The War of Northern Aggression

***Disclaimer: This post is a vast generalization of culture in this country based on my limited but observant experiences across the US. It is not meant to be offensive, but merely a observation of unnecessary conflict. Please read with a funny bone in mind. Thank you*****

The War of Northern Aggression. Perhaps you have heard of it. It's more commonly known as the [American] Civil War and took place between 1861–1865. For those of you awesome AHS kids (go Cougars) who had Mr. Booher for American History, you may think it was just a war about slavery but that is still open to debate. But don't worry, this blog is not a history lesson or a discussion on the causes of the Civil War. Instead it is about a simple clash of culture.

In the wake of 9-11 we have experienced some very serious culture clashing between Americans and Middle Easterners. But what people forget is we've been having culture wars from the beginning. I'm sure you are all old enough to know that Thanksgiving wasn't a friendly feast between Native Americans and the English. But once again, I'm diverting from my main topic for today. North v South. A classic case of misunderstanding and a struggle for power.

So lets outline some of the differences that have plagued this horizontal division of the US.

The South is known for its "Southern Hospitality" but most people don't know exactly what that means. This means if you are driving down a side street and a stranger waves at you you better wave back or you will be a "Damn Yankee." It means if you are sitting next to a stranger on a bus they will talk your ear off about the most personal issues. Ok, so yes, they're friendly...sorta. I mean, no one can be THAT friendly all the time, right? So they make up for it by having a tendency toward gossip and talking behind peoples backs. Hey, no ones perfect, you just have to remember when that new girl you just met said she LOVED your shoes she was just being polite. Oh, and the South has the best comfort foods but they will make you fat in a heart beat, or else stop your heart by clogging your arteries.

On the other end of the spectrum, the North is a whole other ballgame. No really, they take Baseball way more serious up here. *note: Yankees, Mets, Red Socks, Philly's, etc (I mean the Braves just don't match up). Northerners tend to be more into Pro sports while the south is all about college sports (go ACC). As opposed to "Southern Hospitality" they have "Northern Honesty." This means that girl is going to take one look at your shoes and give you a 20 minute brutal lecture on how ugly they are. Oh, but it's nothing personal, I promise you. Northerners don't look one another in the eye, but rather avoid any human contact possible on a subway car.

Overall, Southerns are extremely proud of the past and their heritage (see Rebel Flag) which has a lot to do with agriculture and land (aka farming, hunting, etc). Northerners are about industry and the future. It's merely two different schools of thought. Southern houses are often only one level but are very spread out versus Northern houses which take up little ground space but have multiple stories. Southerns identify themselves as, well, Southerns, while Northerners define themselves as "Irish," "Italian," "Korean," etc.

But despite all of these so called "differences" there are a lot of things they have in common. We all have stupid, mean, or simply annoying people. Both the North and South have accents/dialects that are almost impossible for an outsider to understand (Mountaineer, Asian, Italian, etc). But the main thing both sides have in common is their superiority complex in thinking they are the better "half" of the United States. Seriously people, its been over 100 years and we are still having a culture war over whether "New Yorkers are snobby" or "South Carolinians are ignorant." Can't we just get past all this bull shit, band together and just agree that Scientology is a crazy cult religion. There's nothing like finding a third, weaker party to pick on to bring two sides of the fence together. Amen.