#or further isolated into the separate horror of a lack of existence

[impossible-rat-babies]

you know there’s a specific kind of horror to sidestep not being Broken, but being Changed in some way. there’s obvious reasons to break, but to change is something else.

change raises questions of why? why were they changed? what is the intended outcome of the change? what specifically was done to incite the change? there’s horror in being changed to someone’s idea of how someone should act/what their personality should be; who they are as defined by someone else. existence dictated by someone else, and furthermore to wonder and live in a way as such to wonder if what came before was “who they are” or what here now is truly the reality.

[dailyanarchistposts]

Chapter 3: Mutual Aid Among Savages

Supposed war of each against all. — Tribal origin of human society. — Late appearance of the separate family. — Bushmen and Hottentots. — Australians, Papuas. — Eskimos, Aleoutes. — Features of savage life difficult to understand for the European. — The Dayak’s conception of justice. — Common law.

The immense part played by mutual aid and mutual support in the evolution of the animal world has been briefly analyzed in the preceding chapters. We have now to cast a glance upon the part played by the same agencies in the evolution of mankind. We saw how few are the animal species which live an isolated life, and how numberless are those which live in societies, either for mutual defence, or for hunting and storing up food, or for rearing their offspring, or simply for enjoying life in common. We also saw that, though a good deal of warfare goes on between different classes of animals, or different species, or even different tribes of the same species, peace and mutual support are the rule within the tribe or the species; and that those species which best know how to combine, and to avoid competition, have the best chances of survival and of a further progressive development. They prosper, while the unsociable species decay.

It is evident that it would be quite contrary to all that we know of nature if men were an exception to so general a rule: if a creature so defenceless as man was at his beginnings should have found his protection and his way to progress, not in mutual support, like other animals, but in a reckless competition for personal advantages, with no regard to the interests of the species. To a mind accustomed to the idea of unity in nature, such a proposition appears utterly indefensible. And yet, improbable and unphilosophical as it is, it has never found a lack of supporters. There always were writers who took a pessimistic view of mankind. They knew it, more or less superficially, through their own limited experience; they knew of history what the annalists, always watchful of wars, cruelty, and oppression, told of it, and little more besides; and they concluded that mankind is nothing but a loose aggregation of beings, always ready to fight with each other, and only prevented from so doing by the intervention of some authority.

Hobbes took that position; and while some of his eighteenth-century followers endeavoured to prove that at no epoch of its existence — not even in its most primitive condition — mankind lived in a state of perpetual warfare; that men have been sociable even in “the state of nature,” and that want of knowledge, rather than the natural bad inclinations of man, brought humanity to all the horrors of its early historical life, — his idea was, on the contrary, that the so-called “state of nature” was nothing but a permanent fight between individuals, accidentally huddled together by the mere caprice of their bestial existence. True, that science has made some progress since Hobbes’s time, and that we have safer ground to stand upon than the speculations of Hobbes or Rousseau. But the Hobbesian philosophy has plenty of admirers still; and we have had of late quite a school of writers who, taking possession of Darwin’s terminology rather than of his leading ideas, made of it an argument in favour of Hobbes’s views upon primitive man, and even succeeded in giving them a scientific appearance. Huxley, as is known, took the lead of that school, and in a paper written in 1888 he represented primitive men as a sort of tigers or lions, deprived of all ethical conceptions, fighting out the struggle for existence to its bitter end, and living a life of “continual free fight”; to quote his own words — “beyond the limited and, temporary relations of the family, the Hobbesian war of each against all was the normal state of existence.”[68]

It has been remarked more than once that the chief error of Hobbes, and the eighteenth-century philosophers as well, was to imagine that mankind began its life in the shape of small straggling families, something like the “limited and temporary” families of the bigger carnivores, while in reality it is now positively known that such was not the case. Of course, we have no direct evidence as to the modes of life of the first man-like beings. We are not yet settled even as to the time of their first appearance, geologists being inclined at present to see their traces in the pliocene, or even the miocene, deposits of the Tertiary period. But we have the indirect method which permits us to throw some light even upon that remote antiquity. A most careful investigation into the social institutions of the lowest races has been carried on during the last forty years, and it has revealed among the present institutions of primitive folk sometraces of still older institutions which have long disappeared, but nevertheless left unmistakable traces of their previous existence. A whole science devoted to the embryology of human institutions has thus developed in the hands of Bachofen, MacLennan, Morgan, Edwin Tylor, Maine, Post, Kovalevsky, Lubbock, and many others. And that science has established beyond any doubt that mankind did not begin its life in the shape of small isolated families.

Far from being a primitive form of organization, the family is a very late product of human evolution. As far as we can go back in the palæo-ethnology of mankind, we find men living in societies — in tribes similar to those of the highest mammals; and an extremely slow and long evolution was required to bring these societies to the gentile, or clan organization, which, in its turn, had to undergo another, also very long evolution, before the first germs of family, polygamous or monogamous, could appear. Societies, bands, or tribes — not families — were thus the primitive form of organization of mankind and its earliest ancestors. That is what ethnology has come to after its painstaking researches. And in so doing it simply came to what might have been foreseen by the zoologist. None of the higher mammals, save a few carnivores and a few undoubtedly-decaying species of apes (orang-outans and gorillas), live in small families, isolatedly straggling in the woods. All others live in societies. And Darwin so well understood that isolately-living apes never could have developed into man-like beings, that he was inclined to consider man as descended from some comparatively weak but social species, like the chimpanzee, rather than from some stronger but unsociable species, like the gorilla.[69] Zoology and palaeo-ethnology are thus agreed in considering that the band, not the family, was the earliest form of social life. The first human societies simply were a further development of those societies which constitute the very essence of life of the higher animals.[70]

If we now go over to positive evidence, we see that the earliest traces of man, dating from the glacial or the early post-glacial period, afford unmistakable proofs of man having lived even then in societies. Isolated finds of stone implements, even from the old stone age, are very rare; on the contrary, wherever one flint implement is discovered others are sure to be found, in most cases in very large quantities. At a time when men were dwelling in caves, or under occasionally protruding rocks, in company with mammals now extinct, and hardly succeeded in making the roughest sorts of flint hatchets, they already knew the advantages of life in societies. In the valleys of the tributaries of the Dordogne, the surface of the rocks is in some places entirely covered with caves which were inhabited by palæolithic men.[71] Sometimes the cave-dwellings are superposed in storeys, and they certainly recall much more the nesting colonies of swallows than the dens of carnivores. As to the flint implements discovered in those caves, to use Lubbock’s words, “one may say without exaggeration that they are numberless.” The same is true of other palæolithic stations. It also appears from Lartet’s investigations that the inhabitants of the Aurignac region in the south of France partook of tribal meals at the burial of their dead. So that men lived in societies, and had germs of a tribal worship, even at that extremely remote epoch.

The same is still better proved as regards the later part of the stone age. Traces of neolithic man have been found in numberless quantities, so that we can reconstitute his manner of life to a great extent. When the ice-cap (which must have spread from the Polar regions as far south as middle France, middle Germany, and middle Russia, and covered Canada as well as a good deal of what is now the United States) began to melt away, the surfaces freed from ice were covered, first, with swamps and marshes, and later on with numberless lakes.[72] Lakes filled all depressions of the valleys before their waters dug out those permanent channels which, during a subsequent epoch, became our rivers. And wherever we explore, in Europe, Asia, or America, the shores of the literally numberless lakes of that period, whose proper name would be the Lacustrine period, we find traces of neolithic man. They are so numerous that we can only wonder at the relative density of population at that time. The “stations” of neolithic man closely follow each other on the terraces which now mark the shores of the old lakes. And at each of those stations stone implements appear in such numbers, that no doubt is possible as to the length of time during which they were inhabited by rather numerous tribes. Whole workshops of flint implements, testifying of the numbers of workers who used to come together, have been discovered by the archæologists.

Traces of a more advanced period, already characterized by the use of some pottery, are found in the shell-heaps of Denmark. They appear, as is well known, in the shape of heaps from five to ten feet thick, from 100 to 200 feet wide, and 1,000 feet or more in length, and they are so common along some parts of the sea-coast that for a long time they were considered as natural growths. And yet they “contain nothing but what has been in some way or other subservient to the use of man,” and they are so densely stuffed with products of human industry that, during a two days’ stay at Milgaard, Lubbock dug out no less than 191 pieces of stone-implements and four fragments of pottery.[73] The very size and extension of the shell heaps prove that for generations and generations the coasts of Denmark were inhabited by hundreds of small tribes which certainly lived as peacefully together as the Fuegian tribes, which also accumulate like shellheaps, are living in our own times.

As to the lake-dwellings of Switzerland, which represent a still further advance in civilization, they yield still better evidence of life and work in societies. It is known that even during the stone age the shores of the Swiss lakes were dotted with a succession of villages, each of which consisted of several huts, and was built upon a platform supported by numberless pillars in the lake. No less than twenty-four, mostly stone age villages, were discovered along the shores of Lake Leman, thirty-two in the Lake of Constance, forty-six in the Lake of Neuchâtel, and so on; and each of them testifies to the immense amount of labour which was spent in common by the tribe, not by the family. It has even been asserted that the life of the lake-dwellers must have been remarkably free of warfare. And so it probably was, especially if we refer to the life of those primitive folk who live until the present time in similar villages built upon pillars on the sea coasts.

It is thus seen, even from the above rapid hints, that our knowledge of primitive man is not so scanty after all, and that, so far as it goes, it is rather opposed than favourable to the Hobbesian speculations. Moreover, it may be supplemented, to a great extent, by the direct observation of such primitive tribes as now stand on the same level of civilization as the inhabitants of Europe stood in prehistoric times.

That these primitive tribes which we find now are not degenerated specimens of mankind who formerly knew a higher civilization, as it has occasionally been maintained, has sufficiently been proved by Edwin Tylor and Lubbock. However, to the arguments already opposed to the degeneration theory, the following may be added. Save a few tribes clustering in the less-accessible highlands, the “savages” represent a girdle which encircles the more or less civilized nations, and they occupy the extremities of our continents, most of which have retained still, or recently were bearing, an early post-glacial character. Such are the Eskimos and their congeners in Greenland, Arctic America, and Northern Siberia; and, in the Southern hemisphere, the Australians, the Papuas, the Fuegians, and, partly, the Bushmen; while within the civilized area, like primitive folk are only found in the Himalayas, the highlands of Australasia, and the plateaus of Brazil. Now it must be borne in mind that the glacial age did not come to an end at once over the whole surface of the earth. It still continues in Greenland. Therefore, at a time when the littoral regions of the Indian Ocean, the Mediterranean, or the Gulf of Mexico already enjoyed a warmer climate, and became the seats of higher civilizations, immense territories in middle Europe, Siberia, and Northern America, as well as in Patagonia, Southern Africa, and Southern Australasia, remained in early postglacial conditions which rendered them inaccessible to the civilized nations of the torrid and sub-torrid zones. They were at that time what the terrible urmans of North-West Siberia are now, and their population, inaccessible to and untouched by civilization, retained the characters of early post-glacial man. Later on, when desiccation rendered these territories more suitable for agriculture, they were peopled with more civilized immigrants; and while part of their previous inhabitants were assimilated by the new settlers, another part migrated further, and settled where we find them. The territories they inhabit now are still, or recently were, sub-glacial, as to their physical features; their arts and implements are those of the neolithic age; and, notwithstanding their racial differences, and the distances which separate them, their modes of life and social institutions bear a striking likeness. So we cannot but consider them as fragments of the early post-glacial population of the now civilized area.

The first thing which strikes us as soon as we begin studying primitive folk is the complexity of the organization of marriage relations under which they are living. With most of them the family, in the sense we attribute to it, is hardly found in its germs. But they are by no means loose aggregations of men and women coming in a disorderly manner together in conformity with their momentary caprices. All of them are under a certain organization, which has been described by Morgan in its general aspects as the “gentile,” or clan organization.[74]

To tell the matter as briefly as possible, there is little doubt that mankind has passed at its beginnings through a stage which may be described as that of “communal marriage”; that is, the whole tribe had husbands and wives in common with but little regard to consanguinity. But it is also certain that some restrictions to that free intercourse were imposed at a very early period. Inter-marriage was soon prohibited between the sons of one mother and her sisters, granddaughters, and aunts. Later on it was prohibited between the sons and daughters of the same mother, and further limitations did not fail to follow. The idea of a gens, or clan, which embodied all presumed descendants from one stock (or rather all those who gathered in one group) was evolved, and marriage within the clan was entirely prohibited. It still remained “communal,” but the wife or the husband had to be taken from another clan. And when a gens became too numerous, and subdivided into several gentes, each of them was divided into classes (usually four), and marriage was permitted only between certain well-defined classes. That is the stage which we find now among the Kamilaroi-speaking Australians. As to the family, its first germs appeared amidst the clan organization. A woman who was captured in war from some other clan, and who formerly would have belonged to the whole gens, could be kept at a later period by the capturer, under certain obligations towards the tribe. She may be taken by him to a separate hut, after she had paid a certain tribute to the clan, and thus constitute within the gens a separate family, the appearance of which evidently was opening a quite new phase of civilization.[75]

Now, if we take into consideration that this complicated organization developed among men who stood at the lowest known degree of development, and that it maintained itself in societies knowing no kind of authority besides the authority of public opinion, we at once see how deeply inrooted social instincts must have been in human nature, even at its lowest stages. A savage who is capable of living under such an organization, and of freely submitting to rules which continually clash with his personal desires, certainly is not a beast devoid of ethical principles and knowing no rein to its passions. But the fact becomes still more striking if we consider the immense antiquity of the clan organization. It is now known that the primitive Semites, the Greeks of Homer, the prehistoric Romans, the Germans of Tacitus, the early Celts and the early Slavonians, all have had their own period of clan organization, closely analogous to that of the Australians, the Red Indians, the Eskimos, and other inhabitants of the “savage girdle.”[76] So we must admit that either the evolution of marriage laws went on on the same lines among all human races, or the rudiments of the clan rules were developed among some common ancestors of the Semites, the Aryans, the Polynesians, etc., before their differentiation into separate races took place, and that these rules were maintained, until now, among races long ago separated from the common stock. Both alternatives imply, however, an equally striking tenacity of the institution — such a tenacity that no assaults of the individual could break it down through the scores of thousands of years that it was in existence. The very persistence of the clan organization shows how utterly false it is to represent primitive mankind as a disorderly agglomeration of individuals, who only obey their individual passions, and take advantage of their personal force and cunningness against all other representatives of the species. Unbridled individualism is a modern growth, but it is not characteristic of primitive mankind.[77]

Going now over to the existing savages, we may begin with the Bushmen, who stand at a very low level of development — so low indeed that they have no dwellings and sleep in holes dug in the soil, occasionally protected by some screens. It is known that when Europeans settled in their territory and destroyed deer, the Bushmen began stealing the settlers’ cattle, whereupon a war of extermination, too horrible to be related here, was waged against them. Five hundred Bushmen were slaughtered in 1774, three thousand in 1808 and 1809 by the Farmers’ Alliance, and so on. They were poisoned like rats, killed by hunters lying in ambush before the carcass of some animal, killed wherever met with.[78] So that our knowledge of the Bushmen, being chiefly borrowed from those same people who exterminated them, is necessarily limited. But still we know that when the Europeans came, the Bushmen lived in small tribes (or clans), sometimes federated together; that they used to hunt in common, and divided the spoil without quarrelling; that they never abandoned their wounded, and displayed strong affection to their comrades. Lichtenstein has a most touching story about a Bushman, nearly drowned in a river, who was rescued by his companions. They took off their furs to cover him, and shivered themselves; they dried him, rubbed him before the fire, and smeared his body with warm grease till they brought him back to life. And when the Bushmen found, in Johan van der Walt, a man who treated them well, they expressed their thankfulness by a most touching attachment to that man.[79] Burchell and Moffat both represent them as goodhearted, disinterested, true to their promises, and grateful,[80] all qualities which could develop only by being practised within the tribe. As to their love to children, it is sufficient to say that when a European wished to secure a Bushman woman as a slave, he stole her child: the mother was sure to come into slavery to share the fate of her child.[81]

The same social manners characterize the Hottentots, who are but a little more developed than the Bushmen. Lubbock describes them as “the filthiest animals,” and filthy they really are. A fur suspended to the neck and worn till it falls to pieces is all their dress; their huts are a few sticks assembled together and covered with mats, with no kind of furniture within. And though they kept oxen and sheep, and seem to have known the use of iron before they made acquaintance with the Europeans, they still occupy one of the lowest degrees of the human scale. And yet those who knew them highly praised their sociability and readiness to aid each other. If anything is given to a Hottentot, he at once divides it among all present — a habit which, as is known, so much struck Darwin among the Fuegians. He cannot eat alone, and, however hungry, he calls those who pass by to share his food. And when Kolben expressed his astonishment thereat, he received the answer. “That is Hottentot manner.” But this is not Hottentot manner only: it is an all but universal habit among the “savages.” Kolben, who knew the Hottentots well and did not pass by their defects in silence, could not praise their tribal morality highly enough.

“Their word is sacred,” he wrote. They know “nothing of the corruptness and faithless arts of Europe.” “They live in great tranquillity and are seldom at war with their neighbours.” They are “all kindness and goodwill to one another.... One of the greatest pleasures of the Hottentots certainly lies in their gifts and good offices to one another.” “The integrity of the Hottentots, their strictness and celerity in the exercise of justice, and their chastity, are things in which they excel all or most nations in the world.”[82]

Tachart, Barrow, and Moodie[83] fully confirm Kolben’s testimony. Let me only remark that when Kolben wrote that “they are certainly the most friendly, the most liberal and the most benevolent people to one another that ever appeared on the earth” (i. 332), he wrote a sentence which has continually appeared since in the description of savages. When first meeting with primitive races, the Europeans usually make a caricature of their life; but when an intelligent man has stayed among them for a longer time, he generally describes them as the “kindest” or “the gentlest” race on the earth. These very same words have been applied to the Ostyaks, the Samoyedes, the Eskimos, the Dayaks, the Aleoutes, the Papuas, and so on, by the highest authorities. I also remember having read them applied to the Tunguses, the Tchuktchis, the Sioux, and several others. The very frequency of that high commendation already speaks volumes in itself.

The natives of Australia do not stand on a higher level of development than their South African brothers. Their huts are of the same character, very often simple screens are the only protection against cold winds. In their food they are most indifferent: they devour horribly putrefied corpses, and cannibalism is resorted to in times of scarcity. When first discovered by Europeans, they had no implements but in stone or bone, and these were of the roughest description. Some tribes had even no canoes, and did not know barter-trade. And yet, when their manners and customs were carefully studied, they proved to be living under that elaborate clan organization which I have mentioned on a preceding page.[84]

The territory they inhabit is usually allotted between the different gentes or clans; but the hunting and fishing territories of each clan are kept in common, and the produce of fishing and hunting belongs to the whole clan; so also the fishing and hunting implements.[85] The meals are taken in common. Like many other savages, they respect certain regulations as to the seasons when certain gums and grasses may be collected.[86] As to their morality altogether, we cannot do better than transcribe the following answers given to the questions of the Paris Anthropological Society by Lumholtz, a missionary who sojourned in North Queensland:[87]

“The feeling of friendship is known among them; it is strong. Weak people are usually supported; sick people are very well attended to; they never are abandoned or killed. These tribes are cannibals, but they very seldom eat members of their own tribe (when immolated on religious principles, I suppose); they eat strangers only. The parents love their children, play with them, and pet them. Infanticide meets with common approval. Old people are very well treated, never put to death. No religion, no idols, only a fear of death. Polygamous marriage, quarrels arising within the tribe are settled by means of duels fought with wooden swords and shields. No slaves; no culture of any kind; no pottery; no dress, save an apron sometimes worn by women. The clan consists of two hundred individuals, divided into four classes of men and four of women; marriage being only permitted within the usual classes, and never within the gens.”

For the Papuas, closely akin to the above, we have the testimony of G.L. Bink, who stayed in New Guinea, chiefly in Geelwink Bay, from 1871 to 1883. Here is the essence of his answers to the same questioner:[88] —

“They are sociable and cheerful; they laugh very much. Rather timid than courageous. Friendship is relatively strong among persons belonging to different tribes, and still stronger within the tribe. A friend will often pay the debt of his friend, the stipulation being that the latter will repay it without interest to the children of the lender. They take care of the ill and the old; old people are never abandoned, and in no case are they killed — unless it be a slave who was ill for a long time. War prisoners are sometimes eaten. The children are very much petted and loved. Old and feeble war prisoners are killed, the others are sold as slaves. They have no religion, no gods, no idols, no authority of any description; the oldest man in the family is the judge. In cases of adultery a fine is paid, and part of it goes to the negoria (the community). The soil is kept in common, but the crop belongs to those who have grown it. They have pottery, and know barter-trade — the custom being that the merchant gives them the goods, whereupon they return to their houses and bring the native goods required by the merchant; if the latter cannot be obtained, the European goods are returned.[89] They are head-hunters, and in so doing they prosecute blood revenge. ‘Sometimes,’ Finsch says, ‘the affair is referred to the Rajah of Namototte, who terminates it by imposing a fine.’”

When well treated, the Papuas are very kind. Miklukho-Maclay landed on the eastern coast of New Guinea, followed by one single man, stayed for two years among tribes reported to be cannibals, and left them with regret; he returned again to stay one year more among them, and never had he any conflict to complain of. True that his rule was never — under no pretext whatever — to say anything which was not truth, nor make any promise which he could not keep. These poor creatures, who even do not know how to obtain fire, and carefully maintain it in their huts, live under their primitive communism, without any chiefs; and within their villages they have no quarrels worth speaking of. They work in common, just enough to get the food of the day; they rear their children in common; and in the evenings they dress themselves as coquettishly as they can, and dance. Like all savages, they are fond of dancing. Each village has its barla, or balai — the “long house,” “longue maison,” or “grande maison” — for the unmarried men, for social gatherings, and for the discussion of common affairs — again a trait which is common to most inhabitants of the Pacific Islands, the Eskimos, the Red Indians, and so on. Whole groups of villages are on friendly terms, and visit each other en bloc.

