Southern discomfort

A case for Oklahoma’s true geographic location

Two major societies on earth have the following traits in common: until fairly recently, both were agricultural economies under the dominion of a powerful landholding class and populated by a large number of people born into permanent servitude; residents of both are plagued by health issues that stubbornly resist the progress made in the rest of the industrialized world; both cultures celebrate retrograde models of masculinity and femininity; both have a preference for strongman political leaders with authoritarian tendencies; both peoples cling proudly to their backwardness and fiercely to a romanticized bygone era that came to a reluctant end; and, when compared to other societies nearby, both are unusually fertile ground for complete sociopolitical dysfunction. 

One is Vladimir Putin’s Russia. The other is the American South.

For all its charms—and they are many—there is no denying that among regions in the U.S. the American South is the Michael Jordan of being deplorable. Taken altogether, the South is home to the dumbest, sickest, poorest, most willfully ignorant, and tragically neglected Americans.

Oklahomans like to weigh the issue of whether or not Oklahoma is, in fact, a part of the South. A few years ago, This Land Press ran an article that explored the idea, pointing out that Okies themselves are torn on the question and that people in other southern states tend to claim Oklahoma as part of the region only reluctantly, if at all. 

But after the disaster that was Oklahoma’s most recent legislative session there should be no more question about whether or not Oklahoma belongs to the South. And just in case the debate lingers, I offer you the final, irrefutable case, piece by piece, that Oklahoma is Southern, with a capital S.

Exhibit 1 The U.S. Census Bureau places Oklahoma definitely in Census Region 3, “South,” Division 7, “West South Central,” along with the other unquestionably Southern states Arkansas, Texas and Louisiana.

Exhibit 2 Though not technically one of the states that comprised the Confederate States of America, the Indian Territory was claimed by the CSA, and 14% of the population of were African American slaves. The relationship of Native Americans to the Civil War is complex, but we can say with some clarity that the so-called “Five Civilized Tribes”—who were evicted decades earlier from their homelands in Southern states—sided primarily with the Confederacy. 

Exhibit 3 Like in the rest of the South, an unusually high percentage of Oklahomans are Baptist.

Exhibit 4 Like other once-solidly Democratic states in the South, in the 1968 presidential election following a political realignment over Civil Rights, Oklahoma broke ranks. It’s true segregationist candidate George Wallace didn’t win in Oklahoma, but he did quite well. Wallace didn’t win in South Carolina or Tennessee either.

Exhibit 5 In the 2008 presidential election the vast majority of counties in the United States went more Democratic than in previous years, even GOP strongholds like Utah and Idaho. The exceptions were, by and large, counties in the American South, clearly including Oklahoma (the state that went more red than any other that year). Those Southern counties that did swing Democratic did so because of their relatively large African-American populations. 

Exhibit 6 The Economic Innovation Group’s “Distressed Communities Index,” which tabulates several different measures of economic dysfunction like housing vacancy rates, adult unemployment, and high school drop out rates, places most of Oklahoma squarely in the bad kids corner with the rest of the South. 

Exhibit 7 Mapping Internet connectivity rates county-by-county reveals Oklahoma to be among the least-connected states in America, along with the rest of the South, (plus the parts of Arizona, New Mexico and South Dakota populated largely by Native Americans).

Exhibit 8 It’s true that many Okies, like Midwesterners, refer to soft drinks generically as “pop,” deviating from the generic “Coke” used in the rest of the South. This turns out, however, to be a geographic anomaly centered in the northeast part of the state. The rest of Oklahoma says “Coke.” 

Exhibit 9 The accent. The Southern American English accent is notably present in two places: The South, and a small part of Southern California around the city of Bakersfield. Guess who brought the Southern accent to Bakersfield? 

Okies. 

For more from Denver, read his article on the consequences of drilling tax breaks.