You know, we have a saying here in Texas:

[stoney321]

"Don't ask someone if they're Texan. If they are, they'll tell you. If they aren't, there's no need to embarrass them."

Yep, I've seen a bunch of disparaging commentary on my home state from assholes that have probably never even been here. Just because there are some vocal nitwits in my state, doesn't mean we're all dumb asses. Just like how every state in the union (EVERY. STATE.) has something stupid in its history, we do, too. But we also have a shit-ton of awesome, and it's a lot.

Partial list of Awesome Native Texans: Carol Burnett. Cyd Charisse. Joan Crawford. Sissy Spacek. Buddy Holly. Steve Martin. Molly Ivins. Ann Richards. Willie Nelson. Gene Roddenberry. Tommy Tune. ME. We had a Jewish Empressario (in the late 1700s) we had a Mexican VP. One of the Iwo Jima flag raisers was a Texan, Harlon Block. Oh, hey, and the Admiral of Team Six? As in, just took out Osama Bin Laden? TEXAN. Tom Ford is a Texan. Amy Acker. Jensen Ackles. Debbie Allen. Wes Anderson. Don Bluth. Tex Avery. Shelley Duvall. Bill Hicks. Eryka Badu. Stevie Ray Vaughn. Berkley Breathed. Horton Foote. Most of the astronauts.

You know, just to name a teeny fraction of people my state has birthed.

We have prairie, desert, mountains, thick pine forests, and ocean. We have better food in this state than you'll find anywhere (because we have it all. I've NEVER found pit BBQ, burgers, or Tex-Mex worth a damn outside this state. But I've had outstanding French, Japanese, Ethiopian, Italian, Thai, etc. etc. here. NYC: y'all get steak as good as I can get here and we'll talk, because that's what's keeping me from wanting to live there. Well, that and the crazy real estate prices. But you sure can get a lot of good food easy there, that's one of the good things among many good things about NYC.)

You don't hear me saying this state is shit, or that state is awful. Know why? Because people LIVE THERE. It's their HOME. And I'm too busy loving where I live. I'm not going to dump all over someone's home state or nation because that's not cool. We had a super collider before CERN. But the Feds stopped funding because science wasn't important in the 80s under Regan. We're the home of NASA. Yes, we have idiots and we've borrowed some, too (looking at you, Dubya.) But so has everyone else.

My mother's family was here long before the god damn pilgrims were in the Americas. In Texas (Choctaw Indians.) The other side of my family moved here from England and defended this nation-state at the Alamo. I'm a red-blooded honest-to-god Texan, and I kinda love my home. Please stop shitting on it. I'm a good person, and hey, this place is filled with lots of people that feel like I do. Quit being a dick. In case you haven't noticed, I really really REALLY hate stupid comments about Texas just because it became a habit for some people. It's not clever, and it's not funny. And it makes me think you look like a dumb ass.

Now go bookmark "Hey, Don't Judge Me" and read it later when Glee goes up at 3CST. Lol.

Comments

[ladycyndra.livejournal.com]

*APPLAUDS* THIS! All of this. There were some you mentioned that I didn't know where from here. Awesome!! XD

You said everything I've been thinking for a long time and I thank you, Stoney. Thank you so much! ^_^

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

You know, if I ever heard people say this shit about other states like they do Texas, that would be one thing. But we sure get singled out. I'm sick of it, it's so reactionary to cultural bullshit.

[ladycyndra.livejournal.com]

Yes we do and it angers me so damn much. A former friend of mine's father-in-law looked down his nose at me as soon as he found out I was from Texas and acted like he was better than me because hes from CA and therefore, more evolved than me or some shit. Talked down to me too. -_-

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

YES YES YES. And yep, Florida gets some crap, too, and hey, my BFF lives there (as well as several awesome people I know) and if they're there, then clearly the whole state can't be... blah blah blah.

