Ignorant and Backward and Proud of It

A topic that we ended up talking about last evening was the backwardness of Hampton Roads (and Virginia and the Deep South in general). The conversation arose as we had pre-dinner drinks with the daughter of one of the boyfriend’s clients on the 19th floor roof top deck of her apartment building, Spread out in front of us was a panoramic view northward with the Empire State Building, Woolworth Building and other famous images. Our dinner companion is an attorney with a mega law firm and is highly educated and unlikely to ever move back to Hampton Roads, Virginia. Why? She has no desire to return to the lack of professional opportunity in the area or the cultural/social backwardness of the region.
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Compared to the cosmopolitan atmosphere of New York, much of Hampton Roads is in many ways like living surrounded by suburban hillbillies who are backward and ignorant and – worse yet –are very proud of it. Driving so much of the backwardness and closed mindedness is conservative Christianity. Pat Robertson, Regent University and CBN cast a toxic fog over the region. Politicians seem only too happy to embrace this ignorant and intolerant mindset even as they whine about the need to attract state of the art businesses to the area. Compounding the problem are the Neanderthals in the senior ranks of the U.S. military leadership – yep, those same folks who support DADT - and it’s no wonder that the region is losing college educated residents. Economists at Old Dominion University have identified this problem several times as college graduates either never return after college or who grab employment opportunities elsewhere – Washington, D.C. being the most popular nearby option for escape. Sadly, it is not a new problem: the Virginian Pilot noted it SEVEN years ago. Here are highlights:
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The young and the educated are growing restless in Hampton Roads. From 1995 to 2000, the region lost a greater proportion of single, collegegroomed 25- to 39-year-olds than any other large metropolitan area in the country except for Pittsburgh, the Census Bureau recently reported. . . . . “This is a problem for any community that loses its best and brightest and the people who are going to be its future leaders.”
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The potential dangers: a loss of entrepreneurial activity and civic brainpower and the depression of wages regionwide. “If you lose these people,” Whaley said, “you’re losing a lot of seedcorn from which new companies can be born.” . . . Between 1990 and 2001, wages rose 41 percent in the region, compared with 48 percent nationwide and 60 percent in major metropolitan areas, said James V. Koch, an economics professor and former president at ODU.
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The overwhelming majority of large metropolitan areas showed significant increases in the number of young college-educated singles, topped by Las Vegas, which gained 40.9 percent, and Atlanta, with a 28.2 percent increase. The decision to leave might be reached early: In The Virginian-Pilot’s 2002 survey of high-school seniors, only 29 percent of college-bound students said they thought they’d live here after getting their degrees.
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Frankly, from everything I see, things have not improved. How does one change the phenomenon? I really do not know, but I believe a major first step is ending the worshipping of ignorance that pervades too many of the Christian churches in the area. That, and ending the eagerness of politicians to shamelessly pander to this ignorant element rather than make the case that this mindset is cutting the region's economic throat. This takes education – something that Republicans in Virginia never want to fully fund – and by education I mean progressive education, not the creationism and abstinence only propaganda so loved by the Christo-fascists.