A Geek History of Time - Episode 242 - On-Screen Hatfield & McCoy Depictions Part III

Episode Date: December 16, 2023

Music See people when they click on this, they'll see the title, so they'll be like, poor Ed. What is that even fucking mean? However, because it's England, that's largely ignored and unstudy. I really wish for the sake of my sense of moral righteousness that I could get away with saying no. He had a god-damned ancestral home and a noble title until Germany became a republic. You know, none of this high-falutin, you know, critical role stuff.

So they chewed through my favorite shit. No, I'm not helping them. I'm gonna say that you're getting into another kind of, you know, Mediterranean or psyche archetype kind of thing. Makes sense. Also, trade winds are a thing. Uh-uh, just serious. Like, no, he kind of thing. Makes sense. Also, trade wins or a thing. Ah-ha, just serious. Like, no, he really has a mat on it. Oh, yeah, we'll go upon a tangent.

Um, as we keep doing. Like, yeah, this is how we fill time. 1.0-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1.5-1. This is a geek history of time. Where we connect an artery to the real world. It is a dilemma. History and English teacher here in Northern California. And we we record in the evenings and today we had a get together play date with my son and two of his his two best buds from his his two best buds from his TK program. The two best buds came over and the dad of one of them and the mom and dad

of the other one came over. And I've talked about this group before. And it was nice to get together and talk with other adults for a little while while the kids were running around. And I feel a little badly for our cats, though, because we had three five-year-old boys and the younger sister of one of the boys who I think is about a year old. Between the four kids are two cats are exhausted.

I think our orange tabby might need therapy. But yeah, it was, it's quite an experience to have that much cadetic energy moving around in the house at once. And at a couple of points, they were all focused on one or both of the cats. And yeah. So I on the one hand, I kind of know, give them both extra scratches for kind of taking one for the team. And on the other, I feel like a terrible terrible cat parent. So that was, that was what I had going on earlier today. How about you? Well, I'm Damien Harmony. I am a US history teacher up here in Northern California. And today, I stepped on the scale as I do every morning, because I'm a big believer of apples to apples

Just comparing same time every day Getting a trend getting a feel for things. I recognize that Weight is just a number and yet being able to see certain parts of my body is Transically tied to that. I've also come to notice that Certain weights mean that clothes fit differently. Like there's threshold weights. Like if I get down below a certain number, I'm like, oh, need to tighten another notch in my belt kind of thing.

As of today, I am down 11 pounds from when I started supporting the food that I eat and I'm on it. A goal of losing X amount of pounds through the course of about a year. I've hit my goal every day of coming in under a certain amount of calories. It's by no means unhealthy. The amount of calories I've got. In fact, it's damn near double what my partner gets because I'm a big boy. And as such, like, you know, I told her, like, hey, I lost this much.

She's like, oh, only lost this much. I'm like, proportionally, that's roughly the same, I bet. Well, there's that. Professionally is one thing, there's also just the fact that based on blood chemistry and, you know, muscle mass to weight ratios, men, it is easier for you and me to lose weight than for somebody with two X chromosomes. Yeah.

You know, and that has come up with me and my wife when we've been working on getting more exercise and watching our diets and all that. And I'll have a week where I'll lose six pounds. Right. You know, because I'm because I'm starting it like, you know, fat fuck and I'm, you know, uh, working real hard at it. And I'll lose like six pounds and she'll lose like a pound and a half.

And she'll just be like, I hate you so much. I'm like, I'm sorry. Yeah. I don't know what to do about it. Well, and I always just mark it as like, well, don't you want me to weigh less on top of you? There you go. So there you go. All right. Just my advice is a veteran of two marriages. I'll for you that. You know, I really admire your ability to turn that into a positive. That's I really admire your ability to turn that into a positive. That's.

Well, I mean, certainly the first one it is a positive. Yeah. Well, I like the way my life is. And you know, my, my ex is living her authenticness, her, her most authentic self now. I see that as a positive. So yeah, yeah, you know, um, first one I get a Mulligan, second one, bad fucking luck. Uh, you know, it was great for what it was until it wasn't. And it was like, oh, there you go. So yeah. Uh, so let's see, when last we spoke, I was advertising that we're going

to discuss the Spike Jones music video, uh, it's which is just delicious fun. I mean, it really, really. Yeah. Yeah. So, we're gonna get into that. I may well send you the link and pause the show for it. In fact, I think I'm gonna do that right now. Oh, what?

All right, now that we are done pausing, that was Spike Jones's past the biscuits Mirandi. Okay, so hold on. Oh, okay, I haven't started, so that should be. Yeah, okay. So that has Spike Jones's name on it. Yes. And this was released when?

1943. Okay, okay. That's all right. Okay. And... There are so much to unpack there. And before we do, I would like to point out in 1943 during the war, West Virginia had sent 6.6 of its total population to war.

