Minnesota Nice: Truth or Stereotype?

I am proud to be a life-long resident of Minnesota. Yes, I deserted the twin cities for a brief stint to attend college in the land of the Cheeseheads, but it made me appreciate my home state all the more. That being said, I have noticed that we have a reputation as the state of "Minnesota Nice." Whenever I visit another region, the locals never fail to comment on my accent or mention how nice the Minnesotans are. I witnessed this again last week, when a Youtube video listing stereotypes of the fifty states said that Minnesotans were "too nice not to elect a douchey governor," a clear jab at former governor Tim Pawlenty.

I guess, in a way, we can be pretty nice. You hear the words "please," "thank you,"and "sorry" on a regular basis. In small-town Minnesota, the locals never fail to send a friendly greeting your way. And courtesy extends to the road, where most drivers will slow down and allow you to change lanes.

To truly appreciate the language of Minnesota Nice, you should take a look at Garrison Keillor's principals of "Wobegonics." He outlined this phenomenon during a 1997 broadcast of A Prairie Home Companion. In a short skit, listeners learn that Wobegonics is " basically just your ordinary English except that there are no confrontational verbs or statements of strong personal preference, you know." By the end of the skit, we see that while putting on the appearance of Minnesota Nice, the characters are really hiding a frightening level of aggression.

The Wobegonics phenomenon is also seen in several movies set in the Land of 10,000 Lakes. A great example of this is the Minnesota Nice exhibited in the popular Coen brothers movie Fargo. Sure, Fargo is technically part of North Dakota, but it is more or less a Minnesotan city stuck in the wrong state. At any rate, in Fargo , you see a lot of supposedly nice people hiding ulterior motives. These supposedly "nice" people are capable of committing such atrocities as killing somebody and stuffing their body through a wood chipper.

While most Minnesotans are not cold-blooded killers, many of them share a frightening level of passive aggression. The rumor mill is arguably much stronger and much more lethal here than in any other state. This is why how we are able to raise up politicians such as Tim Pawlenty and Michele Bachmann and then mercilessly attack them behind their backs.

Basically, what I'm saying is not to underestimate Minnesotans. The rest of the nation might think of us as pale-skinned doormats, but we're not as nice as we look, don't 'cha know.