Rednecks?

[_Lisa_]

Originally posted by AKA2D '91
She said the back of their necks. I meant the front of their necks. I thought that the term came from the front of their necks not the back of their neck.

No. Its the back of their neck.

[AKA2D '91]

ohhhhhhhhhhhh. So all these years... m'kay. thanks.

[Rio_Kohitsuji]

There are:
rednecks
white trash
hillbillies
country folk

I live in rural southeastern Ohio, it's filled with this assortment. However, there are differences between them all! When I have more time I'll elaborate!

[FiReKraCkEr]

I don't think its offensive. Its actually quite funny.

[TheEpitome1920]

Originally posted by Rio_Kohitsuji
There are:
rednecks
white trash
hillbillies
country folk

I live in rural southeastern Ohio, it's filled with this assortment. However, there are differences between them all! When I have more time I'll elaborate!

See I find the term 'white trash' interesting because I've never heard of any other group of people referred to as 'trash'. And I think any group of people can be called 'country folk'.

[breathesgelatin]

Personally, as a white, rural southerner who grew up on a farm, I don't consider myself a redneck. But at my high school there was definately a clique of kids who considered themselves redneck and proud. They wore overalls, Wranglers, flannel shirts, etc., every day. During Spirit Week for homecoming at my high school we even had a "Farmer Day" and about 25% of the school would drive to school in tractors. Personally, I find redneck a tad offensive, but it's certainly much better than "white trash" or some other alternative. Besides, a lot of people are self-proclaimed rednecks. I think the issue comes in when you have families that consider themselves more as gentleman farmers that get called rednecks. I know that my grandfather would have been mortified to have been called a redneck, but I think that particular sting of class consciousness has really been dulled for me and my parents, yet we'd never really identify ourselves as "rednecks". But most of the kids I knew from really successful farming families wouldn't have called themselves "rednecks".

Does this make a bit of sense?

[Xylochick216]

I grew up with a bunch of rednecks who proudly called themselves rednecks. They all worke their cowboy boots and hats everywhere, even prom. They all got huge trucks to haul their tractors around and went to school to major in agriculture. They seemed proud whenever anyone called them rednecks.

KillarnyRose, did you mean Jeff Foxworthy?

[Peaches-n-Cream]

I am literally a redneck this week since I forgot to put sun block on parts of my back and the back of my neck. OUCH!

Seriously though, I think that rednecks are country folks and proud of it. I wanted to know the differences between rednecks and hillbillies. I think that there might be some overlap. There are quite a few rednecks and/or hillbillies in the more rural parts of New York State. I looked up the terms in www.dictionary.com.

red·neck
n. Offensive Slang
Used as a disparaging term for a member of the white rural laboring class, especially in the southern United States.

A white person regarded as having a provincial, conservative, often bigoted attitude.

n : a poor white person in the southern United States [syn: cracker]


hill·bil·ly
n. Informal pl. hill·bil·lies
A person from the backwoods or a remote mountain area.

[hill + Billy a nickname for William.]

n : a disparaging term for an unsophisticated person [syn: bushwhacker]

[breathesgelatin]

Rednecks can live anywhere in the rural south. Hillbillies live only in the mountains of Appalachia.

"Hillbilly" tends to be associated with a lot more naivete than "redneck", because it's presumed that hillbillies live in remote areas. And I'd say that hillbilly is a lot more offensive than redneck.

You'll note that redneck, according to Peaches-n-Cream's definition, is associated with a working-class farm laborer, most definately NOT a yeoman or someone who owns their own farm. This is why my family never considered ourselves rednecks. In today's world, many former tenant farmers or farm laborers now own their own farms and have reclaimed "redneck" as a term of pride, much like many other formerly derogatory terms. Of course, these same farm workers now often discriminate against Latino farm laborers.

I could really write an essay on all this stuff.

[DeltAlum]

Originally posted by crzychx
Also being in KY I too see my fair share of rednecks and I don't think its a good thing by any means. Yes, the song is funny, but I use the term redneck to describe many people, but mostly including ignorant, uneducated people who wear clothes that aren't appropriate to see daylight.

Isn't that a little elitist? Some folks can't help the culture they were born into.

Take my late mother for instance. She made it as far as 4th grade before having to help take care of her younger siblings when her second parent died. In some ways that made her ignorant -- but she was far from dumb. When you were born in "rural" Ohio into a family of eleven in a house with no electricity or indoor plumbing and when your father was a moonshiner (literally), sometimes you just don't get the advantages that others do. Sometimes you don't even know what you're missing.

You certainly can't afford to dress well. Lots of hand-me-downs and home made clothes.

She had some prejudices and she would proudly call herself a "hillbilly," -- I don't know if she would even have heard the term "redneck," but a lot of people might have figured her for one.

All of that aside, she managed to make a reasonable living for herself and led a pretty happy life. She was bright enough to run her own business for a while and then become a department head in a discount store. And she was insistant that I get "at least two years" of college.

My point is that, like people of other backgrounds, stereotypes aren't helpful.

She was a loving, caring woman. Hillbilly/Redneck or not, she was quite a person and I miss her a lot.

Then, there's my late father-in-law who ran the family farm nearly all of his life. He could look like the biggest "hick" in the world out in the field. But he had a degree in Agriculture from Ohio State and sat on local and regional school boards. His father, who attended Cornell, was on the Ohio State School Board. My mother-in-law, a farm wife, had a college degree (as did both of my in-laws' mothers and one grandmother). They made most of their own clothes -- hardly fashionable.

Mother-in-law was even an ADPi at Wittenberg University. I suspect her "sisters" gave her some problems because she didn't dress like them and have their financial backing. She didn't talk about the experience for years, and told Mrs. DeltAlum that if she ever pledged, she would never see another penny from them.

Stereotypes can hurt.

[_Lisa_]

Originally posted by DeltAlum
Isn't that a little elitist? Some folks can't help the culture they were born into.

Of course not, if you notice my definition of redneck certainly didn't include the culture they were born into.

[_Lisa_]

Originally posted by DeltAlum
You certainly can't afford to dress well. Lots of hand-me-downs and home made clothes.

Another point you've misunderstood. I mean clothes like a 500 lb. woman wearing spandex shorts and a tank top that only covers her boobs. I mean a man who wears short (daisy dukes-type short) shorts & nothing else. You know, redneck/white trash clothes. I didn't mention anything about people who can't afford to dress well-if I did that would include me!

[DeltAlum]

Originally posted by crzychx
Of course not, if you notice my definition of redneck certainly didn't include the culture they were born into.

However, people born into that culture might not even understand the differences.

[krazy]

the terms is used by white people with some regularity.

Ohhhh... Be careful with that assertion... Obviously that does not mean it is okay for someone to call someone else a redneck, just because they might toss it around with their cohorts.

I know what you are saying though...

[breathesgelatin]

Originally posted by crzychx
You know, redneck/white trash clothes.

I'm trying to control myself here. Let me just say that "white trash" is NEVER, NEVER an appropriate term to use about anyone. It's really, really offensive. No one likes being called that. Besides, white trash is different from redneck anyway.

On the clothes tip: what you're describing is not how "rednecks" dress. Rednecks wear wranglers, overalls, flannel shirts, and caps. You're describing how the people you'd call "white trash" dress. And, let me just say, from growing up with and knowing many such people, the reason they dress that way is A) because they haven't been taught the same standards of dress as you and B) because oftentimes they can't afford new clothes if styles change or if they outgrow old clothes.

Mm-kay? You're about to offend me here.