15 ms·

How Benedict Arnold went from wartime hero to resentful traitor

64 points by neonate 8y ago

ekianjo 8y ago
> In the end, writes Taylor, it was a white man’s revolution whose success came at the expense of everyone else—blacks, Indians, and women. Talk about rewriting History! At the time the American Revolution was widely regarded as a sign of progress - remember that no country had achieved freedom from oppressive monarchs in Europe, and the Americas led the way to true democracy. And the Founding Fathers, instead of establishing an aristocracy on their own (which is what most revolutionaries do), created the Constitution and gave power back to communities and states. Looking at History with the eyes of the modern man is laughable. Progress has to start somewhere.
- alphabettsy 8y ago
  That’s definitely not completely true what you just stated. Only allowing land owning white men to vote in a country that already had people with their own various forms of governance such as the Iroquois Confederacy doesn’t seem much different than aristocracy looking at it with a present day lens, and some, see indigenous people, probably didn’t think it was so great even then. I think to say there were no benefits to others would be inaccurate, but it would also be completely inaccurate to pretend the good fortune of black peoples, indigenous people, etc were even considered.
  - honestoHeminway 8y ago
    Surely, those opressed where pure of heart and ideology? Communistic, noble natives. Not some warlord ruled bands, constantly fighting one another like afghani triebes, opressing there females like the aborigines. And these social structures where of course created by the great nemesis of the authors- the white men today, as they where back then. And surely the slaves escaping to managed villages of theire own in the swamps did not just recreate tribal africa, with its great accomplishments, like constant refugee waves and warlords. There should be at least acknowledgements of the grey areas of history, before releasing a propaganda piece.
- lemmsjid 8y ago
  Why is it laughable to consider that, for example, from the perspective of the large slave population at the time of the Revolution, the event was not so much progress as regress, and signified what was possibly an extension of their slavery? Acknowledging that does not make the founders of the country any less brave or singular, nor does it suggest we should judge them against modern standards, nor does it even remotely cause us to forget the context of the revolution in the course of European political history. Instead it reminds us that behind every great movement there can be and often is great horror.
  - wonderbear 8y ago
    > ... behind every great movement there can be and often is great horror. Exactly. It _was_ a great movement. It was singular and amazing there were brave people who did incredible things. At the same time: they left a lot of people worse off than they would have been otherwise. Both things are true. It sucks when you want a pure righteous hero to look up to, especially people that ultimately gave us so much. But that's what happened. Nothing honest that we can do looks past that.
  - ekianjo 8y ago
    > extension of their slavery First, during the revolution, all slave trade was banned by the new government of the US. And after the war, it became of matter of state jurisdiction: several states went ahead and abolished slavery on their own in less than 10 years following the independence war. Isn't what what you call progress when institutions made it a possibility?
    - pretendscholar 8y ago
      A cynical take on that would be that Jefferson and the other southern aristocrats wanted to limit the supply of slaves so that the value of their estates would skyrocket. I don't actually know much about the time so don't take that musing too seriously.
      - DrScump 8y ago
- jkmcf 8y ago
  While I agree that sentence is a dishonest summary, one has to be careful when claiming “rewriting history”. As history is written by the victors, parts are ignored, misrepresented, or plain fabricated. Eg, every American child is brought up believing the Betsy Ross story (possibly/likely) fabricated by her descendants a hundred years later. Similar examples of retroactive history exist in English history where first recorded mentions are 200+ years after the events in question, not to mention excluding whole groups of people from history, ie women, slaves, children, commoners, losers, etc. All we can hope for is a fair reconstruction when new evidence is discovered, or critical thinking applied where it was previously absent.
  - ekianjo 8y ago
    > Similar examples of retroactive history exist in English history where first recorded mentions are 200+ years after the events in question, not to mention excluding whole groups of people from history, ie women, slaves, children, commoners, losers, etc. Certainly, but the American revolution was just 200 years ago or so, and we have outsiders views like Alexis de Tocqueville who should be regarded as primary source of truth regarding what the Revolution led to, instead of a pullitzer prize professor from 20xx who has never even remotely lived in that period.
    - rounce 8y ago
      But your 'outsider' is actually a temporal insider, and has nothing of the perspective that is lent by time.
    - Mediterraneo10 8y ago
