Japanese Guts Are Made For Sushi 309
cremeglace writes "Americans don't have the guts for sushi. At least that's the implication of a new study, which finds that Japanese people harbor enzymes in their intestinal bacteria that help them digest seaweed, enzymes that North Americans lack. What's more, Japanese may have first acquired these enzymes by eating bacteria that thrive on seaweed in the open ocean."
You'll take my sushi ... (Score:2)
... from my cold, dead digestive tract!
Bowel obstruction (Score:5, Interesting)
Speaking of cold, dead digestive tracts: A few years ago, I got terribly ill while on vacation. Loss of appetite, waves of tremendous abdominal cramps, and vomiting. My intestines had plugged up and it took some intervention to get them moving again.
I put some of the blame on a sushi lunch I ate that day. I'd eaten sushi often before, but this restaurant used a lot more seaweed in the dishes than I was accustomed to. Even as I was eating, I had second thoughts about whether what I was putting into my mouth was actually edible. But I figured it seemed strange to me only because that Japanese restaurant was more authentic than the Americanized sushi places where I usually dined.
Now I wonder whether that seaweed would be edible to Japanese guts, but truly was inedible to mine.
Re:Bowel obstruction (Score:5, Funny)
Some with weaker constitutions would flinch, but I'd give you a mod point if I had any at the moment. As an Alaska'n fisherman, let me tell you that North Pacific bull kelp will rip you up pretty good, but I mix mine with jelly fish for that extra zing! Prepare your bull kelp and brown snot looking jelly fish with vinegar and high voltage, about 30kV or so should do the trick - just enough to evaporate it within a minute. Any longer than that and it starts to get a funny after taste.. Once it has cooled, sprinkle it on smoked tuna or sockeye salmon. Wash it down with orange Jolt and Bacardi 151 - of course, you should only do this on shore at the local tavern. Feel free to experiment with other beverages suitable to your taste if you want to whimp out.
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You're welcome to take mine. (Score:2)
Enjoy yourself.
YUK!
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You've seen the eel soup vid too?
Stomach cancer (Score:2, Interesting)
I wonder if that bacteria is (part of) the reason stomach cancer is a major killer in Japan. Lost a friend to it.
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Re:Stomach cancer (Score:4, Funny)
I wonder if that bacteria is the reason for the blurry qualities of genitals in Japan.
Implications (Score:2, Interesting)
This doesn't seem evolutionary so much as it appears that they grew up eating the bacteria. If I'm wrong, would somebody please tell me where my thought process is hitting a disconnect?
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Enzymes aren't the same as gut bacteria--our body actually produces them. I've been told that whether a person produces a given enzyme (like lactase) partly depends on their habits (if they continue drinking milk throughout their lives), but I believe there's also a strong genetic component.
But then it makes no sense (Score:5, Insightful)
But then it makes no sense to say they acquired it from bacteria.
Genes don't transfer from bacteria to mammals. Genes transfer between bacteria, via exchange of plasmids. (Which is one reason why antibiotic resistance spreads so fast.) But your cells don't have the mechansims to acquire such a plasmid, and wouldn't know what to do with it. You don't even have the regulating proteins or the ribosome to deal with a _circular_ DNA strand, and one outside the nucleus at that.
At this point someone will probably have the knee-jerk reaction to explain how viruses can account for horizontal gene transfer, 'cause they read that notion at some point and it sounded so smart. Not so fast. Viruses are quite specialized in what they attach to. They depend on very specific nucleotid sequences, which is why you can have a virus that attacks your upper respiratory tract, but can't affect your lungs, or viceversa. Viruses that prey on bacteria, the so called "phages", have very specialized capsids and mechanisms to inject themselves into a bacterium, and are even more specialized in what they can attach to. Which is why for example you can spray meat with a phage which destroys Lysteria, but won't destroy your intestinal flora. A virus that's suited to infect both a bacterium _and_ your gut lining and transfer genes from one to the other, is almost an impossibility, and at any rate to the best of my knowledge none was ever identified.
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>Genes don't transfer from bacteria to mammals.
I would not cling to that view too strongly - there's some circumstantial evidence that genes can be transfered between unrelated species. Don't ask me to explain it - it's not understood as yet. But as an example you could Google, some GMO genes are being found in plant and insect species and it looks like the result of an unknown transfer process. It may be that mutations are not entirely random, but can be based on exposure (such as diet).
