While redneck bigotry emanates from the mouths of ignoramuses in Washington, Hollywood and other elite coastal locales with great regularity, it’s rare in the heartland. But the elites do find their way to places like Nebraska now and then — usually at institutions of so-called higher learning.

So it is with Josh Loomis, a writer for the Daily Nebraskan, the school paper at the University of Nebraska. Like most journalists at college publications — even at places like my alma mater, West Virginia University — Loomis looks down his highbrow nose at people who cling to their guns, wear camouflage, drive trucks and know how to have a good time.

He tries to pretend, based on his major (fisheries and wildlife) and his companions, that he’s just one of the redneck boys. But Loomis’ column about the “Top 10 Things You Might/Might Not Know About Rednecks” oozes with condescension. Here are three tidbits that stood out to me:

• “All rednecks (at least redneck men), either chew (’chaw’) or smoke. If they tell you they don’t do either of them, they are lyin’.”
• “Four-wheel drive isn’t an option: It’s a necessity.”
• “Beer. Rednecks of both sexes love beer.”

I despise tobacco; I’m a lifelong tee-teetotaler; and although I’d love to own a four-wheel-drive truck, I drive a recalled Toyota. But I’m proud to wear the redneck label.

Loomis clearly needs to be enlightened as to the diverse ways of the redneck. The stereotypes hatched in his academic mind are not a reflection of reality.