      De Tocqueville was visiting a country that had already been purged of key dissenting voices. When the American Revolution broke out, society was quite split on whether to remain a colony or to rebel. The revolutionaries won in large part by burning down loyalists' houses and tarring and feathering them, until they either fled to Canada and the West Indies or kept their mouths shut from fear. Saying that the independent US was so great because Tocqueville thought it free and prosperous is like saying any repressive state is so great because when you traveled there you met so many happy people and did not see anything amiss. If you like contemporary primary sources, there are plenty of letters and diaries documenting how oppressive the revolutionaries were. No surprise that doesn't get covered in American schools, it would get in the way of constructing a national mythology like every newly independent nation wants to do (my own Eastern European country is just as bad).
- pranjalv123 8y ago
  The American Revolution was fought in part to preserve slavery [1] and to allow westward expansion at the expense of the Native Americans [2]. Tens of thousands of slaves, as well as most of the Native American tribes, fought alongside the British. I also don't quite understand what you mean when you say that the Founding Fathers didn't establish an aristocracy of their own: the first five presidents were involved with writing the Constitution and establishing the Federal government, and the sixth president was one of their sons! 1: https://www.counterpunch.org/2011/05/23/was-the-american-revolution-fought-to-save-slavery/ https://www.counterpunch.org/2011/05/23/was-the-american-rev... 2: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Royal_Proclamation_of_1763 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Royal_Proclamation_of_1763
  - TangoTrotFox 8y ago
    Basing your views on meandering blogs from a hyper partisan site is typical for the times, but an extremely bad idea. Read the actual views of the founding fathers on slavery. This article [1] sums things in a pretty balanced way. Jefferson actually wrote against slavery in the initial draft of the declaration of independence. Of course he also owned slaves along with many other founding fathers, yet institutional ideals and personal action are often detached. For instance Apple products today are produced in factories where workers earn a pittance per day while living in on-site dormitories surrounded by suicide nets. And we can go much more overt as many chocolate treats are produced as a direct product of slave labor which is still rife in West Africa - companies like Hershey and Nestle being some of the biggest sponsors there. And then there's your seafood, or catfood and other seafood derivatives. Okay all that aside, another big point is that the United States' original view was one of an extremely minimal federal government. States would essentially be similar to nations in terms of sovereignty, but united under a single flag for collective defense and other necessities. Slavery remained a major issue throughout the founding of the country. The Republican party was actually founded in large part as the anti-slavery party. Founded in 1854, the party's first president would be elected in 1860 - Abraham Lincoln. Imagine Musk, and SpaceX, succeeds in their mission to colonize Mars. And Mars ends up electing its own representatives. Who do you think they might pick to the highest role available? That a people are highly reverent of the people that lead them towards progress has nothing to do with aristocracy. [1] - https://www.britannica.com/topic/The-Founding-Fathers-and-Slavery-1269536 https://www.britannica.com/topic/The-Founding-Fathers-and-Sl...
- Spooky23 8y ago
  The article is trash, and fails to connect the motivations of the treasonous and ambitious Arnold with the revisionist babble dumped into the article. It’s bizzare to me that the author would attribute the woeful ignorance of Benedict Arnold to our achieving some sort of enlightenment about the “dark and sordid” truth of the revolution. I’m actually somewhat gobsmacked at the ignorance and lack of perspective demonstrated... we’re talking about breaking away from the British Empire, who spent the next hundred years or more oppressing millions in India, China, Africa and Ireland. If this is a demonstration of the rigor of Ivy League academia, that’s the real story here.
  - jonnybgood 8y ago
    > we’re talking about breaking away from the British Empire, who spent the next hundred years or more oppressing millions in India, China, Africa and Ireland. And America has oppressed millions of _its own people_ for ~200 years. I don’t see what your point is.
    - ekianjo 8y ago
      America has been way more benevolent even under its darkest years than the British Empire ever was. Ask Indians and most African countries what it was like to live under the British Crown.
      - jonnybgood 8y ago
        What’s benevolent about slavery, Jim Crow, and attempted genocide?
        ekianjo 8y ago
        It's not like slavery was abolished in all parts around the world before the US. And several states in the US abolished slavery in a few years after the independence war - it became a matter of state policy.
        8y ago
- rjsw 8y ago
  > remember that no country had achieved freedom from oppressive monarchs in Europe Not totally true [1]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commonwealth_of_England https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commonwealth_of_England
- drb91 8y ago
  Progress is a myth (or illusion, if you prefer) that forces reductive narratives. This is a fantastic example of that: the land-owning white man now has legitimate rights. However, one of those hard-won rights was the right to own your fellow man. That seems less like progress than marginal changes that improve life for a few, written in blood. To see something that most would agree as progress, you’d have to consider a much larger time period, over a much wider demographic than the founding fathers managed to consider.