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But then it makes no sense to say they acquired it from bacteria. Genes don't transfer from bacteria to mammals. Genes transfer between bacteria, via exchange of plasmids.
It's more accurate to say that we don't know of gene transfer between bacteria and mammals (or eukaryotes in general). It may happen, but it's probably not common.
But what the article is about is gene transfer between bacteria in the gut. This is something that's well understood in medical circles, but not in the general population. Our
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I would say it's even less than growing up with. Who here remembers the story about gut bacteria in fat people being different and that it could process fat/carbs more efficiently (and extracting all the calorie value from it) and futhermore that the bacteria % could change in a span of 16 hours?
http://www.medicinenet.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=107514 [medicinenet.com]
I assume some people eat probiotic yogurt for similiar reasons? I would think that if you eat more and more sushi/seaweed, you'll have more bacteria
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Newborns don't have the enzymes (supposedly) to break down meat either, but we in the western world seem to do fine with that. I suspect this is more like you're thinking, a habitual thing that your body adapts to based on your other dietary intakes.
Am i missing something? (Score:5, Interesting)
So the japanese end up with the bacteria/enzymes do digest sushi because... they eat a lot of sushi. Presumably anyone else could develop a colony of such bacteria/enzymes by also eating a lot of sushi?
That would mean the division isn't whether you're Japanese or American or something else. It's just whether or not you eat a lot of sushi.
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TFA is simply another story in which a group of scientists have confirmed things we already know by experience.
Maybe I'm mistaken but, are you implying they shouldn't? That they should concentrate on studying the things we don't already know by experience?
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Isn't that basically what all scientific papers are though? Scientific method applied to hunches or experiences to confirm a behaviour?
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Yes, but the surprising ones are generally more exciting than the unsurprising ones.
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I tought we got some of our mothers' bacterial community during pregnancy. is there a biologist or doctor in the room ?
Re:Am i missing something? (Score:5, Interesting)
Some of your gut microflora and fauna comes from your mom during the birthing process, others from breastfeeding and some from what you eat on a regular basis. This is interesting because the genes are transferred supposedly from the bugs living on seaweed to the bugs living in your gut, letting the same species of gut bugs to develop an ability to digest seaweed better.
Re:Am i missing something? (Score:5, Funny)
I'm not a biologist nor in any sense of the word am I qualified to answer your question. However, I feel that I might be able to lend some perspective on that matter that might otherwise be useful in gaining a firmer level of comprehension on the issue at hand.
Onto the question regarding the transfer of some of the bacteria from mother to child I'm almost certain that someone may be able to shed some light on this puzzle.
As noted earlier, I'm almost nearly certain that I am in no way shape or form the person who could assist in this conundrum.
Don't hesitate to ask should you require further assistance.
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It's like some people such as those of European decent can metabolize alcohol fairly easily where as other groups without the history of consuming it have less tolerance.
Ah, that explains the Irish.
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I'm not totally sure about that.
I was out drinking with someone of Russian descent. Like, moved to the US from Russia. We are of roughly equal size. 2 shots, and he was pretty much lit. 8 shots, and I could barely feel it. They were straight shots, they were in mixed drinks. He had two single mixed drinks. I had 4 doubles. The proof was about equal across all the drinks.
Then again, I'm a European mutt, with German, Irish, and French genes. I've always noti
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Not if they're giving birth with a competent doctor/midwife/whoever. A catheter and proper procedure keeps all that off the baby. I have two kids, so I've seen it happen. Next time try going to a hospital instead of a biker bar.
you're missing the implication (Score:4, Interesting)
if you artificially make the birthing process clean, you are not adequately inoculating your baby's digestive tract with the mother's gut flora
perhaps setting the kid up for opportunistic infection in the first days of life, inadequate digestion, malformed immune system (allergies), etc.
so you reacted to the ugliness of getting shat upon by your mother at birth, but your delicate sensibilities are not the issue: for millions of years, getting shit on at birth has meant we evolved with the timing of the introduction of the full spectrum of the mother's gut bacteria at time of birth. meaning a delay in that timing could be unhealthy for normal immune function, normal digestion function, etc.
we talk about how antiseptic living has increased allergies and other diseases. a clean birthing room might be a part of that constellation of problems. perhaps in the future, healthy child birth will consist of the doctor shoving his finger up the mother's ass and sticking it in the newborn's mouth to ensure full spectrum inoculation. this may sound disgusting to you, but it may be the healthiest thing you can do for a newborn's normal development
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Or Japanese.
