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For certain reasons, in my house we watch a lot of 1950's TV westerns. Gunsmoke, Rawhide, Death Valley Days, Bonanza, and especially Laramie (Robert Fuller is the house favorite).
There are whole channels dedicated to these old shows and if you watch them in volume...
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There are whole channels dedicated to these old shows and if you watch them in volume...
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...you see the common theme. The heroic Libertarian myth of the Old West. Small, or nonexistent, government. Small towns populated solely by good white Christians every day under attack by by savages, criminals, and fancy dudes from back east who want their land.
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The woman is always looking for a good man to keep her safe.
The rare person of color is the help or comic relief.
Indians grunt, wear war bonnets, and are played by Italians in redface.
The heroes, white men all, drink in the saloon, fight, or hunt down bad guys.
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The rare person of color is the help or comic relief.
Indians grunt, wear war bonnets, and are played by Italians in redface.
The heroes, white men all, drink in the saloon, fight, or hunt down bad guys.
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EVERY problem is solved with a gun or a rope.
A strong man takes what he wants, land, women, power. He doesn't need anything from anybody, especially the government. It's not about right or wrong, your trusty six-shooter makes you right all of the time.
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A strong man takes what he wants, land, women, power. He doesn't need anything from anybody, especially the government. It's not about right or wrong, your trusty six-shooter makes you right all of the time.
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There were hundreds of these shows in the 1950s, 60s, and 70s. All the same. All the same themes. All the same subtle (and not so subtle) prejudices, myths, and ingrained historical falsehoods.
These shows shaped an entire generation.
Shaped how we think of America.
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These shows shaped an entire generation.
Shaped how we think of America.
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Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying Hollywood is to blame anything in particular. These shows didn't create this mythology, they simply refined it and shaped a viewpoint which echoes generations later -- and you can see the same words and ideas flowing through social media.
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You wonder where I'm going with this?
I'm going here. To the West, to the border, where armed white men, vigilantes, take justice into their own hands and are again come to save the day with guns and ropes and edit people of color from our history.
https://twitter.com/ACLU/status/1119247150012039170
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I'm going here. To the West, to the border, where armed white men, vigilantes, take justice into their own hands and are again come to save the day with guns and ropes and edit people of color from our history.
https://twitter.com/ACLU/status/1119247150012039170
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This is the myth, the heroic white cowboy legend, that Trump's generation sold itself, an America that never was, small, limited, SIMPLE, where problems are solved with a gun and rope and all a good woman needs is a rough man to defend her from the savages outside of town.
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When conservative talk of conserving "our" history, well, that's the history they mean and they would erase anyone who does not fit their myth from it -- or relegate the rest of us to the help or comic relief.
But America is more than that.
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But America is more than that.
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This silly small myth has been our national narrative for far too long. Our history is far richer, far more complex than some Hollywood fable.
And so is our present.
The future must be more than that.
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And so is our present.
The future must be more than that.
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Addendum:
I like how he apologizes before telling me to go fuck myself AND my horse.
Also, "road" et al. I'd love to see a study of the relationship between education and angry conservative trolling.
That said...
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I like how he apologizes before telling me to go fuck myself AND my horse.
Also, "road" et al. I'd love to see a study of the relationship between education and angry conservative trolling.
That said...
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... it's that last bit which fascinates me. His casual confident assertion that he'd just shoot people, maim them horribly, to MAKE them do what HE thinks is right at the muzzle of a gun.
That mindset, then the thread I wrote which prompted it, see what I mean?
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That mindset, then the thread I wrote which prompted it, see what I mean?
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