Could we put an end to the use of the word Redneck on here?

[Yuppie Grinder]

It's a word used to disparage the white working poor. It equates blue collar with stupidity. I know people will respond to this saying that when they use the word redneck they just mean racist or ignorant white people, but that's not really what the word means. I think it's hypocritical of people who claim to be for the liberation of the working class to use such a term.
Left-wing elitism is a problem. Bill Maher type lefties subscribe to what they subscribe to not because they're genuinely angry about poverty or oppression, but because it's a way to set themselves above the actual impoverished and oppressed, many of whom correctly perceive the left in their country to be an elitist thing not concerned with the day to day struggle of working people.

I don't want any Bill Maher type behavior on revleft.

[synthesis]

There is a lot of classism in the use of the term but it's also become "reclaimed" (to whatever extent you think that's a valid description of what's going on) in the sense that it does represent the commonly accepted term for a concrete subculture, not necessarily tied to class, that doesn't really have a less loaded word with which to label it. Challenge people for using it in a reactionary way, but don't just assume that anyone who uses it unironically is being discriminatory or whatever.

In my mind the stereotypical "redneck" is just as likely to be petit-bourgeois as they are to be working class - rural shop owners, truck drivers who own their own rig, cops and so on - and that still, to me, doesn't inherently imply any particular political affiliation. Some bourgeois people also appropriate the identity to seem less discrete from their local working class. I think it's one of those things that's a lot more complicated than just categorizing the term in an absolutist sense as "classist" or "subcultural" to the exception of all other definitions.

[Comrade Chernov]

I just use it to mean someone who is born in the country and works a lot to the extent of their necks being sunburned. I don't really ever use it derogatively. Hell, sometimes I refer to myself as one.

[Yuppie Grinder]

There is a lot of classism in the use of the term but it's also become "reclaimed" (to whatever extent you think that's a valid description of what's going on) in the sense that it does represent the commonly accepted term for a concrete subculture, not necessarily tied to class, that doesn't really have a less loaded word with which to label it. Challenge people for using it in a reactionary way, but don't just assume that anyone who uses it unironically is being discriminatory or whatever.

In my mind the stereotypical "redneck" is just as likely to be petit-bourgeois as they are to be working class - rural shop owners, truck drivers who own their own rig, cops and so on - and that still, to me, doesn't inherently imply any particular political affiliation. Some bourgeois people also appropriate the identity to seem less discrete from their local working class. I think it's one of those things that's a lot more complicated than just categorizing the term in an absolutist sense as "classist" or "subcultural" to the exception of all other definitions.
You know that's not what a redneck is though. Nobody calls a small business owner a redneck. I've never heard that happen in my entire life. They're called rednecks because white workers working in the hot sun get sun burnt on the back of their necks. If someone self-identifies as redneck, I don't see that as any better. They're reaffirming a degrading identity. In US cultural hierarchy, "rednecks" are above "dangerous" proletarian blacks and latinos, but below bougie and petty-bougie whites. Getting cozy in that hierarchy and taking pride in your position in it is harmful.

[Creative Destruction]

You know that's not what a redneck is though. Nobody calls a small business owner a redneck. I've never heard that happen in my entire life. They're called rednecks because white workers working in the hot sun get sun burnt on the back of their necks. If someone self-identifies as redneck, I don't see that as any better. They're reaffirming a degrading identity. In US cultural hierarchy, "rednecks" are above "dangerous" proletarian blacks and latinos, but below bougie and petty-bougie whites. Getting cozy in that hierarchy and taking pride in your position in it is harmful.

Where are you from?

I ask this because if you're from the south (rural TX), like I am, I'd be flat out shocked if you've never heard of a "small business owner" refer to themselves as a redneck, particularly if they live in a rural area or a small town. Where I'm from, "redneck" is a term of endearment and it pretty much always has been. Sometimes you'll get a black person or a Latino insulting a dumb white person as a "redneck" but this is fairly rare. Certainly a lot rarer than a redneck spouting off the N-word. It's "hick" and "hillbilly" which are primarily derogatory.