michaelmrose 8y ago
It seems remarkably clear that his own status and wealth were his primary motivation. Nothing in the article made any sort of case for a more complicated explanation. Had his career trajectory continued upward he would merely be a footnote regarding a successful general.
michaelmrose 8y ago
"Modern scholars haven’t gone so far as to describe Benedict Arnold as a hero for turning against this rather squalid and nasty revolution" Refuted in the same article in the next paragraph. Outside of tabloids I don't know that I've read something more intellectually dishonest recently. The actual heros of the revolution however shitty by modern ethical standards were building their peice of the only hope for a just world we have. Democracy however shitty we still are is a transition like unto agriculture is necessary for our progress as a species. He betrayed this for status and gold. There are two sides of this of course his is just disgusting by present and modern standards.
dagenix 8y ago
> Arnold’s career, written, as many of the best and most readable histories of the revolution are written these days, by an independent scholar who is not caught up in the academic world’s obsessions with race and gender. Possibly the most neckbeard thing you can write. Race and gender matter. To ignore that is to say that they don't. But, this article is celebrating a white man ignoring both those things?
justaaron 8y ago
More American Exceptionalism and Navel Gazing (tm) This is not history, but rather rhetoric and nationalistic propaganda. As an American by birth and upbringing, I really wish that these people would travel and realize: 1) every nation has their "unique and special history" 2) every nation uses that mythology to boost national pride 3) this nationalistic "but we are special" tone only functions for a given domestic audience, given that this is its intended target 4) It therefore contributes NOTHING to international relations & dialogue. Imagine the silly world of 2018 where Belgians would still go on and on about the Belgian revolution vis-a-vis the Dutch. Get over it. It's literally history. While the "reformist" historians that the author decries may indeed turn things inside out and distort the lense in an effort to expiate our national sins (which really were sins and shouldn't be defended ad nauseaum) the author himself seems to have divorced himself from any concept of academic dispassionate truth-telling and be actively engaged in defending nationalist propaganda to a laughably obvious degree. The author should visit nations where actual dictators former and present have created similar "Gods Children" mythos and realize the banal stupidity of such a position as adults in a world we all share. God does not prefer any grouping of humans to another, and most definitely does not approve of politics nor nationalism. God told me this just now, so you can rest assured that it's true. The author and his myopic defenders may accuse me of being a "Left Wing Radical" (tm) to which I may response "indeed" given another context. In this particular context I'm merely 1) right 2) being the voice of reason in the face of emotional rhetoric defending a belief system with the full force of a religion, quite a dangerous belief system, when you consider that. Please, no operating heavy machinery under the influence of "I am the son of Amon Ra" nonsense...
- justaaron 8y ago
  Oh, my favorite "attempted rhetorical device" is definitely a line from one of the first paragraphs: "but since patriotism doesn’t have the appeal it used to have, Arnold’s treason seems not to matter as much anymore." Patria, patriotism, authors particular definition of it, true patriot, false patriot, other interpretations, etc. Wanker.
- natecavanaugh 8y ago
  > The author and his myopic defenders may accuse me of being a "Left Wing Radical" (tm) I wouldn't, I would just politely disagree, though I wouldn't consider myself a myopic defender of the author (I haven't read the book the article references). Personally, since you mentioned being an American by birth and upbringing, I think you're in a spot where you're far more sensitive to the sins of those you were closest to. I've been a conservative for most of my life and have found myself feeling betrayed and disgusted by my own party since Trump, and I'm far more attuned to seeing the flaws of the right now, and has me questioning alot of rhetoric hearing and even repeating during my life. But both parties are inhabited by slicksters and con men who angle for power, and instead of focusing on the fact that both parties have problems, I try to just critically examine my own assumptions and try to give the benefit of the doubt to the opposing side. But when I hear BS from either side, I try to call it as it is. As far as the article, I didn't read it as proselytizing American greatness, but rather a retelling of why the man's name is so indelibly engraved as a euphemism for betrayal in American culture. I don't think it's a radical claim to admit that there have been a couple of generations academics who have been far more focused on the sins of the founding fathers while at the same time completely ignoring the sins of any individuals who may have been part of the disenfranchised or abused groups. That to me is intellectual dishonesty. I think deifying or demonizing the founders is wrong, but the article didn't strike me as trying to do either but rather trying to tell what's actually a pretty interesting story about a complex person, whose story seems to be simplified by one side or the other. But perhaps I'm naive, that's for you to decide :)

