Rural Americans are 'Bad People' Who Deserve to Be Shamed, Says Berkeley Instructor
By: Megan Fox
The typical hate of Heartland flyover America by the urban bi coastal secular progressive ivory tower dwelling limousine liberal elites comes through loud and clear here.
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
If you live in the farmlands of America, or in the vast mountainous regions far away from cities, a University of California Berkeley instructor wants you to know you're a bad person who has made bad choices and you deserve to be uncomfortable. The obviously brilliant person who came up with these groundbreaking conclusions is named Jackson Kernion, a self-described "Graduate Student Instructor at University of California." The since-deleted tweet that got him in trouble read, "I unironically embrace the bashing of rural Americans. They, as a group, are bad people who have made bad life decisions. Some, I assume are good people. But this nostalgia for some imagined pastoral way of life is stupid and we should shame people who aren’t pro-city.”
Kernion began the thread by advocating against affordable healthcare solutions in rural America, saying that “Rural Healthcare Should be expensive! And that expense should be borne by those who choose rural America!”
He argued that promoting a need for “affordable rural healthcare” is equivalent to arguing for rural Americans “to be subsidized by those who choose a more efficient way of life.”
“Same goes for rural broadband. And gas taxes,” Kernion added.
“It should be uncomfortable to live in rural America. It should be uncomfortable to not move,” he wrote.
Kernion tried to justify his statements with economic arguments about not making rural life “*artificially* cheaper,” but quickly devolved into personal attacks against rural and not “pro-city” Americans.
The good news is that Kernion had the self-awareness to realize he had insulted half of America and deleted his inflammatory statements, issuing a half-hearted apology. “Pretty sure I did a bad tweet here. Gonna delete it,” he wrote. “I’ll want to reflect on it more later, but my tone is way crasser and meaner than I like to think I am.” We've all put out a bad tweet here and there, but Kernion's long rant about rural folks sure seemed like he meant every word and that his tone was exactly how he meant it.
Since the online kerfuffle, Kernion has either been banned from Twitter or has left, because his page no longer exists. But the Twittersphere isn't going to let it go any time soon. I'd like to invite Kernion to come spend some time in the woods in rural America with the locals and see how long he lasts without a latte and a salon appointment. It's a shame that the young men of today don't seem to understand what is necessary and good about knowing how to survive without modern conveniences. Rural America isn't looking back and pretending to live some nostalgic former pastoral life. That life never stopped.
I have chickens that need food and water every day or they'll die and I won't be able to trade fresh eggs for produce. My neighbors have livestock to feed and care for so that our community can fill our freezers with fresh meat that never sees the inside of a grocery store. Small farmers were concerned about hormones and corporate farming abuses for years before PETA got involved.
The vineyard owner across the way tends his vines like small children so that wine can be sent across the country to the parties of the elites who sip it while trading insults about the man who made it and others like him while they themselves could never turn grapes into fine wine, let alone sell it for profit.
This is actual everyday life on the farms across America, filling the plates of the city-dwellers who can't imagine traversing a road that hasn't been plowed and salted and don't know the first thing about how to get the milk they rely on for their half-caff cappuccinos if it doesn't get delivered to them via app.
I don't look forward to the day when, say, the power is shut off for millions of Californians and they have no idea what to do without Candy Crush. If that day ever comes, we here in the rural lands of America will not be here criticizing the poor choices that soft men like Kernion made by relying too heavily on smartphones and take-out instead of honing his basic human skills of survival and self-reliance. We will be here, willing to show people like Kernion what's great about us and our chosen way of life while we pull them out of darkness and chaos.
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Kernion began the thread by advocating against affordable healthcare solutions in rural America, saying that “Rural Healthcare Should be expensive! And that expense should be borne by those who choose rural America!”
He argued that promoting a need for “affordable rural healthcare” is equivalent to arguing for rural Americans “to be subsidized by those who choose a more efficient way of life.”
“Same goes for rural broadband. And gas taxes,” Kernion added.
“It should be uncomfortable to live in rural America. It should be uncomfortable to not move,” he wrote.
Kernion tried to justify his statements with economic arguments about not making rural life “*artificially* cheaper,” but quickly devolved into personal attacks against rural and not “pro-city” Americans.