[Lily Briscoe]

I don't know whether or not this is actually relevant, but I've noticed a tendency of some posters on here, seemingly mostly young males from the American midwest and appalachia, of seeming to want to politically accommodate elements of American right-populism, whether its gun fetishism or pandering to whatever backwards aspect of rural sensibilities.

Anyway, is redneck a term that even gets used often on this forum, enough for a thread like this to really be warranted? I'm aware of the origins of the term, but I also think the meaning has changed over time and it doesn't have the same connotations everywhere.

For example, there is a regional element to it. To me, it seems to have more to do with city versus country than with class. To a lot of people where I live, pretty much everyone in Appalachia is a redneck, irrespective of class. Personally it isn't a term I use. 'Hick' is the one I prefer (which isn't to say that I think everyone from appalachia is a 'hick', or that nobody here is) as a term for people who are really proud of being basically complete morons.

The people around here who are enamored with the whole "REDNECK PRIDE YAYRRR", "GUVMENT TYRIN TO TAKE AR GUNSSS" thing seem to be mostly semi-rural small businesspeople, landowners, and managerial types (which goes to show just how divorced its present usage has become from it's class roots in some cases), and honestly I can't say I'm very concerned about offending these types of people.

[synthesis]

You know that's not what a redneck is though. Nobody calls a small business owner a redneck. I've never heard that happen in my entire life. They're called rednecks because white workers working in the hot sun get sun burnt on the back of their necks. If someone self-identifies as redneck, I don't see that as any better. They're reaffirming a degrading identity. In US cultural hierarchy, "rednecks" are above "dangerous" proletarian blacks and latinos, but below bougie and petty-bougie whites. Getting cozy in that hierarchy and taking pride in your position in it is harmful.

I know where the term comes from, bro. You don't see "redneck" as sometimes describing a subculture distinct from class position?

It's definitely used that way here on the west coast. And you've never heard someone using "redneck" to refer to some guy who owns a small convenience store, two hours from any city, who doesn't serve black or Latino people and has a shotgun on the counter?


To me, it seems to have more to do with city versus country than with class.

This is absolutely the case with everyone I've ever heard using the term in real life. I don't believe I've ever heard someone, in person, use it to refer to anyone from the working class.

[Creative Destruction]

I don't know whether or not this is actually relevant, but I've noticed a tendency of some posters on here, seemingly mostly young males from the American midwest and appalachia, of seeming to want to politically accommodate elements of American right-populism, whether its gun fetishism or pandering to whatever backwards aspect of rural sensibilities.

Who does this?

[Yuppie Grinder]

Where are you from?

I ask this because if you're from the south (rural TX), like I am, I'd be flat out shocked if you've never heard of a "small business owner" refer to themselves as a redneck, particularly if they live in a rural area or a small town. Where I'm from, "redneck" is a term of endearment and it pretty much always has been. Sometimes you'll get a black person or a Latino insulting a dumb white person as a "redneck" but this is fairly rare. Certainly a lot rarer than a redneck spouting off the N-word. It's "hick" and "hillbilly" which are primarily derogatory.
I live in Iowa, people use the word redneck pretty frequently here. Usually in a disparaging way, sometimes in a proud way.
And besides, no one on revleft is using the term redneck that way, they only use it in an elitist sense.

[RedGuevara]

I kind of agree with KJI. I'm from the rural south and all to often I've seen people who think they're educated act better than my fellow worker. Given the South is polluted with Nationalist Right Fascist who see the government as taking their guns and rights etc. But when it comes down to the nitty gritty, there are blue collar country folk who are aware of the class issue and want a real change and I think if someone goes with the mindset that all Southerners are stupid rednecks it really widens the gap between the people involved.

[RedGuevara]

Also when I say educated people I'm speaking from college students I've interacted with. The first thought of southern or rural folk and they show signs of negativity. Negativity breeds resentment.

[synthesis]

And besides, no one on revleft is using the term redneck that way, they only use it in an elitist sense.

