In an essay written sixty years ago called "Raffles and Mrs. Blandish," George Orwell reviews two novels written at the beginning of the 20th century. Orwell puts the manners and morality of popular literature through his own prism to reveal the fascism, sadism, and imperialism contained in our literature.
Until recently the characteristic adventure stories of the English-speaking peoples have been stories in which the hero fights against the odds. This is true all the way from Robin Hood to Pop-eye the Sailor. Perhaps the basic myth of the Western world is Jack the Giant-killer, but to be brought up to date this should be renamed Jack the Dwarf-killer, and there already exists considerable literature which teaches, either overtly or implicitly, that one should side with the big man against the little man. Most of what is now written about foreign policy is simply an embroidery on this theme, and for several decades such phrases as "Play the game," "Don't hit a man when he's down" and "It's not cricket" have never failed to draw a snigger from anyone of intellectual pretensions.
So what does it mean now that we're more likely to see a Yosemite Sam or Tasmanian Devil sticker on the back of a car, or on the mudflaps of a pickup truck? In some way I think people sympathize more with the buffoonish aggressors rather than the passive underdogs. Even America's underdogs, such as Bruce Willis, Will Smith, and Keanu Reeves spend much of their time onscreen kicking butt. Definitely more than a Charlie Chaplin or Buster Keaton would ever have done. "Might makes right," becomes engraved in our psyche so much so that the closest analog to American behavior might be the ambivalent mobster Tony Soprano. To all appearances Tony Soprano is a regular guy, even a sensitive guy, but if somebody needs to be whacked, Tony's the man to do it.
Let's just hope this attitude is having no effect on our foreign policy.
Posted by mastr at April 14, 2004 09:10 AM