Folk groups and world view.

I think that my folk groups make me both open minded and closed minded in different ways. I would say that in regard to other cultures I am fairly open minded, but with certain cultural prejudices against regular old Americans with differing values from my groups. As a guy from a rural community I'm more likely to trust someone who has a southern/country accent or background than someone from the city. I like to be able to take my time with things and I identify that as a more rural thing than a city thing, where people seem to be more rushed.

My friends are pretty much all on the straight and narrow and don't steal or break the law and my social groups generally have a high moral code. I feel that this makes me less trusting or tolerant of people who do break the law or people who practice substance abuse.

In regards to world view, I think that I've grown more tolerant as I've gotten older, and my experiences at GMU have definitely had an effect on that. I think that when I was in high school I was much more sheltered and while I still got some amount of culture from my percussion classes or other classes, I didn't really get the kind of tolerance that I've gained in college. I still connect more with Western culture and art, but I'm definitely more open to other points of view.