My reason for posting this question is to get some perspective, since I don't live further west than Indiana.
Indiana has a lot of conservative tendencies, usually opposes progressive policies, and a little old school bigotry in the form of religion based disagreement with people's life styles, like letter community.
From an outsiders perspective, TX, OK, MO etc are even more extreme.
This permalink above from a comment from a person referencing recently proposed legislation against letter community people specifically, though there's tons of examples of bigotry like the school principal getting sued for discrimination due to a kid's hair (black hair).
We know Lemmy is a bit more populated with left than right thinkers, but regardless, what's going on in these western plains states? Is it as bad as it looks?
Do you personally know some sweet old church ladies who 'hate the gays because they'll going to hell' or are there just more extreme law makers being elected that don't represent the majority?
EDIT: tried to fix link to a conversation instead of a login page.
Pretty much, yeah. I didn't used to, but they've shown me time and time again that they are awful.
I don't think it's possible to be Republican without the stereotypical bigotry stuff. Even the "conservative economics" crowd -- when you look at it, those "conservative economic" policies they support have been designed specifically to harm and disenfranchise marginalized groups. For instance, "the Dakota Access Pipeline is good because it helps the economy" is objectively a bigoted opinion.
I mean, yeah. These people often believe their opinions and beliefs are helpful and just. They may believe that undocumented workers are really taking our jobs, or that we LGBTQIA+ people are pedos, or that privatization helps the poor -- but all of these things are so mustache-twirlingly atrocious that they don't get a pass for subscribing to beliefs that are causing so much widespread harm, even if they truly believe they are in the right.
I like the east coast because of the way their cities are designed. Visiting places like NYC or Philadelphia, I don't even miss not having my car. I used to live near the west coast, and that was the opposite. I know there are things like parks and public transportation in LA and OC, but maaaaan I still felt compelled to drive everywhere. There's natural beauty out there though, and I like their conservation areas. Personally, I'd live in Minneapolis, MN if I could. 10 minute walk from a park everywhere you go, and they keep extending the lightrail. I guess I kinda like the midwest. I don't like my state, though, because I can never fit in here, and it's like they specifically design our communities to be miserable. It could be a nice pretty place to live among nature, but it's not.
All that stuff is related, though. I don't trust anyone who says they're "just" an economic conservative because that's still harmful -- and this includes liberals, by the way. I don't trust anyone who defends these inherently inequitable systems. I'm extremely unhappy with both our major parties.
This is all my opinion though, and much of it is based on my repeated experiences. I had to leave my last job because I reported overt racism by people who were some of these "totally not racist but conservative" types. Didn't surprise me that it happened, because I'm old and I've seen this scenario play out time and time again with different people.
Thanks for the insight.
It's a shame we still can all just get along. That saying is lame, but it's ultimately the goal.
One of my ideas, that isn't terribly realistic or shouldn't have to be resorted to, is to locate our selves in regions that are more welcoming.
There was a person at my work who was lesbian, which I suspected, but they weren't open. One day at a social event, they brought their wife and brother (for support) and made public. I was stupid and didn't put all that together until then.
They moved to Washington State and both have great jobs now. I felt like part of that move was related to moving to a region known to support their life style more welcomingly, at least compared to Indiana.
You shouldn't have to do that, but if I could stack enough chips to afford doing that and needed to, I would.
I said above that you shouldn't have to do that ever. No one should be treated like shit by whole groups of people, political, religious or other wise.
I like the idea of states competing for talent and opportunity. Washington also tried decriminalization of all drugs. Lots of people nay sayed. I thought it was great. They tried an experiment instead of just listening to a bunch of wind bags. That didn't work as it was implemented, but we all got real world data, and identified other failures of legislation that went beyond just drugs (treatment, transportation issues, logistics, funding,.etc). I might be all talk though, I would not want to conduct that here.
Weed is the same way. All the states doing it are eventually going to have eliminated all excuses for now allowing it. Some states still might never. That's ok. People can shuffle around based on what's important to them.
You shouldn't ever have to be subjected to mistreatment just for who you are though, anywhere in America.
I hate both our parties, most of all politicians, and a large majority of our policies in their current form. There's no one for me to vote for, and no national pride in what they do or represent.