaign-Urbana area, the food was not one of them. But do check out the downtown Urbana area, it's a great place!

Re: On Being Midwestern: The Burden of Normality

#68

Post by maxerickson » Thu, Nov 16, 2017, 5:05 PM UTC

cableshaft wrote: post #34

dsschnau wrote: post #19

born and raised in michigan, lived all over the state. I hope i die here. This nerd doesn't know shit

Michigan is very pretty, and has lots of nice areas, especially around Lake Michigan. I like to visit when I get the chance. I imagine the winters would be pretty rough there though. I live near Chicago and they get pretty bad here, usually.

Outside the lake effect snow belts, the weather isn't all that different from Chicago, the lakes really moderate the cold. Most of Michigan stays warmer than Central Wisconsin or Minnesota. I guess a large area gets lake effect snow though.

Re: On Being Midwestern: The Burden of Normality

#69

Post by SimbaOnSteroids » Thu, Nov 16, 2017, 5:05 PM UTC

mikestew wrote: post #48

throwaway15814 wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why'd you move out of Indiana my friend? |So you’re saying you absolutley lack the ability to fathom why someone might not share your enthusiasm? Also I can empathize why people are against Tesla, it's just the general mindset in the midwest when it comes to new technologies. There's no wrong or right it's just the way life is out there.

One -27F January day, I looked at my wife and said, “this is America, and we don’t have to live like this.” So we moved to North Carolina, then eventually got a gig with Microsoft. Haven’t worked at Microsoft in twelve years, but Seattle area suits us so we never left. Also I can empathize why people are against Tesla, it's just the general mindset in the midwest when it comes to new technologies. More than just the…

They also tend to ignore that Tesla payed back their subsidies with interest.

Re: On Being Midwestern: The Burden of Normality

#70

Post by Frondo » Thu, Nov 16, 2017, 5:07 PM UTC

Veelox wrote: post #61

I grew up in the Midwest and moved to Silicon Valley. I think that people here don't understand what this author describes as "Midwestern history is a study in racial quarantine." I would go as far as to say that racial is the wrong word to describe what happens in the Midwest. I think that communities in the Midwest have tighter cultural restrictions on what it means to be "one of us." This can be affected by where…

My first thought is how we need to start developing a better working vocabulary around having racist attitudes.

Like the big-R Racist is the white power asshole who wants to create a white ethnostate--that's one that's easy to spot, and most of us can say we're not that.

The real pernicious damage to communities of color comes from the little-r racism that SO SO MANY people carry around totally unthinkingly. Like even my pretty progressive sister will spout off something like "well if they'd just work harder, or get a better job," when in reality there's a well-documented bias against hiring people with "black" names.

The big-R Racism is easy to defeat, because most of us see it as pretty noxious.

The little-r racism is so much tougher, because it's encoded into laws in innocent-seeming ways, it's encoded into algorithms in software (e.g. charging various rates by zip code, but zip code in many places ends up being a proxy for race, and who in this decade checked to make sure the assumptions you've encoded aren't just screwing over minorities), in a lot of unconscious biases (e.g. that AAVE is an uneducated form of english, not its own dialect).

How do you call people's attention to that little-r racist stuff?

Well, I don't know. The thing I do, and it feels like water dripping on stone, is I call out small assumptions whenever I see them, and I always, always draw attention to communities of color as being people, citizens, deserving of all equal opportunities (and pointing out how some law, algorithm, or assumption is denying them one).

It's a real gentle advocacy, but it's also easy to stick to because it's absolutely the right thing to do once you see how stacked against CoC the system is.