Alabama is the buckle of the Bible Belt.
I've lived here most of my life and I can say for a fact that practically everyone I've ever known is a fundamentalist Christian who believes in a literal interpretation of the Bible. Christianity is so prevalent here that everyone basically just assumes you are a Christian upon meeting you. Most social gatherings and interactions here center around the church, which is convenient considering you can find one about every 50 feet on any street in any town. The town where I attended high school had one gas station, one BBQ joint, one traffic light, and 16 churches.
This is, after all, the state where Alabama Supreme Court Judge Roy Moore caused national controversy when he placed a monument of the Ten Commandments within a state court house. Separation of church and state anyone? The large majority of people that I spoke too about the issue fully supported Moore's actions and most seem to be of the mind that our justice system should be wholly controlled and dictated by Christian values. In February 2002, Chief Justice Moore issued an opinion which expressed his belief that the State should rightfully use its powers to punish homosexual behavior, stating at one point
"Homosexual behavior is a ground for divorce, an act of sexual misconduct punishable as a crime in Alabama, a crime against nature, an inherent evil, and an act so heinous that it defies one’s ability to describe it. "
Roy Moore is going to run for Governor of Alabama this year and I'll bet he gets elected. Rednecks love Jesus and hate homosexuals, and Alabama is certainly full of rednecks. Here's Judge Roy Moore reading a poem that he wrote about the Declaration of Independence called "Our American Birthright".
Fundamentalist Christianity deeply affects every aspect of life here. The majority of our news media is Christian biased. Our local newspaper has a Baptist minister as editor in chief. The front page often features religious interest stories where issues of faith and the Bible are given the same matter-of-fact treatment that papers in other parts of the country would give a topic such as a political race or a city construction project.
In the 7th grade, when my science class got to the section on Evolution, my science teacher stood in front of us and stated
"Now this is where we're supposed to talk about Evolution. I think we all know that God created the Earth in seven days, so we're just going to skip over this nonsense."
True story. Not one single person in that class had a problem with this (well, besides me).
Here in Alabama you can find a shocking number of fucking adults who literally believe that the Earth is only 6000 years old, that dinosaurs never existed, that a man named Noah placed two of every single motherfucking animal on the PLANET into a boat, and that one day a magical Jesus is going to return to take them Heaven.
This is a scary place. You can't reason with people like that. Believe me, I've tried. It's like smashing your head into a brick wall over and over. People here, they don't know how to think. It's been bred out of them by generations of being thumped in the skull with a Bible. It's impossible to even get them to consider the possibility that their religion might be absurd nonsense. They're so afraid of being tortured for all eternity in Hell that they won't even allow themselves to consider questioning the beliefs that have been taught to them since the day they were born.
Where I live, you can't buy alcohol on Sunday. Where I live, you can't buy pornography in a store. You can't order XXX rated movies on cable, they're blocked by the states obscenity laws. You can't even buy sex toys. Seriously, they're illegal. There's no gambling, either. Gambling is a sin in the eyes of the all powerful Baby Jesus.
So basically, Alabama is full of ultra conservative, small-minded, dumbfuck, Bible thumping religious fucking zealots who hate everything fun.
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