OFFICIAL ROAST REPORT
We're sorry. Actually, no we're not.
The town is 69% people of color with some of the highest rates of poverty and crime in the nation, but tourists gush about it being "just like Mayberry" because HGTV carefully curates what makes it on camera. These tourists aren't paying to hear about racism or structural poverty - they came to bask in the glow of their favorite feel-good television show, while the real Laurel stays conveniently out of frame.
A few blocks east lived a business owner and Sunday school teacher named Sam Bowers, soon to become the Ku Klux Klan imperial wizard who ordered the firebombing of voting-rights activist Vernon Dahmer's home, killing him. Community leaders told residents to put these incidents behind them and never speak of them again - and apparently y'all took that advice to heart since tourists now think this is Mayberry.
The Buzzard's Roost offers their signature "Fried PB&B" as if deep-frying peanut butter and banana is peak culinary innovation. Pearl's Diner owner calls mac and cheese and fried chicken "the shining jewels" in what used to be a jewelry store - which is fitting because your restaurant scene has about as much sparkle as costume jewelry from a gas station.
At one point, Laurel was known as the Yellow Pine Capital of the World, but once the trees were gone, you had to rely on white tourism that brings in money for white investors and nearly exclusively white business owners. You have tour buses coming because of the HGTV show, which means your entire economic revival depends on people who think your Confederate monument is just charming period decoration.
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