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Similarly something in the Japanese gut could be encouraging the growth of this specific bacteria...
Just speculation, article was lacking about causes.
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Don't enzymes need to be produced by the body? (I.e., they aren't alive and won't replicate just because we're feeding them.)
On the other hand, maybe the body will start producing enzymes when they're needed, in some cases. Is there a microbiologist/nutritionist in the house?
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No, they could be produced by symbiotic bacteria.
Born with Steril Gut. Get flora from Environment (Score:3, Informative)
Primarily the Mother - in cases of vaginal birth. Breastfeeding, touching, etc add more. The infant is pretty well colonized within 1-6 months.
Wikipedia article on Gut Flora
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gut_flora#Acquisition_of_gut_flora_in_human_infants
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But seaweed is quite common ingredient, uuh, now I want those 100-200yen onigiris. Damn you!
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My gut is fine (Score:2)
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But it may be that you don't get any nutritional value out of the seaweed, and Japanese people do.
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We get some just from the available vitamins. I believe it has more nutrition for anyone when compared to lettuce.
http://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&q=cache:z7kLcg0OH1YJ:www.nefsc.noaa.gov/publications/classics/walford/chapter17.pdf+seaweed+nutrition+site:gov&hl=en&gl=us&pid=bl&srcid=ADGEEShm-E8_fVDsGK3rfA1SczboDDMmxYGqshCzSqtsKwWR2xyICuaS-kpjJa9lXsgKLZ29WFPYcGyG7CsLUKfgxL-ydWJRRcB3J2VNlUBdcB3FMacIagOIsc9DgzSxbuXQP0hgILUB&sig=AHIEtbQmVoVjJ-4JzBKRT6VViQFmdx8JTw [google.com]
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Perhaps North American gut bacteria are more efficient at digesting high fructose corn syrup.
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Perhaps North American gut bacteria are more efficient at digesting high fructose corn syrup
That was an attempt at humour, but you may be at least partially right... I'm a European that feels horribly sick if he consumes too much HFCS (one bottle of US produced Coca Cola will do it), whereas I can chow down on basic Fructose and Sucrose all day long with no ill effects (other than getting fat and having rotten teeth). HFCS just makes me queasy. I don't really think it's specifically to do with the ability to digest it, but something in the manner of processing/tolerance is definitely different.
North Americans? (Score:3, Interesting)
No enzymes, eh? (Score:5, Funny)
Well, I'll be; and here I thought my brief illness on an Okinawan beach resulted from my consuming budweiser and salty dogs all night and then passing out on the beach - and failing to wake up when the sun came up.
It wasn't alcohol, heat stroke, or the incandescent sunburn - it was the seaweed from that piece of sushi I had the day before!
No, it was every beer lover kicking your ass (Score:2)
You were knocked out by a beer lover who saw you drinking budweiser. Good thing it happened in Japan, in Europe you would have been killed.
I must have the enzyme for french fries. (Score:4, Insightful)
Is it not obvious that if you regularly eat a certain type of food, you will eventually have bacteria that thrive in your gut because of the regularity of what you eat?
What would really surprise me is if they find that an American living in Japan and eating a 'local' diet would not acquire these bacteria.
I'm sure by now I've acquired bacteria that help with the digestion of french fries and poutine.
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So no, the results of this study are not obvious.
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Not all of Europe, actually, just all of northern Europe and also East Africa and places were the populations are descended primarily of those stocks. Wikipedia has a map!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:LacIntol-World2.png [wikipedia.org]
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I seem to be digesting chocoolate extremely well lately...hmm.
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I think it's obvious that the bacteria are transferred after birth.
The real story behind this article is the 'lateral gene transfer between strictly aquatic bacteria and human intestinal bacteria'.
This article makes it seem like 'Japanese Guts Are Made For Sushi' is the story. But anyone who is exposed to these bacteria and has a 'sushi' diet will have these enzymes in their gut.
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eating a lot of seaweed, by itself, is unlikely to produce this result in an individual.
