From: kovarik@utkux1.utk.edu (SaintMeechTheChaste)
Subject: Re: fat smelly boyfriend
Organization: University of Tennessee Computing Center
Date: Sat, 15 Aug 1992 15:08:12 GMT

In article <1992Aug15.033056.12166@kei.is.s.u-tokyo.ac.jp> jeff@is.s.u-tokyo.ac.jp writes:
>In article <1992Aug14.185247.22624@utkux1.utk.edu> kovarik@utkux1.utk.edu (SaintMeechTheChaste) writes:
>
> >I think the most shocking thing I have noticed in TN is how out of touch
> >with reality people here are. They actually believe it's the Garden of 
> >Eden.  
>
>"out of touch with reality"?  Who's reality?  Of course they are out
>of touch with your reality! Aren't we all?  

I am quite convinced that everyone is out of touch with my reality.

>If they believe it is the
>Garden of Eden then it IS (to them).  That is all that counts.  Gad,
>in the "reality" of which you speak, people don't know what they are
>or where they are, what they want.  They spend large parts of their
>lives just waiting for someone to come along and tell them what they
>should want, be, do.
>

Yeah.  Clearly. But they do not even show any interest in learning about
other ways of living.  When I lived in Spain a few years ago, everywhere
I went, people wanted to know what the place I came from was like, what
people were like there, what they did.  Not in TN.  Nobody seems to have
any interest in the outside world.  The only thing they want to know is
how much you like Tennessee, and that you believe it is better than where
you came from.  

Of course, this is encouraged by having minimal contact with the outside
world via things like TV, or newspapers.  Local Newspapers are really crappy
and give almost no space to covering anything that happens outside
of this little niche in space and time.  On TV news, your top stories
are about highschool basketball tournaments, in which the star player's
4 year old inchoherent baby sister is interviewed about her big brother's
basketball playing prowess, and the obligatory story about a chow dog being
held in quarantine after biting a 3 year old child.  Who gives a shit?
Maybe they do, because that is the way they were brought up. But this lack
of curiosity about anything but the most mundane things, leads me to thing
that as a collective society, they are lacking in the fundamental 
characteristics that make a society function to improve itself.

>I just visited the Philippines.  Great country!  Poor as shit.  Open
>sewers, guns, corruption, every natural disaster (floods, earthquakes,
>volcanos, typhoons, despotic dictators) happens in the Philippines.
>Not to over generalize but the people still smile, they still have a
>good time, they laugh and from time to time they seem to enjoy
>themselves.  

I have met people from the Philippines, and to me they seem just like
everyone else with normal interests,aspirations. In fact, the thing
I have noticed about people who come from places where they face
undue hardships like the Phillipines, like Korea, China, is that they have a 
great enthusiasm to work really hard to make the best out of their lives
with whatever resources they have available.....  Tennesseeans, on the
other hand, like to sit on their trailer porches with their cans
of Bud, and make fun of people with educations.

The fact of the matter is that the University of Tennessee is full of
foreigners (meaning out of state as well as out of the country),
especially in the technical areas like the Sciences, engineering,
computers, probably because these people put more value on education
and displace Tennesseeans who may be interested in getting an education,
but lack motivation (which is so common here).  I have been here for three
years, and I have yet to encounter a grad student in the physics dept. who
is from Tennessee (I met two, but they both dropped out).  Since I have
been here, I have observed many non-Tennesseeans get graduate degrees, but
I have encountered substantial numbers of tennesseeans who are in the
5th year of their Master's program without a thesis topic. This attitude
they have is a "loser~ attitude.  They believe they cannot succeeed, so they
don't even try.

>
> >But to everyone I know from out of state, it is a Hellhole.  Some
> >are more discreet about complaining that I am, so that the locals don't
> >suspect.  But almost everyone I know from out of state has as his or
> >her primary goal, getting out.  And also, not so surprizingly, people from
> >out of state have only minimal interactions with the natives, and those
>
>The same thing happens here.  Foreigners don't mix.  It is really sad
>because in reality, the differences and barriers are really
>superficial.  

I don't believe the attitudes are superficial necessarily.  See above.

>Like who wants to talk about superstrings at a party
>anyway?  Sure I would rather talk about something other than gas caps
>and beltching (thats for the TN crowd) but if we are so smart, why
>can't we solve this simple social problem of finding a common
>denominator?  You really have to fight the idea that people who sound
>dumb are dumb (or uninteresting...).
>

In fact, I have attempted to find common ground with them, but they
have not tried with me.  I have been here 3 years now, and I think that they
sound "dumb and unteresting" and are "dumb and uninteresting".
Gets really tiresome when everyone expects you to be interested in them,
but they show no interest in you.

> >A theory
> >floating around the physics department is that the state was settled by people
> >whose wagon wheels broke one the way west, and they were not smart enough
> >to fix them.  
>
>Having said all I said above, it may just be a fact of life (or
>evolution) that this does explain TN.  I once saw a comedian talking
>about when baby boys are born in TN, the doctor will say, "Yup, that's
>a fine lookin gas station attendent you got there maam".
>

I hadn't heard that one.  I'm saving it for future use.

						Meech

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