| I only lived in Austin for a couple of years, but I grew up in the Amarillo and Lubbock and am a direct descendant of the racist, slave-holding white settlers who signed on the Texas Declaration of Independence. I can concede that there are plenty of nice folks and pretty places in the state. That's the line the person you're responding to is fishing for: somehow the people in the state aren't responsible for the oligarchy that runs it. Somehow folks aren't responsible for not knowing how oppressive that political situation is for everyone who isn't shaped like them. I've left Texas; your points here agree with my understanding. Texas is nothing special- I can get the same cedar fever out on my 40 acres in rural Colorado, but the view is better. I'd rather live out here where I have an outhouse than try and find parking in the green belt and go climb on a few chipped and shitty 40-foot rock climbs in a 104* sauna. I did go down for 18 days of the Kerrville Folk Festival this year- that and my kiddo who lives in Dallas are the only things that can pull me that far south any more. It's a just-fine place if you're okay with the highly authoritarian politics. A lot of folks clearly are okay with those restrictions on their behavior. They see the state as only repressing other people; if the state is murdering black and brown folks (say, folks like Sandra Bland for instance), it's clearly because that's the natural, normal thing for a state to do. And it's somehow never going to affect them. Maybe their sister has never wanted reproductive healthcare and needed a drive from Lubbock to San Antonio and back to get 2 pills. Of course, now that's not even possible, so maybe that kind of state repression is no longer relevant? But I feel that kind of stuff in my day to day life, and I can't really ignore it. It's not much better west of the Pecos, but at least there are fewer people here. |