re: Self-Loathing & The Psychology of South Louisiana

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seems pretty clear that the entire thread, baselessly shitting on a culture, was precipitated by today's 100% miles-inspired negativity.

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There is nothing baseless about it. Is it not telling that the majority of people in this thread agree with it? Just because you take pride in your culture doesn't mean that there aren't any negative aspects to it. That's the biggest problem with this psychology. People are unwilling to see two sides of an argument as valid sides, and if someone doesn't agree with you, they're stupid and an enemy.

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Pimp, any day you wish to compare what I do to what you do, what I accomplish to what you do.Step off of your porch and learn something one day.

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Thanks for demonstrating the premise of the thread so perfectly.

Pimp you know it wasn't any different pre-internet now the morons have a outlet.

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Just because you take pride in your culture doesn't mean that there aren't any negative aspects to it.

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When did I make the claim that there aren't?

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Is it not telling that the majority of people in this thread agree with it?

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Well, I have no idea who these people agreeing are. And the agreement pretty much looks like "yeah something something mean haters." So no, it's not telling of much at all.

Go start a thread on the poliboard, saying something subtly disparaging and generic about american blacks. would the same standard apply as evidence that the accusation is meaningful?

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People are unwilling to see two sides of an argument as valid sides, and if someone doesn't agree with you, they're stupid and an enemy.

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Umm, yeah, I guess this happens sometimes. Not relevant to this discussion. The OP's incoherent and very-poorly-supported premise is the problem.

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Go start a thread on the poliboard, saying something subtly disparaging and generic about american blacks. would the same standard apply as evidence that the accusation is meaningful?

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incoherent and very-poorly-supported premise

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As this post and this poster demonstrates, the tendency is to be Defensive instead of Reflective. Be defensive, change the subject, make personal insults, whatever it takes to discredit an easily-observed cultural behavior. But never do any honest self-reflection. And while the vast majority agree with the observation because they see it every day living here, just make it personal,and shut down that portion of your brain that would consider any such observation anything other than "cultural slander".

I mostly agree with the OP's premise.

How does it relate to LSU football, tigerdroppings, etc? We all have our opinions.

I think a good parallel is Bud Bissinger's description of "Id" fans in his 1994 book "Bringing the Heat."

LSU has a lot of "Id" fans ... those who have the aforementioned "self loathing" and thus find most of their self-worth in the teams they root for. Consequently, when things get bad, their personal life becomes traumatic.

BB described it thus:

Richie and Norman and the players preferred fans who rooted rationally, who showed up Sundays decked in green and silver and cheered their heads off and then--buoyed by victory or disappointed by defeat--returned to their lives refreshed, pleased with the memory of an exciting afternoon.

Norman was convinced most fans were like this. But the most visible and vocal fans were those whose self-worth seemed to hang on the Eagles' fortunes, fans for whom winning was not just a preferred outcome on a fall afternoon, but something owed, by the players, the coaches, ultimately by Norman Braman himself, presumably in return for the cost of their tickets, or for the hardest cases, a Philadelphia birthright.

The Id-people came out on game day, thousands of them, for some primitive venting ritual. They howled abuse and hatred at the enemy--anyone they perceived as an obstacle to victory. They reveled in the violence of football, would cheer when hated opponents (or sometimes hated members of the home team) were carried bleeding, mangled or unconscious from the field.

They were like the throngs who cheered the dismemberment of Christians in Roman coliseums or who turned public hangings into social events. The sheer unthinking brutality of these fans connected vaguely with Norman's Jewishness, summoning disturbing ancestral echoes of murderous mobs, of pogroms, and Kristallnacht.

LSU has a lot of ID fans--with a nuance. We don't have a lot who show up at the stadium screaming these days, they are more the spoiled type Bissinger described. They show up on message boards more than the stadium these days.

I have to admit two things regarding this psychological paradigm:

1) The ferociousness of Tiger Stadium in its glory days was due in large part to this south Louisiana self-loathing Pimp described. But combine that "underdog" feeling when Ohio State, Notre Dame or Southern Cal came to town, with alcohol freely snuck in the stadium and LSU not being on TV every week ... and you had the most intimidating stadium in the country.

Our fans don't have the sense of "going to war" anymore, but as a group we sure feel entitled.

2) I'll admit that--while I don't think I'm a pure "Id fan," I am indeed more than the casual fan who can walk away from a loss unaffected.

LSUpimp:

30444 posts. At one minute per post average that is 21 days. Why don't you come cut my grass if you have nothing else to do?

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Self-Loathing & The Psychology of South Louisiana

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I think some parts of South La. are worse than others, but yes, I agree with most of what you say.

And yes, my neighbors all of a sudden become Alabama fans in 2008 just to spite others.

ETA: When I lived in Dallas for 3 months in 2005, I was surprised how friendly people were.