February 2005     

Sawdust & Splinters...

Flyover Country

By Douglas E. Carlson

It wasn't until the last election that I became aware that I lived in what the urban/suburban elitists refer to as Flyover Country. While so many Americans, liberal and conservative, lament the division that seems to exist in our nation today, almost half of the population uses "flyover country" to label the other half. One man-on-the-street interview a few days after the election was asked about the red/blue election map situation. His response disgusted me, and in some ways shocked me. Of course, that's probably just because I live in flyover country. Anyway, he told the reporter, "I just don't know what's wrong with those people (those of us in the red areas who elected G.W.), they scare me. I'll flyover, but I'll never drive through those areas again." Some attitude, right?

This attitude that seems to have grabbed our nation by the throat is just a lot of the same ol' thing. History is full of the same dichotomy - city versus country. Why do the two always seem to have conflict? I suppose it adds up to different lives lived. As our population drifted toward the manufacturing found in and around cities, the people became more distant from their connections with nature. Rural people have an understanding of the natural world that no urban/suburban dweller is able to experience. In the city, government takes care of the people, from security to sustenance, from paved streets to municipal services, and it all leads to greater reliance upon government for one's life and happiness. In rural America, flyover country, self-reliance and independence are the watchwords. Rural people don't like dependence on government because government is always from some other place, and government tends to step on rural toes too often. The attitude, "Leave me alone, and I'll leave you alone," is typical of many rural citizens, particularly when it comes to government.

The attitude of conservatism also seems to be natural for the majority of rural folks. Keep it simple, stupid! Rural people tend to want the complications of life to be minimized, nature is enough of a handfull to deal with without the complex vagaries of urban life. Of course, that leads the urban/suburban citizen to observe that the rural country cousin is simply - simple-minded to live where wages are low and services non-existent. For some of us, that is just the price to pay for living in paradise. The chickens come home to roost, so to speak, when the urban/suburban visitor comes, and enviously marvels at life in flyover country. The typical comment is, "I'd sure like to live here. If I could find a good job, I would move here in a heartbeat." Meanwhile, the rural parent urges their children to leave and go to school, graduate, and find a good job in the city. If there is a division in this country, it has more to do with each individual, and what is important to them for a worthwhile life.

For many in urban/suburban settings, a good job with a stout savings account and a great retirement plan, is sufficient to provide security for their personal future. For rural folks, security may be as simple as holding down two jobs, and having enough firewood to get through the winter. Rural folks may stand around and talk about the weather, how many deer were in the backyard last night, and the fact that gasoline is up over two bucks a gallon. Urban/suburban folks may stand around, if they ever stop to talk to each other at all, and talk about the police raid in their neighborhood last night, or about the corruption in City Hall, or the fact that such & such company is laying off a couple of hundred workers, a week before Christmas. Different worlds... different people; and that at the risk of being too simple.

A state of national mendaciousness (look it up in the dictionary, word used just because I could!) exists. Politicians who tell voters what they want to hear, and not what the voters need to hear exacerbate this condition of mendacity. The divide is not real, it is a fiction propagated by narrow politically-minded people in all walks of life. Urban/suburban America needs rural America, just as much as rural America needs urban/suburban America, just for different reasons. America has always been a place where different cultures, different people, blended for a common cause: freedom. Rural people just require more freedom, in a different manner, than does the urban/suburban citizen.

The recent election did illustrate differences, issues jumped on by a national media attitude that lusts after the sensational, the bombastic, and the inane. Somehow, political philosophy got mixed up in this mess and the spirit of political party. George Washington warned of the condition in his Farwell Address, an American document everyone should be required to read and understand. He displayed unequaled wisdom in regards to the country's future and character. In reflection of the recent national debate about the separation of church and state, Washington said, "Let it simply be asked, Where is security of property, for reputation, for life, if the sense of religious obligation desert the oaths which are the instruments of investigation in courts of justice? And let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion. Whatever may be conceded to the influence of refined education on minds of peculiar structure, reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle." The ACLU would have sued the Father of our Nation.

The red/blue difference may be summed up in a very simple manner - what is important to the citizens of each area? Basic values run deep in flyover country. I have little idea what values (if any) exist on the Left Coast or on the Eastern seaboard; don't really care to! I have always lived in flyover country, it pleases me, as well does it with the other folks I choose to live among. Freedom in flyover country is rampant, audacious and flag-waving. The Pledge of Allegiance still brings tears to the eyes of patriots living in flyover country. Love of God and Country exceeds love of self, in flyover country, or at least, many of us hope it does. Just as much as the urban/suburban Left-Coaster refuses to drive through flyover country, I detest having to visit the baneful, dirty, congested, insensitive urban landscape. And at the risk of offending many people, I close with just one thought; I'd rather struggle to live free in flyover country, than ever consider moving, enslaved to flushable city.

People need to live in both places and see themselves as Americans first, forget all the other political pandering and blather, find real principles to live by, and set about enjoying our American freedom.

Douglas E. Carlson is the Executive Director of the Conservation District Planning Department, Forest County, PA, and is a founding member of the Allegheny Forest Alliance.