Society has changed in this way, though. Someone born in County Cork, in 1827, could have, as a result of the Potato Famine, climbed aboard a ship bound for New York with the clothes on their back, a small suitcase and a couple of hundred dollars in their wallet, and within a few weeks of arriving, have found a job, and may, over time, have moved westward. Similarly, despite the jokes made about them, a Polish person born in 1925, who lost everything, and who escaped Poland for a refugee camp, may have been offered the opportunity to come to the USA with the clothes they were given by the International Red Cross and precious little else.

Nowadays, to enter the USA, you need to have a certain amount of money, a job lined up and a few other things, and you can possibly earn enough to be able to return to your country of birth to see family, even if it's only for every second Christmas (or Ramadan, or Hanukkah or Diwali) whereas the Irish immigrant of 1849 or the Polish refugee of 1946, may have their last memory of their homeland being as it receded into the distance. Or, for some young Italian girls, who were married by proxy, the last time they saw their parents was when they waved to them from the porthole on a ship, as it pulled away from the Quay headed for the USA.

Regardless of whether or not a state is more progressive or more conservative, that is a general rating, and you may be stepping out of the frying pan and into the inferno.

I remember having an argument with a Right-Winger in a local newspaper, who was opposed to Marriage Equality, and I said that the question that they needed to ask was, "Would Marriage Equality impact upon their daily life or their right to worship or attend church, and if the answer to that question was, no, then what was the problem. This person also said that Christian politicians didn't believe that they were superior, that they went by different principles, and a person who agreed with me said to this person, "Really? Well, why is it that whenever there's a discussion about euthanasia, the Religious Right howled and carried on?" He then also said that the Religious Right was permitted to worship as they saw fit but to keep their saintly, self-righteous noses out of the lives of others. And with that, I agree.

What they need to remember also is, and this happens more in my native Australia than in the USA, often times people want to drop out of the rat race and have a sea or tree change, and within a few years, they're back in the city. And these aren't necessarily LGBTIQA people, either. Because at first, they're happy, but then reality sets in. They talk about small towns not surviving, but the alternative side is, some small towns can be very clicky, and they may not welcome newcomers. I, myself, had a sea change, some years ago, but when reality set it, I wasn't happy, and returned to the city.