If you're in a Red State...

...you might as well learn what that means.

First, my condolences. I share your pain from a city that served as a blue pinprick in vast, tubulent seas of red last November.

Second, check out this keen essay by linguist Geoff Nunberg on what being red or blue means these days, and how it has evolved over time into a backwards, oversimplified representation of demographics.

We think it looks like this...


...when it really looks like this:



Third, you can learn more about your heartland-living, red-meat-eating, god-fearing brethren by reading a blog that (will infuriate and humor you) claims, through its name, to have the red views represented as those of "mainstream America." Right.

There are a number of posts on redstate.org that you might find interesting (and many that will play as just plain delusional). My favorite so far discusses why men make more than women these days (yep, still $0.76 to the dollar) and why that's how it should be.

My favorite reason:
Men choose the harder, less-glamourous jobs; women choose to be teachers and nurses.

Well shit, he's got it all figured out! Women don't want to work hard. Women are fragile, lazy creatures who ought to be at home raising kids. Besides, women entry-level dietitians make more than their male counterparts by more than 30%. What more do we want? Equality under the law?!

Oy.

By the way, Missouri is one of the 15 states that never ratified the Equal Rights Amendment. It only takes three of those states to ratify, and this becomes law. To learn more, read here.