Unhappily, feuds are not uncommon — not in consequence of “Overstocking of the area,” or “keen competition,” and like inventions of a mercantile century, but chiefly in consequence of superstition. As soon as any one falls ill, his friends and relatives come together, and deliberately discuss who might be the cause of the illness. All possible enemies are considered, every one confesses of his own petty quarrels, and finally the real cause is discovered. An enemy from the next village has called it down, and a raid upon that village is decided upon. Therefore, feuds are rather frequent, even between the coast villages, not to say a word of the cannibal mountaineers who are considered as real witches and enemies, though, on a closer acquaintance, they prove to be exactly the same sort of people as their neighbours on the seacoast.[90]

Many striking pages could be written about the harmony which prevails in the villages of the Polynesian inhabitants of the Pacific Islands. But they belong to a more advanced stage of civilization. So we shall now take our illustrations from the far north. I must mention, however, before leaving the Southern Hemisphere, that even the Fuegians, whose reputation has been so bad, appear under a much better light since they begin to be better known. A few French missionaries who stay among them “know of no act of malevolence to complain of.” In their clans, consisting of from 120 to 150 souls, they practise the same primitive communism as the Papuas; they share everything in common, and treat their old people very well. Peace prevails among these tribes.[91] With the Eskimos and their nearest congeners, the Thlinkets, the Koloshes, and the Aleoutes, we find one of the nearest illustrations of what man may have been during the glacial age. Their implements hardly differ from those of palæolithic man, and some of their tribes do not yet know fishing: they simply spear the fish with a kind of harpoon.[92] They know the use of iron, but they receive it from the Europeans, or find it on wrecked ships. Their social organization is of a very primitive kind, though they already have emerged from the stage of “communal marriage,” even under the gentile restrictions. They live in families, but the family bonds are often broken; husbands and wives are often exchanged.[93] The families, however, remain united in clans, and how could it be otherwise? How could they sustain the hard struggle for life unless by closely combining their forces? So they do, and the tribal bonds are closest where the struggle for life is hardest, namely, in North-East Greenland. The “long house” is their usual dwelling, and several families lodge in it, separated from each other by small partitions of ragged furs, with a common passage in the front. Sometimes the house has the shape of a cross, and in such case a common fire is kept in the centre. The German Expedition which spent a winter close by one of those “long houses” could ascertain that “no quarrel disturbed the peace, no dispute arose about the use of this narrow space” throughout the long winter. “Scolding, or even unkind words, are considered as a misdemeanour, if not produced under the legal form of process, namely, the nith-song.”[94] Close cohabitation and close interdependence are sufficient for maintaining century after century that deep respect for the interests of the community which is characteristic of Eskimo life. Even in the larger communities of Eskimos, “public opinion formed the real judgment-seat, the general punishment consisting in the offenders being shamed in the eyes of the people.”[95]

Eskimo life is based upon communism. What is obtained by hunting and fishing belongs to the clan. But in several tribes, especially in the West, under the influence of the Danes, private property penetrates into their institutions. However, they have an original means for obviating the inconveniences arising from a personal accumulation of wealth which would soon destroy their tribal unity. When a man has grown rich, he convokes the folk of his clan to a great festival, and, after much eating, distributes among them all his fortune. On the Yukon river, Dall saw an Aleonte family distributing in this way ten guns, ten full fur dresses, 200 strings of beads, numerous blankets, ten wolf furs, 200 beavers, and 500 zibelines. After that they took off their festival dresses, gave them away, and, putting on old ragged furs, addressed a few words to their kinsfolk, saying that though they are now poorer than any one of them, they have won their friendship.[96] Like distributions of wealth appear to be a regular habit with the Eskimos, and to take place at a certain season, after an exhibition of all that has been obtained during the year.[97] In my opinion these distributions reveal a very old institution, contemporaneous with the first apparition of personal wealth; they must have been a means for re-establishing equality among the members of the clan, after it had been disturbed by the enrichment of the few. The periodical redistribution of land and the periodical abandonment of all debts which took place in historical times with so many different races (Semites, Aryans, etc.), must have been a survival of that old custom. And the habit of either burying with the dead, or destroying upon his grave, all that belonged to him personally — a habit which we find among all primitive races — must have had the same origin. In fact, while everything that belongs personally to the dead is burnt or broken upon his grave, nothing is destroyed of what belonged to him in common with the tribe, such as boats, or the communal implements of fishing. The destruction bears upon personal property alone. At a later epoch this habit becomes a religious ceremony. It receives a mystical interpretation, and is imposed by religion, when public opinion alone proves incapable of enforcing its general observance. And, finally, it is substituted by either burning simple models of the dead man’s property (as in China), or by simply carrying his property to the grave and taking it back to his house after the burial ceremony is over — a habit which still prevails with the Europeans as regards swords, crosses, and other marks of public distinction.[98]

The high standard of the tribal morality of the Eskimos has often been mentioned in general literature. Nevertheless the following remarks upon the manners of the Aleoutes — nearly akin to the Eskimos — will better illustrate savage morality as a whole. They were written, after a ten years’ stay among the Aleoutes, by a most remarkable man — the Russian missionary, Veniaminoff. I sum them up, mostly in his own words: —

Endurability (he wrote) is their chief feature. It is simply colossal. Not only do they bathe every morning in the frozen sea, and stand naked on the beach, inhaling the icy wind, but their endurability, even when at hard work on insufficient food, surpasses all that can be imagined. During a protracted scarcity of food, the Aleoute cares first for his children; he gives them all he has, and himself fasts. They are not inclined to stealing; that was remarked even by the first Russian immigrants. Not that they never steal; every Aleoute would confess having sometime stolen something, but it is always a trifle; the whole is so childish. The attachment of the parents to their children is touching, though it is never expressed in words or pettings. The Aleoute is with difficulty moved to make a promise, but once he has made it he will keep it whatever may happen. (An Aleoute made Veniaminoff a gift of dried fish, but it was forgotten on the beach in the hurry of the departure. He took it home. The next occasion to send it to the missionary was in January; and in November and December there was a great scarcity of food in the Aleoute encampment. But the fish was never touched by the starving people, and in January it was sent to its destination.) Their code of morality is both varied and severe. It is considered shameful to be afraid of unavoidable death; to ask pardon from an enemy; to die without ever having killed an enemy; to be convicted of stealing; to capsize a boat in the harbour; to be afraid of going to sea in stormy weather, to be the first in a party on a long journey to become an invalid in case of scarcity of food; to show greediness when spoil is divided, in which case every one gives his own part to the greedy man to shame him; to divulge a public secret to his wife; being two persons on a hunting expedition, not to offer the best game to the partner; to boast of his own deeds, especially of invented ones; to scold any one in scorn. Also to beg; to pet his wife in other people’s presence, and to dance with her; to bargain personally: selling must always be made through a third person, who settles the price. For a woman it is a shame not to know sewing, dancing and all kinds of woman’s work; to pet her husband and children, or even to speak to her husband in the presence of a stranger.[99]

Such is Aleoute morality, which might also be further illustrated by their tales and legends. Let me also add that when Veniaminoff wrote (in 1840) one murder only had been committed since the last century in a population of 60,000 people, and that among 1,800 Aleoutes not one single common law offence had been known for forty years. This will not seem strange if we remark that scolding, scorning, and the use of rough words are absolutely unknown in Aleoute life. Even their children never fight, and never abuse each other in words. All they may say is, “Your mother does not know sewing,” or “Your father is blind of one eye.”[100]

Many features of savage life remain, however, a puzzle to Europeans. The high development of tribal solidarity and the good feelings with which primitive folk are animated towards each other, could be illustrated by any amount of reliable testimony. And yet it is not the less certain that those same savages practise infanticide; that in some cases they abandon their old people, and that they blindly obey the rules of blood-revenge. We must then explain the coexistence of facts which, to the European mind, seem so contradictory at the first sight. I have just mentioned how the Aleoute father starves for days and weeks, and gives everything eatable to his child; and how the Bushman mother becomes a slave to follow her child; and I might fill pages with illustrations of the really tender relations existing among the savages and their children. Travellers continually mention them incidentally. Here you read about the fond love of a mother; there you see a father wildly running through the forest and carrying upon his shoulders his child bitten by a snake; or a missionary tells you the despair of the parents at the loss of a child whom he had saved, a few years before, from being immolated at its birth. You learn that the “savage” mothers usually nurse their children till the age of four, and that, in the New Hebrides, on the loss of a specially beloved child, its mother, or aunt, will kill herself to take care of it in the other world.[101] And so on.

Like facts are met with by the score; so that, when we see that these same loving parents practise infanticide, we are bound to recognize that the habit (whatever its ulterior transformations may be) took its origin under the sheer pressure of necessity, as an obligation towards the tribe, and a means for rearing the already growing children. The savages, as a rule, do not “multiply without stint,” as some English writers put it. On the contrary, they take all kinds of measures for diminishing the birth-rate. A whole series of restrictions, which Europeans certainly would find extravagant, are imposed to that effect, and they are strictly obeyed. But notwithstanding that, primitive folk cannot rear all their children. However, it has been remarked that as soon as they succeed in increasing their regular means of subsistence, they at once begin to abandon the practice of infanticide. On the whole, the parents obey that obligation reluctantly, and as soon as they can afford it they resort to all kinds of compromises to save the lives of their new-born. As has been so well pointed out by my friend Elie Reclus,[102] they invent the lucky and unlucky days of births, and spare the children born on the lucky days; they try to postpone the sentence for a few hours, and then say that if the baby has lived one day it must live all its natural life.[103] They hear the cries of the little ones coming from the forest, and maintain that, if heard, they forbode a misfortune for the tribe; and as they have no baby-farming nor crèches for getting rid of the children, every one of them recoils before the necessity of performing the cruel sentence; they prefer to expose the baby in the wood rather than to take its life by violence. Ignorance, not cruelty, maintains infanticide; and, instead of moralizing the savages with sermons, the missionaries would do better to follow the example of Veniaminoff, who, every year till his old age, crossed the sea of Okhotsk in a miserable boat, or travelled on dogs among his Tchuktchis, supplying them with bread and fishing implements. He thus had really stopped infanticide.

The same is true as regards what superficial observers describe as parricide. We just now saw that the habit of abandoning old people is not so widely spread as some writers have maintained it to be. It has been extremely exaggerated, but it is occasionally met with among nearly all savages; and in such cases it has the same origin as the exposure of children. When a “savage” feels that he is a burden to his tribe; when every morning his share of food is taken from the mouths of the children — and the little ones are not so stoical as their fathers: they cry when they are hungry; when every day he has to be carried across the stony beach, or the virgin forest, on the shoulders of younger people — there are no invalid carriages, nor destitutes to wheel them in savage lands — he begins to repeat what the old Russian peasants say until now-a-day. “Tchujoi vek zayedayu, Pora na pokoi!” (“I live other people’s life: it is time to retire!”) And he retires. He does what the soldier does in a similar case. When the salvation of his detachment depends upon its further advance, and he can move no more, and knows that he must die if left behind, the soldier implores his best friend to render him the last service before leaving the encampment. And the friend, with shivering hands, discharges his gun into the dying body. So the savages do. The old man asks himself to die; he himself insists upon this last duty towards the community, and obtains the consent of the tribe; he digs out his grave; he invites his kinsfolk to the last parting meal. His father has done so, it is now his turn; and he parts with his kinsfolk with marks of affection. The savage so much considers death as part of his duties towards his community, that he not only refuses to be rescued (as Moffat has told), but when a woman who had to be immolated on her husband’s grave was rescued by missionaries, and was taken to an island, she escaped in the night, crossed a broad sea-arm, swimming and rejoined her tribe, to die on the grave.[104] It has become with them a matter of religion. But the savages, as a rule, are so reluctant to take any one’s life otherwise than in fight, that none of them will take upon himself to shed human blood, and they resort to all kinds of stratagems, which have been so falsely interpreted. In most cases, they abandon the old man in the wood, after having given him more than his share of the common food. Arctic expeditions have done the same when they no more could carry their invalid comrades. “Live a few days more! May be there will be some unexpected rescue!”

West European men of science, when coming across these facts, are absolutely unable to stand them; they can not reconcile them with a high development of tribal morality, and they prefer to cast a doubt upon the exactitude of absolutely reliable observers, instead of trying to explain the parallel existence of the two sets of facts: a high tribal morality together with the abandonment of the parents and infanticide. But if these same Europeans were to tell a savage that people, extremely amiable, fond of their own children, and so impressionable that they cry when they see a misfortune simulated on the stage, are living in Europe within a stone’s throw from dens in which children die from sheer want of food, the savage, too, would not understand them. I remember how vainly I tried to make some of my Tungus friends understand our civilization of individualism: they could not, and they resorted to the most fantastical suggestions. The fact is that a savage, brought up in ideas of a tribal solidarity in everything for bad and for good, is as incapable of understanding a “moral” European, who knows nothing of that solidarity, as the average European is incapable of understanding the savage. But if our scientist had lived amidst a half-starving tribe which does not possess among them all one man’s food for so much as a few days to come, he probably might have understood their motives. So also the savage, if he had stayed among us, and received our education, may be, would understand our European indifference towards our neighbours, and our Royal Commissions for the prevention of “babyfarming.” “Stone houses make stony hearts,” the Russian peasants say. But he ought to live in a stone house first.

Similar remarks must be made as regards cannibalism. Taking into account all the facts which were brought to light during a recent controversy on this subject at the Paris Anthropological Society, and many incidental remarks scattered throughout the “savage” literature, we are bound to recognize that that practice was brought into existence by sheer necessity; but that it was further developed by superstition and religion into the proportions it attained in Fiji or in Mexico. It is a fact that until this day many savages are compelled to devour corpses in the most advanced state of putrefaction, and that in cases of absolute scarcity some of them have had to disinter and to feed upon human corpses, even during an epidemic. These are ascertained facts. But if we now transport ourselves to the conditions which man had to face during the glacial period, in a damp and cold climate, with but little vegetable food at his disposal; if we take into account the terrible ravages which scurvy still makes among underfed natives, and remember that meat and fresh blood are the only restoratives which they know, we must admit that man, who formerly was a granivorous animal, became a flesh-eater during the glacial period. He found plenty of deer at that time, but deer often migrate in the Arctic regions, and sometimes they entirely abandon a territory for a number of years. In such cases his last resources disappeared. During like hard trials, cannibalism has been resorted to even by Europeans, and it was resorted to by the savages. Until the present time, they occasionally devour the corpses of their own dead: they must have devoured then the corpses of those who had to die. Old people died, convinced that by their death they were rendering a last service to the tribe. This is why cannibalism is represented by some savages as of divine origin, as something that has been ordered by a messenger from the sky. But later on it lost its character of necessity, and survived as a superstition. Enemies had to be eaten in order to inherit their courage; and, at a still later epoch, the enemy’s eye or heart was eaten for the same purpose; while among other tribes, already having a numerous priesthood and a developed mythology, evil gods, thirsty for human blood, were invented, and human sacrifices required by the priests to appease the gods. In this religious phase of its existence, cannibalism attained its most revolting characters. Mexico is a well-known example; and in Fiji, where the king could eat any one of his subjects, we also find a mighty cast of priests, a complicated theology,[105] and a full development of autocracy. Originated by necessity, cannibalism became, at a later period, a religious institution, and in this form it survived long after it had disappeared from among tribes which certainly practised it in former times, but did not attain the theocratical stage of evolution. The same remark must be made as regards infanticide and the abandonment of parents. In some cases they also have been maintained as a survival of olden times, as a religiously-kept tradition of the past.

I will terminate my remarks by mentioning another custom which also is a source of most erroneous conclusions. I mean the practice of blood-revenge. All savages are under the impression that blood shed must be revenged by blood. If any one has been killed, the murderer must die; if any one has been wounded, the aggressor’s blood must be shed. There is no exception to the rule, not even for animals; so the hunter’s blood is shed on his return to the village when he has shed the blood of an animal. That is the savages’ conception of justice — a conception which yet prevails in Western Europe as regards murder. Now, when both the offender and the offended belong to the same tribe, the tribe and the offended person settle the affair.[106] But when the offender belongs to another tribe, and that tribe, for one reason or another, refuses a compensation, then the offended tribe decides to take the revenge itself. Primitive folk so much consider every one’s acts as a tribal affair, dependent upon tribal approval, that they easily think the clan responsible for every one’s acts. Therefore, the due revenge may be taken upon any member of the offender’s clan or relatives.[107] It may often happen, however, that the retaliation goes further than the offence. In trying to inflict a wound, they may kill the offender, or wound him more than they intended to do, and this becomes a cause for a new feud, so that the primitive legislators were careful in requiring the retaliation to be limited to an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, and blood for blood.[108]

It is remarkable, however, that with most primitive folk like feuds are infinitely rarer than might be expected; though with some of them they may attain abnormal proportions, especially with mountaineers who have been driven to the highlands by foreign invaders, such as the mountaineers of Caucasia, and especially those of Borneo — the Dayaks. With the Dayaks — we were told lately — the feuds had gone so far that a young man could neither marry nor be proclaimed of age before he had secured the head of an enemy. This horrid practice was fully described in a modern English work.[109] It appears, however, that this affirmation was a gross exaggeration. Moreover, Dayak “head-hunting” takes quite another aspect when we learn that the supposed “headhunter” is not actuated at all by personal passion. He acts under what he considers as a moral obligation towards his tribe, just as the European judge who, in obedience to the same, evidently wrong, principle of “blood for blood,” hands over the condemned murderer to the hangman. Both the Dayak and the judge would even feel remorse if sympathy moved them to spare the murderer. That is why the Dayaks, apart from the murders they commit when actuated by their conception of justice, are depicted, by all those who know them, as a most sympathetic people. Thus Carl Bock, the same author who has given such a terrible picture of head-hunting, writes:

“As regards morality, I am bound to assign to the Dayaks a high place in the scale of civilization.... Robberies and theft are entirely unknown among them. They also are very truthful.... If I did not always get the ‘whole truth,’ I always got, at least, nothing but the truth from them. I wish I could say the same of the Malays” (pp. 209 and 210).

Bock’s testimony is fully corroborated by that of Ida Pfeiffer. “I fully recognized,” she wrote, “that I should be pleased longer to travel among them. I usually found them honest, good, and reserved... much more so than any other nation I know.”[110] Stoltze used almost the same language when speaking of them. The Dayaks usually have but one wife, and treat her well. They are very sociable, and every morning the whole clan goes out for fishing, hunting, or gardening, in large parties. Their villages consist of big huts, each of which is inhabited by a dozen families, and sometimes by several hundred persons, peacefully living together. They show great respect for their wives, and are fond of their children; and when one of them falls ill, the women nurse him in turn. As a rule they are very moderate in eating and drinking. Such is the Dayak in his real daily life.

It would be a tedious repetition if more illustrations from savage life were given. Wherever we go we find the same sociable manners, the same spirit of solidarity. And when we endeavour to penetrate into the darkness of past ages, we find the same tribal life, the same associations of men, however primitive, for mutual support. Therefore, Darwin was quite right when he saw in man’s social qualities the chief factor for his further evolution, and Darwin’s vulgarizers are entirely wrong when they maintain the contrary.

The small strength and speed of man (he wrote), his want of natural weapons, etc., are more than counterbalanced, firstly, by his intellectual faculties (which, he remarked on another page, have been chiefly or even exclusively gained for the benefit of the community), and secondly, by his social qualities, which led him to give and receive aid from his fellow men.[111]

In the last century the “savage” and his “life in the state of nature” were idealized. But now men of science have gone to the opposite extreme, especially since some of them, anxious to prove the animal origin of man, but not conversant with the social aspects of animal life, began to charge the savage with all imaginable “bestial” features. It is evident, however, that this exaggeration is even more unscientific than Rousseau’s idealization. The savage is not an ideal of virtue, nor is he an ideal of “savagery.” But the primitive man has one quality, elaborated and maintained by the very necessities of his hard struggle for life — he identifies his own existence with that of his tribe; and without that quality mankind never would have attained the level it has attained now.

Primitive folk, as has been already said, so much identify their lives with that of the tribe, that each of their acts, however insignificant, is considered as a tribal affair. Their whole behaviour is regulated by an infinite series of unwritten rules of propriety which are the fruit of their common experience as to what is good or bad — that is, beneficial or harmful for their own tribe. Of course, the reasonings upon which their rules of propriety are based sometimes are absurd in the extreme. Many of them originate in superstition; and altogether, in whatever the savage does, he sees but the immediate consequences of his acts; he cannot foresee their indirect and ulterior consequences — thus simply exaggerating a defect with which Bentham reproached civilized legislators. But, absurd or not, the savage obeys the prescriptions of the common law, however inconvenient they may be. He obeys them even more blindly than the civilized man obeys the prescriptions of the written law. His common law is his religion; it is his very habit of living. The idea of the clan is always present to his mind, and self-restriction and self-sacrifice in the interest of the clan are of daily occurrence. If the savage has infringed one of the smaller tribal rules, he is prosecuted by the mockeries of the women. If the infringement is grave, he is tortured day and night by the fear of having called a calamity upon his tribe. If he has wounded by accident any one of his own clan, and thus has committed the greatest of all crimes, he grows quite miserable: he runs away in the woods, and is ready to commit suicide, unless the tribe absolves him by inflicting upon him a physical pain and sheds some of his own blood.[112] Within the tribe everything is shared in common; every morsel of food is divided among all present; and if the savage is alone in the woods, he does not begin eating before he has loudly shouted thrice an invitation to any one who may hear his voice to share his meal.[113]

In short, within the tribe the rule of “each for all” is supreme, so long as the separate family has not yet broken up the tribal unity. But that rule is not extended to the neighbouring clans, or tribes, even when they are federated for mutual protection. Each tribe, or clan, is a separate unity. Just as among mammals and birds, the territory is roughly allotted among separate tribes, and, except in times of war, the boundaries are respected. On entering the territory of his neighbours one must show that he has no bad intentions. The louder one heralds his coming, the more confidence he wins; and if he enters a house, he must deposit his hatchet at the entrance. But no tribe is bound to share its food with the others: it may do so or it may not. Therefore the life of the savage is divided into two sets of actions, and appears under two different ethical aspects: the relations within the tribe, and the relations with the outsiders; and (like our international law) the “inter-tribal” law widely differs from the common law. Therefore, when it comes to a war the most revolting cruelties may be considered as so many claims upon the admiration of the tribe. This double conception of morality passes through the whole evolution of mankind, and maintains itself until now. We Europeans have realized some progress — not immense, at any rate — in eradicating that double conception of ethics; but it also must be said that while we have in some measure extended our ideas of solidarity — in theory, at least — over the nation, and partly over other nations as well, we have lessened the bonds of solidarity within our own nations, and even within our own families.

The appearance of a separate family amidst the clan necessarily disturbs the established unity. A separate family means separate property and accumulation of wealth. We saw how the Eskimos obviate its inconveniences; and it is one of the most interesting studies to follow in the course of ages the different institutions (village communities, guilds, and so on) by means of which the masses endeavoured to maintain the tribal unity, notwithstanding the agencies which were at work to break it down. On the other hand, the first rudiments of knowledge which appeared at an extremely remote epoch, when they confounded themselves with witchcraft, also became a power in the hands of the individual which could be used against the tribe. They were carefully kept in secrecy, and transmitted to the initiated only, in the secret societies of witches, shamans, and priests, which we find among all savages. By the same time, wars and invasions created military authority, as also castes of warriors, whose associations or clubs acquired great powers. However, at no period of man’s life were wars the normal state of existence. While warriors exterminated each other, and the priests celebrated their massacres, the masses continued to live their daily life, they prosecuted their daily toil. And it is one of the most interesting studies to follow that life of the masses; to study the means by which they maintained their own social organization, which was based upon their own conceptions of equity, mutual aid, and mutual support — of common law, in a word, even when they were submitted to the most ferocious theocracy or autocracy in the State.

[jackcinephile]

LO Fans: "I love Lore Olympus because it deals with serious themes, like sexual assault, abuse, gaslighting, trauma, and mental health issues!"

Me, who spent my life discovering and obsessing over masterpieces like this:

"You're gonna have to try a lot harder than that to impress me."

Yeah, I never understood that kind of praise. For one thing, people act like LO is groundbreaking for that reason, despite there being countless movies, books, tv shows, comics, and video games that also deal with the same themes. That isn't to say there can't be more stories like this, however. I, for one, am begging for another video game that comes close to the emotional resonance of Silent Hill 2, or for a faithful adaptation of Dracula and/or Phantom of the Opera, or for a horror movie as unsettling as The Howling! But to say any new story that deals with these themes is unique for doing so, is just simply not true. Lore Olympus is no more unique than any of these stories. Also, I don't understand the praise that Lore Olympus is great just by virtue of having these themes in the first place. Just because a story has serious themes, doesn't automatically make it good. Far too often does LO use its themes as a crutch for a plot that is standard issue among romances, as opposed to stories like The Howling, which has a very intriguing, outlandish plot that serves as a catalyst to explore themes of very real and relatable horror. Lore Olympus, without its intense themes, is just another story about the CEO falling in love with his intern. And don't get me wrong, I LOVE those kinds of stories, but Lore Olympus just doesn't really do it for me. And the poorly executed themes just hamper it even further for me.

If it wasn't already apparent, has anyone noticed a pattern between these titles? All but one are horror stories. In my opinion, that is one of the key differences between them and LO: Horror! The themes within, are ones that illicit terror, and the stories reflect that (even Phantom of the Opera--don't listen to anyone who says it's a romance). Starting with Dracula, one of the scenes that horrified me the most in the book was the one where Count Dracula sneaks into Mina's bedroom. The book describes him slitting open his own vein and forcing her to drink his blood. Mina then expresses feelings of violation, much akin to what rape survivors feel. It doesn't pull any punches in its shocking, horrific portrayal, but it never comes off as exploitative. That's because the best horror stories rely on the audience's empathy. In this case, nobody wants to feel violated, so we feel as horrified as the characters do when we read about this grotesque event. And because it is about illiciting fear through empathy, Dracula succeeds where Lore Olympus fails. Lore Olympus, before all else, is a romance. And rape should not be in a romantic story. Especially not when the narrative of LO uses this trauma to validate the relationship between the two leads. I'm not a fan of stories that use trauma to validate a relationship between romantic interests, and I think that partly stems from reading the Phantom of the Opera.

If you ask me, Phantom of the Opera is one if the best books to discuss abuse and gaslighting ever written! Despite misconceptions generated by the popularity of the musical, PotO is very much a horror story with hardly any romance at all. And it's one of the best examples about why using trauma to validate a romance is a very bad idea! You see, all the conflict of the story begins with The Phantom and his trauma. He was born with multiple physical deformities that cause him to look like a living corpse. Because of this, he is despised and rejected by the world in order to escape the hatred of the world, he commissions the construction of the Paris Opera House, complete with intricate catacombs where he can live out the rest of his miserable days. Then one day, a woman named Christine comes to work at the Opera as a chorus girl. She is sad and alone due to her being orphaned, without a friend in the world. She too is emotionally damaged and the Phantom thinks this means she'll understand him. The trouble begins instantly when he claims to be a character from a folktale that Christine's father used to tell her. This is when the manipulation and gaslighting begins. Part of what makes this so effective is how we see it from an outside perspective. The protagonist, Raoul, is in love with Christine and we get to see his confusion and growing concern when he starts realizing Christine is showing signs of an abusive relationship. What makes the relationship even worse is the fact that Christine actually does understand The Phantom. So she doesn't run away not only out of fear, but also compassion. She knows what it's like to feel isolated and dead to the world and The Phantom uses that against her. The more I describe this, the more parallels I begin to see to Hades' and Minthe's relationship. Yes, Minthe abused Hades in much of the same way as The Phantom abused Christine. Notice how Minthe keeps convincing Hades that they're the only people who understand each other, even going so far as to say, "We're the same." The funny thing is, that's exactly what the narrative uses to validate Hades' and Persephone's relationship! It tries to establish that Hades and Persephone relate to each other and they say, several times, "We're the same," to each other. But this is exactly how Hades got stuck in a toxic relationship with Minthe, so why is it suddenly okay now? Relationships that use shared trauma to validate themselves are almost always doomed to become toxic, in one way or another.

So what about the healthy relationship in Phantom of the Opera? Well, it's kinda interesting actually. You see, Christine eventually comes to realize that she needs help, so she turns to the protagonist, Raoul, to get her away from the Phantom. Raoul has an interesting character arc because he starts the novel being pretty immature and kinda selfish. He doesn't really take Christine's feelings into consideration. It's more like a boy chasing his childhood crush (actually that's exactly what happens). However, over the course of the story, as he becomes increasingly concerned with her well-being, he learns to care more about her feelings and her needs. This culminates in the climax, when he's willing to crawl through hell itself for her sake. I bring all this up because I wanted to compare Raoul with Hades as well. Hades is a very consistent character. He doesn't need an arc like Raoul because, from the very beginning, he's willing to put all of Persephone's needs before his, to a fault! That is his entire purpose within the narrative of LO. He exists to serve Persephone. Raoul didn't exist to serve Christine. He had his own journey of growing and maturing. And Christine didn't exist to serve Raoul either. It bothers me that a novel from 1910 has a more well-rounded relationship than a modern comic! Actually, now that I think about it, isn't Persephone's entire character arc supposed to be her learning that she shouldn't exist to serve others? Well, that totally contradicts Hades' role in the story, doesn't it? He exists to serve her! I guess, in the eyes of LO, it's only okay if men serve women, but not for women to serve men. Newsflash: neither is okay.

