I was born in the Spanish-speaking neighborhood of Tampa, Florida, (Ybor City) but we moved to a rural, very rednecky community way out in the country when I was about 12.

My Cuban-American mother used to tell me
"Some of these Crackers [our generic term for anyone who was not Latino or Negro] can be really nice, but they are still very strange. They just aren't like normal people."

My mother was born of Cuban parents in New York City, and was raised in a Jewish neighborhood. She even spoke English with a Jewish accent! She understood multiculturalism perfectly well. But nothing really prepared her for the Deep South.

Much of the political and social attitudes described in this article were quite common in rural Florida in the early 1960s. Yes, I know the two shouldn't have anything to do with each other, but they do. You'll just have to take my word for it. This isn't so much about politics as it is about culture. I've known all about "conservatives" since before I knew what the word meant.

Of course, for those embedded in this culture, who have been born and raised in it and have no way of comparing or contrasting it to anything else, this is impossible to grasp or to comprehend. You can't explain water to a fish.