Hi,

I read that you had a problem with Southern hospitality, and I’m sorry you had a bad experience with a not-so-nice southerner. It happens. You’ll find disingenuous people everywhere. Even in the north. I also read you like to be blunt. You want me to tell you how I feel straight up. No beating around the bush. I gotcha.

You do not know what you’re talking about.

Here at The University of Alabama, our students are from ALL over the country, from different backgrounds, and lifestyles. While the Northerners admit to preferring bluntness, they don’t perceive Southern hospitality as “fake.” This is most likely due to the fact it is not fake. Trust me, if a Southerner doesn’t like you, you will know.

Don’t lecture us on how poorly we treat people who aren’t like us as you lament the gross injustice of the practice of not being as utter ass. You’re ripping the South a new one for not going about life the way y’all do in the Northeast. In other words, you’re treating us poorly because we aren’t like you. The truth is, most Southerners aren’t stuck in 1964. Our hospitality isn’t discriminatory, unless we just do not care for someone as a person due to their sour, arrogant, pretentious, abrasive and overall unpleasant personality. We don’t take kindly to people mocking our beliefs with such disdain. Kind of how you didn’t appreciate someone coming into your home and disrespecting your family.

No one enjoys being disrespected, and Southerners are no exception. You claim we live in an “honor society.” So, we respect our elders, and put an emphasis on “honor”. It’s a simple respect thing: we want people to respect us, as individuals, and our family name. Has it ever crossed your mind that the South is mainly made up of small towns? We’re concerned with saving face because it’s what people will know us by. In these small towns where everyone knows everyone, word goes around. We do run businesses down here and it’s beneficial to keep a good reputation.

It doesn’t take that much energy to not be frigid. I’m not hiding my social judgments by using my manners. Saying “please” and “thank you” are called using those wonderful things called manners. Using manners just takes so much energy, but being rude on the streets doesn’t. Makes sense. Saying “bless your heart” has a few different meaning, and it all depends on how you say it. It can be sincere, or it can be an expression of one’s social judgments. Here in the South, it's too hot to wear our feelings on our sleeves.

You have all the scientific studies, and what not, but I don’t know what you’re trying to prove with it. You cited a 21-year-old study. They only used 83 men. 83 men to sum up the entire north and south. Reliable. So, maybe Northerners are just used to insults and being bumped into because the region is densely populated. People are bound to bump into each other. You’re just used to it. In the South, we have room to not get ran into by strangers. Our towns are smaller, and you don’t want to start a feud with someone you have to see regularly. In a big city, you will probably never have to see them again after you cuss them a good one. Are you trying to say we need to just accept being treated like shit? Maybe you do, but majority of America doesn’t like that, and y’all are known for being a tough crowd. Maybe it’s not us — it’s you.

I am genuinely sorry you invited a guest into your house who in turn insulted you behind your backs. Being overly nice to someone, by showering them with compliments, then turning around to insult the very same people you were complimenting IS NOT Southern hospitality. It’s called lying. We don’t take kindly to that sort of nonsense in the South either. I’m sorry your experience with one bad Southerner tainted your view of the entire South.

So here’s my cry to you and anyone else who is offended by our hospitality (because I know enough Northerners to understand they’re not all as abrasive as you are): start being nice to people. You never know if a single genuine compliment could make someone’s day.

If someone’s clothes don’t fit quite right, keep your mouth shut. It’s their body and they can dress it however they freakin’ want to. If they ask your opinion, you can kindly tell them it’s not the most flattering, and then come back with something that is flattering. There’s something good about everyone.

I don’t know what kind of monster can look someone in the eye and tell them they don’t the food they just spent time making for you.

If you don’t like someone’s singing, turn up the volume OR sing along with them. Don’t take their happy singing for granted because you never know when you’ll hear it again.

As for me, I don’t need your help figuring out what honest means. I know exactly what it means. And honestly, you don’t want me to be honest with you because I don’t know you. I don’t think bringing down another writer for her opinion makes mine any better. I don’t think talking bad about the North will make the South any better.

You should take a page from your own book and confront this woman instead of coming after the South as a whole. Or maybe you should just come to the South and see for yourself.