Now Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1931) remains, to this day, one of the most terrifying movies I've ever seen! That's all thanks to its brutal depictions of domestic abuse. So Dr. Henry Jekyll believes the solution to enlightening the human race is to separate the good and evil in our souls. He solves this problem by creating a drug to do just that, which transforms him into Edward Hyde, but he becomes addicted and starts terrorizing a woman who was once a former patient of his. I think what makes this so effective, when compared to LO, is one simple factor: Fear. I am terrified of Edward Hyde, but whenever Apollo shows up, I'm just annoyed. That's because Hyde isn't being used to sell an agenda, while Apoll is. Apollo is all about making a statement about toxic masculinity, which always bothered me from the very beginning! Being an abusive cunt who rapes women has nothing to do with masculinity! It doesn't matter if you're masculine or feminine, anyone can be a cunting abusive rapist. If you are a rapist, it's because you're a monster who lacks empathy, not because of masculinity. And if you think masculinity has something to do with a lack of empathy, fuck off! Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde is not about toxic masculinity. It's about how drug addiction can often hurt other people around us just as much, if not moreso, than ourselves. It also doesn't use rape to validate a relationship between characters. I'm sorry, but that is just the laziest storytelling technique. When the antagonist is a rapist OF COURSE the male love interest is going to look better by comparison! But when you take Apollo out of the equation, Hades stops looking like a desirable love interest real fucking quick.

So yeah, I think Hades makes for a bad love interest. That's mostly because he's so much like Shinji Ikari from Neon Genesis Evangelion. Yeah, the one title from the list above that's not a horror, but is no less relevant. The thing is, both Hades and Shinji have a lot in common, such as hating themselves, having a bad relationship with their father, and not caring at all about their own wants and needs. Oh, also Asuka's a better written character than Minthe, but that's a whole other topic. What makes Evangelion work, in my opinion, is that Shinji's whole journey is about learning to love himself, while Hades is portrayed as being perfect the way he is. Hades in LO is like a flawless beacon of virtue, solely because he worships the ground Persephone walks on. But the guy just doesn't care about himself at all! Like I said earlier, Hades guilty of the same self-destructive behaviors as Persephone but he's praised for it, while Persephone is encouraged to look after herself more often. Compare this to Shinji, whose life only gets worse the more he neglects himself. The only time Hades does something beneficial for himself is when he breaks up with Minthe, but immediately after that, he starts devoting every ounce of energy to Persephone! All that matters is her! He doesn't give a single fuck about himself. Sorry, but that's not good qualities in a male love interest. In all fairness, this is a problem with the romance genre as a whole. Most romances give priority to the protagonist (in this case Persephone) while neglecting the love interest (Hades). It's why I have a serious problem with the entire genre.

Now what could Silent Hill 2 have that is in any way relevant to Lore Olympus? Two words: Nightmare Fuel. Personifying trauma as literal demons is one of the smartest ideas anyone's ever had, because speaking from personal experience, that's how it feels. I just don't feel like the trauma experienced by the characters in LO is a waking nightmare like it is in real life. For one, the characters' trauma only pops up when it's convenient for the plot. Like whenever Persephone starts experiencing ptsd, it happens when she's with Hades so we can get a scene with Hades cuddling her. After that, it shows up in a scene to make her look badass by confronting Apollo. No, just no. The Howling did it better too, by making the protagonist's trauma such an inconvenience in her life! I never felt that way in LO. When you uss traumatic encounters to make your character look like a badass, kindly fuck off.

[parpatarts]

Been thinking about Naomi Novik's A Deadly Education via @sortinghatchats. Please enjoy my word vomit.

Orion is such a Lion Lion. At first I thought he might be a Badger primary, because he's very about the inherent value of a human life, and has a lack of curiosity about the potential humanity of the mals he so easily kills. But then I realized Orion doesn't really get that value for human life from his community, who are much choosier about who they choose to value. In fact, Orion feels very separate from his community and is more or less okay with that. He feels isolated because nobody sees the ‘real him’ (internal primary), not because he lacks a community in general. Thus, Lion primary. And then, the charging ahead? His Lion secondary is a no brainer.

Miss Galadriel Higgins is who really fascinates me. El's got a tidy little Bird secondary, which loves to scream at Orion's Lion secondary. "What do you mean you took a shower alone? Why didn't you have someone watch your back? WHERE IS YOUR SYSTEM???" She’s very systematic in the way she goes about her school life, which speaks to how consistently she’s taking in and classifying information to make use of later. But El’s primary is a little more difficult - at least, for her.

El wants to be a Snake primary and truly believes that that's the best way to negotiate the world and her survival in it. And over and over, the book delights in making her choose, will El take an opportunity to further her own goals and those of the people she cares about? Or is she going to do what's right, with no benefit to herself or her circle? El picks the latter, every time, and kicks herself for it. El’s Snake model is so strong because she fully believes she's doing the wrong thing and making the wrong choices with her Lion primary. That's probably why Orion rubs her so wrong at first - he wears his Lion proudly, whereas El hides hers because she knows how costly it can be.

I don’t know that El is a burnt Lion, exactly. She didn’t make a bad decision from her gut that made her question her own instincts, and she doesn’t begrudgingly use a Snake model while longing to be able to trust herself. Instead, she wholeheartedly wishes that she wasn't an idealist while fully committing, without compromise, to upholding her ideals.

The closest thing to a burning El had was that terrible experience when she was a child and her mom was sick. El expected help from others because that's what was right, and when it didn't come it really shook her faith that "right" was something that existed, or at least something she got to be a part of. That’s not what I usually see held up as an example of burning though, so I’m not sure it applies. Maybe a better term would be that she has an immature primary. She uses it, but she wishes she was more like the people she sees succeeding. Over time, perhaps she’ll learn to love her outstanding idealism, the way her friends do.

An overall theme of this first book was very much “Someone with a Snake model so strong they tricked themselves into thinking it was their actual primary discovers their own Lion primary, to their horror.” And I love that.

[margotverger]

top 5 best hannibal takes and worst hannibal takes. go

okay i’m going to do this generally on what other people’s takes (that i’ve seen or read somewhere) are because none of my hannibal takes are bad. 

top 5 best:

that margot should have been butch in the tv show and that the margot/alana romance could have been developed a little more, i’ll elaborate more on the butch angle in top 5 worst, but i think while i enjoy marlana in s3 (who doesn’t) i do think that there could have been a Little More to it, especially since there was admittedly a lot of gratuitous metaphorical work on a visual or verbal level in early s3 that didn’t... really do much after the first few, and that i think bryan fuller definitely got a bit self-indulgent. while i love s3 i think it was weaker because it got quite ensnared in feeling like it had to explain everyone’s individual recovery (not a bad thing necessarily and the looping narrative definitely had this feeling of “time has been changed, mutilated, adjusted after mizumono”, but on a narrative level it could have probably still been achieved but left more room for things to. Happen) and i think that some of the excess could have been trimmed to allow for more margot-alana development beyond simply talking about taking revenge, i would have loved to see some genuine conversation that only affected both of them that made us realise just why alana would raise the child with her, why they would get marriedーalana having very little dating life and presumably trauma around relationships since her immediate ex tried to murder her and is also a serial killer, and margot having been traumatised repeatedly due to being a lesbian in a very homophobic family, they deserved some space in order to explore why exactly they mean a lot to each other. even a singular scene that didn’t depend on taking vengeance on the men who hurt them would have given us enough i think. 

lara jean chorostecki’s hot take (implied) that freddie would have a wife. groundbreaking. love that. regardless of bryan fuller i am assuming with full confidence that freddie lounds has a wife after the timeskip

autistic will graham. enough said. hugh dancy’s only stupid thing was saying will isn’t autistic. that was a sin. will graham is autistic

lesbian abigail hobbs. lesbian abigail hobbs!

the hot take that hannibal doesn’t do its women characters justice, this isn’t just about deaths (i do agree that for the gothic horror narrative characters are doomed to some extent, and i don’t overly grieve over deaths that came too early, so i’m not too fussed) but on a writing level, bryan fuller definitely tries to portray himself as a very woman-positive author who introduces feminine energy - and he does! but at the same time there is a lack in developing relationships between women, and for a story to truly give space to be a genuinely woman-positive story there needs to be strong relationships between women that don’t depend on men; obviously since hannibal’s presence is insidious and infects everything, as is his luciferian ways, and will’s often the binding agent, this can’t be entirely avoided but regardless of hannibal they can exist, on some small level, individually. we saw that a lot in s1! between abigail and freddie and alana and abigail mostly, plus there was a small glimpse at it in season 3 with bedelia and chiyoh (underrated imo i would love to see further into why bedelia has her views of chiyoh and what that means ... i hope they interact again if hannibal s4 comes to pass!). so it proves there is room for it. it doesn’t need to be every episode or even have a huge arc but seeing hannibal pass the bechdel test more than like. twice a season would be nice!

top 5 worst takes:

that bedannibal is more romantic than hannigram (lol)... i love bedelia and bedannibal a lot but that’s just. hm. incorrect

that hannibal has never loved anybody except will. i’ve wrote about this before but i think that’s a deliberate misunderstanding of the character hannibal. what is unique about hannibal and will’s relationship is not the presence of love but the presence of being changed by that love; transformation is at its core, the openness to being adjusted or altered... recognition, seeing, understanding, and that allowing compassion not only for the other (in hannibal’s case) but for the self (in will’s case). hannibal loves a lot, but his love is not separate from crueltyーi think this is where people misunderstand. just because he is willing to hurt or harm people isn’t, in the narrative (not in real life), because he doesn’t love them. his cruelty is because he loves people enough he wants to bring them to the height of their being, in extremis. he loved alana, which is why he showed her a chance at mercy. he loved bedelia. he loved jack. he loved abigail! he loved bella especially, and he genuinely mourned. these went beyond fascinations; these were genuine expressions of affection, love, whether they be platonic or romantic or familial. hannibal’s flaw is not that he is incapable of love. and personally i think to disrespect his relationships with other characters (who are all women, black or both lol) in order to further isolate the white m/m relationship is... not ideal. not a sign that someone is wholly prejudiced but i think it’s something we should be critical about, especially when hannibal through word of god is confirmed to love other people. 

bryan fuller’s own take that margot being femme is somehow less prejudiced or problematic than if she was butch. i haven’t read the book yet but i already know that margot’s portrayal as a butch lesbian was problematic but thomas harris is . undoubtedly prejudiced in many ways and that’s a fault of him, not a fault of the existence of being butchーbeing butch isn’t just a “stereotype” it’s a genuine mode of existence, it’s an intricate relationship with gender, sexuality and love, and butchness deserves to be represented as something beautiful, desirable and complex... instead of just deciding she should be conventionally feminine because that’s somehow more progressive. but then again he also made her have sex with a man so you know. lol

ANY take that involves over-analysing who is a top or who is a bottom and then rendering the characters into homophobic/fetishistic stereotypes. it’s ugly! it’s weird! keep that shit away from me. also any take involving “dark!will”. again that just does the character of will disrespect lol. the whole point of will is that he is morally complex and perhaps beyond the human scopeーhe is not just an echo of hannibal... i’ve seen one too many fics where will just becomes a savage brutal unfeeling murderer who only cares about hannibal after s3. like please watch the show

that hannibal is a narcissist/sociopath... or any other ableist interpretations. not every villain is a narcissistic (a genuine disorder) sociopath (just another word associated with npd etc) just because they do bad things. they’re very real disorders that people deal with and are infinitely more complex than just a character having a god complex and killing people. the whole point about hannibal is that he exceeds what is considered neurodivergent and while i don’t mind if people with similar disorders relate to him (much like how i relate to will’s autistic traits) i think a lot of bad comes from people throwing the label sociopath around because it becomes dehumanising and leads to further stigma against truly vulnerable people. 

basically any trope that just does a character a disservice or neglects the actual story in further of fetishistic thinking, prejudiced thinking, ableist thinking... will graham can be autistic because of his empathy (i’ve seen it implied that he can’t be because of it when, as a very empathetic autistic person, hyper-empathy is a very common if not universal symptom, it just appears differently) and hannibal is not a sociopath just because he kills and eats people. and we should all have a little sip of critical thinking juice

[brigade-claire-opinions]

Day 9: The Haunting of Hill House

Let's talk about this novel and this show.

I already posted a quick review of the novel last year, so I'll briefly plagiarize myself. Please note, however, that I'm adding some significant elaboration to this review, including spoilers. I won't spoil the show once I get to that portion, but if you plan on reading this book, all you need to know is that I absolutely love it - it's my favorite novel about a haunted house and one of the best examples of classic horror literature.

Anyways, onto the review:

The Haunting of Hill House was written by Shirley Jackson and released in 1959. I've been trying and failing to read this book for the better part of two years now. It's always shown up on lists of the scariest books ever written, alongside the likes of The Amityville Horror by Jay Anson and Ghost Story by Peter Straub.

Having finally read (and, ultimately, been severely let down by) Straub's Ghost Story, I picked this one back up. I'm not sure if it's that something changed in me in the past year, or if it's because I was no longer trying to read it before the release of the Netflix "adaptation," but I became enamored with the novel in my third reading and finally, blessedly finished it.

In this novel, Shirley Jackson successfully captured the psychology of living in a haunted house. I fell in love with our central cast: Eleanor Vance, our protagonist who has a history with poltergeist activity, likely stemming from caring for her invalid mother until the latter's passing; Dr. John Montague, a psychologist bent on investigating the scientific angle of the occult and the man responsible for bringing together our ragtag band of misfits; Luke Sanderson, the thieving and charming black sheep of the Hill family and heir to Hill House; and Theodora (or Theo, who intentionally does not have a provided surname), a childish, flamboyant, and likely queer psychic who naively craves the excitement of staying in a haunted place.

Together, these four must brave the throes of Hill House and face whatever remnants of its terrifying history await them. This party is to experience total isolation during their stay, as cell phones weren't common in 1959. They are also to face conditions of "absolute reality," or reality completely unaffected by the subjective perceptions of the human mind. I believe that this is ultimately the narrative's way of explaining that the human mind cannot fathom paranormal activity without prior framework to quantify it, but 1959 was a different time.

What really struck me about The Haunting of Hill House was its lack of empirical ghostly encounters. Yes, the characters have spooky experiences and things happen, but the novel doesn't outright show us a ghost. Instead, it poses a question: is the house truly haunted? Or is the absolute reality that the house's troubled history is affecting the people staying there? Is it possible that Eleanor, with her history of Poltergeist activity, is causing the doors to slam and the writing on the wall? The ending only further adds to the mystery, and the reader is left to ponder.

The Haunting of Hill House has had a troubled history with screen adaptations. Two films based on the novel - both named "The Haunting," - released in 1963 and 1999 respectively, and neither had a particularly warm reception. The 1999 film in particular often appears on "worst of" lists of horror films. Prior to 2018, adaptations of Shirley Jackson's magnum opus seemed taboo, destined to fail.

And that, my friends, leads us to the show.

As you likely already know, the Netflix adaptation of The Haunting of Hill House has VERY little to do with the novel. The eponymous house and some characters are shared, but what we have here is a mostly original story about a family whose lives are still haunted by Hill House decades after they abandoned it.

Our showrunner Mike Flanagan (Oculus, Hush, Doctor Sleep) took Jackson's novel, deconstructed it, and crafted something brand new.

I am exceedingly pleased by what Flanagan and co made for us. The Haunting of Hill House is easily the best thing to come out of the novel since, well, the novel. It's also the only thing on the list so far to have legitimately scared me.

The show follows the Crain family, who move into Hill House in 1992. Olivia and Hugh Crain - the mother and father of the family - are house flippers, and Hill House seems to be their big break. As you'd expect, however, things go awry, and most of the family flees in terror in the middle of the night not long after their arrival.

Along with Olivia and Hugh, there are five Crain children who form our central cast: Steven, Shirley, Theodora, Luke, and Eleanor. The story is told between two eras - in 1992 during the family's summer at Hill House, and in 2018 as the family deals with a tragic loss.

Our cast in this story is absolutely incredible. With one exception, each member of the Crain family is portrayed by two different actors, and each gives it their all.

Michael Huisman and Paxton Singleton play Steven Crain, the eldest of Olivia and Hugh's children. Steven does not believe in the ghostly encounters that the family experienced in their time at Hill House, but that does not stop him from capitalizing on their trauma and writing a book about their experiences anyways, much to his siblings' disapproval. Due to circumstances, Steven is having marital troubles at the start of the series and is separated from his wife Leigh, played by Samantha Sloyan.

Elizabeth Reaser and Lulu Wilson play Shirley Crain, the next oldest, who was named for Shirley Jackson. Depending on how you look at it, Shirley grows up to either have the perfect or most baffling career, as she owns, lives in, and runs a funeral home along with her husband Kevin, played by Anthony Ruivivar.

Kate Siegel and McKenna Grace play Theo (this time with a surname!), the middle child. Theo has a touch empathy, allowing her to experience psychic phenomena when touching people or objects; she wears gloves to help circumvent this. She lives in a guest suite attached to Shirley's funeral home, where we occasionally see her girlfriend Trish, played by Levy Tran.

Oliver Jackson-Cohen and Julian Hilliard play Luke, the older of the twins who make up the two youngest members of the family. Luke, having been severely traumatized by his experiences at Hill House and the way his family was torn asunder afterwards, has a severe struggle with substance abuse. He has a "twin connection" with his younger twin sister, as the two of them have the tightest bond of the entire family.

Victoria Pedretti and Violet McGraw play Eleanor, the youngest of the family and the other half of Luke's twin empathy. Of all of the children, Nell and Luke each had the most traumatic experiences at Hill House; Nell still occasionally sees the ghost that haunted her the most as a child. Nell's story is the most tragic of all of the children as well; I won't say any more than that.

Timothy Hutton and Henry Thomas both put on fantastic performances for Hugh Crain, the father of the family. During the opening of the show, Hugh has to make the drastic decision of leaving Olivia behind as he and the children flee from Hill House in the middle of the night. This, of course, caused a massive rift to tear between him and the children, and they all become estranged.

Last but absolutely not least, Carla Gugino portrayed Olivia Crain, the mother of the family. Olivia has arguably the most tragic story, as a sensitive who becomes increasingly affected by whatever lurks in the walls of Hill House. She still lurks in the minds of the children and Hugh, even after that fateful night.

Flanagan and this wonderful cast knew exactly how to put on a fantastic show. Each role is played pitch perfectly, in both incarnations of the characters. Child actors are known to struggle with putting on strong performances, but none of these young cast members are ever overplayed to the point of being annoying. The stellar writing that these characters have to work with does a great job of bringing the audience in and making them feel like part of the Crain family. We care about these characters and don't want anything to happen to them, and thus we are horrified whenever they are hurt or scared, just as we would be if anything happened to our own loved ones.

The Haunting of Hill House has the some of the most effective scares I've seen in horror. Flanagan knows how to build up tension and when to release it. He knows exactly how to frame a shot and how to use subtlety to his advantage. There are a few jump scares sprinkled throughout the show, but unlike with most other horror pieces, the jump scares are meant for the characters and not for the audience. They have real meaning and serve a purpose and aren't just there as a cheap way to shock the audience.

The score for this show does a great job of underlining the tension, but aside from the opening theme, nothing quite stands out for me. I do want to take a moment to discuss the cinematography, however. Flanagan knows EXACTLY how to frame a shot, when to show something scary, and when to leave something to the audience's imagination. The juxtaposition between the two eras is masterful in its framing and use of colors. The happier childhood era in Hill House is shown in bright, warm colors with some nice bloom effect to display a more innocent time. Shots are more spacious and give the characters plenty of breathing room, and the score is light and almost playful.

In contrast, however, the scarier portions of the childhood era and most of the adult era are filmed with muted colors and cooler, darker tones. Shots are cramped and claustrophobic, and darkness fills corners and swims in rooms. The score for these shots is ominous and quiet, or even non-existant at times, leaving us to wonder what's going to happen.

The Haunting of Hill House is one of my favorite shows. It's fantastic, nearly perfect, in almost every way; I seriously have a hard time thinking of anything I'd change. Over the course of ten episodes, I felt myself moved and swayed and afraid for the members of this family. The show is not for everyone, of course, and I even hesitate to call it an adaptation of my favorite haunted house novel, but its strengths far outweigh anything negative I have to say. If you're looking for a long-form scary watch, I implore you to check this out. I even encourage you to read the novel, as it is interesting to compare the two and look at what few parallels Flanagan drew between them. As of today, the show has a second season. The Haunting of Bly Manor, which is based upon the works of Henry James, reuses much of the Hill House cast in new roles, marking The Haunting as an anthology show.

I'm almost done talking about adaptations for this month. Tomorrow, I return to a film I watched in my youth now that I've read the novel it's based upon...

[itsclydebitches]

I know you say that the Adam stuff in v3 was a good example of visual storytelling in rwby, do you think there is anything else, in your opinion

Yes! Let’s praise poor RWBY for once lol 

I’m sure there’s a lot that I could choose from but that would require me combing back through old content to jog those memories. So let’s stick to Volume 7. Overall, I quite enjoyed the JNOR vs. Neo fight. There are plot convenience issues (the stupidity of having the group carry the relic around instead of putting it in the vault) and choreography issues (I’ve heard a number of complaints about the slow-mo and how Jaune and Oscar don’t integrate well with Ren and Nora), but the fight does a good job of conveying a lot of information visually. It’s one of the few moments in the volume where I felt like RT was successfully a) using the medium to its advantage and b) achieving more than one thing in a single scene. 

Warning: Here be lots of screenshots. 

First, I want to acknowledge that lately RT has been demonstrating a talent for horror-esque writing. RWBY obviously isn’t in the horror genre, but via the Apathy we saw that RT can crank up the creep factor when they choose to. This scene does something similar (though admittedly much more subtly) and it starts with the opening shot of the destroyed guards. 

It’s a simple thing, but note how dark the room is, especially compared to the hallway outside. This is supposed to be a terrifying moment. The team has just arrived looking for Oscar and have instead found a disaster zone. There are scorch marks on the walls. The guards aren’t just lying powered down, they’ve been hacked to pieces. Though AIs without aura or souls, they’re designed to look like people and at first glance it definitely seems like we’ve got three bodies decorating the bedroom. Nora’s panicked cries tell us how bad the situation is, but we get that loud and clear from these visuals first. Also note how, despite being lighter, the hallway is dominated by a very deep red. I’d actually say to a certain extent this is a mistake - the pink/reds of the environment make it easy for Neo and Nora, with their predominantly pink costumes, to blend in too well during the fight - but in regards to color associations we get some nice shots throughout that convey danger and high emotions. 

When “Oscar” comes on the scene we know, instantaneously, that it’s not Oscar. Not just because we as the audience know that Neo is off doing something nefarious, but because via the language of film/television that’s not how you re-introduce an established character. You don’t hide their face like that unless you’re about to reveal something - like the fact that that’s not really them. This is also the first of a number of medium closeups on the relic, putting emphasis on it first because someone currently holds it who should not have it, and then as a means of reminding the viewer what this fight is about. 

Via some great attention to detail, we see again the clear wrongness about this “Oscar.” That’s not how Oscar stands. That’s not how Oscar smiles. More than just animating him differently, this shot pulls from those subtle horror tropes. He has the dead-eyed look of a doll or a supernatural being that immediately makes the viewer (if not Nora) go, “Wait...” It helps that Oscar is a short boy with dark hair. Put him in different clothes and he could play any number of possessed kids. 

With Neo’s deception revealed, we get what the fandom knows is not good visual storytelling. AKA, Oscar charging down the whole length of the hallway while Neo just stands there and lets herself get hit. I don’t need to re-hash how stupid that was. What I like a lot more is the subtleties in how she communicates given that, obviously, Neo can’t rely on any dialogue. Coming out of the hit she immediately has her umbrella leveled at the group and pulls out the blade to communicate, “Yes. I’m taking you on.” The neat choice though is that she brings the umbrella down to do it. She takes her weapon off the group, if only for a moment. Jaune has just gotten done insisting that she should give up because it’s four to one. The blade says, “I’m taking you on” but lowering her umbrella likewise says, “I’m so confident about taking you on I’ll even make myself vulnerable for a second.” 

Which retroactively makes her getting hit like that even stupider but it’s fine we’re moving on. 

During this time we also get a lot of insight into Oscar. Check out how utterly bedraggled he is, showing us how tough the initial fight with Neo was and how lucky he is to have escaped. He clutches the relic close to his chest and stares, scared, at the rest of the team. Oscar hasn’t reached a point yet where he instinctively draws his weapon and prepares to defend himself (indeed, he didn’t even have his weapon out during that initial encounter. That’s one hell of a rookie mistake). He’s still a terrified kid who hopes he won’t have to fight at all, literally hiding behind more powerful friends. This is all great characterization, the only problem is consistency. Nothing about Oscar has been consistent. One moment he’s holding his own against Lionheart and insisting he fight Hazel. The next he’s getting his ass kicked by Neo and cowering at the prospect of more. One moment he’s positively done in by these fights, horrified, scared, unsure of himself. The next he’s confronting the general of a kingdom with all the wisdom of Ozpin. This guy: 

and this guy: 

Exist about fifteen minutes apart. Because though RWBY is great at visual storytelling within each scene, they don’t keep it consistent from one scene to the next. Which is why Oscar is (accurately, imo) animated as an inexperienced kid in Scene #1 and then inexplicably becomes a wise old mentor in Scene #2. Not because anything occurred between Scene #1 and Scene #2 to create that change (let alone such an extreme change), but only because the show suddenly wanted Ironwood to look like an unhinged character. How do you achieve that? Not by having the guy he’s talking to act as winded, wild, and emotional as him, but by having Oscar speak calmly, rationally, softly, sounding oh-so-persuasive so you don’t listen to the actual words he says and how nonsensical they are (you’re as bad as Salem). Instead, you pay attention only to the visuals (Ironwood looks crazier than Oscar so he must be wrong). Ironwood is a great example of how RT sometimes tries to get visual storytelling to outweigh basic logic/what’s been said on screen. 

