About
Jesusland is a fictional country made up of red states: states that traditionally vote Republican. The meme surfaced in 2004 during the U.S. presidential election season, when a satirical map of the new country, along with its counterpart “The United States of Canada” (consisting of blue states and Canada), was uploaded to YakYak.org.
Origin
On November 3rd, 2004, G. Webb posted the map to a thread on YakYak.org. It instantly went viral over the internet, with the New York Times labeling it an “instant internet classic”.
Popularity
The image gained popularity on various political blogs, and from both ends of the political spectrum. Many democrats thought the map a good idea, jokingly and semi-seriously taking secession into consideration. Many liberal users began posting their own maps, or tweaked versions, featuring new countries and borders. Republicans, however, joked about banishing the other states or annexing them to Canada. Conservative users published their own variations of the map, including a flag for the new republic. Soon the maps began to resemble those made during the later years of the American Civil War.
Variations
Jesusland
- Jesusistan
- Dumbf*ckistan
- Redstateistan
- Redneckistan
- Bushlandia
- The United States of Evangelicals
- The United State of Texas
The United States of Canada
- Eastern Realitania
- Northeastistan
- Western France
- The New American Republic
- New America
- The Sorry States of America
- New Canada
- Snobberia
Analysis of Map
Excerpt from Wikipedia:
In the context of the Jesusland map, the states in which a majority voted Democratic in the 2004 election are viewed as more socially liberal in outlook, and therefore having more cultural similarities with Canada than with the remainder of the United States. The Republican-voting red states tended to vote based more on Christian moral values, such as opposition to same-sex marriage and embryonic stem cell research. Holders of these values are characterized by a high degree of faith in Evangelical Christianity, thus causing the name of Jesus to be affixed to the hypothetical country; in an article by Ron Suskind of the New York Times, a Republican official characterized the divide as being one between a “faith-based community” and a “reality-based community”.