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“I unironically embrace the bashing of rural Americans. They, as a group, are bad people who have made bad life decisions. Some, I assume are good people. But this nostalgia for some imagined pastoral way of life is stupid and we should shame people who aren’t pro-city,” he wrote in a since-deleted tweet.
After receiving backlash for his comments, Kernion issued a pseudo-apology for the “tone” of his tweet.
“Pretty sure I did a bad tweet here. Gonna delete it,” he wrote. “I’ll want to reflect on it more later, but my tone is way crasser and meaner than I like to think I am.”
Am I to assume that Kernion is then in favor of city-folk raising their own food? And growing cotton for clothing? Or is he so lost in the world that he thinks food just magically appears in grocery stores and blue jeans naturally grow on sales racks?
The above was tongue in cheek. I fear that his rationalization is darker than that. His tweet and justifications around it appear more like another attack on freedom of choice, forcing people to live in cities (collectives) while some organization runs the rural areas for food and such. He must be young to be pushing such control of freedoms.
Some city folk do belong to community gardens, but too many other essentials can not be created by them.
It looks to me like the tweet was sarcastic/satirical. But even if it is a sincere rant, who cares?
We are supposed to become all worked up about something a graduate student says on twitter? I don't think so. We have right wing nut jobs regularly saying crazy things in the halls of Congress. Don't recall anyone getting worked up about that.
He’s hardly the only big city liberal saying and thinking things like that. We are proud deplorables who love our rural to exurb lifestyle and cost of living.
How many times have you seeded an article about some random person (not a lecturer at a public university) saying something less offensive than this?
So the take away is, at least this instructor didn't denigrate an entire ethnic group calling them rapists, and he qualified the comment just like Donald Trump did, so doesn't that make it okay? He said "some, I assume, are good people". Perhaps he was parroting Trump to point out how vile Trumps words actually were.
So if you think Trumps comment about Mexicans wasn't an insult, then I can't see how you would see this as an insult.
Try another deflection
Trump didn’t say anything about an entire ethnic group.
The bicoastal urban elites are raving mad at us for refusing to be vassal states to their regime.
Trump didn't do that. He denigrated a portion of illegal aliens, not an ethnic group. The context of his remarks was illegal immigration, not legal immigration and not Mexicans generally. The entire speech is available on YouTube.
I watched it as it occurred that day, and his words betray your sad attempts to defend him. While Trump was referring to undocumented immigrants, he clearly inferred that the vast majority of those coming to the US were "rapists" or drug dealers with just the thrown in caveat at the end that "some, I assume, are good people".
So what I know in my heart is that there is a disgusting bigoted cancer in this country, many of my religious conservative relatives in Ohio and Arkansas are part of it and are far more open in expressing it when they don't have to abide by any CoC rules, and Trump feeds them daily and they love it and they love him because he reflects the worst of them in his words and actions. He empowers their bitter hate towards the supposed "others" they have identified and blamed for all their ills. Liberals, atheists, Muslims, Jews, immigrants, LGTBQ Americans, the supposed "coastal elites", they are all the ones the Trump loyalists and sycophants have worked themselves into a rabid furor over and Trump tells them its okay to hate, he calls Nazi's marching in the street along with their confederate compatriots waving swastika flags and confederate flags together "fine people". It's truly disgusting, but I don't expect honest examination from any of his spineless apologists, they have proved they are simply incapable of thinking for themselves and are only able to regurgitate sound bites fed to them by Fox News or a fact-less Trump tweet like sewn in segments of a human centipede.
They were both insults.
I speak as a rural American.
Only if you get pissed off about tractors on the roads or not having a grocery store within walking distance. Or farm smells.
I once read a comment from a woman who moved here and didn't like an apple orchard "messing up" her view. She should definitely be shamed.
Raising steak, bacon, and ice cream (city dwellers eat those, I believe) is a smelly business. Something folks who don't have much exposure to agriculture seem to forget.
I say BS on insults.
I speak as a rural American and as somebody of Mexican heritage.
You mean neither was an insult?
Ok.
I hope HA is reading this.
Born and raised on the prairie. Lived in the mountains 5 miles away from the nearest road. Lived in a desert where potable water was a daily concern. Lived downtown in a few major cities. Now back living on the prairie just a few miles from where I was born and raised. I feel no shame about any of it.
