The thing about Southern boys

I'm talking stereotypical Southern boys who drive trucks and work in a factory doing some sort of manual labor. The ones who are patriotic to a fault. The ones who have a deep tan from working in the sun & muscles to go along with it.
Well my grandmother's 20 yr old next door neighbor is absolutely one of them. I basically grew up with the guy because I used to visit my grandparents so often when I was a kid. We didn't stay close when I moved though & I never really see him anymore except in passing. Yesterday he happened to be outside when I was and he came over & spoke to me. He asked about everybody in the family individually and he gave an easy smile when I responded. I noticed how comfortable he is in his own skin, as he was casually leaning against my Ford. That strikes me as a Southern boy trait, too. Confidence.
So of course after I had that little chat with my long lost childhood friend, I had to stalk him on facebook a little bit.
I wasn't really shocked at what I found. Like I said, I already knew how stereotypical he was. It was just unsettling how charming he was in person(I actually think he might've been extra charming because he wanted to get my cousins number) & how hostile he is on fb. He is a proud gay-bashing Conservative and uses the word Liberal like it's vulgar. In my experience, that's kinda the stereotypical Southern boy, too.

I don't know what to think about that. I mean, on the one hand, I don't agree with his beliefs at all. On the other hand, he's not scared of who will judge him so he states his opinion freely.
I think about my own beliefs a lot and I don't know if I would be willing to put myself out there to be judged like that. Like, now that I know about this, I won't be putting my legalize love bumper sticker on my car any time soon. I know that I should stand up for what I believe in, but I also think I don't want to be victim to a hate crime. That's just my own problems though. Honestly, my neighbor is not the only reason I won't put the bumper sticker on there. My papaw already said I can't put any bumper stickers on his car.

Even still, I don't hate the guy(my grandmother's next door neighbor). There would be never be a time where we would get into it about religion or politics because I would die before I would go through that. I don't know. It's just really hard for me to hate people that I know personally. I can hate a public figure all day long, but when it comes down to people I come face to face with in my daily life, I try to find something good about them.

When I was younger, I used to imagine people being divided up into buckets. Like por ejemplo if the world was divided into Liberal & Conservative, would I choose to be in the bucket with my family (Mostly Conservatives) or would I choose to be in the Liberal bucket with the people I share a few beliefs with. Would I even want to be associated with any bucket? Because they both have people that suck.