[txvoodoo.livejournal.com]

I adore Florida. I've lived there twice, once on South Beach (Ocean Drive! Not a cool part though) before Paris Hilton invaded, and once in the Tampa/St Pete area. I'd move back in a HEARTBEAT. We want to retire there (stereotypical much?) but not to a retirement community - just some funky little town, maybe Middle Keys.

[txvoodoo.livejournal.com]

Ocean Drive was WONDERFUL...until it wasn't. I lived on the South end, at a time when it was still not re-developed below 5th Street. And I recently google-mapped my old little Deco apartment building and..IT'S BEEN TORN DOWN. And I feel very Joanie Mitchell about this - they've put up a parking lot! *weeps* I paid $450/month for that adorable place in the early 90s. (I still don't get the logic of putting a parking lot on OCEAN DRIVE. Behind it? Yes. Not ON it!)

I love Tampa! I really love how close it is to things like Fort DeSoto park (omg Florida has the BEST state parks.) We used to go there in the winter and no one would be there - it was like our own private beach! The water was a little chilly, compared to summer, but I'm from the Northeast - it was fine to me!

The Middle Keys are SO GREAT. Key West is lovely but dude, $$$$. And kitschy. The Middle Keys is just like "yeah, whatever - live how you want. I'm gonna go fishing now."

While I appreciate Stoney's ode to Texas cuisine, I still prefer Florida's. It's where I learned about guava & cheese pastries, cafe cubano, and the plethora of Caribbean/Latin American fusion stuff. Plus: AWESOME Jewish deli - something I really appreciated as a Northeasterner! (Something Texas DOESN'T do: deli.)

OH HEY STONEY. SORRY FOR HIJACKING YOUR TEXAS POST WITH FLORIDA LOVE. To be on-topic - it's another state that gets a truckload of misunderstanding!!

;)

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

WE DO TOO DO DELI, you just live in that weird pocket of the burbs where they're not close. We've got a bad ass one up here owned and operated by this lovely Jewish couple from Brooklyn that moved their business on 380. SO. GOOD.

[anniemare.livejournal.com]

My whole family is from Texas. Lufs me some Texas!

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

See? More awesome people to add to the list. :)

[anniemare.livejournal.com]

Well, I was born in Colorado and live in Nebraska, but I am still pretty neat.

My Dad is hysterical and my Mom is one of the classiest ladies I know :)

[nemesisstar.livejournal.com]

I just wanted to share in the NYC lovefest. Honestly, the only thing keeping me from moving there is my little girl. Not that I don't think she would have a FABULOUS upbringing there, I just don't want her to be that far away from her grandmamas. I think my hubby gets tires of me constantly singing the NYC praise-a-thon. :o)
Oh, and for the record, Texas is on my must-visit list. I've only ever heard wonderful things about your home state and I've been dying to visit since I was a litle girl!

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

I looooooove NYC. But until they get Tex-Mex (they don't have it. They think they do, but they don't.) and it doesn't cost a million dollars to live there, I'll have to be content with visiting.

And Texas is BOSS. The Hill country is some of the prettiest land there is.

[huzzlewhat.livejournal.com]

Sigh. I still miss Molly Ivins. :-(

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

Oh, me too. Sometimes (esp. with idiot Perry in office) I ache for want of her.

[minim_calibre]

My husband was born in Galveston!

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

Mmmm, goooooood seafood in Galveston! Fish tacos, OM NOM!

[sockmonkeyhere.livejournal.com]

GAIDO'S. *drools*

[ryokomusouka.livejournal.com]

Don't mess with Texas. Or Texans. Dammit, ya'll.

(Half Texan, Wichita Falls, yo.)

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

I MEAN, COME ON. That's a great saying we came up with. Because it's true. :D

[elizardbits.livejournal.com]

The problem with terrible Texans, and indeed the problem with terrible people in general, is that they loudly and relentlessly proclaim that they speak for ALL TEXANS, and the cray cray is so loud and relentless that the voices of Texan sanity are drowned out. (see also: Florida.)

