The myth of flyover country's "real America"

This “real America” myth is a nostalgic throwback to a time that seems simpler by comparison, more polite and value-based. This Mayberry idealism may seem harmless, just a romantic look back to the old values expressed in Norman Rockwell paintings. But it’s not harmless. Saying this “real America” is lost or nearly lost is destructive to the Republican party and to real equality.

First of all, American was never as simple as a Robert Frost poem. Second, this “real America” view implicitly excludes all the good, hard-working Americans who just happen to live in towns and cities that don’t resemble Mayberry. Does the “real America” view mean that small-business owners who are struggling, working almost every waking hour as they raise children in Los Angeles, New York City, or Miami, somehow aren’t real Americans? We shouldn’t be surprised that many read that message into it.

This view makes it seem as if those who work in or near a city on the coasts — especially those who aren’t white — don’t count in today’s Republican party. It’s one reason many such people think they’re better off voting for Democrats, even if the Democratic party is the one being exclusionary with its identity politics and special rights for special groups — and even though Democratic politicians harm their jobs and businesses with high taxes and stupefying regulations.

Republicans who repeat this myth inadvertently persuade a few less-than-thoughtful people into thinking they must defend their skin tone, instead of their values. In the extreme, this can lead to “white nationalism,” as was recently expressed by Emily Youcis, a.k.a. “Pistachio Girl,” a peanut and pistachio salesperson at Philadelphia’s Citizens Bank Stadium, who was fired after she took her white nationalism to the airwaves.