Hillbilly Elegy

Few things anger Appalachians more than outsiders passing judgement on how we live. 

Sure, there are lots of other things outsiders do that ruffle our feathers. For example: pronounce the region "Appa-LAY-shuh" instead of "Appa-LATCH-uh" and every hillbilly within earshot will participate in a synchronized, dramatic eye roll. Try it, and watch it happen. It's in our DNA. 

That's because when we hear that we know immediately you're not one of us. And that makes us question your ability to understand and appreciate our culture. We're a bit thin-skinned about outsiders, as we've had a long history of being abused, used, exploited, and mocked by them. 

I reckon if we had our druthers y'all would stay out of our hollers and done leave us be. 

My hillbilly bona fides are legit. I grew up smack dab in the heart of Appalachia. The region in which I was born and raised had all the mountain-folk stereotypes: outhouses were not uncommon; some people drew the water they drank and bathed in from hand-dug wells; kinsfolk from multiple generations lived on the same property; and a few kids I knew took summertime baths in large tubs of water in the back yard. The region was also home to hard working men and women. People with a deep connection to their land and to their communities. Family clans within which cousins, aunts, and uncles held nearly the same status as brothers, sisters, and parents.  

I've spent a lifetime immersed in hillbilly culture, and that experience caused me to have strong feelings about J.D. Vance's Hillbilly Elegy. Those feelings are so strong, in fact, that I find it difficult to describe them. Anger is too strong a word, but frustration is not strong enough. Maybe the most appropriate descriptor is disappointment. 

Yeah. Disappointment. Deep, pervasive disappointment. Because -- once again -- an outsider took a hard look at my hillbilly culture, compared it to how he sees and experiences the world, then concluded that we live as we do because we don't make the right choices. 

[Cue eye roll]

Vance visited Appalachia lots of times, but he grew up in northern Ohio. He's an outsider. And outsiders like him ain't looking at the right things when they peer in at us from the outside. That view is superficial and lacks nuance. They see hillbillies as unambitious and unmotivated. Shiftless and lazy. Ignorant and impulsive. 

If they truly understood the culture they'd instead see resilience and resourcefulness. Steadfast loyalty and fierce determination. A people curious about life even while being geographically and socially isolated. 

A kind people eager to help others. 

Hillbilly Elegy tells the story of one family's response to trauma, mental illness, and addiction. While Appalachia has its share of those things, the region holds no ownership of them. Those mental health issues affect millions of Americans of all types; men and women; adults and children; poor and rich; city and country dwellers. 

And flatlanders and hillbillies. 

Dark Waters

Some of my early memories involve playing outdoors in the 1970s on our family farm in south-central West Virginia. A kid could get lost in his imagination in a place like that: I was a cowboy while riding my pony, Robin Hood hiding out in the forest, and Evel Knieval while doing stupid stunts on my dirt bike.

I lived, although I don't know how.

I often played in our backyard creek. There, no matter who I imagined I was, I was really just a typical West Virginia kid playing in sludge and sloshing through water made colorful by oil leaking downstream from a coal mine.  And because I was a just a kid from West By God, my safety was less important to The Man than was the cost of creating systems that protect me from their pollution.

In the 1970s the government had to step in and make that decision for them.

Directed by Todd Haynes and starring Mark Ruffalo, Dark Waters tells the story of what happens when The Man decides his profit is more important than the health and safety of his neighbors. The legal mystery, based on a true story that spanned over 20 years, follows unassuming hero Robert Bilott in his David vs. Goliath fight to prove The Man wrong.

Dark Waters tells an honest and mostly accurate story, and Ruffalo is good at playing the understated hero. Some characters -- Ann Hathaway's Sarah Bilott, particularly -- are two dimensional and underdeveloped. I suspect that's to allow focus on the conspiracy, but it is a flaw in the film. What does work, however, is the depiction of West Virginians allowing ourselves to be exploited by big business in return for a job that will feed our families.

"Go ahead and test it, you won't find anything," says a woman having blood drawn to determine if she's contaminated by C-8.  Although she unknowingly drinks poisoned water every day from her tap, the woman adds: "DuPont is good people."

It's the West Virginia way.