SANE TEXANS. I IMPLORE YOU. DRIVE THE MANIACS INTO THE SEA (OKAY THE GULF WHATEVER) AND RECLAIM YOUR GIANT STATE IN THE NAME OF AWESOMENESS. and then bring me some tacos.


ilusm for putting berke breathed on that list btw.



(i order my steak online. from texas.)

[ladycyndra.livejournal.com]

Well said! And hell, I will give you tacos right now. Homemade from my own kitchen. XD

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

UGH, I am trying SO HARD. And my good friends have vowed to reach 100 people a day calling on behalf of the Democrats/non-Republicans to restore some god damn sanity in the public.

TACO OM NOM I WANT BRISKET TACOS WITH PICKLED RED ONIONS AND JALAPENOS. (They will make you see the face of God.)

Berkley Breathed - omg, I worshipped him as a kid. LOVED HIM. Still do.

(You are wise.)

[podle.livejournal.com]

I've been reading for awhile and not commenting, but this seemed like the perfect opportunity so here goes -
I've been one of those people that just assumed that Texas was pretty bleagh. Happily, I've grown out of making giant assumptions about what places/things/people that I have no knowledge of are like. Also, I have enough manners to know not to be rude about where people are from. I sure don't like it when people do it to me. I also wanted to say that, reading your blog has really turned me around about my perception of Texas.

Also - I would like to apologize for the rest of California. Some of us do actually have manners. If you ever return to the Bay Area and don't mind taking a side trip, there's a tiki bar in Alameda where we'd love to buy you drinks.

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

I would like to THANK YOU for being a fantastic person, how awesome of you to post when I'm being stubborn and cranky! :D

And I am so glad to know that I've been able to show you a different side of my beloved home state. We're pretty nice out here, and we make some killer grub, I'm just saying. And we're the home of Shiner Bock! Hahaha.

I would love to hit a tiki bar, that sounds fantastic!

[podle.livejournal.com]

Aw, you just totally made my day! You're welcome!
Ever since I read your post about visiting the Bay Area and that guy was rude when you were wine tasting I've wanted to comment and tell you that we're not all like that. California (and the Bay Area in particular) gets a bad rap - sometimes deservedly so.

Ping me if you and yours ever come back - we will totally take you to Forbidden Island (http://www.forbiddenislandalameda.com/).

[txvoodoo.livejournal.com]

You know, I'm not a Texan. Texans tell me this often! ;) But I've been in Texas since 1998 now.

I have some isues with DFW, but my biggest one is that THERE IS NO OCEAN NEAR IT.

All the rest? Well, I've lived all over this country. I've heard the same attitudes expressed EVERYWHERE, and that includes South Beach, Miami Beach, FL - where you'd think it's all woohoo liberal! BZZZ. Yes, multicultural, huge LGBT, but also rich conservative people. (Remember the line from The Birdcage, that the Bushes had a place near it).

I really liked living in Austin. It still wasn't close enough to a body of saltwater for me, because no place that isn't within 10 miles of one is close enough for me. But I'd live on the Texas coast happily.

Yes, bible thumpers make me crazy. They made me crazy in Nevada and Tennessee, too. And, while the culture of open and vocal testimony is different in the northeast, they're there, too. Pennsylvania, my home state, gave us Rick Santorum (*spit*). I'm from a part of PA that's right near Delaware, which gave us Christine O'Donnell ("I'm not a witch"), but also Joe Biden, literally!

Yes, Texas educational policy can be horrifying - but guess which state is making HUGE cuts in education right now? Pennsylvania.

Lordy, your family has been here forever. None of mine arrived in the US before 1900. We're arrivistes!

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

13 years and you're officially a Texan, I promise.

Oooh, I was also shocked by the strong conservatism in that part of FL.

And thank you for this, I appreciate what you're saying - we ALL have our flaws. We all have something great about us, too. (Us/We = States of the Union.)

