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The hills of West Virginia are breathtakingly beautiful. The people I met there were unfailingly kind, and forgiving of my liberal tendencies. Though the culture, landscape, attitudes, voting tendencies, and religious beliefs were about as far from my own as they are from Saudi Arabia’s, I felt at home. I was enchanted—both by the people I met and by McDowell County’s mist-covered small towns.

Like any other episode of Parts Unknown, whether in Vietnam or Nigeria, or any city in the United States, this West Virginia episode is a plea for understanding of the people whose personal histories, sense of pride, independence, and daunting challenges deserve respect. It’s a walk in somebody else’s shoes.

The stereotypes about West Virginia, it turns out, are just as cruel, ignorant, misguided, patronizing, and evil as any other. Every meal might have begun with saying grace, but there was nothing hypocritical about it. People do care about each other. Friends, family, and the community are held close. The men and women who come from families of four, five generations of coal mining are not naive about the promises of cynical politicians—or the inevitable future of fossil fuel. Their identities, their aspirations, and their situation are far more complex than one can imagine, and their needs are more immediate.

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