Years ago my husband and I went camping in Big Bend national park.  We flew into Midland and drove down there and then went to Austin after that.  We met some really really cool people on the trip, especially at the park.  And we did not have that hard a time finding veg food (compared with other places we've been).  The landscape was just incredible.

Texas has always seemed to me to be the Maine of the south.  A bunch of independent people saying "leave me the f* alone."  And a bunch of characters.

I guess I romanticize it a bit.  But then I hear about some guy in Texas getting life in prison because he helped his girlfriend have an abortion, or some parents going to jail because they don't want their daughter to have a form of chemotherapy, and I go ballistic and send faxes to the governor.

I think it is hard to live anywhere where you feel you don't fit in.

I don't remember reading about the guy getting life for helping the girlfriend have an abortion.  Did he perform the procedure himself and kill her?  If so that would be some form of murder in most states, I think.  As for the religious nuts who opposed chemo for their daughter, I guess just calling them "religious nuts" shows my prejudice.  That could have happened in almost any state, too.  I don't think Texas has a monopoly on conservative views.  Most of the Southern US including New Mexico and Arizona have a strong hunting culture.  I think the continued fascination and love for what they perceive as the "Old West" is a big part of the problem.  You can't be a cowboy and really support animal rights.  A lot of cowboys get really upset when they hear of someone hurting a dog or cat.  They don't want to  see that rabbits, opossums, raccoons that they consider vermin as well as  the cows, pigs, sheep and goats are not that different from the domesticated pets.  No one is so blind as he who will not see.  >:(

The guy I was talking about kicked his girlfriend at her request since she couldn't afford an abortion and was sentenced for murder.  The girlfriend testified on his behalf.  And the parents--at least the father--was a professor at Texas A&M and concerned about the effects of chemotherapy on his daughter.  It wasn't a religious thing.

I wasn't meaning to criticize Texas.  I don't think I romanticize the cowboy thing either.  But it does seem like it has a lot of idiosyncratic people who like to do their own thing, and I think that is kind of cool.

Then that was another case than the one I was thinking about where the parents did cite religious beliefs as the reason for opposing chemo.  As for the other case, I think that there's a mind-set in Texas where if you do something so stupid (like not borrowing the money and going about the abortion in the normal way), a jury figures it's doing the rest of society a favor by locking the person up before they do something worse.  It's also a crime to cause a miscarriage in the commission of another felony, in this case, assault.  You cannot in Texas consent to be assaulted.  If another person witnesses it or it can be proven forensically that you did it, even if the victim refuses to press charges, the prep. is prosecuted.  There was a big controversy when that law was passed but most people supported the law because there were too many cases where the father harmed the mother in order to kill the fetus that she wanted and he got away with what was perceived as a slap on the wrist.  Texans for the most part take serious offense to hurting a baby, even the unborn.  The law applies even if it was what the mother wanted.  Like I said, the conviction was basically for being too stupid to be out on the street.  Our prisons are very overcrowded and I personally think a lot of the convictions are basically for the same reason.  It's not right but it is Texas.  I have mixed feelings on the issue.  I support strong punishments for those who take someone's life but realize that in a lot of ways, those murders are the product of the Texas culture.  It still doesn't make it not their fault.  It's a paradox that the culture that glorifies killing in so many ways, punishes some killing so harshly.  Sorry for rambling on so. 

Oh, if someone comes to Texas from say, New York City and hacks someone to death with a machete or blows someones head off with a shotgun for no good reason in the commission of another felony, we'll be very glad to stick the needle in their arm just the same as if they were Texan.  Equal justice even if you're Yankees!  :D

I don't think my earlier posts captured what I was trying to say.  For example, in the middle of this park, we met two fiftish women who had lived together in a nearby town for twenty something years and one of them was the justice of the peace.  And we met lots of other people like that too, and just some plain interesting people who were doing or had done some interesting things. 

So here is this incredibly vast state with all of these different kinds of people with a whole range of perspectives all mixed together.  It was like the whole state was one vast tofu scramble.  I found it so unlike the narrow perspective of the place you get from the media.

I really enjoyed visiting there.  I'm sorry it's frustrating, TinTexas.

Thanks.  I know I'll always find sympathetic people on vegweb when I need to vent over the cruelty to animals that so prevalent around here but exists in varying degrees all over the world.  That's why I keep coming back even when I get tired of reading the nth post on what to do with tempeh.  ;)

tintexas,  im coming to san antonio for a music educators conference from feb. 13-16, we should get together at a veg restaurant and just talk shit on our local hunting scenes.  it just appalls me as well. 

im not sure if you have a subscription to vegweb, but if not, my email is eval(unescape('%64%6f%63%75%6d%65%6e%74%2e%77%72%69%74%65%28%27%3c%61%20%68%72%65%66%3d%22%6d%61%69%6c%74%6f%3a%68%69%5f%69%6d%5f%6b%65%6c%73%69%40%63%61%72%65%32%2e%63%6f%6d%22%3e%68%69%5f%69%6d%5f%6b%65%6c%73%69%40%63%61%72%65%32%2e%63%6f%6d%3c%2f%61%3e%27%29%3b')) let me know if you want to get dinner!

That would be nice.  I've sent you an email.  But it just occurred to me that my DH and I have been talking about maybe going to Austin for our Spring Break trip so if things don't work out maybe we could have dinner together then.  That's about the middle of March, I don't remember the exact dates.  I think there are other vegwebbers in the Austin area, maybe we could have a party!  I'm so looking forward to this drab, dreary winter being over.  A party in Zilker Park or out at the lake (not Town/Ladybird Lake) would be so much fun!  Heck, we could do that even if we get to have dinner together in SA.  So Austin area vegwebbers, what do y'all think?