And yeah, we're big on geneology, but lost the thread on the American Indian side after several hundred years. Creole and Choctaw on my maternal line, Dutch/English on the other. My older sister and I - you can tell we have those dark pigmented genes come summer. My little sister? Little Dutch girl. :D

[txvoodoo.livejournal.com]

My neighbors have been here for hundreds of years and say we aren't Texans! I figure, whatever. I'm a Pennsylvanian/Floridian/Texan, dammit. I CLAIM THEM ALL.

Ya know where I was MOST surprised by conservatism? Working at MTV Latino. It was very patchy, and this was pre-GWB. Very very strange. Never knew where I'd be stepping in it.

You're like my husband! His family has been in Virginia since people where there, the original people. American Indian, and poor-ass Scots and English. Classic Appalachian. They have dark olive skin and green and hazel eyes.

[wandering-bat.insanejournal.com (from livejournal.com)]

I grew up in an area that has a Latino majority, and my experience has been that the culture is very conservative.

Claim them all! Do you still have license plates from each state? You could make a "Where I'm from" roadmap/tree/something more creative than I am! :)

[themindseye.livejournal.com]

Bible thumpers are EVERYWHERE. I live in a very conservative town in rural FAR northern Californa. We have a huge tea party and Bethel Church population here. We have a statue of Shiva in front of my work and people were outraged and said we were devil worshipers.

[stephanierb.livejournal.com]

"Texas Forever"

Okay, I had to post that. I love Friday Night Lights so damn much.

I admit, being a New England Liberal, I tend to get angry about some of the politics in Texas but I know it's completely unfair to tar everyone with that brush. I've only ever been to the Dallas airport, so I know nothing about what Texas is really like, except what I learn from you folks on LJ. Also a little from my Dad, who was stationed in San Antonio many moons ago and said the food was awesome and the weather too damn hot (that was not all, but those were the bits he was most emphatic about). :-)

I would very much like to visit Texas some day and experience all it has to offer firsthand. It sounds pretty fabulous.

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS SPEAKS TO MY SOUL, OH MY GOD.

We're such a big state that when our policies reflect a certain, shall we said, enthusiastic type of crazy, it's bigger news than if, say, Rhode Island or Idaho had the same policies enacted. That's the unfortunate problem of being a huge and populous state. But that same mindset is everywhere, otherwise there wouldn't be a Tea Party or blah blah. Crazy is everywhere.

Texas is pretty boss, I gotta admit. Austin is the best place for East Coast Liberals to get a taste. Hahaha. It's the San Francisco of Texas! More assless chaps, though. (Over Wranglers, natch.)

[stephanierb.livejournal.com]

FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS SPEAKS TO MY SOUL, OH MY GOD.

YES! I totally balled during last night's episode and I'm going to be a sobbing mess during the finale. :-(

I would definitely love to visit Austin, the music scene there is enough to grab my interest. But the rest of Texas appeals to me, too. At least, what I know of it, which I admit is rather limited. I get the feeling that it will be unlike anything I've experienced before. In a good way. :-)

[captainofidiots.livejournal.com]

I've always wanted to visit Texas! I almost visited Austin about 5 years ago, but the family I was flying to see canceled last minute and flew up to Washington instead. (Still out the $500, too. Bleh.) My mama works for the TSA and spent some time working at DFW during a hurricane. She LOVED it there. I think she'd live there if she could.

I get ragged on a lot here in the Bay Area about being from Washington. Especially about being from Spokane. I figure people shouldn't bitch about other places unless they've actually LIVED there. I may bitch about my home, but I do it with love.

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

It's like your family: you can rag on them, but no one else better. :D

[ljgould.livejournal.com]

Amen, Sister!

[kuzu-no-ha.livejournal.com]

Tell me about it. I'm from Flint, MI. But you may amused to know I pass by GWB's Connecticut home all the time. It is across the street from the Planned Parenthood clinic in New Haven. Heh.

Oh and I get really sick of people using what they suppose is a Southern accent when they want to either pretend they are stupid or are voicing the stupidity of someone else.

