On Conceit and Catfish

This week on X, the Website Formerly Known as Twitter, a post by former Miss New Jersey Sameera Khan against a Southern woman went viral and caused some umbrage in the Dixiesphere. The uproar began when Khan directed disdain at Alabamian Hannah Barron, aka "The Catfish Girl." Barron's YouTube channel, which has almost 750,000 subscribers, showcases her enthusiasm for hunting, fishing, and processing and cooking hunted meat, among other things. 

On March 8, Khan tweeted a short video of Barron excitedly showing updates of a house building project, remarking, "This accent needs to be illegal and women should be banned from doing manual labour like this. There is NOTHING feminine about American women. American women are literally men." As of March 10, the tweet has received over 44 million views and 25,000 comments, most of them negative.

In response to the deluge of backlash, Khan doubled down on her comments the next day. She shared a video of herself having her makeup done for a photo shoot along with the comment, "Lebanese women are literally perfect. And they are actually feminine, unlike estrogen-deficient American women who hold the record for highest testosterone levels in the world... High-value American men should become passport bros. Don’t they deserve better than the filth they are limited to in their own country…?"

More interesting and encouraging was the bold backlash against Khan's vicious and unprovoked criticism of Barron.

"That's marriage material in my neck of the woods!"

"I dunno. I think she's pretty badass."

"She's a very happy person and seems to be living her best life." 

More than a few supporters were overtly pro-Southern. A poster using the handle "Lauren wants TEXIT" stated, "Thankfully, Southern women are too busy being useful to worry about what ornamental women such as yourself think about our accent or culture."

One tweeted, "The anti-southern propaganda will stop. Women like her built this nation. Women like you flee to it."

One man simply remarked, "Dibs on the Southern girl!"

​It is worth noting that the accomplished Khan, who has worked for RT and bills herself as a  foreign policy analyst, would lash out so viciously at a lesser-known woman who she claims is her clear inferior. And the backlash to her vitriol was heartening - almost universal support for the fit, personable and outdoorsy Barron, and a sizeable chunk of it was explicitly pro-Southern. The brazen, unprovoked contempt against our people and culture is increasingly conspicuous, and it seems to be reawakening a sense of Southern identity and forging a greater sense of ourselves. We can hope that as our detractors' masks of civility and tolerance are tossed aside, good people will continue to wise up.

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A few days after the initial provocation, a chipper and smiling Baron released a short video response. 

"Good morning y'all!... Apparently I'm trending on Twitter right now, because some girl - [Barron pauses to greet her dog] - some girl said that my accent should be illegal... and that American women are basically men. I would tell y'all this girl's name, but I can't remember it, because I don't have a clue who she is... I've been helping Dad build houses since I was fifteen... I just help as much as I can, and I try, and it's fun... There's a lot of blue collar women out there who are also feminine... These folks talking about me and think they're going to offend me, that ship sailed a long time ago... Be your own person and you'll be happier in the long run because of that."

I know which woman I have an affinity for, and I'm betting you feel the same way.