Welcome to Gaia! :: View User's Journal | Gaia Journals

Rob the Marine mailed me a huge documentary epic on the American Civil War. I'm part way into the second tape and here are some preliminary musings:

1. "The Civil War is brought to you by GM." The way the announcer says it, it sounds like they sponsored the actual war. Disturbing.

2. After looking at all those photos of dead soldiers from both sides, I had this thought: Why is it such a fuss is made about "the honored Confederate Dead," even after all these years. What about the Union dead? I don't think anybody sane really thinks the Confederate side is the right side. Did we really want the union to break into little bits? As an ex-governor said, "Carolina is too small to be a Republic, and too big to be an asylum." Does anyone but the most lunatic racist think slavery was a good idea? Why then do people act as if the death of the Confederate soldier was a huge tragedy, while the Union dead are long forgotten? Didn't they have wives and mothers and children? Weren't their lives important? My great, great grandmother married a man who lost an arm fighting for the Union. He had his faults, but he was an excellent stepfather for my Great Grandmother, who loved him dearly. He was the only father she knew, since her biological father had TB, and wasn't allowed to live near the children.

3. I wish some of those alternative photos of Lincoln were more common. I'm terribly fond of a picture with one of those big bushy eyebrows raised. He has this intelligent, knowing smile that seems to laugh across time at the image we all have of him. It's as if he is dreadfully amused by all the fuss. Our image of him is basically a cartoon; we lose his humor, cleverness, and complexity. I wish they put that picture in the textbooks instead of the same old stodgy ones everybody sees.