I agree that people here don't use it as a term of endearment, but I think we're also pretty conscious not to use it in a way that is derogatory on the basis of class rather than culture. I'd like to see some examples of where you see it being used here in a way that is incontrovertibly classist, and I'm really not making that request in an argumentative "SOURCE PLEASE" kind of way.

I would on the other hand posit that pretty much everything that could be accomplished by using "redneck" in a derogatory rather than neutrally descriptive manner could also be accomplished with the word "cracker."

[Yuppie Grinder]

I agree that people here don't use it as a term of endearment, but I think we're also pretty conscious not to use it in a way that is derogatory on the basis of class rather than culture. I'd like to see some examples of where you see it being used here in a way that is incontrovertibly classist, and I'm really not making that request in an argumentative "SOURCE PLEASE" kind of way.

I would on the other hand posit that pretty much everything that could be accomplished by using "redneck" in a derogatory rather than neutrally descriptive manner could also be accomplished with the word "cracker."

Culture rather than class? In the US someones cultural status is primarily made up of their race, gender, and most importantly economic position. The term redneck is used to demean white blue collar folk. You could argue that it disparages a culture of ignorance that could be found in the white working class but that doesn't necessarily encompass that whole community, but most folks getting called rednecks are actually intelligent people. White blue collar workers aren't as uncultured and ignorant as the democrat elitists seems to think they are.
The word cracker is a joke. People use the word redneck with real contempt for those they view as below them.

[Creative Destruction]

Culture rather than class? In the US someones cultural status is primarily made up of their race, gender, and most importantly economic position. The term redneck is used to demean white blue collar folk. You could argue that it disparages a culture of ignorance that could be found in the white working class but that doesn't necessarily encompass that whole community, but most folks getting called rednecks are actually intelligent people. White blue collar workers aren't as uncultured and ignorant as the democrat elitists seems to think they are.
The word cracker is a joke. People use the word redneck with real contempt for those they view as below them.

I agree with your sentiments re: white blue collar folks and their portrayal by Democrat (and socialists, too, btw) elites. However, I've heard "cracker" used in a more derogatory and malicious manner than "redneck." I've got family from Louisiana (a mix of workers and petit-bs), that'll proudly call themselves rednecks, but when they hear about some stupid shit some white dude in the swamp did, they'll usually say "Goddamn cracker" or, if they're Cajun, "stupid fuckin' coonass."

I think regardless of "redneck," cityslickers will always find a way to denigrate country folks. On Bill Maher, last year, he had on Pelosi's daughter, who's a filmmaker. And this person was fucking horrible. She made a mini-doc of white southerners mostly saying some dumb things, but she gave it no context. The ending thesis of her film was the same as Thomas Frank's horrible book "What's The Matter With Kansas?" -- these poor ass white folks are voting against their interests because of Gods and guns or whatever. She didn't call them rednecks or anything. There was sufficient enough uproar about her shoddy work that Maher had her back on, and she followed up that dumb shit with some racist and classist tones that consisted of her interrogating people who were picking up welfare checks. In the end of that, she said that they are the reason the Democrats are losing -- because 'personal responsibility.'

This is kind of why I find Marx's insistence on "town and country" being abolished a bit strange nowadays. Maybe it's my bias, but I've seen more of these stupid white yuppies and hipsters crow on about people in the rural areas more than I have heard rural folks even give a flying rat's ass about some dumb shit in a high rise. City people (and I'm narrowly referring to the gentrifying motherfuckers here and even some "radicals") need to quit with that shit if they want to get anywhere.

Anyway, sorry for the disorganized rant. This topic sort of gets me riled up.

[RedBen]

as someone who's parents were born in mexico, i gotta say i agree with the OP about the word. i try not to use certain words, any that may be deemed below the belt, i really really do. i don't like racist or stereotypical or homophobic or patriarchal terms. i can sympathize in that i heard the words "beaner", "wetback", and "spic" to a point where they just piss me off. i can understand white (inaccurate as black in terms of ethnic background) people feeling a sting or aversion. i know alot of mexican americans who use the word "beaner, and "beanerific" to describe something or someone. OP, i try not to use words like that even on accident, i certainly understand you, i agree and personally i'm gonna continue to avoid offensive words regardless of how often i hear them.