Anyway, I’m getting off track. The fight begins and I do still love how Oscar is depicted here, even if it doesn’t align with what we get later. The moment that umbrella and cane cross was great because who doesn’t love visual symmetry? Oscar grabbing Neo is wonderfully in character because he’s barely trained! He’s a kid! He’s flying by the seat of his pants and going with whatever vaguely successful act pops into his head. The absurdity of, “I’m just going to grab her” is tempered by Oscar’s furiously determined expression as well as Neo’s brief look of shock. It works up until they realize what Oscar grabbed was just a copy. 

I mentioned early that JNOR often doesn’t work well as a team, unless it’s specifically in the context of Jaune giving orders and the others executing them. Oscar and his lack of integration is obviously exempt from this, being the newbie both to fighting and this particular team’s dynamics, but Ren, Nora, and Jaune have no excuse. The first half of this fight is a good example of what I mean. We see Nora attack. She’s tossed aside. Then Ren attacks. He’s slammed into the wall. Oscar attacks (umbrella vs. cane) and it’s only at the last second that Jaune arrives with his shield to stave off a blow that would fell him too. Why is everyone taking turns here? They know none of them can beat Neo one-on-one and Jaune just said that their victory lies in it being four-to-one. So why separate out all the attacks? Arguably we can read this as a major flaw of JNOR’s and visual setup for something they’ll have to overcome later. In reality though I highly doubt this was deliberate on RT’s part, leaving this as bad visual storytelling (in that it makes the characters look stupid) as opposed to good visual storytelling (JNOR will realize this flaw and work to correct it). 

After Neo disappears we get a chase through the hallway that does a great job of showing us precisely how weaker Oscar is compared to his teammates. He doesn’t have their stamina, breathing heavily and falling further and further behind. At one point (screenshot #2) he arrives just in time to find the team turning back in the direction he’s just come, showing not only how he can’t physically keep up, but also his place in this team/the group. He’s literally not with them. Anyone who has followed my blog knows my thoughts on how the group has treated Oscar and if (again) I were inclined to think that RT was aware of that treatment and working to integrate it into the show with the intent to resolve it, this would be another great detail. As it is, I think Oscar as a character is just continually going to get the short end of the stick. In particular, the crane shot shows us exactly how far behind Oscar is. The others charge ahead without him, not caring where he is or if he can keep up. Which leads to this. 

Oscar rounds another corner and they’re gone. Nowhere to be seen. If anyone had the thought, “He’s not that far behind. It’s not as bad as you’re making it out to be,” Ren, Nora, and Jaune were clearly moving fast enough to round another corner and leave Oscar stranded. Here those subtle horror elements come back into play, particularly the maze-like design of the corridors. The only unique marker we get is the info board, otherwise it’s all identical hallways, housing a killer, with Oscar now left alone in it. The long shot makes him look small and emphasizes his isolation. 

Then he’s attacked and it’s suitably scary. The hand over his mouth. The dark room again. We only get the briefest glimpse of Neo-as-Nora before she attacks, but that one second is another excellent moment of animation. Nora has never sauntered away like that. Even the quickest look in an action-driven scene is enough for the viewer to go, “Nope. Not Nora.” 

The attack itself is the one moment where I think the slow-mo serves a good purpose. We might know (via that quick shot, how characters act (Nora is unlikely to pull Oscar aside like that) and expectations for how a story functions) that that’s not Nora, but Oscar doesn’t know that. The slow-mo gives us - and him - the chance to focus on Neo’s eyes changing, that stomach-dropping moment of realization, and we see Oscar’s horrified shock in the close up on his own eyes. Though RWBY doesn’t always grapple with the emotional implications of every encounter, I think it’s worth noting that this can really mess someone up. Oscar thought he was safe with an ally and had the rug pulled out from under him. He will now forever have the image of Nora attacking him, regardless of the fact that it was really “Nora.” Jaune likewise exclaims in horrified surprise when “Nora” charges him down the hallway. The ability to turn into someone else is an advantage that Neo knows how to use to its fullest. Not just in regards to spying, but how to unsettle your opponent too. 

Waiting for the day she turns into Pyrrha ngl. 

We see that same work when she encounters Ren. Admittedly, I’m torn on this one. If only because I agree with others when they ask, “Doesn’t Ren spar with Nora all the time? He should be able to hit her.” The context of “Barely trained kid thought he was with a friend and then watches said ‘friend’ attack him” is not the same thing as, “Much more experienced fighter realizes the moment ‘Nora’ rounds the corner with an umbrella that that’s not her, has no doubt hit her numerous times in the past during training, yet for some reason can’t bring himself to hit her now.” It... doesn’t quite work. Here, I think RT does a good job of showing us Ren’s distress, it’s just that this is paired with a very bad job of establishing what that distress is and why it exists. This is what we needed to hear about during the party conversation. If Ren and Nora had actually talked rather than just kissing, we might have understood why Ren is suddenly incapacitated here when “Nora” looks at him sadly. 

As said though, the emotion of the scene is great even if we don’t quite know where it came from. Neo’s pitiful look, Ren freezing in shock (check out the red there too), his dumbfounded expression as he just sits in the middle of a battle, and when we come back to him we see the tear tracks. Overall, this scene does a great job of incorporating lots of information beyond “Team JNOR is fighting Neo for the relic.” We just need to connect that information better to what came before this scene (Ren) and what comes after (Oscar). 

Finally, Neo slams into the other guards and transforms again. I love this final shot of her, both for how she moves and the implications of the transformation itself. Meaning, Neo is a professional. She had a job and she did it. Once the relic was in her possession and she had an escape route, she took it. Neo doesn’t get distracted by taking revenge - these are some of the people we fought against when Roman died - or trying to take them out to please Cinder, or even just going after them because she’s Evil. Neo is focused, no unnecessary actions taken, and that, just as much as her semblance and skill, is what makes her dangerous. 

[tcolmstead-horror-su20]

Monstrous Matriarchal Madness in “The Wind”

"Given the thinness, the blankness of the American historical past...the absence of a coherently meaningful symbolic..." Savoy writes, "it is precisely the semantic impoverishment of allegory, the haunting consequences of its refusal of transparency, that impelled American gothic's narrativization of Otherness towards its insubstantial shadows, and vice versa." It is this blankness, and the fear thereof, that propels the plot of Emma Tammi's The Wind, wherein a woman on the American frontier is haunted by shadows, strange noises and torrential gusts ripping across the prairie that ultimately drive her to madness. The monster here is not the wind, nor the paranoid neighbor, but the madness that Lizzy (Caitlin Gerard) succumbs to in her isolation from the "civilized" world back east. This is directly in keeping with Savoy's argument:

"'American Gothic' does not exist apart from its regional manifestations...yet common to all is a narrative site that tends to be an epistemological frontier in which the spatial division between the known and the unknown, the self and the Other, assumes temporal dimensions."

The Other in the case of The Wind, is the madness consuming Lizzy. She cannot be separated from it, nor it from her, except perhaps by remembering times she thought herself to be sane. These memories take the form of extedned flashback sequences in the film, which lack clear visual distinction from the events of the narrative's "present." This visual presentation (or lack thereof) allows Tammi to manipulate the temporal dimensions of her tale and create a constant uncertainty in the spectator as to when events are occuring. The sparsity of the frontier space and the spatial confinement of the plot to merely two cabins and the mile of land in between allows for the creation of further uncertainty as to who and what are "real."

This uncertainty results in a kind of blindness for Lizzy, where though she can see it is unclear if what she is seeing is really there. As Linda Williams has written, "when the heroine is not literally blind, the failure and frustration of her vision can be the most imporant mark of her sexual purity..." This is certainly true of Lizzy, whose madness begins during her pregnancy and reaches its peak when new neighbor Emma (Ashley Zukerman) sleeps with her husband. This madness is thus associated with sexual behaviors early on and further tied to purity with the presence of the minister, who we later see give Lizzy the pamphlet on "Demons of the Prairie" that inspired her horrific visions upon her initial entry to the frontier.

Like the other horror heriones examined by Williams, Lizzy spends much of the film looking out across the frontier at the nothingness that comes to represent her monstrous madness. Unlike her more feminine rival Emma, who is killed for seducing Lizzy's husband and thus being impure, Lizzy wields a rifle for most of the film. Traditionally a symbol of the phallus, the rifle here represents what Williams calls "a frightening potency precisely where the normal male would perceive a lack." Lizzy's ability to kill is what makes her madness threatening and ultimately makes her a monstrous figure. That she chooses to point her gun at another woman and execute her on grounds of sexual impropriety raises concerns about the progressive prospects for women in The Wind.

[afriendlyirin]

Steven Universe Rewrite

So I’ve now finished my rewrite of the final arc (go read it and tell me all your thoughts), and while I’m satisfied with it in many respects, I still feel like it doesn’t properly resolve or engage with everything I’d like to, nor is it fully in keeping with the parts of Steven Universe I liked, despite that being my goal. There’s simply too much to get into and too little space to for it. To fully “fix” the narrative in my mind, I’d probably have to diverge much farther back.

I’m not interested in actually writing such a story, but I think it would be a good exercise to sketch an outline of what such a thing might look like.

I think the biggest problem is that Steven Universe has too many antagonists. The three initial Homeworld gems work well on their own – we spend a lot of time between each one, giving us time to process what’s happened before they return or a new antagonist gains focus. But with the diamonds, we don’t really get that breathing room. We barely know anything of Yellow before Blue shows up, we’re only just starting to really process them before White appears, and then the show ends. And throughout all of this, we have even more unresolved antagonists dangling – Jasper, the rubies, Topaz and Aquamarine, Homeworld’s system itself. To do justice to all of these characters at the previous pace of the show would probably have taken twice as many seasons.

My second problem, which is more personal preference, is that I don’t like how the plot ended up going epic, with Steven having to take on uberpowerful opponents with an entire empire of resources. I’d say this is also thematically confused – the show starts off making it seem like everyone is safe on Earth and the war is in the distant past, but it’s then revealed the war is very much still on and the plot becomes about Steven continuing the rebellion Rose left half-finished. My favorite parts of the show were seasons 1-3, which were much the antithesis of that – the conflicts were much more subdued, against lone actors or just interpersonal problems.

So, let us combine these things to give us a different starting state.

There was only one diamond, and she was destroyed during Rose’s rebellion. Either she blew herself up with a corruption bomb, or the shattering of a diamond is what makes a corruption blast. Down-scale the empire’s resources such that they were putting most of their manpower into fighting the rebellion, meaning that their population is utterly crippled by the fallout of the blast in addition to their loss of leadership. The gem empire still exists but as a shadow of its former self; it no longer has the manpower to invade new planets. (We can also tone down the oppression; no killing people just for being born. Whether or not that is still the case for Era 1, it’s just not possible to keep doing that with your population so crippled. Homeworld can still be oppressively conformist, but not to the point of EUGENICS EVERYWHERE.)

Right off the bat, this dodges a lot of awkward questions that are present in canon. Why did Rose stop fighting just because she saved one of many colonies, and why did she make Steven when Homeworld was still a threat that could endanger him – why, in sum, does she act like the war is over? Well, because it is, and she won.

This shifts the tone and focus of the story away from an epic rebellion plot and into one of postwar reconstruction. After the dust has settled, what happens? How do you pick up the pieces and move forward? Steven will only ever encounter pale shadows of Homeworld’s former power. Things like the Cluster become akin to forgotten landmines, echoes of a violent past that can still hurt people long after the conflict is over. He can still fight Homeworld gems, but they are lone agents acting on personal grudges; Jasper is not acting under orders, she just really wants to take a swing at Rose Quartz. (This setup even works a lot better with the threat level we actually see from canon, which is that Homeworld keeps sending weak scouts and small groups instead of bringing their full military might to bear against the Crystal Gems.)

This frees up a lot of space to just get into the characters talking about their feelings, which was always the real core of Steven Universe. In canon, Amethyst is the only Crystal Gem who really gets a full arc with a proper resolution (the battle with Jasper at the conclusion of season 3); Garnet’s gets flattened to just be about her relationship so it can be rushed through in Heart of the Crystal Gems, and Pearl’s arc gets completely substituted for something else that officially has no problem for her to resolve at all. The time spent on the diamonds and battle logistics could instead be spent on developing those arcs. With the antagonist compression, we could develop the Homeworld gems further as well, perhaps making them proper foils to Crystal Gems – something I get the impression canon was trying to go for but never seemed to really commit to.

Speaking of which, this would make the Homeworld gems much more tragic and sympathetic. Lapis’ despair over how different the new Homeworld is would no longer be about the simple passage of time, but because it is genuinely a shambling corpse of what it once was. And because Era 2 is so different than Era 1, Peridot, an Era 2 gem, would lack much of the shared culture and knowledge other gems have, justifying her naivete and social awkwardness. Finally, the rebellion destroying the entire army makes Jasper even more isolated – she is one of the very few survivors of the war, further justifying her fury at Rose and her inability to open up to her peers – she has none.

This would also make everything about Bismuth so, so much more reasonable. Instead of reacting to the fact that Rose lost the war that is very much still on, she’s advocating for igniting a brand new one before the ashes have even cooled on the first. (For extra horror, she might not even be dissuaded by the news Rose killed the diamond after all – they may have understood Homeworld’s soldiers were only following orders and assumed they would defect if they removed the command structure… but now you’re telling her they assassinated the head honcho and they’re still loyal to Homeworld? Clearly the only solution is to KILL ‘EM ALL.) It is far more understandable for Steven to keep her bubbled in that situation, and for the Crystal Gems to agree to it.

Ultimately, I think this plotline could remain very similar for seasons 1-3; perhaps move up the “Rose shattered Diamond” reveal to around season 2, and follow it with the Cluster plot to show why that really was necessary while emphasizing that yeah, war is horrible we really shouldn’t be starting another one, Bismuth!

The major difference would be swapping out Yellow Diamond for a lower administrative gem. I thought Yellow Diamond alone worked as a fine antagonist, really, so not much needs to change – just transplant her personality into another gem. This character could function as a foil to Garnet, someone thrust into overwhelming responsibility because there’s no one else qualified left alive. We could even double down on this and make her a permafusion; that maps really well onto modern conservatism, where people who would actually be hurt by the old hegemonies still romanticize them anyway. Season 4’s arc could revolve around her; having dealt with Lapis, Peridot, and Jasper, Steven must go to Homeworld and address the problem at its source. (The events of “Raising the Barn” could happen here, giving Lapis an extra season to work through her issues.) This could actually be resolved very similarly to the White Diamond resolution in canon, but it would fit with the earlier themes much better – this gem really would have reasons to feel insecure about her failure to live up to a perfect ideal. And for bonus points, that makes her a foil to Steven, too.

It would also make it a lot more believable that these gems would need Steven to teach them what is, if we’re being honest, pretty basic philosophy. If they are technically free of the old system but still stubbornly cling to its trappings, it makes sense that they’d need an outsider to tell them to think for themselves and that this would genuinely be a radical new perspective for them. Hauntings, again – just as in real life, the system still influences peoples’ thinking long after it was officially dismantled.

We could replace the Zoo arc with something that hits the same beats. The rubies return (or someone new gets sent) and capture Greg for some reason. Instead of seeing the Zoo we get to see Homeworld society directly during the trip. The events of That Will Be All still occur, as Not Yellow Diamond, cracking under the strain, unfuses and argues with herself behind closed doors.

Instead of the gems only being caught as a joke (and having that also be resolved as a joke), it’s a choice Steven makes. We invoke the hero’s last temptation: He has everything he’s ever wanted, his family in one piece and Homeworld beaten so thoroughly they’ll never threaten them again… but to take that offer means looking away, and abandoning everyone who is still suffering on Homeworld. He looks upon the gates of Heaven, but willingly chooses to walk back into Hell.

(Connie should probably be present to witness this so we can set up the falling-out arc, which is important for deconstructing Steven’s martyr complex.)

This leads to an analogous arc to Wanted and Diamond Days where Steven navigates Homeworld until he finally reaches Not Yellow Diamond. For added tension, the gems are separated somehow and Steven spends a significant time on his own befriending Homeworld gems. Garnet converges with him for the finale so we can make it about her (maybe extend her themes to the previous arc, focus on her stress and failures as leader during the heist).

Not Yellow Diamond is a noncombatant, but hides behind elite guards and defenses that Garnet and Steven can’t handle on their own, necessitating a fusion. The theme here could be that Garnet is paralyzed by her responsibilities, unable to both mount an offense while also keep Steven protected; Steven cuts through this by taking on his own responsibility, showing Garnet that she doesn’t have to do everything herself.

Not Yellow Diamond’s redemption happens similarly to White Diamond’s, but because she’s a noncombatant it is actually reasonable for Steven to spend so long on a nonviolent solution. Possibly Garnet even tries to shatter her (this could be what makes them unfuse), but Steven stops her. Not Yellow Diamond more explicitly agrees to change things and protect Earth.

So by this point, Steven will have dealt with all extant threats… but there are still issues left unresolved. The corrupted gems still aren’t healed, Bismuth’s still bubbled, Lapis is still missing, and Pearl hasn’t had a personal arc to resolve her issues. This would then turn season 5 into something of a denouement season, tying up all the remaining loose ends. This season’s theme could be one of self-actualization, revolving around Lapis and Pearl working through their difficult mental health problems and Steven, though seeing his own issues reflected in them, overcoming his own imposter syndrome in the process.

Season 5 starts after a timeskip. Steven is trying to heal the corrupted gems but is making no progress. Make this into a metaplot, with snippets in other episodes throughout the season showing he’s continuing to try and making more progress as his personal arc progresses.

Bismuth is already unbubbled to leapfrog over that awkward conversation, but still suffers from PTSD. She gets an episode (or two) about her issues, primarily grief. She bemoans the loss of her friends, and Steven tries to assure her that he’ll heal the corrupted gems any day now. She shows him the shards and says bitterly, “Can you heal these?” Spirals into a breakdown naming and remembering all the shattered gems. Steven tries to lay down some generic platitudes like he always does, but this time it doesn’t work; Bismuth calls him out on his ignorance and innocence, that he’s never lost anyone so he has no idea how she feels. This forces him to rethink things and actually listen to Bismuth, foreshadowing that that will be the theme of this season. (For bonus points, could also have her echo Pearl’s “She’s gone, but I’m still here,” re: the shattered gems.)

This could probably happen simultaneously with the falling-out arc (though that interacts awkwardly with the timeskip since Connie would probably be upset immediately after), could draw a connection by having Steven realize or Connie point out his god complex, he wants to help people for his sake not for theirs.

After that heavy opening we can have funtimes with human friends; Sadie Killer arc happens here plus any outstanding human subplots resolve. Should probably also have an episode about Pearl that touches on her issues since that’ll be the topic of the final stretch.

Then Lapis comes back. Have a conversation about PTSD and how she needed to do it on her own time etc., Steven can show his growth by accepting this and not pushing.

If the Lion chest is important, Lapis found the key while soul-searching (it was hidden somewhere on Earth the CGs didn’t look).

Next plot episode is Steven getting frustrated over his inability to heal the corrupted gems (can have a comedy bit where he tries increasingly absurd and convoluted methods), wonders what he’s doing wrong. Something happens that leads to him talking to Pearl about Rose. Possibly he thinks whatever’s in the chest is the cure, but that seems pretty stupid even for him. Events lead to Pearl revealing that she shattered Diamond and Steven has a fresh meltdown, accuses all the other gems of secretly being shatterers and not telling him (Garnet could react really awkwardly, implying she actually has killed people), decides that’s the problem and runs off.

(If there is a similar memory scene with Pearl, it’s via hologram; Diamond literally does not get a voice.)

Either Pearl tracks him down, or someone else brings him back only for him to discover that Pearl has run off because she agrees that she is horrible and shouldn’t be around Steven. Either way leads to a deep conversation about their issues. The climax here would result in Steven fusing with Pearl as he has with the others, but perhaps this time the context is peaceful rather than it being a tactic used in desperation, affirming the idea that fusions are a way of life and not just a tool.

As a result of his growth from this, Steven finally figures out the method to heal the corrupted gems, whatever that may be. We have a great happy ending montage where it looks like everything’s resolved – Steven has forged peace with Homeworld, and all the corrupted gems are healed, including Jasper…

…who immediately attacks him. We get one final episode, or perhaps even a full arc, revolving around a final fight with Jasper. Because Steven never actually resolved her issues before she got bubbled! She is still mad, still violent, and still hurting. This is the most narratively satisfying climax, because Jasper is all the story’s themes embodied: the sins of the past come back to haunt us, the scars left by war, and the pain of grief and acceptance. She always made the most sense as a “final villain” to me. Steven’s usual approach of steamrollering people with generic feel-good platitudes would not work here; he must actually use what he’s learned and engage with Jasper on her own terms.

(If this were an actual show THIS is where I would pull the surprise season extension, lead everyone to think the Pearl reconciliation is the grand finale and then surprise them with Jasper.)

The Jasper episode, or the finale if it’s a whole arc, would be titled “Under the Stars So Bright” as a reference to Trigun and also the imagery of being under the star of Diamond.

I feel the only way to make this work would be to intercut the Jasper ep with flashbacks to her time under Diamond, much like Trigun’s final episode. Only issue is that the sudden change in POV would be really weird; Trigun worked because the hero was there for those events and we only see his perspective, but Steven has no window into Jasper’s past.

Jasper poofs all the CGs and digs a hole to the core with the intent of popping the Cluster. Steven proceeds to get the crap beaten out of him protecting and bubbling the CGs like Vash vs. Midvalley in Trigun. Make this incredibly gruesome, even with the bubble shields she cracks his gem and draws blood.

Steven tries to reason with her like he did before, and like before it just makes her push back harder. Eventually she tries to pull a suicide by cop and bait Steven into shattering her. He gruesomely rams his fingers through her face to grab her gem and draws his fist back to kill her, and then we get a flashback montage of all his family memories – but in an inversion of Vash vs. Legato, this results in him not killing her. (For bonus creepy, he could also be stopped by Jasper flashing a grin or letting slip that she wants to die.)

Maybe as a compromise, he does poof her – this would be the only time in the series he intentionally does so.

(In the fantasy world where I have an animation studio at my beck and call, this would be filled with visual references to Trigun, both the Legato and Knives confrontations.)

Ending is Jasper going to prison to face trial for trying to blow up Earth. Lapis gets to say her piece, then Steven gives a more mature redemption speech than usual, about how he can’t make her change and she has to want to become a better person but he still believes in her anyway. This can perhaps be the nuanced message that the movie… appeared to be trying to go for with Spinel, that people can have understandable reasons for lashing out and doing bad things, but that doesn’t mean you’re obligated to exhaust yourself for them; you don’t have to be a martyr.

In the final montage, Jasper reunites with other jaspers who were corrupted in the war (maybe mirrored with a montage of Bismuth hugging formerly-corrupted Crystal Gems). Final message is what the canon ending claims to be: Steven has gained a more mature and complex outlook on “good” and “evil” but he still chooses to be optimistic and believe in the goodness of people. GOOD END.

That’s my take. Ultimately, it seems Steven Universe bit off more than it could chew, or perhaps had too many cooks. The most important takeaway from this, in my view, is to keep things to a manageable level in your story. Don’t introduce elements you know you won’t have time to adequately address; a few points done well will often land better than a lot of stuff done slapdashedly.

[madimargolishon394]

Challenge Post 2: Fairy Tales and Horror

As we saw in King Kong, many horror films draw on fairy tale elements and transform them, reimagining them in evil, threatening, and sinister ways. Pan’s Labyrinth, directed by Guillermo del Toro, operates along the same lines. However, instead of just presenting fairy tale aspects in a new, horrific light, he combines horror and fairy tales—integrating and maintaining both traditions at the same time.

Although Pan’s Labyrinth is possibly better classified as fantasy than horror, it still includes horror elements. Ofelia’s new home, for example, is an old mill—creaky, isolated, and set in the middle of a forest. It easily fits the description of a haunted house. Not to mention, this film is directed by Guillermo del Toro, a filmmaker known for his work in horror. If all of that weren’t enough, I like to think the inclusion of the Pale Man alone qualifies Pan’s Labyrinth as a horror film.

(Though, of course, the normal-looking Captain who can kill a child without a second thought is the true monster.)

This film, like other fairy tale-inspired horror films, blends aspects of horror and fairy tale together to call the purity and innocence of fairy tales into question. What Ofelia calls her “fairy,” for instance, is actually a stick-like insect creature that leads her into the woods. Del Toro casts doubt on the distinctions between horror and fairy tales. In this film, fairy tale is one short remove from horror—it’s just a matter of how you see the world. Even the color palette of this film shows the tenuous division between the two. The earthy browns, greens, and reds of the forest become menacing in the moonlight, framing the transformation from fairy tale to horror film as a matter of mere lighting. By juxtaposing the happiness and innocence of childhood with irrational and war-like terror, Pan’s Labyrinth reveals the horror inherent in fairy tales.