If an instructor from, for example, Liberty University has said something like that about cities, I wonder what the reaction would be. (I am not a fan of Liberty or Berkley)
Yawn. Being called "bad people" by religious conservatives? They're used to being called far worse by those on the right, just browse any seed about San Francisco or New York and you'll see the seething hate towards city dwellers.
shame "rural Americans" and those who aren't "pro-city."
Jackson Kernion, who has reportedly taught at least 11 philosophy courses at the California university, made the comments last Wednesday.
UC BERKELEY GRAD FEATURED IN 'NO SAFE SPACE' DOC DETAILS BEING SHUNNED BY CLASSMATES FOR BEING CHRISTIAN
"I unironically embrace the bashing of rural Americans," Kernion wrote in a now-deleted tweet. "They, as a group, are bad people who have made bad life decisions...and we should shame people who aren't pro-city."
Kernion started going after rural citizens, saying they should have higher health care, pay more in taxes and be forced to live an "uncomfortable" life for rejecting "efficient" city life,
And let us not forget the hate towards those who are educated. Improving oneself is considered being elite.........
What's really sad is that nothing this President does bothers his loyal sycophants.
Recording of Trump admitting he "grabs" women he finds attractive "by the pussy" and doesn't "even wait" for consent?
"Nothing I've heard in that comment on Access Hollywood bus bothers me..." - MAGA loyalists
President being an un-indicted co-conspirator in a campaign finance violation case where he was caught paying hundreds of thousands of dollars to porn star mistresses to keep them quiet about his adultery during the campaign?
"Nothing I've seen in that case and the fact that Trumps co-conspirator is currently in prison bothers me..." - MAGA loyalists
Ten clear counts of obstruction spelled out in the Mueller report where Trump told staff to lie and fire those investigating his campaign violations?
"Nothing I've seen in the Mueller report bothers me..." - MAGA loyalists
Thirty two individuals surrounding the Trump campaign have either been indicted or plead guilty to lying about the illicit aide the Russian government gave the Trump campaign along with over a dozen Russian agents charged.
"Nothing I've seen about all the criminality surrounding Trump bothers me..." MAGA loyalists
Over 13,000 lies have come out of the Presidents mouth or through his tweets in just 3 years.
"None of the lies Trump tells bothers me, all politicians lie..." - MAGA loyalists
A transcript of the President extorting a foreign government in an attempt to get them to publicly announce an investigation into one of Trumps primary political rivals where Trump held back nearly $400 million in military aide till two days AFTER the whistle blower concerns were made public and less than a day before the President of Ukraine had agreed to Trumps demands and was scheduled to go on CNN and make the claim that they were opening an investigation into Burisma, the Biden's and validate a conspiracy theory started by the Russians that it was Ukraine who was behind the 2016 election hacking against all contrary evidence and every US intelligence agencies assessment?
"Nothing I've heard about that Ukraine call bothers me..." - MAGA loyalists
Notice the key word there, "Nothing I've heard"? That shows that MAGA loyalists didn't actually read the transcript, they listened to their right wing pundits tell them what to think about the transcript.
It really is amazing to me that so many Americans could be abandoning all sense, reason and morality and side with what is becoming clearer day by day, a Russian asset bent on destroying western democracy in favor of an authoritarian oligarchy. It was truly sickening to see Trump tweeting during the testimony this morning with the clear intent of intimidating the witness testifying. This Presidency, without a doubt, is the most corrupt administration in the history of the United States, only being outdone in the arena of treason by those who attacked US soldiers at Fort Sumter on April 12, 1861.
Are you trying to suggest you are non-partisan?
For what? What do you believe she did? She wasn't even told why she was fired, so I seriously doubt you'd be able to supply that reasoning.
The ones who wanted her removed, which Trump did at their behest, were the two Giuliani cohorts that were arrested and are being prosecuted, and quite possibly Putin in his quest to force Trump to pin the election hacking on Ukraine and the Clinton campaign which was a total nonsense conspiracy theory started by the Russians that was picked up by complicit right wing media. If you have any evidence to the contrary, that the Ukraine was actually behind it, I'm sure the Trump campaign would be very excited to receive it because at the moment, they've got nothing and they know it. That's why they were trying to use their shadow diplomacy to get Ukraine to at minimum say in public that they were investigating those Russian conspiracy theorist allegations.
