Editing Jesusland map

{{Short description|Satirical political map of North America}}
{{Redirect|Jesusland|the Ben Folds song|Jesusland (song)}}[[File:Jesusland map.svg|thumb|300px|A recreation of the Jesusland map; the colors differ from the original, and state lines have been added
{{legend|#399ed6|"United States of Canada": Canada, plus the [[Red states and blue states|blue states]] that voted for [[John Kerry]] in the [[2004 United States presidential election]]}}
{{legend|#ce0000|"Jesusland", the [[Red states and blue states|red states]] that voted for [[George W. Bush]] in the 2004 United States presidential election}}]]
[[File:Jesusland map with Alberta.svg|thumb|Some versions of the map include the Canadian province of [[Alberta]], known for its [[Politics of Alberta#Provincial|conservative politics]], in Jesusland]]
The '''Jesusland map''' is an [[Internet meme]] created shortly after the [[2004 United States presidential election|2004 U.S. presidential election]] that [[satire|satirizes]] the [[red states and blue states|red/blue states scheme]] by dividing the United States and Canada into "The United States of Canada" and "Jesusland".<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/19/magazine/19wwln_lede.html?_r=2|title=The Last 20th-Century Election?|first=Matt|last=Bai|author-link=Matt Bai|date=November 19, 2006|work=[[The New York Times Magazine]]|quote=Since Bush's disputed victory in 2000, many liberals have been increasingly brazen about their disdain for the rural and religious voters; one popular e-mail message, which landed in thousands of Democratic in-boxes in the days after the 2004 election, separated North America into 'The United States of Canada' and 'Jesusland.'|access-date=13 December 2009}}</ref> The map implies the existence of a fundamental political divide between contiguous northern and southern regions of North America, the former including both the socially liberal Canada and the West Coast, Northeastern, and Upper Midwestern [[U.S. states]], and suggests that these states are closer in spirit to Canada than to the more conservative regions of their own country, which are characterized by the influence of [[Christian fundamentalism]] in their political and popular culture.{{Citation needed|date=November 2024}} The [[Freakonomics]] blog opined that the map reflected the "despair, division, and bitterness" of the election campaign and results.<ref>{{cite news|url=http://freakonomics.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/11/09/maps-fighting-disease-and-skewing-borders/|title=Maps: Fighting Disease and Skewing Borders|last=Mengisen|first=Annika|date=November 9, 2009|publisher=[[Freakonomics blog]], from [[The New York Times]]|access-date=13 December 2009}}</ref> ''[[Slate (magazine)|Slate]]'' also covered the image and posited that it might be the reason the Canadian immigration website received six times its usual page views the day after the 2004 election.<ref>{{cite magazine|last1=Lithwick|first1=Dahlia|last2=Lithwick|first2=Alex|title=Moving to Canada, Eh?|url=http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/low_concept/2004/11/moving_to_canada_eh.html|access-date=4 September 2015|magazine=Slate|date=November 5, 2004}}</ref>

==Origin==
The original image was created on November 3, 2004, by G. Webb, a poster on yakyak.org, an Internet [[message board]] for fans of the work of [[Jeff Minter]].<ref>{{Cite web|title=I've solved it! - Now the Jesusland watch thread.|url=http://www.yakyak.org/viewtopic.php?t=26994|date=November 3, 2004|access-date=2023-01-13|website=YakYak}}</ref> It quickly became an [[Internet meme]], which ''[[The New York Times]]'' described as an "instant Internet classic".<ref>{{cite magazine|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2004/12/12/magazine/12NEO.html|title=Neo-Secessionism|first=Jack|last=Hitt|author-link=Jack Hitt|date=December 12, 2004 |quote=A proposed map showing the United States of Canada just above ''JesusLand'' has become an instant Internet classic.  |magazine=[[The New York Times Magazine]]|access-date=13 December 2009}}</ref>

==Geography==
The meme is in the form of a map of the U.S. and Canada which depicts a new hypothetical national border between the two countries. The "[[red state-blue state divide|blue states]]" from the [[2004 United States presidential election|2004 election]] ([[New England]], the [[Mid-Atlantic states]], the [[West Coast of the United States|Pacific coast]], and the [[Great Lakes region (North America)|Great Lakes states]] of [[Illinois]], [[Michigan]], [[Minnesota]], and [[Wisconsin]]) have been merged with Canada to form a single contiguous nation of more than 170&nbsp;million inhabitants, which is labeled the "United States of Canada". The remaining "[[red state-blue state divide|red states]]" are labeled "Jesusland". Some versions of the map include [[Alberta]] [[Alberta separatism|as part of]] "Jesusland" due to the province's [[Politics of Alberta|predominantly conservative politics]].

== See also ==

{{commons category|Jesusland map}}
* {{annotated link|Bible Belt}}
* {{annotated link|Blue wall (United States)}}
* {{annotated link|Cascadia movement}}
* {{annotated link|Conservatism in Canada}}
* {{annotated link|Conservatism in the United States}}
* {{annotated link|Deep South}}
* {{annotated link|Ecotopia}}
* {{annotated link|Left Coast}}
* {{annotated link|Secession in the United States}}
* {{annotated link|The Nine Nations of North America}}
* [[Královec Region]]

==References==
{{Reflist}}

{{Fictional countries}}

[[Category:Canada–United States relations in popular culture]]
[[Category:Electoral geography of the United States]]
[[Category:Political Internet memes]]
[[Category:2004 United States presidential election in popular culture]]
[[Category:Fictional maps]]
[[Category:Fictional North American countries]]
[[Category:Maps of North America]]
[[Category:Geographical neologisms]]