Similarly, fairy tales and horror work together to connect the audience to distinctly childhood fears. When horror films include fairy-tale elements, they root the horror in the anxieties that haunt childhood—fears of monsters, the dark, and the unknown. By making Ofelia, the main character of Pan’s Labyrinth, a child, del Toro limits the audience to a child’s helplessness. Ofelia is at the mercy of her stepfather, the same way other characters in horror films are subject to the whims and wills of the monsters. By connecting horror to fairy tales—and therefore to childhood—these films expose a lack of control, and even understanding, on the part of both the character and the audience.  

Combining fairy tales and horror taps into a childlike vulnerability. Fairy tales with horror elements, like those of the Brothers Grimm, further blur distinctions between genres. With evil monsters, supernatural occurrences, and haunted settings, sometimes the only thing that separates fairy tales from horror is the ending—and, sometimes, not even then.

Some cool quotes I found from Guillermo del Toro about horror and fairy tales:

“Much like fairy tales, there are two facets of horror. One is pro-institution, which is the most reprehensible type of fairy tale: Don’t wander into the woods, and always obey your parents. The other type of fairy tale is completely anarchic and antiestablishment.”

“In fairy tales, monsters exist to be a manifestation of something that we need to understand, not only a problem we need to overcome, but also… a more tangible, more mortal side of being human: aging, decay, darkness and so forth… I feel that monsters are here in our world to help us understand it. They are an essential part of a fable.”

[ciathyzareposts]

The Shareware Scene, Part 4: DOOM

The full extent of Wolfenstein 3D‘s popularity during 1992 and 1993 is difficult to quantify with any precision due to the peculiarities of the shareware distribution model. But the one thing we can say for sure is that it was enormously popular by any standard. Apogee sold roughly 200,000 copies of the paid episodes, yet that number hardly begins to express the game’s real reach. Most people who acquired the free episode were content with it alone, or couldn’t afford to buy the other installments, or had friends who had bought them already and were happy to share. It thus seems reasonable to assume that the total number of Wolfenstein 3D players reached well into seven digits, putting the game’s exposure on a par with The 7th Guest, the boxed industry’s biggest hit of 1993, the game generally agreed to have put CD-ROM on the map. And yet Wolfenstein 3D‘s impact would prove even more earthshaking than that of The 7th Guest in the long run.

One telling sign of its influence — and of the way that it was just a fundamentally different type of game than The 7th Guest, that stately multimedia showpiece — is the modding scene that sprang up around it. The game’s levels were stored in a rather easily decipherable format: the “WAD” file, standing for “Where’s All the Data?” Enterprising hackers were soon writing and distributing their own level editors, along with custom levels. (The most popular of them all filled the corridors of the Nazi headquarters with facsimiles of the sickly sweet, thuddingly unclever, unbelievably grating children’s-television character Barney the Dinosaur and let you take out your frustrations with an automatic weapon.) The id boys debated fiercely among themselves whether they should crack down on the modders, but John Carmack, who had read Steven Levy’s landmark book Hackers at an impressionable age and thoroughly absorbed its heroes’ ethos of openness and transparency, insisted that people be allowed to do whatever they wished with his creation. And when Carmack put his foot down, he always got his way; at the end of the day, he was the one irreplaceable member of the id collective, and every one of the others knew it.

With Wolfenstein 3D‘s popularity soaring, the id boys started eyeing the territory of the boxed publishers greedily. They struck a deal with a company called FormGen to release a seventh, lengthier installment of the game exclusively as a boxed retail product; it appeared under the name of Spear of Destiny in September of 1992. Thus readers of magazines like Computer Gaming World could scratch their heads that fall over two separate luridly violent full-page advertisements for Wolfenstein 3D games, each with a different publisher’s name at the bottom. Spear of Destiny sold at least 100,000 copies at retail, both to hardcore Wolfenstein 3D addicts who couldn’t get enough and to many others, isolated from the typical means of shareware distribution, who came upon the game for the first time in this form.

Even Nintendo came calling with hat in hand, just a couple of years after summarily rejecting id’s offer to make a version of Super Mario Bros. 3 that ran on computers. The id boys now heeded Nintendo’s plea to port Wolfenstein 3D to the new Super Nintendo Entertainment System, whilst also grudgingly agreeing to abide by the dictates of Nintendo’s infamously strict censors. They had no idea what they had signed up for. Before they were through, Nintendo demanded that they replace blood with sweat, guard dogs with mutant rats, and Adolf Hitler, the game’s inevitable final boss, with a generic villain named the “Staatmeister.” They hated this bowdlerization with a passion, but, having agreed to do the port, they duly saw it through, muttering “Never again!” to themselves all the while. And indeed, when they were finished they took a mutual vow never to work with Nintendo again. Who needed them? The world was id’s oyster.

By now, 1992 was drawing  to a close, and they all felt it was high time that they moved on to the next new thing. For everyone at id, and most especially John Carmack, was beginning to look upon Wolfenstein 3D with a decidedly jaundiced eye.

The dirty little secret that was occluded by Wolfenstein 3D‘s immense success was that it wasn’t all that great a game once it was stripped of its novelty value. Its engine was just too basic to allow for compelling level design. You glided through its corridors as if you were on a branching tram line that had been mashed together with a fairground shooting gallery, trying to shoot the Nazis who popped up before they could shoot you. The lack of any sort of in-game map meant that you didn’t even know where you were most of the time; you just kept moving around shooting Nazis until you stumbled upon the elevator to the next level. Anyone who made it through seven episodes of this — and make no mistake, there were plenty of players who did — either had an awful lot of aggression to vent or really, really loved the unprecedented look and style of the game. The levels were even boring for their designers. John Romero:

Tom [Hall] and I [designed] levels [for Wolfenstein 3D] fast. Making those levels was the most boring shit ever because they were so simple. Tom was so bored; I kept on bugging him to do it. I told him about Scott Miller’s 300ZX and George Broussard’s Acura NSX. We needed cool cars too! Whenever he got distracted, I’d tell him, “Dude, NSX! NSX!”

Tom Hall had it doubly hard. The fact was, the ultra-violence of Wolfenstein 3D just wasn’t really his thing. He preferred worlds of candy-apple red, not bloody scarlet; of precocious kids and cuddly robots, not rabid vigilantes and sadistic Nazis. Still, he was nothing if not a team player. John Romero and Adrian Carmack had gone along with him for Commander Keen, so it was only fair that he humored them with Wolfenstein 3D. But now, he thought, all of that business was finally over, and they could all start thinking about making a third Commander Keen trilogy.

Poor Tom. It took a sweetly naïve nature like his to believe that the other id boys would be willing to go back to the innocent fun of their Nintendo pastiches. Wolfenstein 3D was a different beast entirely than Commander Keen. It wasn’t remarkable just for being as good as something someone else had already done; it was like nothing anyone had ever done before. And they owned this new thing, had it all to themselves. Hall’s third Commander Keen trilogy just wasn’t in the cards — not even when he offered to do it in 3D, using an updated version of the Wolfenstein 3D engine. Cute and whimsical was id’s yesterday; gritty and bloody was their today and, if they had anything to say about it, their tomorrow as well.

Digging into their less-than-bulging bag of pop-culture reference points, the id boys pulled out the Alien film franchise. What a 3D game those movies would make! Running through a labyrinth of claustrophobic corridors, shooting aliens… that would be amazing! On further reflection, though, no one wanted the hassle that would come with trying to live up to an official license, even assuming such a thing was possible; id was still an underground insurgency at heart, bereft of lawyers and Hollywood contacts. Their thinking moved toward creating a similar effect via a different story line.

The id boys had a long-running tabletop Dungeon & Dragons campaign involving demons who spilled over from their infernal plane of existence into the so-called “Prime Material Plane” of everyday fantasy. What if they did something like that, only in a science-fiction context? Demons in space! It would be perfect! It was actually John Carmack, normally the id boy least engaged by these sorts of discussions, who proposed the name. In a scene from the 1986 Martin Scorsese movie The Color of Money, a young pool sharp played by Tom Cruise struts into a bar carrying what looks like a clarinet case. “What you got in there?” asks his eventual patsy with an intimidating scowl. As our hero opens the case to reveal his pool cue, he flashes a 100-kilowatt Tom Cruise smile and says a single word: “Doom.”

Once again, Tom Hall tried to be supportive and make the best of it. He still held the official role of world-builder for id’s fictions. So, he went to work for some weeks, emerging at last with the most comprehensive design document which anyone at id had ever written, appropriately entitled The DOOM Bible. It offered plenty of opportunity for gunplay, but it also told an earnest story, in which you, as an astronaut trapped aboard a space station under assault by mysterious aliens, gradually learned to your horror that they were literal demons out of Hell, escaping into our dimension through a rift in the fabric of space-time. It was full of goals to advance and problems to solve beyond that of mowing down hordes of monsters, with a plot that evolved as you played. The history of gaming would have been markedly different, at least in the short term, if the other id boys had been interested in pursuing Hall’s path of complex storytelling within a richly simulated embodied virtual reality.

As it was, though, Hall’s ambitions landed with a resounding thud. Granted, there were all sorts of valid practical reasons for his friends to be skeptical. It was true enough that to go from the pseudo-3D engine of Wolfenstein 3D to one capable of supporting the type of complex puzzles and situations envisioned by Hall, and to get it all to run at an acceptable speed on everyday hardware, might be an insurmountable challenge even for a wizard like John Carmack. And yet the fact remains that the problem was at least as much one of motivation as one of technology. The other id boys just didn’t care about the sort of things that had Tom Hall so juiced. It again came down to John Carmack, normally the least articulate member of the group, to articulate their objections. “Story in a game,” he said, “is like story in a porn movie. It’s expected to be there, but it’s not that important.”

Tom Hall held out for several more months, but he just couldn’t convince himself to get fully onboard with the game his friends wanted to make. His relationship with the others went from bad to worse, until finally, in August of 1993, the others asked him to leave: “Obviously this isn’t working out.” By that time, DOOM was easily the most hotly anticipated game in the world, and nobody cared that it wouldn’t have a complicated story. “DOOM means two things,” said John Carmack. “Demons and shotguns!” And most of its fans wouldn’t have it any other way, then or now.

Tom Hall doesn’t look very happy about working on DOOM. Note the computer he works with: a NeXT workstation rather than an MS-DOS machine. John Carmack switched virtually all development to these $10,000 machines in the wake of Wolfenstein 3D‘s success, despite their tiny market footprint. The fact that the DOOM code was thus designed to be cross-platform from the beginning was undoubtedly a factor in the plethora of ports that appeared during and after its commercial heyday — that in fact still continue to appear today any time a new platform reaches a critical mass.

Making DOOM wound up requiring more than three times as many man-hours as anything the id boys had ever done before. It absorbed their every waking hour from January of 1993 to December of that year. Early on in that period, they decided that they wouldn’t be publishing it through Apogee. Cracks in the relationship between the id boys and Scott Miller had started forming around the latter’s business practices, which were scrupulously honest but also chaotic in that way dismayingly typical of a fast-growing business helmed by a first-time entrepreneur. Reports kept reaching id of people who wanted to buy Wolfenstein 3D, but couldn’t get through on the phone, or who managed to give Apogee their order only to have it never fulfilled.

But those complaints were perhaps just a convenient excuse. The reality was that the id boys just didn’t feel that they needed Apogee anymore. They had huge name recognition of their own now and plenty of money coming in to spend on advertising and promotion, and they could upload their new game to the major online services just as easily as Scott Miller could. Why keep giving him half of their money? Miller, for his part, handled the loss of his cash cow with graceful aplomb. He saw it as just business, nothing personal. “I would have done the same thing in their shoes,” he would frequently say in later interviews. He even hired Tom Hall to work at Apogee after the id boys cast him adrift in the foreign environs of Dallas.

Jay Wilbur now stepped into Miller’s old role for id. He prowled the commercial online services, the major bulletin-board systems, and the early Internet for hours each day, stoking the the flames of anticipation here, answering questions there.

And there were lots of questions, for DOOM was actually about a bit more than demons and shotguns: it was also about technology. Whatever else it might become, DOOM was to be a showcase for the latest engine from John Carmack, a young man who was swiftly making a name for himself as the best game programmer in the world. With DOOM, he allowed himself to set the floor considerably higher in terms of system requirements than he had for Wolfenstein 3D.

System requirements have always been a moving target for any game developer. Push too hard, and you may end up releasing a game that almost no one can play; stay too conservative, and you may release something that looks like yesterday’s news. Striking precisely the right point on this continuum requires knowing your customers. The Apogee shareware demographic didn’t typically have cutting-edge computers; they tended to be younger and a bit less affluent than those buying the big boxed games. Thus id had made it possible to run Wolfenstein 3D on a two-generations-behind 80286-based machine with just 640 K of memory. The marked limitations of its pseudo-3D engine sprang as much from the limitations of such hardware as it did from John Carmack’s philosophy that, any time it came down to a contest between fidelity to the real world and speed, the latter should win.

He still held to that philosophy as firmly as ever when he moved on to DOOM, but the slow progression of the market’s trailing edge did give him more to work with: he designed DOOM for at least an 80386-based computer — 80486 recommended — with at least 4 MB of memory. He was able to mostly ignore that bane of a generation of programmers, MS-DOS’s inability to seamlessly address memory beyond 640 K, by using a relatively new piece of software technology called a “DOS extender,” inspired to a large extent by Microsoft’s recent innovations for their MS-DOS-hosted versions of Windows. By transparently shifting the processor between its real and protected modes on the fly, Rational Systems’s “DOS/4GW” could make it seem to the programmer as if all of the machine’s memory was as effortlessly available as the first 640 K. DOS/4GW was included in the latest versions of what had heretofore been something of an also-ran in the compiler sweepstakes: the C compiler made by a small Canadian company known as Watcom. Carmack chose the Watcom compiler because of DOS/4GW; DOOM would quite literally have been impossible without it. In the aftermath of DOOM‘s prominent use of it, Watcom’s would become the C compiler of choice for game development, right through the remaining years of the MS-DOS-gaming era.

Rational Systems, the makers of DOS/4GW, were clever enough to stipulate in their licensing terms that the blurb above must appear whenever a program using it is started. Thus DOOM served as a prominent advertisement for the new software technology as it exploded across the world of computing in 1994. Soon you would have to look far and wide to find a game that didn’t mention DOS/4GW at startup.

Thanks not only to these new affordances but also — most of all, really — to John Carmack’s continuing evolution as a programmer, the DOOM engine advanced beyond that of Wolfenstein 3D in several important ways. Ironically, his work on the detested censored version of Wolfenstein 3D for the Super NES, a platform designed with 2D sprite-based games in mind rather than 3D graphics, had led him to discover a lightning-fast new way of sorting through visible surfaces, known as binary space partitioning, in a doctoral thesis by one Bruce Naylor. It had a well-nigh revelatory effect on the new engine’s capabilities.

That said, the new engine did remain caught, like its predecessor, in a liminal space between 2D and true 3D; it was just that it moved significantly further on the continuum toward the latter. No longer must everything and everyone exist on the same flat horizontal plane; you could now climb stairs and jump onto desks and daises. And walls must no longer all be at right angles to one another, meaning the world needed no longer resemble one of those steel-ball mazes children used to play with.

The DOOM level editor was a much more complicated tool than its Wolfenstein 3D equivalent, reflecting the enhanced capabilities of John Carmack’s latest engine. Most notably, the designer now had at his disposal the third dimension of height.

On the other hand, walls must still all be exactly vertical, and floors and ceilings must all be exactly horizontal; DOOM allowed stairs but not hills or ramps. These restrictions made it possible to map textures onto the environment without the ugly discontinuities that had plagued Blue Sky Productions’s earlier but more “honest” 3D game Ultima Underworld. Texture mapping in DOOM, while by no means perfectly perspective-correct, was at least closer to that ideal than in the older game. DOOM makes such a useful study in game engineering because it so vividly illustrates that faking it convincingly for the sake of the player is better than simulating things which delight only the programmer of the virtual world. Its engine is perfect for the game it wants to be.

In a telling sign of John Carmack’s march toward a more complete 3D engine, the monsters in DOOM were sculpted as three-dimensional physical models by Adrian Carmack and Greg Punchatz, an artist hired just for the task. (The former is shown above.) The id boys then took snapshots of the models from eight separate angles for insertion into the game.

The value of the simple addition of height to the equation was revealed subtly — admittedly not an adverb often associated with DOOM! — as soon as you started the game. Instead of gliding smoothly about like a tram, your view now bobbed with uncanny verisimilitude as you ran about. You might never consciously notice the effect, but it made a huge difference to your feeling of really being in the world; if you tried to go back to Wolfenstein 3D after playing DOOM, you immediately had the feeling that something was somehow off.

But the introduction of varying height was most important for what it meant in terms of the game’s tactical possibilities. Now monsters could stand on balconies and shoot fireballs down at you, or you could do the same to them. Instead of a straightforward shooting gallery, the world of DOOM became a devious place of traps and ambushes. A clever hack allowed for portals such as windows, adding another level of tactical depth. (Walls with windows were actually implemented as free-standing objects in the engine rather than “real” walls; the same technique allowed for many other types of partial barriers.) Carmack’s latest engine also supported variable levels of lighting for the first time, which opened up a whole new realm of both dramatic and tactical possibility in itself; entering an unexplored pitch-dark room could be, to say the least, an intimidating prospect.

This outdoor scene nicely showcases some of the engine’s capabilities. Note the fireball flying toward you. It’s implemented as a physical object in the world like any other.

In addition, the new engine dramatically improved upon the nearly non-existent degree of physics simulation in Wolfenstein 3D. Weight and momentum were implemented; even bullets were simulated as physical objects in the world. A stereo soundscape was implemented as well; in addition to being unnerving as all get-out, it could become another vital tactical tool. Meanwhile the artificial intelligence of the monsters, while still fairly rudimentary, advanced significantly over that of Wolfenstein 3D. It was even possible to lure two monsters into fighting each other instead of you.

John Carmack also added a modicum of support for doing things other than killing monsters, although to nowhere near the degree once envisioned by Tom Hall. The engine could be used to present simple forms of set-piece puzzles, such as locked doors and keys, switches and levers for manipulating parts of the environment: platforms could move up and down, bridges could extend and retract. And in recognition of this added level of complexity, which could suddenly make the details of the geography and your precise position within it truly relevant, the engine offered a well-done auto-map for keeping track of those things.

The DOOM automap, an impressive technical achievement in itself.

Of course, none of these new affordances would matter without level designs that took advantage of them. The original plan was for Tom Hall and John Romero to create the levels. But, as we’ve seen, Hall just couldn’t seem to hit the mark that the id boys were aiming for. After finally dismissing him, they realized that Romero still needed helped to shoulder the design burden. It arrived from a most unlikely source — from a fellow far removed from the rest of the id boys in age, experience, and temperament.

Sandy Petersen was already a cult hero in certain circles for having created a tabletop RPG called Call of Cthulhu in 1981. Based on the works of the horror writer H.P. Lovecraft, it was the first RPG ever to convincingly transcend the kill-monsters-to-level-up-so-you-can-kill-bigger-monsters dynamic of Dungeons & Dragons. But Call of Cthulhu remained a cult game even when the tabletop-RPG boom was at its height, and by the early 1990s Petersen was serving as an in-house design consultant at the computer-game publisher MicroProse. Unhappy in this role, he sent his résumé to the upstart id.

The résumé was greeted with considerable skepticism. It’s doubtful whether any of the id boys fully grasped the significance of Petersen’s achievement with Call of Cthulhu; while they were hardcore tabletop-RPG players, they were perfectly happy with the traditional power-gaming approach of Dungeons & Dragons, thank you very much. Still, the résumé was more impressive than any other they had received, and they did urgently need a level designer… they called him in for an interview.

Their initial skepticism wasn’t lessened by the man himself. Petersen was pudgy and balding, looking even older than his already ancient 38 years, coming across rather like a genial university professor. And he was a devout Mormon to boot, washed up among this tribe of atheists and nihilists. Surely it could never work out.

Nevertheless, they decided to grant him the favor of a test before they rejected him; he had, after all, flown all the way from Baltimore to Dallas just to meet with them. They gave him a brief introduction to the DOOM engine and its level editor, and asked him to throw something together for them. Within minutes, Petersen produced a cunningly dramatic trap room, featuring lights that suddenly winked out when the player entered and a demon waiting in ambush behind a hidden door. He was hired.

Romero and Petersen proved to complement each other very well, with individual design aesthetics that reflected their personalities. Romero favored straight-up carnage — the more demon blood the better — while Petersen evinced a subtler, more cerebral approach in levels that could almost have a puzzle-like feel, where charging in with shotgun blazing was usually not the best tactic. Together the two approaches gave the game a nice balance.

Indeed, superb level design became DOOM‘s secret weapon, one that has allowed it to remain relevant to this day, when its degree of gore and violence seems humdrum, its pixels look as big as houses, and the limitations of its engine seem downright absurd. (You can’t even look up or down, for Pete’s sake. Nor is there a “jump” command, meaning that your brawny superman can be stopped in his tracks by an inconveniently high curb.)

It’s disarmingly easy to underestimate DOOM today on your first encounter with it, simply because its visual aesthetic seems so tossed-off, so hopelessly juvenile; it’s the same crude mixture of action movies, heavy-metal album covers, and affected adolescent nihilism that defined the underground game-cracking scene of the 1980s. And yet behind it all is a game design that oozes as much thought and care as it does blood. These levels were obsessed over by their designers, and then, just as importantly, extensively critiqued by the other id boys and their immediate hangers-on, who weren’t inclined to pull their punches. Whatever your opinion of DOOM as a whole and/or the changes it wrought to the culture of gaming — I for one have thoroughly mixed feelings at best on both of those subjects — one cannot deny that it’s a veritable clinic of clever level design. In this sense, it still offers lessons for today’s game developers, whether they happen to be working inside or outside of the genre it came to define.

Subtle DOOM isn’t…

DOOM‘s other, not-so-secret weapon went by the name of “deathmatch.”

There had been significant experimentation with networked gaming on personal computers in the past: the legendary designer Dani Bunten Berry had spent the last half-decade making action-strategy games that were primarily or exclusively intended to be played by two humans connected via modem; Peter Molyneux’s “god game” Populous and its sequels had also allowed two players to compete on linked computers, as had a fair number of others. But computer-to-computer multiplayer-only games never sold very well, and most games that had networked multiplayer as an option seldom saw it used. Most people in those days didn’t even own modems; most computers were islands unto themselves.

By 1993, however, the isolationist mode of computing was slowly being nibbled away at. Not only was the World Wide Web on the verge of bursting into the cultural consciousness, but many offices and campuses were already networked internally, mostly using the systems of a company known as Novell. In fact, the id boys had just such a system in their Dallas office. When John Carmack told John Romero many months into the development of DOOM that multiplayer was feasible, the latter’s level of excitement was noteworthy even for him: “If we can get this done, this is going to be the fucking coolest game that the planet Earth has ever fucking seen in its entire history.” And it turned out that they could get it done because John Carmack was a programming genius.

While Carmack also implemented support for a modem connection or a direct computer-to-computer cable, it was under Novell’s IPX networking protocol that multiplayer DOOM really shined. Here you had a connection that was rock-solid and lightning-fast — and, best of all, here you could have up to four players in the same world instead of just two. You could tackle the single-player game as a team if you wanted to, but the id boys all agreed that deathmatch — all-out anarchy, where the last man standing won — was where the real fun lived. It made DOOM into more of a sport than a conventional computer game, something you could literally play forever. Soon the corridors at id were echoing with cries of “Suck it down!” as everyone engaged in frenzied online free-for-alls. Deathmatch was, in the diction of the id boys, “awesome.” It wasn’t just an improvement on what Wolfenstein 3D had done; it was something else from it that was genuinely new under the sun. “This is the shit!” chortled Romero, and for once it sounded like an understatement.

The excitement over DOOM had reached a fever pitch by the fall of 1993. Some people seemed on the verge of a complete emotional meltdown, and launched into overwrought tirades every time Jay Wilbur had to push the release date back a bit more; people wrote poetry about the big day soon to come (“The Night Before DOOM“), and rang id’s offices at all hours of the day and night like junkies begging for a fix.

Even fuddy-duddy old Computer Gaming World stopped by the id offices to write up a two-page preview. This time out, no reservations whatsoever about the violence were expressed, much less any of the full-fledged hang-wringing that had been seen earlier from editor Johnny Wilson. Far from giving in to the gaming establishment, the id boys were, slowly but surely, remaking it in their own image.

At last, id announced that the free first episode of DOOM would go up at the stroke of midnight on December 10, 1993, on, of all places, the file server belonging to the University of Wisconsin–Parkside. When the id boys tried to log on to do the upload, so many users were already online waiting for the file to appear that they couldn’t get in; they had to call the university’s system administrator and have him kick everyone else off. Then, once the file did appear, the server promptly crashed under the load of 10,000 people, all trying to get DOOM at once on a system that expected no more than 175 users at a time. The administrator rebooted it; it crashed again. They would have a hard go of things at the modest small-town university for quite some time to come.

Legend had it that when Don Woods first uploaded his and Will Crowthers’s game Adventure in 1977, all work in the field of data processing stopped for a week while everyone tried to solve it. Now, not quite seventeen years later, something similar happened in the case of DOOM, arguably the most culturally important computer game to appear since Adventure. The id boys had joked in an early press release that they expected DOOM to become “the number-one cause of decreased productivity in businesses around the world.” Even they were surprised by the extent to which that prediction came true.

Network administrators all over the world had to contend with this new phenomenon known as deathmatch. John Carmack had had no experience with network programming before DOOM, and in his naïveté had used a transmission method known as a broadcast package that forced every computer on the network, whether it was running DOOM or not, to stop and analyze every packet which every DOOM-playing computer generated. As reports of the chaos that resulted poured in, Carmack scrambled to code an update which would use machine-to-machine packets instead.