Trumps plan is clear. He wanted to flip the script and was desperate to do so for the upcoming 2020 election. He, and his apparent puppet master Putin, wanted to get Ukraine to accept fault for election hacking which would allow him to claim it was all a hoax, that Putin never did anything wrong. He'd argue for sanctions to be lifted and claim complete vindication in the 2020 campaign cycle while also attacking any Democrat who supported the Obama administration who he would claim, without any evidence and just on the announcement of Ukraine opening an investigation, was the real criminal. Trump held $400 million and a meeting at the white house out as the carrot to make the new president of Ukraine toe his line and do what he wanted. Again, all he actually wanted was a public announcement of an investigation that was clearly intended to harm the Democrat front runner in the 2020 election cycle and throw the dogs off Putin's vile scent.
What a disgusting comment. This is a woman who has served her country for over 33 years and you try to reduce her to a common whore with your comment.
Trump has reduced the entire administration and justice department to the status of the many whores he's used and discarded throughout his silver-spoon gold painted life, his followers doing the same to anyone that dares reject his slimy advances is no surprise. It's disgusting as you rightly point out, but not surprising. What would surprise me is any one of his sycophants actually standing up and thinking for themselves instead of championing the clearly criminal behavior of this unhinged and deranged out of control joke of a President.
Seriously? That's your response? Congratulations, you have proven my assertion that Trump is a reflection of his supporters.
Let's hope the ladies in your life are treated in the same fashion you would treat other women.
That was just so much of what the seeded article said. Thanks for the blatantly obvious derail have nothing to do with anything the seeded article was about. Nice liberal diversionary talking points.
Are you?
If I’d wanted to seed an article about Trump and impeachment yesterday I would have done so. This one clearly and obvious to any fair minded objective observer reading it is not.
And yet rural states have universities and colleges and many of us who live there are college educated.
You're right, I don't know you. I thought I did because my initial impression was that you were a man who treated women with respect. We didn't agree on policy issues but I never thought you'd disparage a woman for political points.
Amazing. The disgusting misogynistic comment is allowed to stand while the critiques of it are censored. Sad to see this kind of obvious partisan moderation.
What exactly are you responding to?
If you hadn’t taken the seed off topic in the first place, these other comments would never have come up.
Consider the source. To him, every woman is a whore if they don't believe as he does.
Do his followers realize that the meat for their BBQ's and the hops for their beer come from rural America?
Would they care even if they knew? To Trump's supporters who are not farmers and others who are suffering greatly from his imbecilic trade debacle with China, they could care less if they are not the ones who are suffering.
However, what they don't understand, is that the effects of their "brilliant" trade war at this point is only the tip of the iceberg, and the real repercussions are yet to come. China is just letting Trump dig America's fall.
JMOO
That is the progressive dream, to hope that China can do the damage to our capitalist economy that they themselves could not.
We Heartland Americans got our economy and incomes back along with the jobs and this loser is upset that our revolution has restored the deplorable bitter clingers and they hate that “is the economy stupid.
Heartland Americans have been bought and sold by the Koch brothers.
That must be why the brothers are siding with China and the democrats against Heartland America.
If this guy is for real, he's an ignorant jackass.
We don't agree often, but this time you are spot on.
Well he is from the people’s republic of Berzerkely! 😂
Supposed "Smart People" say the darndest things ….don't they ?
Indeed. It’s ludicrous and ridiculous the things they say about people not wanting to share in their lifestyle. They bash us and ours and then are stunned, shocked even when we respond to their belittling our existence by doing likewise to their environment and those inhabiting it.
Aren't these just the sort of stupid-ass comments we have come to expect from some college professors?
Liberal elitism on full display!
Because having a functioning brain is so elite? Or liberal?
LOL, you said it, not me!
Enjoy!
So those of us from small cities, exurbs, small town and rural farm or rural mountain are always under attack for.what reason by the liberal urban elite. Why is that? Many of us used to be a part of the democrat party base. What changed?
Identity politics became more profitable.
He is better than they are.
Good point.
Pretty much. This idiot is from California and he’s basically attacking the people who live on about 80% of our states land.
A couple of things there XX....You attack fellow California's on many of your comments and articles...Pot meet kettle...
I find it hilarious that the seeder is whining about this guy when the majority of his articles are denigrating dems/lib/progressives and most anyone that doesn't think like him..
POT MEET KETTLE (AGAIN).....
I’m always happy to defend Heartland America and Americans from the bi coastal secular progressive limousine liberal elites.