64 points by neonate 8y ago

> In the end, writes Taylor, it was a white man’s revolution whose success came at the expense of everyone else—blacks, Indians, and women. Talk about rewriting History! At the time the American Revolution was widely regarded as a sign of progress - remember that no country had achieved freedom from oppressive monarchs in Europe, and the Americas led the way to true democracy. And the Founding Fathers, instead of establishing an aristocracy on their own (which is what most revolutionaries do), created the Constitution and gave power back to communities and states. Looking at History with the eyes of the modern man is laughable. Progress has to start somewhere.

alphabettsy 8y ago
That’s definitely not completely true what you just stated. Only allowing land owning white men to vote in a country that already had people with their own various forms of governance such as the Iroquois Confederacy doesn’t seem much different than aristocracy looking at it with a present day lens, and some, see indigenous people, probably didn’t think it was so great even then. I think to say there were no benefits to others would be inaccurate, but it would also be completely inaccurate to pretend the good fortune of black peoples, indigenous people, etc were even considered.
- honestoHeminway 8y ago
  Surely, those opressed where pure of heart and ideology? Communistic, noble natives. Not some warlord ruled bands, constantly fighting one another like afghani triebes, opressing there females like the aborigines. And these social structures where of course created by the great nemesis of the authors- the white men today, as they where back then. And surely the slaves escaping to managed villages of theire own in the swamps did not just recreate tribal africa, with its great accomplishments, like constant refugee waves and warlords. There should be at least acknowledgements of the grey areas of history, before releasing a propaganda piece.
lemmsjid 8y ago
Why is it laughable to consider that, for example, from the perspective of the large slave population at the time of the Revolution, the event was not so much progress as regress, and signified what was possibly an extension of their slavery? Acknowledging that does not make the founders of the country any less brave or singular, nor does it suggest we should judge them against modern standards, nor does it even remotely cause us to forget the context of the revolution in the course of European political history. Instead it reminds us that behind every great movement there can be and often is great horror.
- wonderbear 8y ago
  > ... behind every great movement there can be and often is great horror. Exactly. It _was_ a great movement. It was singular and amazing there were brave people who did incredible things. At the same time: they left a lot of people worse off than they would have been otherwise. Both things are true. It sucks when you want a pure righteous hero to look up to, especially people that ultimately gave us so much. But that's what happened. Nothing honest that we can do looks past that.
- ekianjo 8y ago
  > extension of their slavery First, during the revolution, all slave trade was banned by the new government of the US. And after the war, it became of matter of state jurisdiction: several states went ahead and abolished slavery on their own in less than 10 years following the independence war. Isn't what what you call progress when institutions made it a possibility?
  - pretendscholar 8y ago
    A cynical take on that would be that Jefferson and the other southern aristocrats wanted to limit the supply of slaves so that the value of their estates would skyrocket. I don't actually know much about the time so don't take that musing too seriously.
    - DrScump 8y ago
jkmcf 8y ago
While I agree that sentence is a dishonest summary, one has to be careful when claiming “rewriting history”. As history is written by the victors, parts are ignored, misrepresented, or plain fabricated. Eg, every American child is brought up believing the Betsy Ross story (possibly/likely) fabricated by her descendants a hundred years later. Similar examples of retroactive history exist in English history where first recorded mentions are 200+ years after the events in question, not to mention excluding whole groups of people from history, ie women, slaves, children, commoners, losers, etc. All we can hope for is a fair reconstruction when new evidence is discovered, or critical thinking applied where it was previously absent.
- ekianjo 8y ago
  > Similar examples of retroactive history exist in English history where first recorded mentions are 200+ years after the events in question, not to mention excluding whole groups of people from history, ie women, slaves, children, commoners, losers, etc. Certainly, but the American revolution was just 200 years ago or so, and we have outsiders views like Alexis de Tocqueville who should be regarded as primary source of truth regarding what the Revolution led to, instead of a pullitzer prize professor from 20xx who has never even remotely lived in that period.
  - rounce 8y ago
    But your 'outsider' is actually a temporal insider, and has nothing of the perspective that is lent by time.
  - Mediterraneo10 8y ago
