Redneck Girls and Southern Belles

“Well I’m a redneck woman.

I ain’t no high class broad.

I’m just a product of my raisin’.

I say “Hey y’all” and “Hee haw.”

I keep my Christmas lights on on my front porch all year long

And I know all the words to every Charlie Daniels song.

So here’s to all my sisters out there keeping it country—

Can I get a big H_ _ _ Yeah from the redneck girls like me?” (Gretchen Wilson)

It’s new country not old, but I like the song Redneck Woman anyway. I like rednecks; they are an integral part of Southern society, “this earth” of Southern society as Shakespeare would put it. I have a little redneck in me as a matter of fact. But something about RW really disturbs me, and it isn’t that it is tacky even though it is. The problem is that the song promotes Southern stereotypes when it assumes that, on one hand, there are high class broads (Yankees and deracinated Southerners) and, on the other hand, women who say y’all, the latter being lower class. The implication is that Southern speech and, by inference, Southern culture, is déclassé.

Carpetbaggers have a devil of a time distinguishing good old boys from rednecks, rednecks from trash. They think they are all the same, but Southern people know the difference.

Many Southerners, especially the young, while taking pride in their Southern ways, still believe that all Yankees are educated high society swells. To the contrary, most Yankees, I find, are poorly educated (technical training is not education) and vulgar. In the North (and in the occupied South) , where class is largely defined by wealth, riff raff rise to the top; in the traditional South the uneducated, the profane, the chronically disgruntled are consigned to the bottom rungs of the social ladder.

On the top rung are the modern day Southern aristoi. In most cases, the descendants of the old planter society, they are leaders to the manor born, rich or poor, refined and well-educated. Well-mannered but not as refined as the gentry, just plain folks –good old boys and girls—make up the Southern middle class. They might live in suburban subdivisions or in the country; they drive pickup trucks, but they keep them shiny and clean. The community leaders who come from this class are made not born, and they do not always handle the mantel of authority as gracefully as the gentry class.

Just below just plain folks are the rednecks (the line between the two classes is somewhat blurred), a little rough around the edges and not the best material for leadership, at heart decent people even if they have minor scrapes with the law from time to time. Hard-working, hard-drinking –if he hasn’t yet found Jesus—the redneck is as independent as a hog on ice. He might drive a clean new pickup but more likely will own an old mud-splattered one. His home is a veritable shrine to NASCAR.

At the lowest rung of Southern society are white trash. They should never be entrusted with authority because they see it as a tool for revenge.

At the lowest rung of Southern society are white trash. They should never be entrusted with authority because they see it as a tool for revenge. Self-assured all out of proportion to their abilities, rich or poor, they are not very well-mannered although better-mannered than most Northerners; they are often violent and mistreat women and children. Frequently settling family matters by calling the police, they are the authors of their own misery given to self-pity and resentment towards their betters.

Carpetbaggers have a devil of a time distinguishing good old boys from rednecks, rednecks from trash. They think they are all the same, but Southern people know the difference. Behavior at social events tells the tale: A good old boy is the one who has himself a cold beer the second he arrives at the wedding reception; a redneck will crack open his first ten-ounce Budweiser in the church parking lot before the ceremony. Trash start drinking early the day of the wedding and usually end up in a knock down drag out, the bride frequently in the thick of things, before the day is over.

The trashy class of Southern society (examples of which we see on Jerry Springer) is rapidly growing as the South coarsens and degenerates. But while the gentry are dying out, there are a few aristocrats around— maligned and hated— but still around. The Southern gentleman is mistaken for a fool and a yokel, but no one is more despised in America than the Southern belle—even her defenders believe all sorts of myths about her. Reduced to a comic figure, witless, helpless and deceitful, in reality her gentle ways only conceal a deadly resolve to protect those she loves— it is a mistake to underestimate her. She is courteous even when she doesn’t want to be, cheerful when her heart is breaking, smart, self-effacing...she doesn’t leave her Christmas lights on all year round as the redneck woman does; she might prefer Vivaldi to Old Bocephus, but she is proud to be Southern, and she says y’all. And she would much rather live next door to Redneck Woman than trash or Yankees.