The Wild and Wonderful Whites of West Virginia

http://www.wildandwonderfulwhites.com/trailer/

Caught this last night on Netflix... and wow. Sadly, it seems like I know this family. It would make for a pretty educational actual documentary. This documentary basically only covers the insanity without explaination.

Do you know folks like this? Seen it?

:wow:

I know people pretty much just like that. :blush:

:blush:

:hi:

:hi:
I see you are in NC too......we have our fair share of that 'cultural' demographic.

By that I mean these folks put a W. Va. stamp on the whole thing but there are people like that everywhere. I never know what to think--is it a generations-long decline? Was it ever better? Is it an endless cycle of poverty and drugs that affects everything from IQ to impulse control to sociopathy to helplessness to substance abuse and round and round? I expect so. Some rise above and get out. I know that too. Many don't. It just plain makes me sad.

I want to know the answers too. I agree with you about the West Virginia part. I've lived all up and down the east coast plus midwest... that type of crowd is everywhere. I, myself, am not -that- bad, but I seem to have been surrounded by the type most of my life.

The mock-documentary (produced by Johnny Knoxville of Jackass fame) snuck in a little information about how this particular family started. A coal miner was getting screwed by the company, government, law, etc. and decided he'd screw back. I think it was said all of those in the film get disability. That.. and isolation from main stream culture (which I can see).

Boggles the mind.

:hi:

EDIT: wording

I saw your post earlier & I was so excited about it because it seemed similar to Rory Kennedy's "American Hollow" from the 90's, which was set in the Appalacians. That documentary followed a big extended family for a year. It was interesting, sad at times, & funny when it wasn't intended to be. It was a real-life Snuffy Smith-type family.

My husband & I are going to watch this later on Netflix!

check this film. i started watching and did`t get up till it was done. one of the best movies i`ve seen in years.

http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/10012136-winters_bone/

Thanks!

:hi:

if I lived in W.Virgina, I think I'd be mad. There are people like that everywhere. It just looks different in other places. Pretty much everyone knows some family who is a bit 'off' like that (in varying degrees) no matter where you live. It'll be apparent in different ways depending on your area, (rural/sub-urban/or urban), but it'll be there

Unfortunately I've seen almost the exact/same type of thing as the Whites here at the northern end of the Appalachian Mountains. There are more than a few families around here who behave exactly like that. Minus the dancing talent. But thank God most of the rest of the country does not see us ALL as being 'that way'. Not only because it is false, but because no one has truly successfully stereotyped us. Carolyn Chute w/her 'Beans of Egypt Maine' gave people a good peek, but that fictional book from the 80's is long forgotten now, I think.

I suspect the converse is true of the people of the town in W. Virginia where the White's story is based. I'm certainly not vouching for the White family, but I can't help but feel as if they were being lampooned and stereotyped by the documentary, for the sake of tv/dvd ratings. And in a broader sense, the region itself. Heck, the whole state!

Rural poverty is a very real problem. But very few rural poor are well represented by The Whites, which is why I found this documentary a bit offensive

how they did the documentary. Once I realized who was behind it I thought... they won't get to the reasons why because showing only the dark side will sell.

:hi:

for anyone posting on any of the education threads in GD.

Watch this and then tell me what you'd do as a teacher if you had a couple kids from families like this in your class.

I probably wouldn't last long though. When I confront the guardians about an issue I'd probably get lawed.

:hi:

Well just one of them, Jessco. He is a nice but crazy person. See the county where this was filmed? I live in that county.

that the documentary picked this family in particular to shine a spotlight on? I'm sure that they are not the norm in your county but the documentary does little to inform their viewers of this. It unfairly seems to be making a mockery out of All of you. Yes, the Whites make for interesting viewing, but couldn't the documentary at least show some respect to your region by making it clear that MOST folks don't behave the same way as them?

It'd bug me if someone did a documentary about people in my area who are just like the Whites, but didn't bother to point out that not all of us are that way. Not everyone from rural areas are unemployed, ignorant, drunken, thieving, pill poppers. Although there are a few. I would be embarrassed if that is all people knew about us who live out here in the boonies.

Looks like you live in a beautiful area though. I was struck by how similar our two areas seem to be even though we live well over 500 miles from each other. :hi:

when they interview the DA and he talks about a kid from the county that got into MIT. The first three or four interviews are with people who are disgusted by the way the Whites behave and don't want to be associated with them.

And it never says anything about how all West Virginians behave this way. It just talks about the culture of coal mining exploitation where people live fast and die young and see the companies cheating in collusion with the government so think why not me? That doesn't imply everyone thinks that way- it's just trying to find an explanation for their behavior in their environment.

I had forgotten about the DA interview until just now. He does make that point. I think on some level he was probably trying to do pre-emptive damage control on behalf of the people of that county, just in case the documentary leaned a little too much into the stereotypical 'redneck' direction.

And you're right about the DA and some other interviews that provided some balance to what otherwise could've been an extremely unflattering portrait. I still think they could have done a little more of that though. And yeah, they went a little into the coal mining/hard-living thing but I personally didn't read as much into it in terms of an explanation as you.