    De Tocqueville was visiting a country that had already been purged of key dissenting voices. When the American Revolution broke out, society was quite split on whether to remain a colony or to rebel. The revolutionaries won in large part by burning down loyalists' houses and tarring and feathering them, until they either fled to Canada and the West Indies or kept their mouths shut from fear. Saying that the independent US was so great because Tocqueville thought it free and prosperous is like saying any repressive state is so great because when you traveled there you met so many happy people and did not see anything amiss. If you like contemporary primary sources, there are plenty of letters and diaries documenting how oppressive the revolutionaries were. No surprise that doesn't get covered in American schools, it would get in the way of constructing a national mythology like every newly independent nation wants to do (my own Eastern European country is just as bad).
pranjalv123 8y ago
The American Revolution was fought in part to preserve slavery [1] and to allow westward expansion at the expense of the Native Americans [2]. Tens of thousands of slaves, as well as most of the Native American tribes, fought alongside the British. I also don't quite understand what you mean when you say that the Founding Fathers didn't establish an aristocracy of their own: the first five presidents were involved with writing the Constitution and establishing the Federal government, and the sixth president was one of their sons! 1: https://www.counterpunch.org/2011/05/23/was-the-american-revolution-fought-to-save-slavery/ https://www.counterpunch.org/2011/05/23/was-the-american-rev... 2: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Royal_Proclamation_of_1763 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Royal_Proclamation_of_1763
- TangoTrotFox 8y ago
  Basing your views on meandering blogs from a hyper partisan site is typical for the times, but an extremely bad idea. Read the actual views of the founding fathers on slavery. This article [1] sums things in a pretty balanced way. Jefferson actually wrote against slavery in the initial draft of the declaration of independence. Of course he also owned slaves along with many other founding fathers, yet institutional ideals and personal action are often detached. For instance Apple products today are produced in factories where workers earn a pittance per day while living in on-site dormitories surrounded by suicide nets. And we can go much more overt as many chocolate treats are produced as a direct product of slave labor which is still rife in West Africa - companies like Hershey and Nestle being some of the biggest sponsors there. And then there's your seafood, or catfood and other seafood derivatives. Okay all that aside, another big point is that the United States' original view was one of an extremely minimal federal government. States would essentially be similar to nations in terms of sovereignty, but united under a single flag for collective defense and other necessities. Slavery remained a major issue throughout the founding of the country. The Republican party was actually founded in large part as the anti-slavery party. Founded in 1854, the party's first president would be elected in 1860 - Abraham Lincoln. Imagine Musk, and SpaceX, succeeds in their mission to colonize Mars. And Mars ends up electing its own representatives. Who do you think they might pick to the highest role available? That a people are highly reverent of the people that lead them towards progress has nothing to do with aristocracy. [1] - https://www.britannica.com/topic/The-Founding-Fathers-and-Slavery-1269536 https://www.britannica.com/topic/The-Founding-Fathers-and-Sl...
Spooky23 8y ago
The article is trash, and fails to connect the motivations of the treasonous and ambitious Arnold with the revisionist babble dumped into the article. It’s bizzare to me that the author would attribute the woeful ignorance of Benedict Arnold to our achieving some sort of enlightenment about the “dark and sordid” truth of the revolution. I’m actually somewhat gobsmacked at the ignorance and lack of perspective demonstrated... we’re talking about breaking away from the British Empire, who spent the next hundred years or more oppressing millions in India, China, Africa and Ireland. If this is a demonstration of the rigor of Ivy League academia, that’s the real story here.
- jonnybgood 8y ago
  > we’re talking about breaking away from the British Empire, who spent the next hundred years or more oppressing millions in India, China, Africa and Ireland. And America has oppressed millions of _its own people_ for ~200 years. I don’t see what your point is.
  - ekianjo 8y ago
    America has been way more benevolent even under its darkest years than the British Empire ever was. Ask Indians and most African countries what it was like to live under the British Crown.
    - jonnybgood 8y ago
      What’s benevolent about slavery, Jim Crow, and attempted genocide?
      - ekianjo 8y ago
        It's not like slavery was abolished in all parts around the world before the US. And several states in the US abolished slavery in a few years after the independence war - it became a matter of state policy.
        8y ago
rjsw 8y ago
> remember that no country had achieved freedom from oppressive monarchs in Europe Not totally true [1]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commonwealth_of_England https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commonwealth_of_England
drb91 8y ago
Progress is a myth (or illusion, if you prefer) that forces reductive narratives. This is a fantastic example of that: the land-owning white man now has legitimate rights. However, one of those hard-won rights was the right to own your fellow man. That seems less like progress than marginal changes that improve life for a few, written in blood. To see something that most would agree as progress, you’d have to consider a much larger time period, over a much wider demographic than the founding fathers managed to consider.