In the meantime, DOOM brought entire information-technology infrastructures to their knees. Intel banned the game; high-school and university computers labs hardly knew what had hit them. A sign posted at Carnegie-Mellon University before the day of release was even over was typical: “Since today’s release of DOOM, we have discovered [that the game is] bringing the campus network to a halt. Computing Services asks that all DOOM players please do not play DOOM in network mode. Use of DOOM in network mode causes serious degradation of performance for the players’ network, and during this time of finals network use is already at its peak. We may be forced to disconnect the PCs of those who are playing the game in network mode. Again, please do not play DOOM in network mode.” One clever system administrator at the University of Louisville created a program to search the hard drives of all machines on the network for the game, and delete it wherever it was found. All to no avail: DOOM was unstoppable.

But in these final months of the mostly-unconnected era of of personal computing — the World Wide Web would begin to hit big over the course of 1994 — a game still needed to reach those without modems or network cards in their computers in order to become a hit on the scale that id envisioned for DOOM. Jay Wilbur, displaying a wily marketing genius that went Scott Miller one better, decided that absolutely everyone should be allowed to distribute the first episode of DOOM on disk, charging whatever they could get for it: “We don’t care if you make money off this shareware demo. Move it! Move it in mass quantities.” For distribution, Wilbur realized, was the key to success. There are many ways to frame the story of DOOM, but certainly one of them is a story of guerrilla marketing at its finest.

The free episode of DOOM appeared in stores under many different imprints, but most, like this Australian edition, used the iconic cover id themselves provided. John Romero claims that he served as the artist’s model for the image.

The incentives for distribution were massive. If a little mom-and-pop operation in, say, far-off Australia could become the first to stick that episode onto disks, stick those disks in a box, and get the box onto store shelves, they could make a killing, free and clear. DOOM became omnipresent, inescapable all over the world. When you logged into CompuServe, there was DOOM; when you wandered into your local software store, there was DOOM again, possibly in several different forms of packaging; when you popped in the disk or CD that came with your favorite gaming magazine, there it was yet again. The traditional industry was utterly gobsmacked by this virulent upstart of a game.

As with Wolfenstein 3D, a large majority of the people who acquired the first episode of DOOM in one way or another were perfectly satisfied with its eight big levels and unlimited deathmatch play; plenty of others doubtless never bothered to read the fine print, never even realized that more DOOM was on offer if they called 1-800-IDGAMES with their credit card in hand. And then, of course, there was the ever-present specter of piracy; nothing whatsoever stopped buyers of the paid episodes from sharing them with all of their DOOM-loving friends. By some estimates, the conversion rate from the free to the paid episodes was as low as 1 percent. Nevertheless, it was enough to make the id boys very, very rich.

Sometimes $100,000 worth of orders would roll in on a single day. John Carmack and John Romero each went out and bought a new Ferrari Testarossa; now it was the turn of Scott Miller and George Broussard to look on the id boys’ cars with envy. Glossy magazines, newspapers, and television news programs all begged to visit the id offices, where they wondered over the cars in the parking lot and the unkempt young men inside screaming the most horrid scatological and sexual insults at one another as they played deathmatch. If nothing else, the id boys were certainly a colorful story.

The id boys’ cars got almost as much magazine coverage as their games. Here we see John Carmack with his Ferrari, which he had modified to produce 800 horsepower: “I want dangerous acceleration.”

Indeed, the id story is as close as gaming ever came to fulfilling one of its most longstanding dreams: that of game developers as rock stars, as first articulated by Trip Hawkins in 1983 upon his founding of Electronic Arts. Yet if Hawkins’s initial stable of developers, so carefully posed in black and white in EA’s iconic early advertisements, resembled an artsy post-punk band — the interactive version of Talking Heads — the id boys were meat-and-potatoes heavy metal for the masses — Metallica at their Black Album peak. John Romero, the id boy who most looked the part of rock star, particularly reveled in the odd sort of obsequious hero worship that marks certain corners of gamer culture. He almost visibly swelled with pride every time a group of his minions started chanting “We’re not worthy!” and literally bowed down in his presence, and wore his “DOOM: Wrote It!” tee-shirt until the print peeled off.

The impact DOOM was having on the industry had become undeniable by the time of the Summer Consumer Electronics Show in June of 1994. Here everyone seemed to want in on id’s action. The phrase “first-person shooter” had yet to be invented, so the many soon-to-be-released games of the type were commonly referred to as “DOOM clones” — or, as Computer Gaming World preferred, “DOOM toos.” The same magazine, still seeming just a trifle ambivalent about it all, called it the “3D action fad.” But this was no fad; these games were here to stay. The boxed publishers who had scoffed at the shareware scene a year or two before were now all scrambling to follow id’ lead. LucasArts previewed a DOOM clone set in the Star Wars universe; SSI, looking for a new lease on life after losing their coveted Dungeons & Dragons license, had multiple games of the type, including one using a rented version of id’s own technology.

And then, inevitably, there was id’s own DOOM II: Hell on Earth. As a piece of game design, it evinced no sign of the dreaded sophomore slump that afflicts so many rock groups — this even though it used the exact same engine as its predecessor, and even though John Romero, id’s rock-star-in-chief, was increasingly busy with extracurriculars and contributed only a handful of levels. His slack was largely taken up one American McGee, the latest scruffy rebel to join the id boys, a 21-year-old former auto mechanic who had suffered through an even more hardscrabble upbringing than the two Johns. After beginning at id as a tester, he had gradually revealed an uncanny talent for making levels that combined the intricacy of Sandy Petersen’s with the gung-ho flair of John Romero’s. Now, he joined Petersen and, more intermittently, Romero to create a game that was if anything even more devious than its predecessor. The id boys had grown cockier than ever, but they could still back it up.

John Romero in 1994, doing something the other id boys wished he would do a bit more of: making a level for DOOM II.

They were approached by a New York City wheeler-and-dealer named Ron Chaimowitz who wanted to publish DOOM II exclusively to retail. He had never had anything to do with computer games before; he had made his name in the music industry, where he had broken big acts like Gloria Estefan and Julio Iglesias, then moved on to publish Jane Fonda’s workout videos through his company GoodTimes Entertainment. But he had distribution connections — and, as Jay Wilbur has so recently proved, distribution often means everything. GoodTimes sold millions of videotapes through Wal-Mart, the exploding epicenter of heartland retail, and Chaimowitz promised that his new software label would be able to leverage those connections. He further promised to spend $2 million on advertising. He would prove as good as his word in both respects. Chaimowitz’s new software label, which he named GT Interactive, manufactured an extraordinary 600,000 copies of DOOM II prior to its release, marking by far the largest initial production run in the history of computer gaming to date.

In marked contrast to the simple uploading of the first episode of the original DOOM, DOOM II was launched with all the pomp and circumstance that $2 million could provide. A party to commemorate the event took place on October 10, 1994, at a hip Gothic night club in New York City which had been re-decorated in a predictably gory manner. The party even came complete with protesters against the game’s violence, to add that delicious note of controversy that any group of rock stars worth their salt requires.

At the party, a fellow named Bob Huntley, owner of a small Houston software company, foisted a disk on John Romero containing “The Dial-Up Wide-Area Network Games Operation,” or “DWANGO.” Using it, you could dial into Huntley’s Houston server at any time to play a pick-up game of DOOM deathmatch with a stranger who might happen to be on the other side of the world. Romero expressed his love for the concept in his trademark profane logorrhea: “I like staying up late and I want to play people whenever the fuck I want to and I don’t want to have to wake up my buddy at three in the morning and go, ‘Hey, uh, you wanna get your skull cracked?’ This is the thing that you can dial into and just play!” He convinced the other id boys to give DWANGO their official endorsement, and the service went live within weeks. For just $8.96 per month, you could now deathmatch any time you wanted. And thus another indelible piece of modern gaming culture, as well as a milestone in the cultural history of the Internet, fell into place.

DOOM was becoming not just a way of gaming but a way of life, one that left little space in the hearts of its most committed adherents for anything else. Some say that gaming became better after DOOM, some that it became worse. One thing that everyone can agree on, however, is that it changed; it’s by no means unreasonable to divide the entire history of computer gaming into pre-DOOM and post-DOOM eras. Next time, then, in the concluding article of this series, we’ll do our best to come to terms with that seismic shift.

(Sources: the books Masters of Doom by David Kushner, Game Engine Black Book: Wolfenstein 3D and Game Engine Black Book: DOOM by Fabien Sanglard, and Principles of Three-Dimensional Computer Animation by Michael O’Rourke; Retro Gamer 75; Game Developer premiere issue and issues of June 1994 and February/March 1995; Computer Gaming World of July 1993, March 1994, July 1994, August 1994, September 1994. Online sources include “Apogee: Where Wolfenstein Got Its Start” by Chris Plante at Polygon, “Rocket Jump: Quake and the Golden Era of First-Person Shooters” by David L. Craddock at Shack News, Benj Edwards’s interview with Scott Miller for Gamasutra, Jeremy Peels’s interview with John Romero for PC Games N, and Jay Wilbur’s old Usenet posts, which can now be accessed via Google Groups. And a special thanks to Alex Sarosi, better known in our comment threads as Lt. Nitpicker, for pointing out to me out how important Jay Wilbur’s anything-goes approach to distribution of the free episode of DOOM was to the game’s success.

The original Doom episodes and Doom II are available as digital purchases on GOG.com.)

source http://reposts.ciathyza.com/the-shareware-scene-part-4-doom/

[ephillipsresearch]

Making Places out of Non-Places

Emma Phillips

                      Upon entering the north end of Stevenage town onto Hitchin Road, drivers are greeted by a large Sainsbury’s car park to the right, Lister hospital on the left, and in between, the familiar brown road sign reading ‘tourist attractions’- defaced with a great sarcastic question mark. This seems a fitting analogy for the struggle in many of London’s satellite towns to create a strong sense of identity in a space with no previous historical or cultural foundations, and the resulting disillusionment of their communities.  Existing self-contained commuter towns and many of the first generation New Towns are comparable to Marc Augé’s definition of ‘non-places’ for their sterile lack of character, their artifice, the strange anonymity of their dwellers and a general sense of ‘inbetween-ess’. Our fear of the non-place is evident in the scorn of these areas which, in their own emptiness, add little to our sense of self; a sentiment most keenly demonstrated in Tracey Thorn’s Another Planet: A Teenager in Suburbia, which questions how her own identity as a musician was influenced (or stifled) by her ‘subtopian’ upbringing. The question of our relationship to the land is also a focus for MK Gallery’s latest exhibition The Lie of the Land, which further addresses the pursuit of transforming non-places into places by spotlighting the development of Milton Keynes as a solution to the failures of the earlier New Towns, with its architectural innovation and engineering approach to urban planning.  

In his book Non Places: Introduction to an Anthropology of Supermodernity, Marc Augé describes the non place as ‘a space which cannot be defined as relational, historical, or concerned with identity’1, and as such the user of the non place enters a contractual relationship where they must ‘for a time, have only to keep in line, go where they are told, check their appearance’2, as the temporarily anonymous passenger, customer, or Sunday driver.  It is a more abstract space, ‘a distance between two things, a temporal expanse’3. There are many parallels throughout this text to Thorns own description of suburbia in ‘another planet’: the ‘contingent, liminal border territory, In- betweenland’4 of Brookmans Park.  Augé’s description of the practical requirements of inhabiting a non-place become the very rules that Thorn must abide by growing up. The temporary anonymity which may be liberating for a short time becomes permanent and suffocating. ‘What should be aimed for was anonymity... in the hope that such quietness would be quietly acknowledged and rewarded... security and safety were the reward of dullness.’5 Unlike many older British towns structured around specific industries or historical landmarks, the new towns and outer London suburbs were built to relieve crowding in war torn London, promoted to young families for their clean air, open green space and comfortable housing. This was a welcome escape for families living in cramped, polluted conditions. However, fifty years on, many of these towns have served their purpose and now begin to stagnate, with no strong sense of place or identity to satisfy modern residents.  Instead their self sufficiency, uniformity, and low density modernist housing bred isolation among their people, as one man from Hemel Hempstead complains in the 1959 Spectator ‘There is no imagination or planning behind the layout of the community... the community resembles a modern chicken farm, every chicken alone in its identical box.’6 Though some of these towns have since matured and began to establish themselves with time, many remain bleak and uninspiring. Ageing Brutalist architecture looms grey and dreary over empty out-of-date town centres, any semblance of utopia having vanished completely.

Despite this harsh depiction, there is evidence to suggest that such places are in fact the perfect breeding ground for creativity to flourish. Thorn refers to her hometown as ‘a stage set dropped onto an empty landscape’7 – The non-place suburban town has potential to act as a blank canvas for the imagination. Thomas Demand demonstrates this in his 1989 film ‘Tunnel’8, following a repeated journey through an urban underpass. Though it appears realistic, the scene is entirely artificial, constructed with ephemeral materials and computer generated traffic sounds.  Familiar to all, but void of any figures or defining characteristics, the scene becomes an empty stage upon which audiences are invited to project their own stories. Here the viewer engages in making place out of a non-place.  Given Augé’s definition of place as ‘frequented place’, we must assume that notions of place may always be subjective, and that place and non- place can never be mutually exclusive, often overlapping. In his photographic series ‘Urban Goals’, Micheal Kirkham9 documents commercial buildings and brick walls  transformed into makeshift goal posts by working class communities, revealing the creativity of locals to work around the lack of community resources and investment. This can be seen as an act of creating place with non-place, but is recognised only by its creators, remaining non-place to the casual passerby.

Indeed the suburban setting is one favoured by authors and screenwriters as the ideal backdrop for the horror and fantasy genres. Their eerie sense of artifice, secrecy, and exaggerated utopian associations provide ‘ideas to reject, something to kick against, a reason to rebel.10’ Blue Velvet, Edward Scissorhands, Harry Potter and more recently, Stranger Things, have all used the quintessential suburban town as an initial setting for the fantastic and strange, creating a perfect juxtaposition.  Tim Burton himself talks of growing up in the suburbs of Burbank California, ‘ there’s no sense of history, no sense of culture, no sense of passion for anything...you were either forced to conform and cut out a large portion of your personality, or to develop a very strong interior life which made you feel separate.’11 The values of uniformity and homogeny being so deep rooted in these towns is just as evident in the behaviour of their inhabitants as is in their architecture, leaving those who choose to deviate from the small town norm feeling isolated and ostracised , attracting disapproval and even violence from their communities. This is perhaps a result of the development corporation’s failure to create mixed and balanced communities, attracting mainly young white working class families. Thorn touches on this throughout her book as her interest in the punk aesthetic creates tension in the family, and she seems ever to be battling an inner conflict between fitting in and asserting her creative identity. Stephen Willats emphasises this sense of seclusion in his 1984 photographic series ‘Tower Block Portraits’12, revealing the profound isolation of those living in East London apartment blocks. The grey uniformity of the buildings disguises the eclectic variety of people within. Working as a civil servant by day and frequenting anarchist clubs at night, one woman describes herself as a ‘doppelganger’, demonstrating the double lives we lead where creativity and rebellion must be kept to the home. Though the variety of city life can be more forgiving, these apartments act both as a prison and a retreat, an important place for creativity to take place, but confined within concrete boundaries. The suburban setting can be both a stifling and motivational place for creation; though standing out often comes at a cost.

The discontent of residents living in many of the first generation new towns gave the Milton Keynes Development Corporation an opportunity to build a unique town that could serve as a modern solution to some of these problems. There was much anxiety among the working classes about moving to new towns, particularly within the mining villages where there was a strong sense of shared identity which would be difficult to recreate  - many saw moving to the these towns as the death of their communities and the ‘embourgeoisement’ of the urban working class.  In his forthcoming film, New Town Utopia, Christopher Smith criticizes the earlier towns for their rushed, careless planning by upper class men who failed to understand the needs of the working classes. The founding principles of collective action and the importance of local community in towns like Stevenage have eroded over time, particular with the increasing lack of government investment in these areas, leading to rising youth crime and greater numbers of workers commuting to London, as new generations grow up dissatisfied and alienated from their homes. The Milton Keynes development cooperation aimed to address many of these failures in building a ‘municipal utopia’, committed to the public good.  Inspired by the ‘community without propinquity’13 values of urban designer Melvin Webber, with planning focused more on technology, connectivity and transportation,  carried out by experienced architects rather than just property developers. The result was a de-centralised grid system catering for greater car use, less localised and more flexible communications, and post- modern architecture. The town was initially to be centred around its potential for leisure, with a ‘techno- bucolic’ vision of living. Towards to the end of the decade however the dawn of Thatcherism and the end of the welfare state called for a more practical approach focused on production and a greater balance of work and leisure. The town today consists of wide open spaces mimicking Victorian pleasure gardens, pedestrian friendly streets, and widespread public art. The Lie of the Land exhibition reveals some of these more fanciful plans for Milton Keynes that never materialised , such as Andrew Mahaddie’s ‘Cowcommon Canyon’ theme park featuring a 3D moving ‘electric maze’, Joan Littlewood’s ‘Fun Palace’ and the ‘City Club’ leisure complex which was to include a wave pool and rodeo. Though these plans were never realised due to lack of funding, they demonstrate the incredible innovation and creativity of town planners who were keen to build something much more monumental than the non place towns that came before them. This is honoured by artists Gareth Joan’s and Nils Norman’s City Club project, which aims to embed contemporary art within Milton Keynes, exploring public space, modernism and social design through public art projects that spotlight the towns design history.14 This is just one example of the ways in which Milton Keynes has successfully instilled a sense of pride and place among its communities by promoting cultural activity. Despite its successes the ageing Milton Keynes is not devoid of criticism -  its car- central grid system may now be said to be unsustainable, much of the housing is in desperate need of renovation whilst cramped new estates built by private property developers threaten the high quality open spaces for which the town is praised.  In the face of the housing crisis however the success of Milton Keynes has set an example for the renewed potential of government funded New Towns and still attracts city planners from across the world today for its architectural legacy. Having learned from the failures of previous new towns and garden cities, Milton Keynes dared to be different and has subsequently come to be considered an important heritage site.  

       1Augé M, (1992) Non Places: Introduction to an Anthropology of Supermodernity, Verso Books, pp.63

2Augé M, (1992) Non Places: Introduction to an Anthropology of Supermodernity, Verso Books, pp.81

3Augé M, (1992) Non Places: Introduction to an Anthropology of Supermodernity, Verso Books, pp.67

4Thorn T, (2019) Another Planet: A Teenager in Suburbia, Canongate Books Ltd, pp.3

5Thorn T (2019) Another Planet: A Teenager in Suburbia, Canongate Books Ltd, pp.25

6Clapson M, (2017) The English New Towns since 1946: What are the Lessons of their History for their Future?, Urban History, French Society of Urban History, pp. 93-111  Available at: https://www.cairn.info/revue-histoire-urbaine-2017-3-page-93.htm

7Thorn T, (2019) Another Planet: A Teenager in Suburbia, Canongate Books Ltd, pp.13

8Demand T, (1989) Tunnel [16mm colour film], London: Tate Britain

9Kirkham M (2015-18) Urban Goals [photography] Milton Keynes: MK Gallery

10Thorn T, (2019) Another Planet: A Teenager in Suburbia, Canongate Books Ltd, pp.27

11 Wisniewska D (2012) The American Psycho(sis) Goes Suburbia. Madness, Depravity, and Gender in Domestic Topographies, [pdf] Poland, University of Łódź, pp.67, Available at: https://revistas.ucm.es/index.php/INFE/article/download/41136/39348

12Willats S (1984) Tower Block Portraits [photography, collage] Milton Keynes: MK Gallery

13Teitz M (2007) Melvin Webber and the Nonplace Urban Realm, Access, Available at: https://www.accessmagazine.org/special-issue/melvin-webber-and-the-nonplace-urban-realm/

14Emerson T (2019) The Lie of the Land, MK Gallery, pp.147

Where we Live Now: Home Town New Town (1979) [Film] BBC, David Haycock

Dodd C, (2018) Endeavours of Simple Altruism [blog] An Age of Nothing, Available at: https://anageofnothing.tumblr.com/essays

Barkham P (2016) Story of Cities #34: The Struggle for the Soul of Milton Keynes, The Guardian, Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2016/may/03/struggle-for-the-soul-of-milton-keynes

[lxxmiere]

Under Water

this is an original piece i wrote three years ago and recently began work-shopping again whilst playing around with an essay format. tw for mentions of death/fear of dying so if you’re uncomfortable with that then please don’t read!!

Everything feels distant, like you’re completely separated from the reality that continues on as normal around you – it appears distorted through the water that clouds your vision, but you can make out the misshapen silhouettes of all the people surrounding you, and the bright light through the blue hue of the water. It feels distinctly like you’re floating freely in your own personal space, completely detached from everyone and everything, almost as though the single cord that kept you grounded has snapped. The sounds which were once deafening are now muffled, and when you finally open your eyes all you can see is a sea of blue. The shrieks of laughter from the children which populate the pool are dull and almost non-existent. For a moment, it’s peaceful.

The moment is fleeting. Panic hits you in overwhelming waves, like an iron grip latching onto your stomach like a vice, pulling it down towards the tiled floor. Your heart is hammering against your ribcage to a beat that is both foreign and strange. Another wave of panic hits you, a debilitating one, and you desperately to push yourself up through the vast body of water – just to reach the surface – but it only seems to get further away. You begin to doubt you’ll ever get there. A finish line that you’ll never cross.

The sheer levels of panic that consumed me in that moment felt out of place - children were playing in the water that surrounded me, joy evident on every inch of their youthful faces, floating serenely and splashing mini tidal waves in the direction of their parents. Their yelps of laughter echoed, travelling in every direction. This experience seemed to hit me like a freight train at full speed, the prospect of death lying in its wake. I realise that this initial reaction, this overwhelming and all-consuming panic was automatic when the possibility of death loomed so eerily overhead. It’s human, like the response itself is somehow encoded in our genetic makeup, identical in each and every person. I can see very clearly how my fear of death stemmed from this moment, the fear of dissolving into nothingness, of having life snatched away so easily. It had never found its way into my thoughts until the moment it barged in, completely unannounced. Death instilled nothing but fear in me from the second its presence intruded in my life. There was nothing I could have done to fight off the terror that consumed me in that moment.

It seems impossible to think that mere moments ago, before everything had been completely normal. I had splashed around in the depths of the pool with my friend, brimming with joy and feeling fully content. The atmosphere around me left me feeling completely at ease, surrounded by laughter and bliss. It left me completely unsuspecting to the horror that followed.

Mere seconds pass in what feels like hours, and you can’t believe you ever thought for one second that anything about this was relaxing. Your head is throbbing so excruciatingly that your entire line of vision seems to jump. Your throat feels like it’s on fire, and despite all the water surrounding you, closing in on you, it just won’t go out. Your limbs feel heavy and begin to ache, exhausted from fighting against the water, frantically throwing punches that don’t land. More time passes. Your head feels like it might explode, and you are so painfully aware of the lack of oxygen in your lungs. Suddenly, exhaustion hits like a ton of bricks and there’s nothing you want more than to give up already. It’s too much, and you can’t possibly go on. And then you think of everything you’d been trying to push to furthermost corner of your mind, every terrible thought you had fought down and tried to suffocate. They all break free at once and it’s enough to make your head spin. Every dreaded ‘what if?’ floods your mind.

What if I can’t get out? What if no one can see me? What if this is where and when I die?

The idea that in a few short moments my life could have ended filled me with a fury akin to nothing I had ever felt before. Finding myself at a fork in the road, where the routes led to either life or death, the decision not entirely mine to make, was something which enraged me. I didn’t want to leave, to figure out what waited beyond death, regardless of whether it was a void or some type of utopian paradise that awaited me. I wasn’t ready. Now, I know that I will never be ready. The idea of entering the unknown, of possibly ceasing to exist in the blink of an eye - it is not something I can even begin to prepare myself for.

It all sounds too surreal. You’ve heard about all the young people taken far too soon; read all the tragic stories in the newspaper. But they aren’t about you. They can’t be. Suddenly, it feels like reality has slapped you across the face. That’s all these people become: stories you’ve heard in passing, known for their death rather than the life they have lived, regardless of how fulfilling it has been. And their names are never remembered, all that amounts to their being is how their story ends. And the possibility that you may join them sends fear to your very core.

In retrospect, perhaps that was what scared me the most. The idea of unfulfilled potential, of every achievement and every aspiration being reduced to nothing. An entire life, a full life, culminating to just a singular moment that ended it all. To being remembered only at the end, being immortalised in those last five minutes which would become my identity. The fear burrows itself deep in my gut, ever present and unnoticed.

That fear is enough to keep you going, because maybe – just maybe – you can get out of this. Adrenaline courses through your veins like never before, and you recognise something that seemed so foreign: hope. Maybe someone will notice you. Maybe you will get out in time. You might just make it.

Now I realise that no amount of desperation could have saved me. I could have begged and cried and prayed to Gods that I don’t believe in, and whatever would have happened to me would still remain out of my hands. I had no say, no impact on my life in the end. Regardless of this, nothing could stop me from just wishing that something would happen - absolutely anything. Bargaining with whoever’s hands my life was in at that very moment, to have some remorse, to let this horrible ordeal be over.

You kick your legs harder and flail your arms with every ounce of energy you have left. You keep going, even when your limbs are burning, screaming out in protest at every individual movement, begging you to stop. You keep going because it’s the only option you have. You feel your energy slowly diminish, but you don’t stop, not even for one second. You can’t. You need them to notice you, to get out of all of this. All the panic is gone, replaced entirely with a new-found desperation- desperation to be noticed. To be saved.