[altyronsmaker.livejournal.com]

Exactly this! Texas as a state is AWESOME! the people of Texas are quite awesome as well.

urgh. If people are going to be disparaging about something, they need to learn PRECISION! Don't paint the whole state with the brush of badness. :(

[ruthless1.livejournal.com]

Molly Ivins converted me to Texas. I loved all the amazing ways she would talk about being from Texas and how she took the good with the bad. Of course that was twenty five years ago that I saw her and now I can't remember exactly how she said it but she made me realize that being proud of where you are from didn't ever mean that you were condoning that asshats that can bring shame upon your state. And those kinds of ickmonsters are sadly everywhere.
Plus you are from there. So that you get my second 'nuff said re: Texas.

[themindseye.livejournal.com]

I was born in Houston but I grew up in California. I have lived in Cali since 1981. We went back and visited family every year though. I think there are things to love and hate about both states. I like the weather here better but the food in Texas is to die for. I don't eat BBQ here in Cali anymore because no one can do it right. OH and believe me I tried a lot of places and wanted to like it. They think BBQ is grilling with BBQ sauce on it or they dry the meat out so bad they have to slather it with a ton of sauce to make it edible.

I have actually been considering moving back lately. My brother lives in Conroe and I have tons of family and friends around there.

[crazydiamondsue.livejournal.com]

"There's a seat for you at the rodeo and I've got every slow dance saved, besides the Mexican food sucks north of here anyway!"

Ah, you know you're from Oklahoma when you look up to Texas 'cause y'all got Austin, Dairy Queen and Neiman Marcus.

[zendrifter.livejournal.com]

PREACH IT. I grew up in TX (from age 3 on), and I still refer to it as 'home' even though I've been living in Chattanooga for the last three years. I take pride in being the black sheep of the family - everyone, on both sides of the family, grew up in (or spent a good part of their lives in) a very rural county here in TN. There's as many - and, usually more - things I dislike about what goes in TN (like that whole 'don't say gay!' fiasco), but I don't shit on this state and I expect the same courtesy of others when it comes to MY state.

[cdvla313.livejournal.com]

Perhaps you could open up an authentic Tex-Mex place here in NYC. Then you'll have both the food covered and the expensive rent thing covered. LOL.

There's some Texas BBQ place down on 26th street that ALL the ex-Texans I know go to when they're homesick for BBQ. It has a certificate from the Texas Senate declaring it authentic and everything. lol. The name will come to me at some point...

[stoney321.livejournal.com]

Hmm, I feel like I went there, is it on a corner? If so, then... I wasn't happy with it when I was there a couple of years back. But then, it's been a few years, so.

Own my own place, hmm..... ;)

[wandering-bat.insanejournal.com (from livejournal.com)]

I will admit to being super-jealous of the ocean bit, being from Kansas. :)

[megarandom.livejournal.com]

I can dig it. A lot of the residents of my home state (including my family) embarrass me on a regular basis, but I still love the place.

[dovil.livejournal.com]

Having been to Texas (did you know this??) I LOOOOOVED it! The food (that restaurant that we went to that first day, some of the best food/drinks I've ever had hands down), the buildings, the people, the large expansive views, the craziest lightening storm I've ever seen in my entire life, what was there not to love?! Nothing, that's what. And yes, Texas has crazy people, but having traveled to a couple of countries / states, I have it on first hand knowledge that EVERYWHERE has crazy people. Looking out of my office door right now, there are crazy people. QUICK, TO THE EMERGENCY BUNKER!

[redbrickrose.livejournal.com]

Growing up I think I internalized that weird inferiority complex thing that New Mexicans can get about Texas - where we feel like there's a rivalry and Texas is generally like "...wait, what?" But since leaving the southwest that's changed completely. I don't know even know when it happened, but I have gotten SO defensive about Texas. While I never lived there, I do have a lot of family there and my family has a lot of history there. The defensiveness doesn't reach the levels of knee jerk crazy I can work up about New Mexico, but it's definitely there. Ever since moving so far east, I've been very aware of the intensity of my loyalty to the southwest as a whole.