But that's just me, and I concede that you do have a point. They at least provided some balance. I guess it's instinctive for me to want to jump to the defense of rural people because there very often are unfair misperceptions. This documentary could very easily have made those misperceptions much worse if it had provided nothing in the way of an explanation or balance. As you correctly pointed out, they did at least present other members of the community thus proving that not everyone could be identified w/the same type of behavior(s) as the Whites.

While I am proud of a rich heritage, I am not defined by the White family. We all have our crack houses, street gangs, and White families. I don't think that gives either you or me any reason to be embarrassed. I don't blame folks for being interested in them. Like I said, I know Jesco and I've seen him dance, although I haven't seen him for quite a few years.

The Whites were not just picked at random. Jesco is known nationally in some circles and even has a modest cult following. Here is an article about his colorful but troubled past.

I'm really lucky to live where I do. The area looks a lot like the pictures Inchworm shared. There are no neighbors living any closer to me than I want them to be, and there is wildlife all around me. Some of those neighbors are as noble as people ever get. And we have people from the other end of the spectrum too, just like everybody else.

Remind me sometime to tell you about the nearby church where they used to handle rattlesnakes.

And... I know several "families" like this. Funny thing though, I never really considered the poverty aspect as much as the isolation part. A lot has changed in the past 20 years with outsiders buying up land all over, but some areas remain the same.

Here is out my current bedroom window.


Here is home-town. Population 147 in 2009.


Here is where I was raised. Dad's ex's now.


And.. for shits and giggles, here is the latest me. :D


:hi:

Great pics, reminds me of here. Mountaintop removal mining has devastated a lot of this area but it won't touch my 20 acres as long as I can remember the combination to my gun safe.

Thanks for sharing.

Lasher

She understands plain English lol .. In the back puppy! Move! :P

:hi:

set up its camp site at Pennsic, held at Coopers Lake Campground, near Butler, PA, every summer. He drove from our house in Maryland, through West, by God, Virginia and stopped at a McDonalds for a snack. When he got home all he could talk about were the patrons that he saw there. So, the next weekend, as we drove up to Pennsic for War Week, we stopped at the same McD's. I honestly thought that he had been joking. Heck, I thought most of the jokes about West Virginia were, well, just that, jokes. I had forgotten the cardinal rule of humor - make sure that there is some modicum of truth in your jokes. OMG! Watching that brings back the McD's experience like it was yesterday.

:hi:

I live in AEthelmearc.

Alas, WV is part of my kingdom. I thought the stereotypes about WV were just a joke until we moved here and met some of those stereotypes in the flesh (at fighter practice, no less).

I tried to be open-minded for a few years, but honestly, we just don't go down to events there anymore. It's just a different planet, and not a nice one or one we want to spend much time in.

I hate how in the reviews of this documentary all the Hollywood types are just yucking it up at the premiere of this film, like "ha ha aren't these yokels funny, lol!" Yeah, it's really funny...right up until they're your next-door neighbors just over the border and they play in your hobby and act like that. Then it's not quite such a laugh anymore. :-(

I sometimes worry that the rest of the world thinks all of American and Americans are like this. It's embarrassing.

I know what you mean - we're in Atlantia, so we have Maryland, most of Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina and a little tiny bit of Georgia. Our barony, Lochmere, has Fort Meade (as well as the NSA) in it and we sometimes get some of our more southerly neighbors at fighter practice or barony events. Most are lovely, but you sometimes get one that you just want to go up to, slap upside the head and say "Son, being a southern stereotype is not the way to go through life.".

And when I called a buddy 3 states away he basically laughed at me and joked, "if you hear a banjo, get the hell out of there!" I replied, "That was Georgia you stupid hillbilly"

I made it to a stand alone convienient store (in the middle of nowhere) and a truckload of partying construction workers asked me if I needed a hand. Hec, they gave me the spare from their truck and changed the tire as we sipped beers. I thought it was heaven! lol

I was on the way home from a roadtrip, so my money was funny. I offered $10 and they asked if I had any pain pills. I said nope and they refused the money. I bought a 12pack, drank one and left them with the rest.

A good day indeed.

:hi:

I think he married into this tribe.

I think he married into this tribe.

Cousinfucking hillbilly tweaker jackasses. And I'm being nice about it.

Yeah...we don't associate with that branch of the family much.

Cousinfuckin type :rofl:

Hec, here where the population is so small that's the first questions I ask, "Who is your daddy? From up where? Ahhh, didn't he marry ol' whatsername? Yea, we went to different schools together." Then I slink off because I'm not sure :D

:hi:

One of my second cousins has a kid by his first cousin (by marriage, no relation to me). When his family all started defending the relationship, the rest of the family started referring to them as the "cousinfuckers". :evilgrin: Personally, I had a bigger problem with the fact that he was 25 and she was 16 at the time.

They're a bunch of meth addicted junkies, and I don't allow them around my home anymore. Things tend to vanish when they're around, and I always feel like they're casing my house for a burglary. "Nice BluRay player...what's that worth? Wanna run to the store and pick up some JD? We'll watch your house for ya!"

Central California tends to be a meth hub, and our foothill areas can be just as backward as any part of Appalachia you want to point at.