re: Is it fair for Auburn fans to view themselves as the opposite of "gumps"?

I will always love the anecdotal BS that flows from the mouths and hands of opposing fan bases with absolutely no foundation in reality. "All the people who wear ties that I walk past on my way to work are AU fans" or some other ridiculous concoction formulated within the fevered minds of fans from smaller fanbases as some kind of "justification" for that elitism that are so desperate to hold onto.

No, Auburn fans are not any better than Alabama fans or vice versa. One fan base is LARGER, and therefore will have a greater number of fans that you may or may not find distasteful. That's irrelevant. You, and by you I mean not a dang soul on here, has any inkling what the "majority" of any fan base is, outside of looking at good old fashioned statistics. If, say, 23% of residents in Alabama live in a trailer park, then that means that the best bet is that 23% of Alabama fans in Alabama, 23% of Auburn fans in Alabama, 23% of LSU fans in Alabama, etc - all live in trailer parks.

On a flip side, I will say this:
Quit using "went to the school" as some moronic justification. Every fan base is teeming with people who didn't go to the school, and the more successful, the more likely that number will grow. Are you going to tell me that if you're under the age of 18, you can have a favorite team? Currently enlisted in the military, you can't have a favorite team? Got a scholarship to a different school and went there, or went to a different school because they had a better program in a specific field, that they can't be a fan of said school?

Wow.