There was a story here a while ago which said you swap something like 50 species whenever you kiss someone, so here's your excuse to make out with a cute Japanese girl, provided she's cool with geeky gaijin.
"You'll be helping to spread Japanese culture, on several levels..."
population sample (Score:5, Insightful)
If I used this many test subjects in my job I would get fired.
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Czjzek's team compared the microbial genomes of 13 Japanese people with those of 18 North Americans.
Unless there is a scientific reason for not testing more people, a sample size of 31 sounds worse than a school project effort.
Five of the Japanese subjects harbored the enzyme, but among the North Americans, "we didn't find a single one," says Czjzek
Fixed "conclusion" should be: Americans, and almost 60% of Japanese, don't have guts for sushi.
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31 people, but billions of gut bacteria...
Re:population sample (Score:5, Funny)
Czjzek's team compared the microbial genomes of 13 Japanese people with those of 18 North Americans.
If I used this many test subjects in my job I would get fired.
They don't even let me use test subjects in my job. Even after assuring them that most won't die.
!News (Score:2)
Vietnamese people who immigrate to Australia often have trouble with Australian food until they get used to it (I.E. develop the bacteria to help digest it). Each part of the would would have developed different bacteria in the digestive system.
This is why, more often then not when one travels to SE Asia one's stool is more regular (about 1 hour after you eat) and rarely solid. YMMV of course, peopl
...and Americans are made for steak... (Score:3, Insightful)
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doubtful USers being overweight is due to hamburgers, more likely excessive simple carb intake keeps blood triglycerides high
Ammo for Racism (Score:5, Interesting)
Just what we need, more "Japanese are unique" idiocy to justify racism and discrimination in Japan. So far we've heard that "Japanese intestines are longer [yahoo.com], so Japanese can't eat foreign beef", "Japanese brains are unique [vt.edu], so only Japanese people can speak the Japanese language." and so on, all of which are supported by pseudo-scientific studies such as this one.
This sort of incomplete research just feeds the view of racial uniqueness (and superiority) among Japanese and justifies their racism and discrimination against others.
Re:Ammo for Racism (Score:5, Funny)
This sort of incomplete research just feeds the view of racial uniqueness (and superiority) among Japanese and justifies their racism and discrimination against others.
They can keep their ability to digest seaweed.
I'll just try to get by on my > 4" weiner.
strange diet (Score:5, Funny)
I'll just try to get by on my > 4" weiner.
That seems like an odd diet, I hope it serves you well.
Re:strange diet (Score:5, Funny)
Your mother swears by it.
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How is she able to swear with her mouth full?
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I think if I was doing bogus research to prove my racial superiority I'd choose something like mental and physical superiority, not the ability to eat fucking seaweed.
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My hunch is that this is an economic strategy. Japan has a history of doing stuff like this before - this is not strictly an example about genetic superiority - but they have claimed that Japanese snow has a unique texture, and therefore only Japanese-manufactured skis are suitable for their ski resorts.
A lot of seaweed gets exported from China and Korea. This may be to stem the import of foreign seaweed.
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On the other hand, I think Japanese taste buds have devolved... they will put anything in their mouth.
From my experience in Japan, the 'natives' love it when I try and speak Japanese when communicating. I've never s
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Height comes largely from nutrition and health as a child.
Many Ethiopians and Kenyans run to school their whole lives before competing, and they have different hydration strategies (they run far less than we do during long distance races and they don't overeat to store energy for races) and they tend to start their training with much more minimalistic shoes.
Americans are much more sedentary, it's likely not genetic, though it'll be interesting what we find with all the epigenetic stuff I've been hearing abo
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There is also Sci-Fi animated movie where Japan is separated from other world by some power shield. Same seclusions motives from 19th century.
A bit off topic but I believe the movie you are referring to is: Vexille [wikipedia.org] released in 2007. There are probably others with the same theme but this came to mind since it is a recent Anime.
I thought it was very enjoyable..no Appleseed..but good.
Idle? (Score:2, Informative)
What a surprise, samzenpus posting an idle article on the main page under a heading such as Science or Your Rights Online so his articles get more views.
Seriously, take a look at the articles you've posted today samzenpus and the sections you placed them in. All, but one of your stories are Idle and yet all of them appear on the main page.
