eebmore: I’m Not Donating Any Wampum

I’m Not Donating Any Wampum

January 19, 2006

*boring alert*

Speaking of Injun and Canadian savages, I just caught PBS’s "The War that Made America” tonight, about, coincidentally, the French and Indian War. It was loads of fun, as it had lots of Indians scalping and kidnapping settlers and whatnot. I think it was informative and I learned stuff, too. I think. As what little I know about the conflict and the era the documentary portrayed in a painfully inaccurate manner.

For instance, I do know:

1. The Huron are not “Canadian Mohawks,” as the documentary stated. I see where they were going with that, but they’re not the same.
2. The British did not “invade” or “attack” Acadia/Nova Scotia in the 1750’s. That land was signed over to the British in a treaty 40 years prior. They reinforced their garrisons in what was already at that time British Nova Scotia, in case the Acadians rebelled... which they never did.

3. The British did not round up and kick out “all” the Acadians. They rounded up and kicked out those Acadians who where unwilling to sign an oath of allegiance to the crown and renounce their Catholic faith, resulting in the expulsion of 75% of the Acadians. Granted, the renunciation of their religion was a complete douchebag clause for the British to add to the oath, and the oath of allegiance itself was kind of bullshitty, but ethnic cleansing it was not... never mind the fact we're talking about 18th Century concepts of ethics and morality.

4. In the Fort William Henry Massacre, they were right to point out that there were not 1500 killed, as the British propaganda at the time stated. The more accurate estimate was somewhere between 70 and 180. But don’t state “only about 75 were killed.” You cannot accurately revise history by swinging the bullshit pendulum all the way to the other extreme. If you are going to fix figures, you have to give the proper figures, not the minimum estimates. Inaccurate or slanted historic revision smacks of agenda every bit at much as populist propaganda.

I suppose one could argue that these were simplifications to expedite the narrative flow of the history, and I would probably agree with them if this was a movie. But a documentary? I mean, what about the 95% of the information the documentary provided that I knew absolutely nothing about? Was that all “simplified” to the point of being inaccurate too? Did I learn anything? Do I now have a broad view of the events that are just plain wrong, instead of no view or knowledge of the events? And which would be better?

Eh. Whatever. At least the haircuts were cool.

01:44 AM | Permalink

Comments

Damn librul media.

Posted by: AnonymousCoworker at January 19, 2006 10:21 AM

you spelled media wrong. the proper spelling is "MSM" or "Kennedy." Idiot.

Posted by: eebmore at January 19, 2006 11:06 AM

too bad all those Acadians' decsendants just got kicked out of their homes b/c of the hurricane.

Posted by: esf at January 19, 2006 01:52 PM

?? I thought the Acadiana parishes came out of the hurricane relatively unscathed?

Posted by: eebmore at January 19, 2006 02:04 PM

esf, did you see that "Trading Mommies" or "Mommy Swap" (I can't remember) when they switched a Cajun mother with a Californian Peta Vegan mother? OH MY GOD, that was some funny shit. Never in my life have I wanted to be a Cajun more.

Posted by: eebmore at January 19, 2006 02:17 PM

You are the biggest fucking retard on the planet. You can knitpick any historic documentary to death. The intent isn't for the extremely educated scholars to learn about the war they studied, it is for the average american to learn about one of america's very important forgotten wars. It is true that they screwed some things up, but I would like to see you make a F&I documentary that is near as good. Please if there is any human desency in your heart kill yourself so that the world will have one less flaming douchebag to deal with.

Posted by: Mike Kelley at January 20, 2006 09:22 PM

wow. you don’t muck up the facts in history for either expediency’s sake or to help “ the average american to learn” anything. Revisionism is good. I tries to clean up the subtle errors in fact added by both victors and the victims, typically to enoblize themselves or their ancestors. It is also a discipline. You cannot supplant one agenda with another. Not that this documentary is necessarily an example of such a thing, and yes, I found it entertaining and “hopefully” informative. The producers obviously did enough research that no errors in fact were in anyway excusable. Nazis twisted facts to support an agenda. Serbian “historians” were twisting fact to support an agenda. Iran is currently twisting facts for an agenda. You cannot twist facts for good. Obviously, the intentions of the producers were not as nefarious as these examples. I think they were generally for the sake of expediency, but this does not change the fact that in the past, muddling history has had exceptionally nefarious intentions and sometimes horrific consequences. Simply put, there is never an excuse. If anyone is expected to take a history seriously, every single fact, no matter how small, absolutely must be presented as accurately as humanly possible. Otherwise it is not history.

Also, since I wrote this yesterday, I’ve done some more reading, and admittedly, especially in the case of Acadia/Nova Scotia, I too was misinformed. As it so happens, the borders of what was Nova Scotia and what was still Acadia was vague. The British did attack fortresses belonging the French crown on this vague border, and were actually fought back, not by the French, but by the Acadians and the Mi’kmaq. Funny? I’ve always been taught the Acadians were pastoral pacifists who wanted no part of war, felt no allegiance to the French crown, and only wanted peace. Hmmm. It seems as though the histories that I have read, typically in relation to the Cajuns, were slanted and had an agenda of some sort.

For shock.

And, off of the subject of history for a moment, I think your emotional reaction and desire for me to kill myself is a bit out of measure for the situation. I can’t say that I’ve never wished someone dead, but I’ve never wished it because someone was a stickler for accuracy. Have a great day :)

Posted by: eebmore at January 20, 2006 11:29 PM

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