[synthesis]

Culture rather than class? In the US someones cultural status is primarily made up of their race, gender, and most importantly economic position. The term redneck is used to demean white blue collar folk. You could argue that it disparages a culture of ignorance that could be found in the white working class but that doesn't necessarily encompass that whole community, but most folks getting called rednecks are actually intelligent people. White blue collar workers aren't as uncultured and ignorant as the democrat elitists seems to think they are.
The word cracker is a joke. People use the word redneck with real contempt for those they view as below them.

Why are you so averse to the notion that people from other geographic regions use the term in a relatively neutral way, that is not inherently related to class, to refer to a specific subculture that doesn't have any other accurate name? The problem here isn't that you don't think people should use the term in that way, it's that you don't think anyone does use the term in that way.

What I'm trying to say is that it's not just the motivation of the person using it - it's the fact that in cases like these the word essentially has multiple definitions, one that is used in a reactionary way and one or more that are neutral, and you can't just conflate them and thereby completely eliminate the word without at least providing an alternative for the neutral definitions.

[DasFapital]

I think it would be best not to go about alienating such a large sector of the working class

[Fairfax]

I live in a country where that word isn't used at all so I don't know terribly much regarding it's meaning or usage. I've just always assumed it meant getting sunburn from working all day eg. working class, but I obviously know it's used as a derogatory term used toward mainly some people who live in the south of USA. You can advise people not to use it and educate them in why you don't think they should. Not a fan of banning words though out right, not that you're suggesting that, but I know plenty Leftists who are in favour of that sort of thing.

[goalkeeper]

Most of the time the word is used on here from what I see, other posters challenge it. This, i think, is preferable to some administrative policy which bans the word being posted or whatever.

[erupt]

Hardly anyone knows where the term comes from, but everyone (self-described and derogatory usage) says it.

Rednecks were unionized mine workers in West Virginia who mutinied against the coal companies, the state (as in West Virginia), and the sections of the union that wanted to cave in to the companies.

The miners that distributed guns and ammunition to one another wore red handkerchiefs, bandannas, babushkas, etc, around their necks.

From what I understand, it has nothing to do with being sun-burnt, and has a lot to do with being class-conscious...originally.

[Thirsty Crow]

It's "hick" and "hillbilly" which are primarily derogatory.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't the term "hillbilly", used in a derogatory way, actually come from the US Civil War, designating Southern farmers who opposed slavery?

[Creative Destruction]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't the term "hillbilly", used in a derogatory way, actually come from the US Civil War, designating Southern farmers who opposed slavery?

Someone else here claimed that in a separate thread and I tried finding the etymology of the word, but the best I could find is that it was unclear where it came from. The first recorded use of it was in 1900, apparently, but Wiki says that it could've gone back as early as the 17th century, used to describe Ulster Irish settlers in Appalachia. But of all the theories come up with, none of them were about Southern farmers opposing slavery.

[Red_Banner]

Meh, Redneck Rampage is a fun game.
-o0dyYJt60g

[Popular Front of Judea]

I am a recovering redneck and I approve this comic:

http://candorville.com/comics/2013-11-03-rednecks.jpg

[cyu]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Redneck

The term characterized farmers having a red neck caused by sunburn from hours working in the fields. A citation from 1893 provides a definition as "poorer inhabitants of the rural districts...men who work in the field, as a matter of course, generally have their skin stained red and burnt by the sun, and especially is this true of the back of their necks".

By 1900, "rednecks" was in common use to designate the political factions inside the Democratic Party comprising poor white farmers in the South. The same group was also often called the "wool hat boys" (for they opposed the rich men, who wore expensive silk hats).

By 1910, supporters of Democratic Party politician James K. Vardaman—chiefly poor white farmers—began to describe themselves proudly as "rednecks," even to the point of wearing red neckerchiefs to political rallies and picnics.