Maybe you’ve been filling yourself with false hope as time goes by and you have progressed no further. It feels like the more time passes, the further away you float from everything. Everyone around you, your hope, your future. You are completely and utterly isolated. No one notices you and you don’t notice them. You hadn’t even thought about the pain, which had increased to a point so unbearable it feels like it will never end – it feels as though fire is coursing through your veins, burning every inch of your skin, and your bones are made of lead, weighing you down. You're not even sure if you're scared - the exhaustion seems to be swallowing you whole and the only emotion you can fully register is how eerily calm you are. Disoriented, perhaps, but most of all you're completely calm floating amongst the nothingness. It's almost peaceful again. You're so close to accepting everything that's happening when you feel something wrap around your waist and pull you up. Light bursts through the sea of blue as you finally make it to the surface and engulfs everything in your line of vision. You swallow the air in gulps, and your starved lungs stop screaming. You can finally breathe.

After that, everything is a blur. There’s a lifeguard who appears to be talking to you, but it’s entirely indistinguishable. There’s a room with a comfy chair in a corner, where you are finally able to rest your tired legs as they fire question after question at you, and all you can do is force replies out of your raw throat as you shiver, water still trickling down your back. Everything about the situation is overwhelming- the brightness of the lights, the sharp tone in everyone’s voice, the panic on people’s faces.

And just like that, it’s over. Every worry I ever had is now irrelevant. I realize that now. Looking back, the fears that I didn’t even know existed until that moment are ridiculous. I am more than simply what I leave behind. I am still here, still fighting and still determined. And everything is just as I left it. Comforting, welcoming me with open arms that I accept with no hesitation now that I’m finally home.

Acceptance. That is what each second amounted to in the end. I recognise that nothing - my pleas, my anger, my fear - had any impact on the final outcome, whether I lived or died. Despite fighting up until the last second, it is always waiting, that death can’t be eluded. I came to the realisation, the acknowledgement, that there is no defeating death, not really. I didn’t escape it, but merely evaded it for a time. No matter what I do, it will always be there, looming in the background and waiting for the perfect time to intrude once more. Waiting, always waiting.

[corruptionchronicle]

The Tulsa Race Riot & Massacre Cover Up

  Not many years after 1907 statehood, a race riot in 1921 convulsed Tulsa. The triggering event, inflamed by local newspaper reports, was an accusation that a black man had sexually assaulted a white woman. Racial tensions, abetted by growing Ku Klux Klan activities, had been on the rise for some time. Some commentators have described the riot as one of the nation’s worst. The body count is uncertain but ranges from seventy or eighty to as many as three hundred. A destructive fire raged through the Greenwood District, destroying homes and a prosperous business section. Thousands of blacks were rounded up as “suspects” and jailed, some for a week or so. At the time, many whites reacted with horror. But a veil of denial, created mainly by public officials, descended. 

  History books usually gave this episode only passing mention. Not until the late 1990s was the riot reexamined and made the subject of the Tulsa Race Riot Commission that undertook further inquiry, including consideration of possible reparations. Whatever else might be said, the veil of denial had been lifted.

THE TULSA RACE RIOT OF 1921

BY I. MARC CARLSON

This paper is a discussion about the Tulsa Race Riot that occurred in 1921, and presents an argument that suggests that the Riot was not one event, but rather two separate, but linked events, each with their own separate set of causes.

Written to fulfill course requirements for a Bachelors Degree in History at Oklahoma State University; 1 January 1989 (HTMLized 1 February 1999)

The original copy of this paper is housed in the Special Collections department at McFarlin Library, University of Tulsa.

The Tulsa Race Riot of 1921 is a little-known and somewhat misunderstood event in the history of the United States. It is generally considered, on those rare occasions it is discussed, to have been an isolated event in Tulsa’s past that resulted in death and considerable destruction. The theories about what happened and why are divers and often conflicting. With the paucity of information available, it is difficult to determine absolutely the course of events. Enough evidence exists, however, to justify the drawing of certain limited conclusions.The conclusions presented in this paper stem from a view the Tulsa Race Riot, not as a single occurrence, but as two separate but linked events. Each event evolved from separate sets of causes. Each set of causes originated in the social context that existed prior to the events. It should be possible to determine some of these causes and from there interpolate other logical causes.In the years bridging the second and third decades of the twentieth century, episodes of racial tension and violence were frequent. In July of 1917, East St. Louis, Illinois erupted into a bloody battle between blacks and whites after an aluminum plant began to hire black workers to break a strike. Three hundred people were killed, and hundreds were injured.1 In August of the same year, more than one hundred black soldiers of the 3d Battalion, 24th Infantry Regiment stationed in Houston, Texas mutinied against their officers. The mutineers seized arms and ammunition and engaged in a three hour riot. This riot was in protest to the abuses that local white civilians had perpetrated against the soldiers and the lack of concern about those abuses shown by the unit’s commanders.2 As a final example, the Chicago Race Riot in late July, 1919 was based in a long-standing dispute over white-black neighborhood boundaries. A young black male accidentally entered a recreation area that was reserved for whites, triggering this riot that quickly moved beyond this otherwise minor incident and after a week of violence left many dead and wounded.3These are samples of the more striking episodes in an epidemic of racial violence that existed between 1917 and 1922.4 The Tulsa riot was one of the last disturbances of this kind before the Detroit Race Riot in 1942.5Each riot was catalyzed by an incident that seemed important to the instigators, but was often relatively minor when viewed in retrospect. The trigger event only gained importance in conjunction with the ongoing attitudes and already extant tensions. Of primary significance were the causes that had led up to the point of violence. For example, in the Chicago riot the trigger was insignificant, simply a young man in the wrong place at the wrong time, but the potential for violence had been prepared beforehand by years of perceived threats to white neighborhood boundaries by black economic expansion. When that young man entered that area, the seeds of violence that had lain dormant finally sprouted.6The Tulsa riot found its trigger in an elevator mishap and a newspaper article. An article appeared on the first page of the Tuesday, 31 May 1921 Tulsa Tribune headlined “Nab Negro for attacking girl in elevator”, along with an “inflammatory” editorial.7 The article and editorial described an attack by a young black man upon a white woman in a downtown Tulsa office building elevator.8The young woman, Mrs. Sarah Page, filed a complaint against Dick Rowland, the young man, and by the next morning he was in police custody. That afternoon the headline and article appeared. The article’s description of the episode caused tremendous tension throughout both black and white Tulsa.9 Almost immediately talk of lynching Rowland for the assault began to circulate, along with reports that the assault had sexual overtones.10Several black leaders began to organize for the possible necessity of defending Rowland from a lynch mob.11 The police also prepared to repel a possible lynch mob. The chief of police had Rowland transferred to a detention cell in the county jail, on the top floor of the courthouse. The county jail was considered by both the police and sheriff’s department to be easily defendable.12By 7.30 p.m., a crowd of three hundred white curiosity-seekers had formed around the courthouse.13 An hour and a half later, the crowd had swelled to over four hundred.14 After an abortive attempt by three white men to remove Rowland from custody, the sheriff effectively barricaded the prisoner, himself, and his men into the office.15A “company of armed and hostile”16 blacks marched up the street to the jail at 8.00 p.m. They had come to offer their services to the authorities who had Rowland in custody. They wanted to protect him from a lynch mob, such as the one that had hung Roy Belton, a white man, a year earlier.17 The sheriff and one of his black deputies convinced the men that they were not required and should return home quietly. The blacks left.18The white crowd was still growing an hour later19 when several carloads of armed blacks arrived at the courthouse. Approximately seventy-five men got out of the cars.20 Their arrival sparked a great deal of shouting, harsh words and insults between the crowds of whites and the blacks.21The Tulsa National Guard command communicated with higher headquarters at 10.15 p.m., in order to keep those up the chain of command abreast of the disturbance. General Charles F. Barrett, the National Guard Adjutant General, who was in constant communication with both the Tulsa unit and the Governor, told the unit’s officers that they should mobilize only to guard the armory, and that they were to assist the civil authorities if necessary. The Governor was the only person who could mobilize the unit, and he could not officially do so unless the civil authorities felt that they were no longer able to control the situation.22At 10.30 p.m., encounters took place between individual whites and groups of armed blacks near the railroad tracks.23 At the courthouse no violence had as yet occurred.The ‘spark’ that touched off the riot was an incident between a white deputy and an armed black man outside the courthouse. The deputy was attempting to disarm one of the blacks when the gun for which they were wrestling discharged.24The crowd panicked and split into several confused groups. The armed blacks and the police began firing, first into the air, then eventually into the crowds and at each other. The police, quickly joined by the few armed whites, drove the blacks north. Many of the unarmed whites, led by a few police officers, broke into pawn shops and hardware stores searching for weapons and ammunition.25The battle rushed north, dividing along several of the main streets until it reached First Street. There the blacks drew, and for a short time held, a battle-line. The line broke after an hour and a half of shooting and the blacks fell back a block north to the railroad tracks. A line of black snipers formed at the tracks to prevent the white rioters from entering the black district. The blacks held back the whites across a “no man’s land” of gravel and steel.26Shortly after midnight, the whites attempted to burn down the buildings protecting the black snipers. This arson, however, had no strategic result at the time.27Between 12.30 and 2.30 a.m., the battleground fell relatively silent, disturbed only by the occasional, sporadic gunfire from one side or another.28 No record exists of any moves made, by either side, to establish mutual, peaceful communication.It is this period that defines the division of the riot into two separate events. Before this period of relative calm, the riot was an armed brawl. After this point, the hostilities assume the guise of organized urban warfare. The riot shifted emphasis, and became two separate events.It is possible that, during this two-hour lull, the authorities could have put an end to the riot, had they taken any form of calm and decisive action directed towards that goal. The decisive actions that they did take only nurtured the violence. These actions included establishing and overseeing the arming of a small army of “Special Deputies”, mostly volunteers from the white rioters.29Serious confusion existed, and still exists, as to who was actually in charge. There was a division between a minority of police officers and sheriff’s deputies who were trying to maintain the peace, and those who were leading the special deputies.30 No actions were taken against armed whites violating the law, while all blacks caught on the streets were arrested. The only preparations that were made by the whites were those done to put down and contain the blacks.31At roughly 2.30 a.m., the battle increased in intensity as the whites tried to weaken the black’s defenses and push across the railyard. They were pushed back by the black defenders who were now joined by other blacks coming to defend their homes from an invasion of their district by the whites.32It is impossible to establish an accurate timetable of the next morning because of the confusion inherent in the events. At daybreak, the loosely organized army of white rioters entered the black district in two movements. The first movement was a push from the south that came across the railyard, covered by white snipers. According to one witness, there was a machine gun atop the granary tower that covered this southern push as well.33 This push moved through the business district, and into the neighborhood, looting and burning.34 The second front attacked from the north down Standpipe Hill. A machine gun on the hilltop covered this attacking force. This second front ran into, and through, crowds of black refugees who were fleeing from their homes.35 Whites in spotter planes oversaw the entire battle. These planes, with no known official authority, were used to locate pockets of black resistance for the white ground forces.36 Eyewitness reported outrages committed by whites as the white belligerents swept over the district. Most of these reports involved the murder of blacks who had surrendered or were obviously non-hostile or noncombatants.37It can not be supposed that the relative majority of the white population was involved in the invasion, nor even in favor of it. There is a report of a white policeman trying to stop the white invaders at daybreak from crossing the rail-line.38 A National Guard captain was shot while trying to stop the whites atop Standpipe Hill from machine-gunning refugees.39 However, those police trying to protect the black populace were ineffective, and there were other police in apparent collusion with the white looters40 The police slowly brought the surviving black populace into “protective custody.”41At 8.00 a.m., National Guard troops, under General Barrett, arrived from Oklahoma City42 What they did between that time and 11.29 a.m.,43 when General Barrett declared martial law, is not documentable. The fighting came to a stop when martial law was declared. The black district, after five to six hours of battle and looting, was a mass of black clouds of smoke rolling above the ruins of thirty-some city blocks of rubble and ashes.44 Conservatively, $1.5 million in real estate, including the black business district once called the “Black Wall Street”,45 had been destroyed.Because very little has been written about the riot, a discussion of the primary authors on the subject is not difficult. Contemporary accounts centered their attention on the beginning of the riot and the armed blacks marching on the courthouse. Thus placing the white segment of the community in the position of defending itself. These accounts, however, tend to ignore the retributive counter-invasion.General Barrett’s history of Oklahoma46, and Colonel Douglas’s history and description of contemporary Tulsa47 typified the official view of the little-discussed riot. Barrett was the Commanding Officer of the National Guard troops that came and restored order. His history makes a concerted effort to keep any apparent bias from damaging his credibility as an historian. Douglas was also present during the events of the riot, although only as an uninvolved observer. He also tries to maintain a clear picture of the events, but is not as successful as Barrett in keeping a bias against the black participants from coloring his narrative.Mary Parrish, a black woman, made a collection of accounts told by survivors, and published these shortly afterwards together with her own experience of the riot. Mrs. Parrish’s account, and the others collected in her book, are from the perspective of blacks who were forced from their homes, usually by heavy fighting nearby. Her sources were people who had lost everything they owned. There is a strong criticism against the initial rioters, both black and white, as well as the white looters. Her book is a major source for the study of the riot, but its contradictions and inconsistencies clearly show the innate difficulties in comparing multiple eyewitness accounts.48A number of firsthand accounts of the events given by blacks who survived the events exist, but none of the accounts are from people who were actually involved in the riot or the battle. Many of their accounts take as fact events that may have well been rumor or conjecture.49Also, few of the firsthand accounts found after the fact show the events from a white perspective. Most whites seemed to be unwilling to talk about the subject, although all of the official documentation that is available is from a white point of view. No one who will admit to having actually been involved have left a firsthand account of either the riot or the destruction of north Tulsa. Witnesses seem unwilling to commit, or possibly incriminate themselves, and so it is difficult to establish firmly what has happened. Much of the primary source material are interviews taken generally from people who were not directly involved in the combat. Even newspapers and the other official sources have trouble corroborating each other on details.The newspaper accounts are an interesting study in themselves. In 1921, the Tulsa Tribune was a newspaper with a strong racist bias, and yellow journalistic tendencies, and thus much of its reporting is suspect. This paper places the blame for the riot squarely on the shoulders of the “Bad Niggers” and their militant activities against the white population.50 The Tulsa World, on the other hand, had a less pronounced editorial viewpoint. On the morning of the riot, the World published five editions as it tried to maintain timeliness in its coverage.51 Copies of the black papers in town from the period are almost impossible to locate, but clippings about the riot and its aftermath have survived that state that the white population and its treatment of the blacks were to blame for the riot, and its aftermath.52Official documentation for the riot is even more difficult to find than black newspapers. Many of the police and court records are missing or unavailable. The report made by the grand jury, which had been convened by the governor to investigate the riot, placed the blame for the rioting on the black militants, an ineffective police department, the inflammatory reporting by an unnamed newspaper, and a laxity in segregation that led to unnecessary mixing of the races.53 The reports made by the Red Cross during the weeks after the riot list some important figures on damage and number of people treated for injuries, but shed no light on any details such as names or even give a death toll.54As the years progressed, public feeling about the riot seems to have changed. Loren L. Gill’s master’s thesis, although written twenty-five years after the riot, could easily be placed with the contemporary accounts, as much of his information is from eyewitness sources, as well as the sparse official record. This thesis was the first real historical study on the subject. Gill tends to blame black agitators for actually starting the riot. He feels, however, that they may have had reason for doing so.55The next interpretation of the event was not made until 1971. It was initially written as a newspaper article noting the fiftieth anniversary of the riot. Written by Ed Wheeler, this article’s Change in perspective clearly indicates that perception of the riot had changed, possibly as a result of the Civil Rights movement of the 50s and 60s.56 Wheeler presents a view of the riot that stresses white culpability. His account is relatively impartial until he begins to discuss the aftermath of the riot. He is the first writer to speculate on a “cover-up” after the events based on the lack of information that is available. As his work progresses Wheeler becomes more interested in the “conspiracy of silence” that he sees in the riot’s aftermath than he is in the riot itself.57R. Halliburton published his article, “The Tulsa Race War of 1921”, in the Journal of Black Studies shortly after Wheeler’s article saw print. Halliburton presents the view that the riot and ensuing destruction were an assault led by a white element against a peaceful and affluent black district. Halliburton, in his article, as well as in his later book of the same name, paints a portrait of complete white guilt.58Finally, Scott Ellsworth published in 1982 what may well be the most influential work on this subject, Death in a Promised Land. Ellsworth’s work is basically fair to both sides; however, he still writes from the view that the whole sequence of events of the riot were primarily the fault of white Tulsa. Ellsworth carefully draws a valid portrait of an economically successful black section of Tulsa. Ellsworth centers the blame for the riot on the inability of the white population to accept the economic successes of “one of the finest black commercial districts in the entire southwest.” He also contends that the Ku Klux Klan had a great influence on the events.59In examining the events of 31 May-1 June 1921 it is interesting to note that the that ideas most commonly held about the riot by the public are those that have little, if any, documentable basis. For example, Wheeler continually emphasizes the missing information, and while that lack of information appears to support his claims of a “conspiracy”, it is speculation. Similar ideas appear repeatedly through out the literature and in interviews, but are still speculative in nature.60The events that can be documented as occurring reveal glimpses into the origins of the riot and destruction. In tracing those origins, the theory that the riot and the destruction were two different, but related, incidents becomes apparent. An examination of those pressures and of the causes of race riots will show that if fault must be established that each of these events was caused by a relatively small segment of the two segregated populations, which were reacting to social pressures that were consistent with the times.In 1921, no one made any studies of the actual causes of racial disturbances. This type of study was not really begun until the causes of the race riots in the late 1960s were sought for, in the hope of avoiding their reccurance.61 The studies of those later riots are useful when looking at the riot of Tulsa.There is no such thing as a “typical” riot.62 The riot of Tulsa in 1921 differed in many respects from the riots of forty-five years later. Many of those later riots focused against the symbols of white authority, but not against whites specifically. These riots were of a racial nature, not an interracial one.63 In 1921, however, the blacks were not rioting against the de jure white establishment, per se, but rather against the de facto white power structure inherent in the mob violence. When the armed blacks marched on the courthouse in Tulsa they desired to support the legitimate white power structure. This power structure had shown itself, via the Belton incident, to be incapable of self-defense.The problems expressed in 1921 were similar in nature to those expressed in the late sixties. The blacks in the sixties voiced complaints about discrimination in employment, underemployment, inadequate housing and municipal services, discriminatory police practices and administration of justice, an ineffective political structure with little or no mechanism for grievance relief, and the attitude of whites in general towards blacks.64 These charges are also valid for the riot in 1921 Tulsa.In the history of racial relations, the role of the black has been traditionally one of lower status. Discrimination has, through limiting growth possibilities and inhibiting prospects for advancement, kept this status quo.65 This was true in Tulsa, as it was throughout the United States in 1921.Although blacks occupied most fields of employment, they were generally barred from many of the higher status positions.66 Those blacks who bypassed the social barriers, such as doctors, lawyers, and shopkeepers, found themselves forced to offer their services to only other blacks.67 This type of business segregation was more extreme than in Tulsa than in many other places. Tulsa supported its own black business district, two high schools, a hospital, a library, and a movie theatre.68 The urban growth and prosperity of the city had trickled down to the blacks, and although they were in a less favorable position than their white neighbors, they held a higher level of prosperity than that of blacks in many other cities. This level of prosperity was in particular contrast to the rest of Oklahoma, which relied on sharecropping as the primary form of black labor and farm management.69Many blacks were tiring of the low status position that they held in American society. These people were desirous of, if not total equality, at least social acceptance by the white segment of the community. Booker T. Washington had taught for many years that accommodation to the white position was the best idea. Only after each black person developed his own abilities until his own self-esteem had been improved would white society grant the black populace desired respect. Washington felt that no one would respect someone who did not fully respect himself.70Many blacks felt Washington’s way was no longer an acceptable alternative. Among these people was the black activist W.E.B. DuBois. DuBois advocated a more direct approach. He felt that agitation and political activity, particularly through the N.A.A.C.P., an organization made up of both blacks and whites, was the only way to gain social acceptance.71The African Blood Brotherhood had another view, a view that seemed to build upon DuBois’ arguments. The A.B.B. was a self-admittedly socialist, “secret”, organization whose ultimate goa1 was the unification of all black organizations under one central committee. The committee to be made up of the leaders of those organizations under its suzerainty.72 If it took militant activism to achieve that goal, then that would be done.A chapter of the A.B.B. had been founded in Tulsa shortly before the riot, and, also, there had long been a chapter in Tulsa of another socialist organization, the Industrial Workers of the World. Previous encounters with the I.W.W. and a white K.K.K.-like group called the Knights of Liberty had at least once before resulted in a riot and lynchings.73The blacks in American society found themselves trapped. The harsh treatment by the whites caused frustration, leading the blacks to express a desire for a change. That desire to alter the status quo was, in turn, causing the situation to worsen.74This was the general situation in Tulsa in 1921. The already frustrating situation grew even worse. 1920 was a bad year for crops. The black sharecroppers had lived at a subsistence level before the crop failure. Now many found themselves forced off their farms, and eventually gravitated to Tulsa looking for work. In Tulsa, these itinerates only increased the black population without contributing to the economy with either their money or their labor, as there were few, if any, jobs to be had. The black community, segregated into a strictly defined ghetto, was forced to try to deal with this overcrowding in a district that the city government was not willing to assist. The city had not even built sewers into much of the district before the overcrowding, and as the situation worsened, there was little help from the city.75Then, in early 1921, the price of oil dropped suddenly to $1.00 per barrel of crude from nearly $3.00 a barrel.76 Without any warning white workers, previously employed in the oil fields, were placed in direct competition with blacks, particularly the dispossessed sharecroppers, for the few remaining jobs. This economic fluctuation did not strike everyone in Tulsa, but in a community whose economic foundation was the price of oil, nearly everyone felt some of the tension.With the high level of unemployment, the crime rate also rose.77 The police department applied pressure, first on the criminal class, much of whom existed on the border between black and white Tulsa. The police then spread their pressure gradually into the entire black community.  The police had been warned of the possibility of a riot months before it occurred.78 However, the civil authorities had either been totally unconcerned about the problem, or else unable to understand what was happening.79 Early in 1921, an entirely new city administration had been elected. Possibly, the socioeconomic dynamics of this complex situation were beyond the comprehension of the new administration, and their ignorance of the threat potentials led them to ignore the warnings.80Dick Rowland’s arrest precipitated a succession of events. After the Belton lynching, the blacks community knew that the civil authorities were incapable of handling the situation effectively. This knowledge, when combined with the general feelings of black powerlessness, made it possible for a small group of activists, allegedly members of the A.B.B.,81 to arouse other blacks who were looking for a way to express their desires for reform.82 The rumored lynch mob preparing to hang Rowland gave an opportunity for such a demonstration. The activists wanted to show white Tulsa that they were not willing to stand still and let this sort of thing continue.83 The primary issue, then, was not Rowland, but the black frustration with the entire socioeconomic situation as it then existed. Such social issues were not likely to be on anyone’s mind when the rioting began, but it was likely that these issues prompted the armed black presence that allowed the trigger situation to occur.84The significance of the event quickly moved away from the issue of Rowland’s possible lynching as the riot progressed. Different motives, from different sources, led to the destruction. To understand what those motives were, the probable leaders of the white rioters must be examined.A recent view of the riot states that the Ku Klux Klan was responsible for the riot.85 This view is fundamentally flawed. The riot occurred on the night of 31 May-1 June, 1921. The first formal appearance of the Klan in Oklahoma took place on 12 August 1921.86 No evidence exists to implicate any Klansmen in fomenting unrest. However, it should be noted that the psychological characteristics of the average Klansman were present in the rioters, and that the large Klan organization, as described in most of the articles on the Klan in Tulsa, benefited from the race riot.87The average member of the Ku Klux Klan was a “decent, hardworking, patriotic if narrow-minded blue-collar worker”.88 He was not driven so much by vindictiveness, as by a fear of change.89 The early twentieth century, particularly right after the First World War, was a period of immense social and technological changes, and it was with the desire to maintain feelings of self-esteem, and dignity that these people turned to the Klan.90 The Klan was more than willing to grant validation to these people. The Klan presented a comforting ideology, cloaked in mystery and ceremony, that asserted that the American White Anglo-Saxon Protestant was the most important person on earth.91In Oklahoma, the Klan is purported to have operated covertly for a few months before its formal appearance.92 However, there is no direct evidence of any such operation. Regardless, whether subversive Klan recruiters were in the crowd that night or not, someone directed a need for self-esteem into an already existent violent confrontation. Because of a lack of situational control demonstrated by the authorities, that violence became legitimized in the guise of the special deputies.93 Most whites involved in the rioting only later became involved in the burning and looting, because they saw that such behavior had been legitimized. They were operating as “free riders” on the waves of violence.94 Other whites felt the desire to express their self worth through violence and destruction. While they would have been able to keep that exigency in check under normal circumstances, the existence of the riot’s violence allowed these people to vent their desires, their behavior lending a further situational legitimacy to the riot.This situational belief in the legitimacy of the riot may have been further fueled by the cultural racism of the era. It seems to have been culturally normal to discriminate against black people in 1921. With white racism as a cultural norm and the apparent situational acceptance of the riot’s violence, it should have been easy for even a relatively small group of white agitators to direct the response away from the armed blacks to blacks in general. This shift in emphasis leading the whites to a retaliatory invasion that quickly degenerated into total destruction, with little, or no regard for lives or property.As this paper has striven to show, the Tulsa race riot and the subsequent destruction of north Tulsa were separate events, and although they were closely related, they did not stem from the same causes. The riot itself resulted from the presence of an armed body of blacks led by a few agitators trying to defend a black man from a perceived threat by a white population. There followed a white response to the invasion by armed and threatening blacks who were evidently seeking violence. The inability of the legitimate authorities to defuse the situation agitated the white response, so that ultimately, when first shots fired, sufficient motivations on both sides caused the shooting to continue.Only a relatively few blacks were involved in the rioting, and certainly only a like segment of white Tulsa was involved in the actual destruction. Small groups of agitators were able to sufficiently direct the other participants in directions that would eventually achieve the agitator’s goals. For the black agitators, those goals were Dick Rowland’s safety, as well as showing the whites that force would be met with force. The white agitators were able to see to it that the relatively successful blacks, as well as those who weren’t successful, were “Put back in their places.”

