Hillbilly

This weekend, while in NYC with Jason and Dabney, Dabney and I were comparing our rural upbrings (I'm from West Virginia, she's from Arkansas) when the subject of strip mining came up. I related to her and to Jason my belief that the country simply would not tolerate the wholesale destruction occurring in Appalachia were it being subjected upon New England.

Can you imagine the uproar if the headlines read "Vermont forests dynamited for coal baron profit" or "Annual N.E. foliage pilgrimage threatened by mining destruction"? The press would go, in a word, batshit.

So why doesn't anyone take notice of the 700,000 acres of Appalachian mountains that have been literally rendered to dust by this barbaric practice? The answer, I believe, is because it's happening not to upper-middle class New Englanders, but to dumb ol' hillbillies.

The term "hillbilly" has been used for centuries to debase and dehumanize rural mountain people, the the great benefit of those who would make a handsome profit from the region's natural resources. Dismissive and offensive, the term connotes a subhuman class of people who are simply undeserving of sympathy or human dignity. Images of Snuffy Smith and the Beverly Hillbillies or my [irony]favorite movie[/irony], Deliverance, reinforce an outdated and unfair stereotype that outsiders are unfortunately all too eager to believe.

I can't tell you the countless "West Virginia jokes" I've endured since moving from my home state. While no one would have the audacity to walk up to an African-American and start spouting "Uncle Remus" jokes, it seems to be perfectly acceptable in our society to ask a West Virginian if he married his sister or has all of his natural teeth. It's especially prevalent in Appalachian border states like Maryland, Virginia, Pennsylvania, and the Carolinas, but I heard them all too frequently during my time in California as well.

But the real problem with the general acceptance of the hillbilly stereotype is not the obviously offensiveness of the term, but that it gives people a perceived moral "out" in terms of being able to look away while a small, but inordinately powerful, industry systematically obliterates the lives and quality of life of an entire class of people.

After all, it's just the dumb ol' hillbillies' ground water being fouled by toxic sludge.

It's just the dumb ol' hillbillies' towns being flooded by deforestation and valley fills.

It's just the dumb ol' hillbillies' livelihoods being taken away.

It's just the hillbillies. Who cares?