And I'm sure that they are happy to point out your hypocrisy.
I simply defend Jefferson from Californication and the less than useless human debris in the urban coastal areas who want to think of us as their serfs and house pets.
Says the person that lives in the mythical kingdom of Jeffersonia..
When progressives from big cities in coastal California mock the Jefferson movement, our lifestyle, our region, we hit em back harder. We want progressive urban Californication to know that we love the government of the state of Texas and absolutely despise the government of this stupid state.
If the Jeffersonia movement is so popular why can't you get it on the ballot?
I recommend that if your going to really hit back hard don't pay your state income tax. That will show them...
I'm sure that despite your despising the CA government they really don't much care and they still have you under their thumb...
Jeffersonia is a myth that will never be reality.
Actually they don’t. We live far enough away from them that they rule on paper but unless they are physically present 24/7/365 we pretty much live our day to day lives as if they didn’t exist. Most big city politicians at the state and federal level won’t even come here. Dianne Feinstein is the only one who will actually talk to local government and business leaders here. Thanks to Trump our economy is booming and our unemployment rate is down to 3.5% because we are different.
It will be fought for for as long as it takes even if it is a multigenerational effort. We won’t go away and we will be waiting when DC and our PR want statehood to leverage our cause into a bi partisan compromise to bring in one of those.
https://soj51.org/
[Deleted]
As long as they pay their taxes the CA government could care less what their delusions are. And there is a cure for that.
We pay our taxes and fortunately our wages and cost of living don’t trigger the caps on federal deductions as they do for most coastal urban Californication residents. Few things short of Statehood made us in rural Ca more happy than the SALT limits. We liked it even more than the red states did. A nice taste of revenge.
You can fight all you want for a lost cause because it will never happen
Anyone can create a fake website
So what’s the cure for our desire to secede from the worst state in the Union by far...?
Well we at least got to relish getting full federal and local tax deductions and mortgage interest deductions while most of our instate enemies no longer do. Consider it our revenge for your occupation of us.
Because fake websites can be up and advocating for us since 2013.
Actually they do. You have to pay state sales tax and state income tax...Try not paying that and see what happens.
The reason that you can't get Jefferson on the ballot is that you can't get enough signatures. Which means you don't have the support you keep claiming you do.
You do realize that the top employers in Shasta are the state/fed/city and country operations.
XX, the area is naturally beautiful but hardly self-sufficient without the state of California. I've lived there and still have property in Siskiyou county and many relatives in many of the counties in the surrounding area. So I'm quite familiar with the situation in northern California.
Sad that if someone is hurt finically by SALT you rejoice in it. I doubt if most people of goodwill would have the same feeling
I still say, not happy here....move.
Actually our region of the state has been negatively impacted economically by Californication. If we became a state, we would be able to self sustain just as many other small population states do. California holds us back. It does not benefit us. The finding we get due to constitutional rules does not come close to replacing money lost due to the regimes negative influences. When cost of living is factored in , we are better off than a lot of the rest of the state is. We don’t add on to the sales tax like urban counties do and we qualified for federal opportunity zones and our local government incentivizes businesses to move here so yes, we are tax advantaged compared to the rest of the state.
No. We were simply tired of subsidizing their high state and local taxes with federal income tax refunds from the rest of America including the rural portions of these urban blue states. The SALT limits don’t have anywhere near the same impact on rural areas as they do on urban places.
As I said people of goodwill wouldn't rejoice over something that hurts people, perhaps you're not that person of goodwill.
If the propaganda that you spouting were true the people pushing Jefferson should have no problem getting enough signatures to get on the ballot, you've had 4 or 5 years to get it done. It's obvious that the majority of people in the so called Jeffersonia have more sense than those pushing this pipe dream.
Carry on.
It hurts no one. It simply transfers the responsibility of state and local high tax rates back upon the people living in said state such as NJ, NY, Ca, and properly takes that burden away from the tax payers of the other states. The only way to force NY or Ca to lower their state and local tax rates is to make those citizens have to pay them without subsidies from other Americans. It just so happens that rural California doesn’t have income and living cost level nor prohibitive real estate costs to reach the nationwide 10k and 750k caps. We will though benefit if the pain caused by city people paying the full effect of their own tax rates cause them to lower tax rates and build more housing.
Now we are going to celebrate the unanimous opposition to democrats impeachment of our President in these rural congressional districts.