Thanks for bypassing my filters and cluttering up people's pages with your nonsense.
BREAKING NEWS... (Score:5, Funny)
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babies (Score:4, Insightful)
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Ah! (Score:2, Insightful)
Japanese yogurt cultures (Score:4, Interesting)
TFA is not clear whether non-Japanese really cannot break down seaweed at all.
In Japan it is popular to buy yogurt with live culture, for example there is Meiji's LB51 (lacto bacillus 51) yogurt supposedly good for your gut.
Might be cool if a yogurt with this organism is made.
Of course if you could just eat non-sterile seaweed maybe it would make a culture for you in your gut.. anybody know about edible seaweeds that would have this?
I've had seaweed salad and maybe that would have it.
Also the American gut is supposedly longer does that balance not having the enzyme at all?
Nothing new really (Score:2, Interesting)
Let's recall that tribes that life off hunting have more lactose intolerant people that those that practice livestock breeding, that certain northern tribes of Chukchas and Eskimo doesn't have ensimes to get rid of alcohol so they become alcoholics easily and so on and so on.
really? (Score:2, Insightful)
organisms adapt to local diet.
film at 11.
North Americans? What, like the Sioux? (Score:3, Interesting)
I didn't realise that the appetite for sushi amongst the Sioux, Cherokee and other North Americans was quite such a concern.
Or did they mean Europeans?
If you're going to discuss genetic differences, you do need to be accurate.
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If you were going to be pedantic, maybe you should have suggested they use the term 'Caucasian'
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'Caucasian' includes the peoples of the Indian and Arabian subcontinents, as well as the European subcontinent.
"I do not think it means what you think it means."
Sigh...some of you are dumb (Score:5, Informative)
Gene transfer from the living bacteria transferred into the Japanese people's genome that produces enzymes in the gut that make breaking down seaweed easier (i.e. they get more from it).
They didn't say you couldn't eat seaweed and that it was bad for you if you don't have these enzymes, just that it's better for you if you do.
To tune your guts... (Score:2, Interesting)
So Japanese people have a seaweed digesting bacterium in their guts. So sushi restaurants could offer visiting westerners a small culture of this bacterium, and they would be set up to digest the seaweed. Before you go "Ewww, bacteria!", this is just what is being offered commercially as "pro-biotic yogurt". You would probably need a top-up on every visit to Japan, because the bacterium would probably die out without a regular supply of seaweed.
It's the saké that gets you (Score:2)
Sample size (Score:3, Insightful)
such a big sample size, how could they possibly be wrong..
sushi, fashion? (Score:2)
it seems a lot more people these days eat sushi, or mention eating it, and that makes me wonder if it have become fashionable for some reason.
These Guts Were Made For Sushi... (Score:4, Funny)
Many asians can't digest milk (Score:3, Interesting)
A large proportion suffer lactose intolerance which means milk and yoghurts are out though I believe they can still eat some cheeses where the lactose has been converted into something else. If anyone has ever wondered why you never see dairy food in chinese or japanese restaurants - theres your answer.
Anyway , most veg if cooked long enough can be digested by the human gut so these enzymes only give them an advantage if they eat it partially cooked or raw.
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In theory there shouldn't be any lactose in yoghurt - it should have been converted to lactic acid. However some manufacturers add milk powder as a sweetener/thickener.
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For getting sick, try some good old fashion New York street meat. Not only is there a good chance of getting sick you won't even know if it's beef or rat that you're eating. :)
Mmmmm. Now I'm really hungry.
Sure thing (Score:2)
If you didn't drive over it, it ain't worth eating.
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Oh the hilarity of the name behind the one uttering the phrase "If you didn't drive over it, it ain't worth eating."
Like putting those crosshairs on yourself, do you?
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Yep - I've had alligator tail sushi before - as well as having seen teriyaki chicken sushi on the menu at one place I've been to. I do tend to enjoy more traditionally simple ones though, and I'm a born and bred redneck (live in the south - nearest business is a 20 mile drive, in the fall I go deer hunting like I've done since I was a kid).
All "rednecks" aren't uncultured.
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So let me be clear, you're wrong...some things just rub people the wrong way. It's not how you were introduced to it...we are honestly that different from each other. I hate Sushi and it makes me want to throw up just looking at it.