Talk:The South

It gets tricky defining "The South" as far as a geographic region in the United States. The ones listed in the article are what I would consider to be Civil War Era south. However, I've found this map as well on the census website that has a considerably larger scope here. --Colest 15:48, 11 May 2007 (EDT)

Solid South

Both of the Bushs carried a solid South in 1988, 2000, and 2004. Clinton won in 1992 & 1996 by winning some southern states, but not all of them. <http://fisher.lib.virginia.edu/collections/stats/elections/maps/>

Any reason that you removed the category Rob? --Colest 12:25, 17 May 2007 (EDT)

Which cat? RobS 15:50, 24 May 2007 (EDT)

I had it tagged as Geography, I think it might have just been accidently removed. --Colest 16:02, 24 May 2007 (EDT)

I removed Missouri and Kentucky because they were not part of the Confedracy.--Cobb 12:35, 17 May 2007 (EDT)

I made a change regarding the 1968 election. The Democrats carried Texas.--McIntyre 13:28, 19 May 2007 (EDT)

Before someone reverts this again, please note that the Democrats carreid Texas in 1968--Davyjones 14:24, 21 May 2007 (EDT)

OK, before editing, check the map. Nixon did NOT carry Texas in 1968--Lobo 13:08, 24 May 2007 (EDT)

Kerry material

Democratic Senator John Kerry, the party's 2004 Presidential nominee, mocked Southerners and their tradition of military service during the 2006 Midterm elections saying,

“

You know, education, if you make the most of it, you study hard, you do your homework and you make an effort to be smart, you can do well. If you don’t, you get stuck in Iraq.

”

The incident is widely believed to have killed any hope for Kerry to run as a viable Presidential candidate in 2008, or ever again.

I don't see what this has to do with the South. According to the reference, the speech was made in California, and the reference does not, as far as I can see, even mention the South. If you assume that he was mocking military volunteers (my perception is that he was attempting to mock Bush for getting the U. S. stuck in Iraq, and phrased it so clumsily and gracelessly that it was readily subject to misinterpretation... but never mind), well, military volunteers are not limited to the South. Dpbsmith 14:48, 18 May 2007 (EDT)

Education

I'm not sure this 'ding' against the south is justified. Any part of the country, southern or not, has lower scores for minority populations - and the south happens to have a higher percentage of minority population than most other areas of the country. Going by overall trends in our country, it should be expected that the south would test lower in educational achievement. Learn together 12:02, 22 May 2007 (EDT)

You are right, there are always cause and effects when it comes to this sort of thing. Perhaps the article would be better served by just providing some demographic data and allowing the reader to draw the correlation. --Colest 12:15, 22 May 2007 (EDT)

A review of the cite provided (and it is a good cite) shows virtually all scores from all states are minutely below national averages, minutely. See for yourself. There are two scales with national averages of something lke 238 and 257 (speaking from memory), and all states consistently come in 2 or 3, seldom more than 5 or 6 pts lower, IOW 98 to 99% of the national average. One instance, from memory, I think MS had one embarssingly low score. It's little more than a curiousity, and doesn't deserve much attention. RobS 17:30, 22 May 2007 (EDT)

Well then, it seems like we're all agreed that it doesn't belong here. --Colest 17:44, 22 May 2007 (EDT)

Please, before someone willy-nilly reverts this, please note that I have cited my sources--Philaretes 14:35, 19 June 2007 (EDT)

We discussed this above; the claims are so marginal that to make light or it raises the issue of undue weight (unless you are a racist and attempting to make a connection between large minority populations and lower academic scores. Either way, it's not going into this article). RobS 14:58, 19 June 2007 (EDT)

How's this for compromise language,

• Liberal racists maintain the South, with it's large minority populations, lags behind the rest of the US in academic scores. RobS 15:02, 19 June 2007 (EDT)

South as a direction

South is a direction, you know... not a place or a political entity like The West. It is one of the cardinal points of the compass along with East, West and North and should be counted with them. To be a place it needs the "The" in front of it . As it stands, with no "South" joining its siblings in Category: Navigation, it is a fine example of CP parochialism. AlanE (talk) 02:11, 4 November 2016 (EDT)

