moral climates

Moral climates is what Nietzsche calls them, these differing clusters of ways of viewing "reality." America is made up of such clusters. For example, in spending a few days in the Chattahoochee River country along the Georgia-Alabama line recently, it did not take me long to realize the moral climate there is conflict-based. Conflict within oneself and between self and others is perceived as normal and natural. It is like a fish that does not notice the water. This ongoing conflict (and a tendency to cluster within one's own racial and religious grouping) is offset by great and sincere hospitality.

My experience as a fish in these northern Arizona - Flagstaff waters is that the conflict here focuses more on land use. Developers, hikers, bicyclists, car drivers, river runners, cattle ranchers, native peoples keep up an ongoing conversation. I find the bounds of religious faith and of racial identity here to be more permeable.

Multiply these two scenarios by some large unknown (at least to me) quantity. Visualize a map of the United States with all the towns and communities within the towns represented and the moral climate of each cluster of folk with similar understandings colored differently. It goes way beyond red and blue. All the colors of the rainbow would shift into play.