Well, let's just distill things a bit here.
So, people are saying that there is a geographical and historical South, and a cultural South. If that's the case, then what, exactly, is this Southern culture -- and more importantly, why can that Southern culture not include big cities, aggressive drivers, Hindu temples, signs in Mandarin, Catholics, decent dim sum, bodegas, conveyor belt sushi, El Salvadorans, subzero winter temperatures, and all the rest?
Just going from the stereotype of Southern "hospitality" alone, anyone who thinks Southerners are hospitable has never driven in the South. Atlanta is home to the most vicious drivers on the planet.
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"To sustain the life of a large, modern city in this cloying, clinging heat is an amazing achievement. It is no wonder that the white men and women in Greenville walk with a slow, dragging pride, as if they had taken up a challenge and intended to defy it without end." -- Rebecca West for The New Yorker, 1947
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