The "bring 'em on" response, which can be overintellectualized/overinterpreted in a multitude of ways that have not accomplished much, doesn't seem to have
been "rooted" in honor but just tired, stupid machismo. The air is way too thick with the stuff in the US with no Lysol in sight.
[WS:] Right on. What is more, machismo is not a "north -south" or even race or ethnicity issue - but it seems to be related to class. It seems to be more prevalent and accepted in lower socio-economic strata as a part of a broader gender role setup - manly men vs. feminine women. This is not to say that machismo is absent from upper strata, but that it is less prevalent and less obvious in those strata.
This distinction was quite in evidence in Baltimore during the invasion of Iraq. The middle class folk were putting anti-war signs in their cars and windows and staging peace rallies, the (white) working class folk put pro-war, anti-France stickers and frequented "Bagdad bombing parties" organized by local pubs. A similar distinction was manifested just north of the Mason-Dixon line in central Pennsylvania. The rednecks were pro-Bush, pro-war, anti France in a distinctively macho way, whereas the middle class was either silent or pro-peace. The machismo hypothesis can explain this distribution of attitudes, but the north-south 'honor' hypothesis cannot.
Wojtek