michaelmrose 8y ago

It seems remarkably clear that his own status and wealth were his primary motivation. Nothing in the article made any sort of case for a more complicated explanation. Had his career trajectory continued upward he would merely be a footnote regarding a successful general.

michaelmrose 8y ago

"Modern scholars haven’t gone so far as to describe Benedict Arnold as a hero for turning against this rather squalid and nasty revolution" Refuted in the same article in the next paragraph. Outside of tabloids I don't know that I've read something more intellectually dishonest recently. The actual heros of the revolution however shitty by modern ethical standards were building their peice of the only hope for a just world we have. Democracy however shitty we still are is a transition like unto agriculture is necessary for our progress as a species. He betrayed this for status and gold. There are two sides of this of course his is just disgusting by present and modern standards.

dagenix 8y ago

> Arnold’s career, written, as many of the best and most readable histories of the revolution are written these days, by an independent scholar who is not caught up in the academic world’s obsessions with race and gender. Possibly the most neckbeard thing you can write. Race and gender matter. To ignore that is to say that they don't. But, this article is celebrating a white man ignoring both those things?

justaaron 8y ago

More American Exceptionalism and Navel Gazing (tm) This is not history, but rather rhetoric and nationalistic propaganda. As an American by birth and upbringing, I really wish that these people would travel and realize: 1) every nation has their "unique and special history" 2) every nation uses that mythology to boost national pride 3) this nationalistic "but we are special" tone only functions for a given domestic audience, given that this is its intended target 4) It therefore contributes NOTHING to international relations & dialogue. Imagine the silly world of 2018 where Belgians would still go on and on about the Belgian revolution vis-a-vis the Dutch. Get over it. It's literally history. While the "reformist" historians that the author decries may indeed turn things inside out and distort the lense in an effort to expiate our national sins (which really were sins and shouldn't be defended ad nauseaum) the author himself seems to have divorced himself from any concept of academic dispassionate truth-telling and be actively engaged in defending nationalist propaganda to a laughably obvious degree. The author should visit nations where actual dictators former and present have created similar "Gods Children" mythos and realize the banal stupidity of such a position as adults in a world we all share. God does not prefer any grouping of humans to another, and most definitely does not approve of politics nor nationalism. God told me this just now, so you can rest assured that it's true. The author and his myopic defenders may accuse me of being a "Left Wing Radical" (tm) to which I may response "indeed" given another context. In this particular context I'm merely 1) right 2) being the voice of reason in the face of emotional rhetoric defending a belief system with the full force of a religion, quite a dangerous belief system, when you consider that. Please, no operating heavy machinery under the influence of "I am the son of Amon Ra" nonsense...

justaaron 8y ago
Oh, my favorite "attempted rhetorical device" is definitely a line from one of the first paragraphs: "but since patriotism doesn’t have the appeal it used to have, Arnold’s treason seems not to matter as much anymore." Patria, patriotism, authors particular definition of it, true patriot, false patriot, other interpretations, etc. Wanker.
natecavanaugh 8y ago
> The author and his myopic defenders may accuse me of being a "Left Wing Radical" (tm) I wouldn't, I would just politely disagree, though I wouldn't consider myself a myopic defender of the author (I haven't read the book the article references). Personally, since you mentioned being an American by birth and upbringing, I think you're in a spot where you're far more sensitive to the sins of those you were closest to. I've been a conservative for most of my life and have found myself feeling betrayed and disgusted by my own party since Trump, and I'm far more attuned to seeing the flaws of the right now, and has me questioning alot of rhetoric hearing and even repeating during my life. But both parties are inhabited by slicksters and con men who angle for power, and instead of focusing on the fact that both parties have problems, I try to just critically examine my own assumptions and try to give the benefit of the doubt to the opposing side. But when I hear BS from either side, I try to call it as it is. As far as the article, I didn't read it as proselytizing American greatness, but rather a retelling of why the man's name is so indelibly engraved as a euphemism for betrayal in American culture. I don't think it's a radical claim to admit that there have been a couple of generations academics who have been far more focused on the sins of the founding fathers while at the same time completely ignoring the sins of any individuals who may have been part of the disenfranchised or abused groups. That to me is intellectual dishonesty. I think deifying or demonizing the founders is wrong, but the article didn't strike me as trying to do either but rather trying to tell what's actually a pretty interesting story about a complex person, whose story seems to be simplified by one side or the other. But perhaps I'm naive, that's for you to decide :)