Fox News makes its money by patronizing working class and Southern Americans, stoking their worst fears and pretending to be “on their side.” Fox, along with the Republican party at large, expends an enormous amount of time and energy trying to associate itself with Southern and Christian values, in order to sell Southerners and Christians on its policies, which are all driven by the desire to protect the economic interests of the already-rich.
A favorite bogeyman of Fox and its talk-radio brethren is the “liberal media,” and specifically, the New York Times. Among the most stomach-churning of Fox’s programs is the morning show “Fox and Friends,” which Gawker beautifully and accurately describes as ” Fox News’ illiterate dementia variety hour.” In the clip below, these shameless hucksters take a New York Times article about Southern chefs trying to bring out the best in Southern cuisine, and completely flip its meaning. Through a combination of selective hearing and outright misrepresentation, the hosts spin the article as an attempt by the NYT to “eliminate classic southern cooking.” Seriously. Here is the excerpt upon which the alleged “war on Southern Food” is based:
The quest for “real” Southern food isn’t new: for decades, food historians and organizations like the Southern Foodways Alliance and Slow Food USA have mourned the extinction of treasures like beaten biscuits and cane syrup.
Today, purists believe, Southern cooking is too often represented by its worst elements: feedlot hams, cheap fried chicken and chains like Cracker Barrel.
“My mother didn’t cook like that, and my grandmother didn’t cook like that,” Mr. DeFelice said. “And if you want to come down here and talk about shrimp and grits, well, we’re tired of that, too. Southern cooking is a lot more interesting than people think.”
Clearly and plainly, the quoted text is the opposite of a denigration of Southern cuisine. It is unambiguous praise for Southern cuisine, coupled with a lament that food chain corporations are hawking deep-fried crap as Southern food, thereby diminishing its reputation. Of course, the talking heads of “Fox and Friends” ignore this plain meaning, and launch into some “aw shucks” blather about how dare the libruls and the New York Times talk bad about the South. Of course, none of these dingbats are Southern. And none of them give a damn about the South. Fox’s mandate is not to defend Southern tradition. It’s to defend the corporate behemoths with a stake in selling fake Southern food to the masses.
Fox News, real Southerners could do without your patronizing attempts to pigeonhole us as NASCAR Republicans suspicious of anything printed in a Northern newspaper. Next time you get the inkling to “defend the South” from your studios in New York City, do as a favor and don’t. We are not pawns of the Republican party and its perverted version of “conservatism.”
If you must, here’s a video of the segment:
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