I saw something somewhere recently about how Hallmark movies have a target audience of 55+ conservative white women, and the running theme is "city bad country good," "daughter come home, settle down with nice country man," but in reality their daughters will never move back home.
That makes a lot of sense. And it really hits at one of the misconceptions a lot of those people have about cities: that they’re lonely places without community. Sure it can be, but it can also be a vibrant place filled with close friends and the rural town where everyone knows everyone can be alienating and lonely. Conservative mom doesn’t get that her daughter is actually part of a community, just a different kind of community built on shared interests more than shared location.
Too true. It is definitely possible to meet people and have a sense of community with myriad fun things to do.
One of the factors mentioned in the Salon article linked in another comment is right wing media propaganda that paints big cities as a hellscape with various ills directly attributable to Democratic leadership. So the right wing mom has a completely distorted picture of big city life.
Cities can definitely be lonely places without community, especially if you move to a big one as an adult. Seattle has a phrase, The Seattle Freeze, and it's not related to the weather. It's really just going to depend on the person, and their situation. Being in an expensive city without money can be really depressing. Being in a high culture city with a lot of money can be really amazing. And of course there are a million degrees in-between.
There can be a lot of community found in commiseration. Finding people who are going through the same thing and making friends with them will always make it better, even if it doesn't actually solve the problem.
I live in a rural "city," and I feel far more connected to the people around me in big cities when I travel than I ever have at home. Rural people only want to talk to people they already know and have connections with (which as mentioned are primarily location based,) while city people LOVE chatting with folks, finding common ground, and discussing differences.
I like visiting DC and someone practically offers me a job almost every time I go, 😂
This is nothing new. It's been happening for decades, it's just reached the point it's more noticable now.
I graduated high school in a small rural Ohio town in the late 2000s. The kind of country school where k-12 are all in the same building. My graduating class was less than 100 people. Some kids drove tractors to school if they were feeling ornery. Lots of Confederate flags (in Ohio).
Of that class, according to Facebook, around 10 of them still live in or around that town. The rest of us got the fuck out. And this has been the trend in every small town from the Midwest to the South to the West.
You know what happens when you invest in education for young people in these small backwater towns? They leave, and take their progressive votes with them. Hence why it doesn't seem like education tends to work in these areas. It's working, it's just helping kids gain the knowledge that they don't want to stay living in a conservative backwater, and providing them the skills so they don't have to. And off they go.
Unfortunately there's a problem with this. The Senate. Red State brain drain is going to continue to fuck the Senate up worse than it already has. It doesn't matter how many people flee those red states, they will always get two Senators. Ironically, as they flee for better blue states, they are damaging the national government's ability to function properly and making it more red.
That happens in microcosm with gerrymandered congressional districts, too. "Sure, leave your small town, go to the cities, were your voting power is suppressed."
It's basically porn for those people, except far more dangerous bc they think it's real. They even vote according to it.
So Hallmark movies are right wing now?
Are you to tell me the infinitely reused plotline of "moves from big city to small town and leaves a white collar worker for a blue collar worker" has a conservative appeal??
city slickers maybe the only exception?
Always have been
Yeah, no babe, its totally fine that you were flirting with this guy for two weeks while I was away and now want to end our relationship to be with him. That's totally normal and I respect your decision despite being slightly bummed about the situatio . I'll get out of your life now and am totally not also upset about the time and money I spent getting out here to see you. Alright, bye!
I enjoy a podcast called “You Should See the Other Guy” which takes romantic/romcom movies and highlights why the protag should have gone with the “other guy”. Sometimes it’s a joke because somehow the other guy was actually worse, but a lot of times the “boring other guy” was a solid companion lmao.
Her: I am going to live with a man who makes angel sculptures out of acorns. He makes 17 dollars a year and lives in a tree stump but he has taught me the true meaning of Christmas with his washboard abs.
Her now ex: Okay guess I'll go back to my vibrant city life where I can buy spices that aren't salt and pepper, watch netflix on fiber internet, and have a social circle that doesn't blame the climate crisis on trans people.
I’ve never seen a hallmark movie is this true? Lmao
Generally? Yeah.
A lot of them are also set around Christmas time, because that's another draw. A lot of the time the female "protagonist" is single or in a "bad" relationship at the start, or there are two men interested in her, but one is "emotionally distant".
The thing is, those are very low stakes for a movie, so they all seem to use the exact same plot lines and such.
They're all sort of Velveeta level cheesy. That fake cheesiness that is sometimes a guilty pleasure for people who are sitting around the house all day long with nothing better to do.
My wife watches these movies constantly. I can watch the first five minutes of a Hallmark movie and tell you exactly what's going to happen at the end, even if I've never seen it. There's like 3 plots, and they just keep recycling them with different actors and slight changes.
But is it true?
Oh, it's true in 2/3 plotlines.
Fiscal responsibility isn't sexy???
"Let me see the thickness of that wallet!"
Stocks and bonds baby.
Is that a wallet in your pocket...?
Talk to me about your RRSP, baby.
Two kids, living more than comfortably on the earnings of a small town contractor vs. going through second divorce while under investigation by the SEC.
Nice idea but just because somebody is humble doesn't mean that they're nice. And just because somebody is well off doesn't mean that they're awful.
Funny but, let's be real, how informed do you think this take is?
Legitimately, how many Hallmark movies have they or any of actually watched, to the degree we can say anything like this with confidence?
I've seen one and only one Hallmark movie, and it was the one Will Ferrell did ironically.
A lot of people watch them as "bad movies". I've seen quite a few
My wife will often leave the Hallmark xmas movies on in the background while shes on her phone or cleaning or something. She jokes that she doesn't have to pay attention to them because they're all essentially the same
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