Between William Faulkner and “The Dukes of Hazzard,” Lynyrd Skynyrd and “Gone With the Wind,” few places have been romanticized quite like the South.
- Phillip Kurdunowicz
Americans bear a strange affinity for the land of the Confederacy, of King Cotton, where high schools are for football and not for fancy book-learning. If you’re the type of person who yearns for mint juleps in the summer or a good, violent Civil War reenactment, this video is for you.
In the clip, called “How Real Men Catch Catfish,” we learn that “real men” go shirtless, wear trucker hats and sit shoulders-deep in murky water while waiting for the catfish to come. Their hands are the bait, the fifty-pound catfish the prey.
When a catfish bites, one fisherman reaches deep into its mouth, pushing his fist through the fish’s gills to keep it from escaping. He picks up the immense, wriggling bottom-feeder and dumps it into his boat, then pulls out his arm, which is bloodied by the catfish’s teeth.
“Hold it up, show your mama,” the cameraman says. “Oh, mama, look at his hand.”
It’s as red as Chickamauga Creek, but his family could eat fried catfish for a week.
Mama’ll be proud.
See this and other YouTube videos of the week at youtube.com/user/michigandaily