The United Mine Workers of America (UMW) and rival miners' unions appropriated both the term redneck and its literal manifestation, the red bandana, in order to build multiracial unions of white, black, and immigrant miners in the strike-ridden coalfields of northern and central Appalachia between 1912 and 1936. The use of redneck to designate "a union member" was especially popular during the 1920s and 1930s in the coal-producing regions of southern West Virginia, eastern Kentucky, and western Pennsylvania, where the word came to be specifically applied to a miner who belonged to a union.

The term can be found throughout Coleman and Raushenbush's 1936 socialist proletarian novel, Red Neck, which recounts the story of a union leader and an unsuccessful strike by his fellow union miners in the fictional coalfield town of Laurel, Pennsylvania. "I'm not much to be proud of," Houston admits to his admiring girlfriend Madge. "I'm just a red necked miner like the rest."

The earliest printed uses of the word red-neck in a coal-mining context date from the 1912-1913 Paint and Cabin Creeks strike in southern West Virginia and from the 1913-1914 Trinidad District strike in southern Colorado. coal operators, company guards, non-union miners, and strikebreakers were among the first to use the term "redneck" in a labor context when they derided union miners with the slur. The best explanation of redneck to mean "union man" is that the word refers to the red handkerchiefs that striking union coal miners in both southern West Virginia and southern Colorado often wore around their necks or arms as a part of their informal uniform.

In Scotland in the 1640s, the Covenanters rejected rule by bishops, often signing manifestos using their own blood. Some wore red cloth around their neck to signify their position, and were called rednecks by the Scottish ruling class. Because of the large number of Scottish immigrants in the pre-revolutionary American South, some historians have suggested that this may be the origin of the term in the United States.

[RevolucionarBG]

Well, I'm new on this forum, so this might not be topic for me.

But just so that you all know, I never use that kind of words about anything, so I won't use that word here, either.

[Rottenfruit]

the original meaning for redneck is actully extremly classist one in my view it meant a working class farmer because they got sunburned at the neck while working in the cornfields, the term redneck was and is classism because it was used to degrade working class farmers

[Jimmie Higgins]

It's a flexible term and I think in a practice sense it would be hard to officially mod, but I don't think people should be discouraged from asking other member not to use the term -- particularly if it's used in an offensive or derogatory way (in fact that useage could be officially moderated).

At any rate, what do people mean when they use the term? It can be used in an identity -- and this is a cross-class identity based more in white southern cultural things and a flexible, but generally now right-wing, populism. Synthesis described this well: the kind of populism which creates a false sense of white unity that even George bush jr. Could take on as a role. So someone could also use the term in this sense in a way that's synonymous with being blue collar and from a rural area. There's a positive side to this but also negatives because the identity can become fused with certain political or cultural assumptions.

There is also the elitist characature of "redneck" which is almost always directed towards workers and unemployed workers. In this useage it becomes a parallel to the racist use of "ghetto" and "welfare queens". This trope exists beyond the term "redneck" and probably is more common than people actually saying "redneck". This is the "you might be a redneck if..." Useage.

So really I think for the political implications of the term, there's really not much place for it in left politics. Leaving aside the important questions about if it's alienating or divisive, the term is just imprecise and has too much baggage and contested meaning. As identity, it's a blob of people in society who do not actually have the same relationship to things in society; it also excludes people who do have fundamentally common interests. So I say, avoid the term, but we should have a nuanced approach to calling out other people about it; there's no reason to jump down on anyone if they just say it meaning that they are from a rural background.

[RedWaves]

Could we put an end to the N word, and the words gooks, and wetbacks?


Until then, no......I live in the south, and most of them are proud to be "rednecks" just as they proudly use other racist terms to call minorities.



You live in a white privileged society already, most of them even like being called it in the south and wear the tag with pride.

[Sinister Intents]

I'm formerly from the city of Erie, but since I now live in a rural area I get called redneck and hick frequently. It's so fucking obnoxious, a stereotype of the small town I live nearby to is that we're all inbred. I'm related to NO ONE in this area. When ever I hear words that convey hate and prejudice I call the person out on it.