Notes

Sources

Some thoughts on the Tulsa Race Riot

The Tulsa Race Riot of 1921 - “Tulsa Race Riot”. Copyright © 1989, 1999  I. Marc Carlson This page is given for the free exchange of information, provided the author’s name is included in all future revisions, and no money change hands, other than as expressed above.

[corruptionchronicle]

The Tulsa Race Riot & Massacre Cover Up

  Not many years after 1907 statehood, a race riot in 1921 convulsed Tulsa. The triggering event, inflamed by local newspaper reports, was an accusation that a black man had sexually assaulted a white woman. Racial tensions, abetted by growing Ku Klux Klan activities, had been on the rise for some time. Some commentators have described the riot as one of the nation's worst. The body count is uncertain but ranges from seventy or eighty to as many as three hundred. A destructive fire raged through the Greenwood District, destroying homes and a prosperous business section. Thousands of blacks were rounded up as "suspects" and jailed, some for a week or so. At the time, many whites reacted with horror. But a veil of denial, created mainly by public officials, descended. 

  History books usually gave this episode only passing mention. Not until the late 1990s was the riot reexamined and made the subject of the Tulsa Race Riot Commission that undertook further inquiry, including consideration of possible reparations. Whatever else might be said, the veil of denial had been lifted.

THE TULSA RACE RIOT OF 1921

BY I. MARC CARLSON

This paper is a discussion about the Tulsa Race Riot that occurred in 1921, and presents an argument that suggests that the Riot was not one event, but rather two separate, but linked events, each with their own separate set of causes.

Written to fulfill course requirements for a Bachelors Degree in History at Oklahoma State University; 1 January 1989 (HTMLized 1 February 1999)

The original copy of this paper is housed in the Special Collections department at McFarlin Library, University of Tulsa.

The Tulsa Race Riot of 1921 is a little-known and somewhat misunderstood event in the history of the United States. It is generally considered, on those rare occasions it is discussed, to have been an isolated event in Tulsa's past that resulted in death and considerable destruction. The theories about what happened and why are divers and often conflicting. With the paucity of information available, it is difficult to determine absolutely the course of events. Enough evidence exists, however, to justify the drawing of certain limited conclusions.The conclusions presented in this paper stem from a view the Tulsa Race Riot, not as a single occurrence, but as two separate but linked events. Each event evolved from separate sets of causes. Each set of causes originated in the social context that existed prior to the events. It should be possible to determine some of these causes and from there interpolate other logical causes.In the years bridging the second and third decades of the twentieth century, episodes of racial tension and violence were frequent. In July of 1917, East St. Louis, Illinois erupted into a bloody battle between blacks and whites after an aluminum plant began to hire black workers to break a strike. Three hundred people were killed, and hundreds were injured.1 In August of the same year, more than one hundred black soldiers of the 3d Battalion, 24th Infantry Regiment stationed in Houston, Texas mutinied against their officers. The mutineers seized arms and ammunition and engaged in a three hour riot. This riot was in protest to the abuses that local white civilians had perpetrated against the soldiers and the lack of concern about those abuses shown by the unit's commanders.2 As a final example, the Chicago Race Riot in late July, 1919 was based in a long-standing dispute over white-black neighborhood boundaries. A young black male accidentally entered a recreation area that was reserved for whites, triggering this riot that quickly moved beyond this otherwise minor incident and after a week of violence left many dead and wounded.3These are samples of the more striking episodes in an epidemic of racial violence that existed between 1917 and 1922.4 The Tulsa riot was one of the last disturbances of this kind before the Detroit Race Riot in 1942.5Each riot was catalyzed by an incident that seemed important to the instigators, but was often relatively minor when viewed in retrospect. The trigger event only gained importance in conjunction with the ongoing attitudes and already extant tensions. Of primary significance were the causes that had led up to the point of violence. For example, in the Chicago riot the trigger was insignificant, simply a young man in the wrong place at the wrong time, but the potential for violence had been prepared beforehand by years of perceived threats to white neighborhood boundaries by black economic expansion. When that young man entered that area, the seeds of violence that had lain dormant finally sprouted.6The Tulsa riot found its trigger in an elevator mishap and a newspaper article. An article appeared on the first page of the Tuesday, 31 May 1921 Tulsa Tribune headlined "Nab Negro for attacking girl in elevator", along with an "inflammatory" editorial.7 The article and editorial described an attack by a young black man upon a white woman in a downtown Tulsa office building elevator.8The young woman, Mrs. Sarah Page, filed a complaint against Dick Rowland, the young man, and by the next morning he was in police custody. That afternoon the headline and article appeared. The article's description of the episode caused tremendous tension throughout both black and white Tulsa.9 Almost immediately talk of lynching Rowland for the assault began to circulate, along with reports that the assault had sexual overtones.10Several black leaders began to organize for the possible necessity of defending Rowland from a lynch mob.11 The police also prepared to repel a possible lynch mob. The chief of police had Rowland transferred to a detention cell in the county jail, on the top floor of the courthouse. The county jail was considered by both the police and sheriff's department to be easily defendable.12By 7.30 p.m., a crowd of three hundred white curiosity-seekers had formed around the courthouse.13 An hour and a half later, the crowd had swelled to over four hundred.14 After an abortive attempt by three white men to remove Rowland from custody, the sheriff effectively barricaded the prisoner, himself, and his men into the office.15A "company of armed and hostile"16 blacks marched up the street to the jail at 8.00 p.m. They had come to offer their services to the authorities who had Rowland in custody. They wanted to protect him from a lynch mob, such as the one that had hung Roy Belton, a white man, a year earlier.17 The sheriff and one of his black deputies convinced the men that they were not required and should return home quietly. The blacks left.18The white crowd was still growing an hour later19 when several carloads of armed blacks arrived at the courthouse. Approximately seventy-five men got out of the cars.20 Their arrival sparked a great deal of shouting, harsh words and insults between the crowds of whites and the blacks.21The Tulsa National Guard command communicated with higher headquarters at 10.15 p.m., in order to keep those up the chain of command abreast of the disturbance. General Charles F. Barrett, the National Guard Adjutant General, who was in constant communication with both the Tulsa unit and the Governor, told the unit's officers that they should mobilize only to guard the armory, and that they were to assist the civil authorities if necessary. The Governor was the only person who could mobilize the unit, and he could not officially do so unless the civil authorities felt that they were no longer able to control the situation.22At 10.30 p.m., encounters took place between individual whites and groups of armed blacks near the railroad tracks.23 At the courthouse no violence had as yet occurred.The 'spark' that touched off the riot was an incident between a white deputy and an armed black man outside the courthouse. The deputy was attempting to disarm one of the blacks when the gun for which they were wrestling discharged.24The crowd panicked and split into several confused groups. The armed blacks and the police began firing, first into the air, then eventually into the crowds and at each other. The police, quickly joined by the few armed whites, drove the blacks north. Many of the unarmed whites, led by a few police officers, broke into pawn shops and hardware stores searching for weapons and ammunition.25The battle rushed north, dividing along several of the main streets until it reached First Street. There the blacks drew, and for a short time held, a battle-line. The line broke after an hour and a half of shooting and the blacks fell back a block north to the railroad tracks. A line of black snipers formed at the tracks to prevent the white rioters from entering the black district. The blacks held back the whites across a "no man's land" of gravel and steel.26Shortly after midnight, the whites attempted to burn down the buildings protecting the black snipers. This arson, however, had no strategic result at the time.27Between 12.30 and 2.30 a.m., the battleground fell relatively silent, disturbed only by the occasional, sporadic gunfire from one side or another.28 No record exists of any moves made, by either side, to establish mutual, peaceful communication.It is this period that defines the division of the riot into two separate events. Before this period of relative calm, the riot was an armed brawl. After this point, the hostilities assume the guise of organized urban warfare. The riot shifted emphasis, and became two separate events.It is possible that, during this two-hour lull, the authorities could have put an end to the riot, had they taken any form of calm and decisive action directed towards that goal. The decisive actions that they did take only nurtured the violence. These actions included establishing and overseeing the arming of a small army of "Special Deputies", mostly volunteers from the white rioters.29Serious confusion existed, and still exists, as to who was actually in charge. There was a division between a minority of police officers and sheriff's deputies who were trying to maintain the peace, and those who were leading the special deputies.30 No actions were taken against armed whites violating the law, while all blacks caught on the streets were arrested. The only preparations that were made by the whites were those done to put down and contain the blacks.31At roughly 2.30 a.m., the battle increased in intensity as the whites tried to weaken the black's defenses and push across the railyard. They were pushed back by the black defenders who were now joined by other blacks coming to defend their homes from an invasion of their district by the whites.32It is impossible to establish an accurate timetable of the next morning because of the confusion inherent in the events. At daybreak, the loosely organized army of white rioters entered the black district in two movements. The first movement was a push from the south that came across the railyard, covered by white snipers. According to one witness, there was a machine gun atop the granary tower that covered this southern push as well.33 This push moved through the business district, and into the neighborhood, looting and burning.34 The second front attacked from the north down Standpipe Hill. A machine gun on the hilltop covered this attacking force. This second front ran into, and through, crowds of black refugees who were fleeing from their homes.35 Whites in spotter planes oversaw the entire battle. These planes, with no known official authority, were used to locate pockets of black resistance for the white ground forces.36 Eyewitness reported outrages committed by whites as the white belligerents swept over the district. Most of these reports involved the murder of blacks who had surrendered or were obviously non-hostile or noncombatants.37It can not be supposed that the relative majority of the white population was involved in the invasion, nor even in favor of it. There is a report of a white policeman trying to stop the white invaders at daybreak from crossing the rail-line.38 A National Guard captain was shot while trying to stop the whites atop Standpipe Hill from machine-gunning refugees.39 However, those police trying to protect the black populace were ineffective, and there were other police in apparent collusion with the white looters40 The police slowly brought the surviving black populace into "protective custody."41At 8.00 a.m., National Guard troops, under General Barrett, arrived from Oklahoma City42 What they did between that time and 11.29 a.m.,43 when General Barrett declared martial law, is not documentable. The fighting came to a stop when martial law was declared. The black district, after five to six hours of battle and looting, was a mass of black clouds of smoke rolling above the ruins of thirty-some city blocks of rubble and ashes.44 Conservatively, $1.5 million in real estate, including the black business district once called the "Black Wall Street",45 had been destroyed.Because very little has been written about the riot, a discussion of the primary authors on the subject is not difficult. Contemporary accounts centered their attention on the beginning of the riot and the armed blacks marching on the courthouse. Thus placing the white segment of the community in the position of defending itself. These accounts, however, tend to ignore the retributive counter-invasion.General Barrett's history of Oklahoma46, and Colonel Douglas's history and description of contemporary Tulsa47 typified the official view of the little-discussed riot. Barrett was the Commanding Officer of the National Guard troops that came and restored order. His history makes a concerted effort to keep any apparent bias from damaging his credibility as an historian. Douglas was also present during the events of the riot, although only as an uninvolved observer. He also tries to maintain a clear picture of the events, but is not as successful as Barrett in keeping a bias against the black participants from coloring his narrative.Mary Parrish, a black woman, made a collection of accounts told by survivors, and published these shortly afterwards together with her own experience of the riot. Mrs. Parrish's account, and the others collected in her book, are from the perspective of blacks who were forced from their homes, usually by heavy fighting nearby. Her sources were people who had lost everything they owned. There is a strong criticism against the initial rioters, both black and white, as well as the white looters. Her book is a major source for the study of the riot, but its contradictions and inconsistencies clearly show the innate difficulties in comparing multiple eyewitness accounts.48A number of firsthand accounts of the events given by blacks who survived the events exist, but none of the accounts are from people who were actually involved in the riot or the battle. Many of their accounts take as fact events that may have well been rumor or conjecture.49Also, few of the firsthand accounts found after the fact show the events from a white perspective. Most whites seemed to be unwilling to talk about the subject, although all of the official documentation that is available is from a white point of view. No one who will admit to having actually been involved have left a firsthand account of either the riot or the destruction of north Tulsa. Witnesses seem unwilling to commit, or possibly incriminate themselves, and so it is difficult to establish firmly what has happened. Much of the primary source material are interviews taken generally from people who were not directly involved in the combat. Even newspapers and the other official sources have trouble corroborating each other on details.The newspaper accounts are an interesting study in themselves. In 1921, the Tulsa Tribune was a newspaper with a strong racist bias, and yellow journalistic tendencies, and thus much of its reporting is suspect. This paper places the blame for the riot squarely on the shoulders of the "Bad Niggers" and their militant activities against the white population.50 The Tulsa World, on the other hand, had a less pronounced editorial viewpoint. On the morning of the riot, the World published five editions as it tried to maintain timeliness in its coverage.51 Copies of the black papers in town from the period are almost impossible to locate, but clippings about the riot and its aftermath have survived that state that the white population and its treatment of the blacks were to blame for the riot, and its aftermath.52Official documentation for the riot is even more difficult to find than black newspapers. Many of the police and court records are missing or unavailable. The report made by the grand jury, which had been convened by the governor to investigate the riot, placed the blame for the rioting on the black militants, an ineffective police department, the inflammatory reporting by an unnamed newspaper, and a laxity in segregation that led to unnecessary mixing of the races.53 The reports made by the Red Cross during the weeks after the riot list some important figures on damage and number of people treated for injuries, but shed no light on any details such as names or even give a death toll.54As the years progressed, public feeling about the riot seems to have changed. Loren L. Gill's master's thesis, although written twenty-five years after the riot, could easily be placed with the contemporary accounts, as much of his information is from eyewitness sources, as well as the sparse official record. This thesis was the first real historical study on the subject. Gill tends to blame black agitators for actually starting the riot. He feels, however, that they may have had reason for doing so.55The next interpretation of the event was not made until 1971. It was initially written as a newspaper article noting the fiftieth anniversary of the riot. Written by Ed Wheeler, this article's Change in perspective clearly indicates that perception of the riot had changed, possibly as a result of the Civil Rights movement of the 50s and 60s.56 Wheeler presents a view of the riot that stresses white culpability. His account is relatively impartial until he begins to discuss the aftermath of the riot. He is the first writer to speculate on a "cover-up" after the events based on the lack of information that is available. As his work progresses Wheeler becomes more interested in the "conspiracy of silence" that he sees in the riot's aftermath than he is in the riot itself.57R. Halliburton published his article, "The Tulsa Race War of 1921", in the Journal of Black Studies shortly after Wheeler's article saw print. Halliburton presents the view that the riot and ensuing destruction were an assault led by a white element against a peaceful and affluent black district. Halliburton, in his article, as well as in his later book of the same name, paints a portrait of complete white guilt.58Finally, Scott Ellsworth published in 1982 what may well be the most influential work on this subject, Death in a Promised Land. Ellsworth's work is basically fair to both sides; however, he still writes from the view that the whole sequence of events of the riot were primarily the fault of white Tulsa. Ellsworth carefully draws a valid portrait of an economically successful black section of Tulsa. Ellsworth centers the blame for the riot on the inability of the white population to accept the economic successes of "one of the finest black commercial districts in the entire southwest." He also contends that the Ku Klux Klan had a great influence on the events.59In examining the events of 31 May-1 June 1921 it is interesting to note that the that ideas most commonly held about the riot by the public are those that have little, if any, documentable basis. For example, Wheeler continually emphasizes the missing information, and while that lack of information appears to support his claims of a "conspiracy", it is speculation. Similar ideas appear repeatedly through out the literature and in interviews, but are still speculative in nature.60The events that can be documented as occurring reveal glimpses into the origins of the riot and destruction. In tracing those origins, the theory that the riot and the destruction were two different, but related, incidents becomes apparent. An examination of those pressures and of the causes of race riots will show that if fault must be established that each of these events was caused by a relatively small segment of the two segregated populations, which were reacting to social pressures that were consistent with the times.In 1921, no one made any studies of the actual causes of racial disturbances. This type of study was not really begun until the causes of the race riots in the late 1960s were sought for, in the hope of avoiding their reccurance.61 The studies of those later riots are useful when looking at the riot of Tulsa.There is no such thing as a "typical" riot.62 The riot of Tulsa in 1921 differed in many respects from the riots of forty-five years later. Many of those later riots focused against the symbols of white authority, but not against whites specifically. These riots were of a racial nature, not an interracial one.63 In 1921, however, the blacks were not rioting against the de jure white establishment, per se, but rather against the de facto white power structure inherent in the mob violence. When the armed blacks marched on the courthouse in Tulsa they desired to support the legitimate white power structure. This power structure had shown itself, via the Belton incident, to be incapable of self-defense.The problems expressed in 1921 were similar in nature to those expressed in the late sixties. The blacks in the sixties voiced complaints about discrimination in employment, underemployment, inadequate housing and municipal services, discriminatory police practices and administration of justice, an ineffective political structure with little or no mechanism for grievance relief, and the attitude of whites in general towards blacks.64 These charges are also valid for the riot in 1921 Tulsa.In the history of racial relations, the role of the black has been traditionally one of lower status. Discrimination has, through limiting growth possibilities and inhibiting prospects for advancement, kept this status quo.65 This was true in Tulsa, as it was throughout the United States in 1921.Although blacks occupied most fields of employment, they were generally barred from many of the higher status positions.66 Those blacks who bypassed the social barriers, such as doctors, lawyers, and shopkeepers, found themselves forced to offer their services to only other blacks.67 This type of business segregation was more extreme than in Tulsa than in many other places. Tulsa supported its own black business district, two high schools, a hospital, a library, and a movie theatre.68 The urban growth and prosperity of the city had trickled down to the blacks, and although they were in a less favorable position than their white neighbors, they held a higher level of prosperity than that of blacks in many other cities. This level of prosperity was in particular contrast to the rest of Oklahoma, which relied on sharecropping as the primary form of black labor and farm management.69Many blacks were tiring of the low status position that they held in American society. These people were desirous of, if not total equality, at least social acceptance by the white segment of the community. Booker T. Washington had taught for many years that accommodation to the white position was the best idea. Only after each black person developed his own abilities until his own self-esteem had been improved would white society grant the black populace desired respect. Washington felt that no one would respect someone who did not fully respect himself.70Many blacks felt Washington's way was no longer an acceptable alternative. Among these people was the black activist W.E.B. DuBois. DuBois advocated a more direct approach. He felt that agitation and political activity, particularly through the N.A.A.C.P., an organization made up of both blacks and whites, was the only way to gain social acceptance.71The African Blood Brotherhood had another view, a view that seemed to build upon DuBois' arguments. The A.B.B. was a self-admittedly socialist, "secret", organization whose ultimate goa1 was the unification of all black organizations under one central committee. The committee to be made up of the leaders of those organizations under its suzerainty.72 If it took militant activism to achieve that goal, then that would be done.A chapter of the A.B.B. had been founded in Tulsa shortly before the riot, and, also, there had long been a chapter in Tulsa of another socialist organization, the Industrial Workers of the World. Previous encounters with the I.W.W. and a white K.K.K.-like group called the Knights of Liberty had at least once before resulted in a riot and lynchings.73The blacks in American society found themselves trapped. The harsh treatment by the whites caused frustration, leading the blacks to express a desire for a change. That desire to alter the status quo was, in turn, causing the situation to worsen.74This was the general situation in Tulsa in 1921. The already frustrating situation grew even worse. 1920 was a bad year for crops. The black sharecroppers had lived at a subsistence level before the crop failure. Now many found themselves forced off their farms, and eventually gravitated to Tulsa looking for work. In Tulsa, these itinerates only increased the black population without contributing to the economy with either their money or their labor, as there were few, if any, jobs to be had. The black community, segregated into a strictly defined ghetto, was forced to try to deal with this overcrowding in a district that the city government was not willing to assist. The city had not even built sewers into much of the district before the overcrowding, and as the situation worsened, there was little help from the city.75Then, in early 1921, the price of oil dropped suddenly to $1.00 per barrel of crude from nearly $3.00 a barrel.76 Without any warning white workers, previously employed in the oil fields, were placed in direct competition with blacks, particularly the dispossessed sharecroppers, for the few remaining jobs. This economic fluctuation did not strike everyone in Tulsa, but in a community whose economic foundation was the price of oil, nearly everyone felt some of the tension.With the high level of unemployment, the crime rate also rose.77 The police department applied pressure, first on the criminal class, much of whom existed on the border between black and white Tulsa. The police then spread their pressure gradually into the entire black community.  The police had been warned of the possibility of a riot months before it occurred.78 However, the civil authorities had either been totally unconcerned about the problem, or else unable to understand what was happening.79 Early in 1921, an entirely new city administration had been elected. Possibly, the socioeconomic dynamics of this complex situation were beyond the comprehension of the new administration, and their ignorance of the threat potentials led them to ignore the warnings.80Dick Rowland's arrest precipitated a succession of events. After the Belton lynching, the blacks community knew that the civil authorities were incapable of handling the situation effectively. This knowledge, when combined with the general feelings of black powerlessness, made it possible for a small group of activists, allegedly members of the A.B.B.,81 to arouse other blacks who were looking for a way to express their desires for reform.82 The rumored lynch mob preparing to hang Rowland gave an opportunity for such a demonstration. The activists wanted to show white Tulsa that they were not willing to stand still and let this sort of thing continue.83 The primary issue, then, was not Rowland, but the black frustration with the entire socioeconomic situation as it then existed. Such social issues were not likely to be on anyone's mind when the rioting began, but it was likely that these issues prompted the armed black presence that allowed the trigger situation to occur.84The significance of the event quickly moved away from the issue of Rowland's possible lynching as the riot progressed. Different motives, from different sources, led to the destruction. To understand what those motives were, the probable leaders of the white rioters must be examined.A recent view of the riot states that the Ku Klux Klan was responsible for the riot.85 This view is fundamentally flawed. The riot occurred on the night of 31 May-1 June, 1921. The first formal appearance of the Klan in Oklahoma took place on 12 August 1921.86 No evidence exists to implicate any Klansmen in fomenting unrest. However, it should be noted that the psychological characteristics of the average Klansman were present in the rioters, and that the large Klan organization, as described in most of the articles on the Klan in Tulsa, benefited from the race riot.87The average member of the Ku Klux Klan was a "decent, hardworking, patriotic if narrow-minded blue-collar worker".88 He was not driven so much by vindictiveness, as by a fear of change.89 The early twentieth century, particularly right after the First World War, was a period of immense social and technological changes, and it was with the desire to maintain feelings of self-esteem, and dignity that these people turned to the Klan.90 The Klan was more than willing to grant validation to these people. The Klan presented a comforting ideology, cloaked in mystery and ceremony, that asserted that the American White Anglo-Saxon Protestant was the most important person on earth.91In Oklahoma, the Klan is purported to have operated covertly for a few months before its formal appearance.92 However, there is no direct evidence of any such operation. Regardless, whether subversive Klan recruiters were in the crowd that night or not, someone directed a need for self-esteem into an already existent violent confrontation. Because of a lack of situational control demonstrated by the authorities, that violence became legitimized in the guise of the special deputies.93 Most whites involved in the rioting only later became involved in the burning and looting, because they saw that such behavior had been legitimized. They were operating as "free riders" on the waves of violence.94 Other whites felt the desire to express their self worth through violence and destruction. While they would have been able to keep that exigency in check under normal circumstances, the existence of the riot's violence allowed these people to vent their desires, their behavior lending a further situational legitimacy to the riot.This situational belief in the legitimacy of the riot may have been further fueled by the cultural racism of the era. It seems to have been culturally normal to discriminate against black people in 1921. With white racism as a cultural norm and the apparent situational acceptance of the riot's violence, it should have been easy for even a relatively small group of white agitators to direct the response away from the armed blacks to blacks in general. This shift in emphasis leading the whites to a retaliatory invasion that quickly degenerated into total destruction, with little, or no regard for lives or property.As this paper has striven to show, the Tulsa race riot and the subsequent destruction of north Tulsa were separate events, and although they were closely related, they did not stem from the same causes. The riot itself resulted from the presence of an armed body of blacks led by a few agitators trying to defend a black man from a perceived threat by a white population. There followed a white response to the invasion by armed and threatening blacks who were evidently seeking violence. The inability of the legitimate authorities to defuse the situation agitated the white response, so that ultimately, when first shots fired, sufficient motivations on both sides caused the shooting to continue.Only a relatively few blacks were involved in the rioting, and certainly only a like segment of white Tulsa was involved in the actual destruction. Small groups of agitators were able to sufficiently direct the other participants in directions that would eventually achieve the agitator's goals. For the black agitators, those goals were Dick Rowland's safety, as well as showing the whites that force would be met with force. The white agitators were able to see to it that the relatively successful blacks, as well as those who weren't successful, were "Put back in their places."

Notes

Sources

Some thoughts on the Tulsa Race Riot

The Tulsa Race Riot of 1921 - "Tulsa Race Riot". Copyright © 1989, 1999  I. Marc Carlson This page is given for the free exchange of information, provided the author's name is included in all future revisions, and no money change hands, other than as expressed above.