After reading you comment, I blundered onto the page, thinking I could patch it up a bit or add a paragraph to deal with the problem. As you clearly recognized, that's not going to work for this--the entire thing is on the wrong topic. I'm guessing a move would be best (dump this page somewhere else, then make a page on the compass direction) but what do you think this page should be titled? "The South," "Southern United States," "South United States," or something else entirely? --David B ^(TALK) 10:41, 4 November 2016 (EDT)

I suggest "Southern United States" or "South (region)". I say one of those two, and the other one should be a redirect. --1990'sguy (talk) 17:42, 4 November 2016 (EDT)

Thanks to both of you for thinking about it. Hopefully something will come of it, even if it's only a disambiguation page. I would accept "The South" (It is the common term for the region, both geographically and culturally) but the pedant in me rebels. But stuff the pedant! As long as the word "South" is able to join its three siblings as a Category subject I won't moan.

I think. AlanE (talk) 21:00, 4 November 2016 (EDT)

I think Southern United States would be best, but such a page already exists as a redirect to here. That page must be deleted before I can more this there. Then a disambiguation statement at the top of the new "south" page and maybe a redirect from South (region) should finish it up. --David B ^(TALK) 01:18, 5 November 2016 (EDT)

It doesn't have to be deleted. You just cut n paste this article into it and make a disambig out of this one. RobS^{#NeverHillary} 17:15, 5 November 2016 (EDT)

That wouldn't be ideal, as the edit history would still be in this one, despite the fact it will cover a completely different subject. --1990'sguy (talk) 18:12, 5 November 2016 (EDT)

Agreed, it works, but it's not the favored option. --David B ^(TALK) 18:22, 5 November 2016 (EDT)

The "South" is a fairly common term, in its political/geographic connotation in the U.S. It's not often that we hear any other term for that concept.--Andy Schlafly (talk) 01:24, 5 November 2016 (EDT)

Agreed, but the word "south" refers to the direction. The south is named such because it is in that direction. If we aim to be an encyclopedia, it seems that our "south" article should be like our "east," "west," and "north" articles (the last of which could refer to northern U.S. instead). --David B ^(TALK) 01:39, 5 November 2016 (EDT)

After edit conflict...) Agreed Andy. So can you now then change the Heading of the article (and this talk page) to "The South" thereby freeing the direction "South" to be listed in its rightful Category? AlanE (talk) 01:45, 5 November 2016 (EDT)

The South or American South would make sense.RobS^{#NeverHillary} 02:46, 5 November 2016 (EDT)

I suggest a redirect titled "South (region)", so people who make that search still find it, and then we can move the page to "Southern United States". --1990'sguy (talk) 11:14, 5 November 2016 (EDT)

"The South" doesn't sound very "encyclopedic" but it might be most logical option. If we do that, we definately should have a few redirects, too. --David B ^(TALK) 13:13, 5 November 2016 (EDT)

What about "American South" or "The American South"? Does that sound any better? --1990'sguy (talk) 13:20, 5 November 2016 (EDT)

Those might be hard to find too--Maybe I'm overthinking this, it just seems there's no perfect solution. We'd have the same problem if there was an article on the north--as in the northern states. Thankfully, that doesn't see to be the case. --David B ^(TALK) 13:30, 5 November 2016 (EDT)

But I've suggested "South (region)" several times. Why don't we use this? People would find it much more easily. Or we could do something more along the lines of "South (American region)". --1990'sguy (talk) 18:10, 5 November 2016 (EDT)

You're right 1990'sguy, and I wasn't ignoring it. Both suggestions are pretty good. I think South (region) a great candidate for a redirect, and perhaps South (American region), so if someone types "South" into the search box, that will show. However, the south doesn't mean the same in Australia or any other country as it does here in the US. The problem becomes, how do title a page on a colloquial term for global use? It sounds like from this discussion, "The South" is the favored option, so that's what I'll probably do unless someone else objects or intervenes. To help patch up the aftermath, a few redirects will be in order, including one from South (region). --David B ^(TALK) 18:19, 5 November 2016 (EDT)