And that actually was only in the top half percentage of the country, like they were 24th in the country as far as how many of their population Kentucky sent 6.1% so both were within like a standard deviation. And now that's 24th in total number. So they're 24th in total number not in proportion because Kentucky sent 6.1% and they were 16th and total number. It's Denny, Tennessee sent 8.2% of its population, which was 10th in total number. And California, Pennsylvania and New York ranked in numbers three, two, and one of the total number of people sent. Really? Yeah, Pennsylvania sent the second most people to fight in the

war. California sent the third most. Third and New York was number one. Yes. So at the time, I believe New York was the highest populated state to. Okay. But now,

yeah. So is that that's that's the highest percentage of of or not highest percentage. That's that's highest raw number of young men. So that's okay. But the percentage of military age males was only 7, 10 percent for New York or for New York. So I know that in terms of their total population, it didn't squeak much above, I think three. Oh, three or four. So proportionally, West Virginia and Kentucky

are bearing a greater burden, but total numbers are going to be less, right? Okay. That's my Jones and his city slickers, which is the band's name. They put together something called a Soundie, which is essentially a music video. And that was for Pastor Biscuits Miranda. And it's like two and a half minutes, three minutes of full story about Hill folk, right?

Yeah. So feel free to start unpacking here. Okay. Well, they name check McCoy's. They do directly. Yep. And Burton boys. Let's see. So in the in the lyrics, in the hills of Tennessee, sitting near, near the Hickory tree, there's an ornery, rifle, shoot, and mountain near. He loves loves mountain feuds and he also loves good food And when he goes home to supper you will hear and then we get the chorus of past the biscuits Mirandi What I love about that first verse is he loves mountain feuds Like they enjoyed it like it was their recreation like yeah like you, you at C-Sport. Students loved track and field, right?

Yeah. Yeah, and so the next verse, since nine o'clock, I've been sitting on a rock, a shootin' everything in sight. I shot the boys and it doesn't barkin' boys. A shootin' gives a man an appetite. And then the chorus, which this time mentions that he's here for a quick meal and has to head

back out to continue feuding and may die. Yeah. Yeah. So I find it interesting. Could you just real quick describe what Spike Jones looks like in the video? Because I think that's this is an audio medium and people like to be able to do. Yeah, it's a good point. Okay. So you got. Yeah, he's got a broad brim straw hat that looks a little bit, a little bit like a like a cowboy hat with the way the brim is turned up on it, but not 100%. Right. It's clearly strong. Yeah. Now he is he is clean shaven. Mm-hmm. He has there's a whole there's a whole pack of other guys with him. Not all of whom are true. If I'm yeah. Yeah. And there and a whole bunch of them come into the house and they're in overalls. Yes. And like check plaid shirts and yeah that fucking hurt and oddly i'm not mad about it that's that's that's pretty good um

but uh there's there's got to be eight or nine of them that come into the house and there's an older woman and a younger woman who is very blonde and has her hair plated in braids. They're all dressed in old-timey country clothing. He has one of his teeth blacked out too. Yes, I was getting to that. He's missing a tooth and there's a couple of places where they're making visual gags on how shitty the biscuits are because they're trying to bite them and they're

spitting teeth out of their mouths. Right. Allah, you know, Mary Melody's kind of cartoon stuff. Sure. He's carrying in his hand, by the way. Oh, well, they're all they're all armed to the teeth. They're carrying rifles. Um, and then, and then at one point, they roll a cannon up to the window, because they're, they're sitting, they're sitting at their, at their repast.

And the lyrics say that, you know, a bullet hit the shack and, you know, they're, they come under fire. And so the whole group of them wheel a cannon to the window. And the younger woman actually sits on the cannon. Yep. When they're, when they're going to fire it. Not sidesaddle either. Not sidesaddle. Not no, there's there's some Freudian shit going on there. Um, I think there's some class shit going on there too. Really, yeah, well, yeah, these rooms would show us their ankles if we have, you know, these low rents. Um, and they're and they're, you know, audacious behavior. Yeah. Yeah. There's some. Go ahead. Here's some more of the lyrics. Then he heard a rifle crack at a bullet hit the shack. And another one, another broke the dishes on the shelf.

So he grabbed his trusty gun because the battle had begun. And he knew that he must protect them. He must protect himself. Opas the biscuits Miranda. I'm a gunna load up my gun. I'll use your biscuits for bullets. I'll put them varmints on the run. He poured a ton of black powder in his gun. Rand the biscuits into place. He took good aim. Oh my goodness. What a shame. Bang the gun exploded in his face. Oh darn your bandage Miranda. I know that I'm gonna die. Oh darn your bandage Miranda.

I know that I'm gonna die. Oh darn your biscuits Miranda. I knew they'd get me buy and buy. So that's the song. Yep. And like you said, everyone eats a biscuit, loses teeth. One guy, like you said, spits out a mouthful of teeth. Additionally, during the feeding,

they're all crawling over each other to get to the food on the table, right? Well, he continues to sing, showing the, uh, the lack of sophistication, right? Yeah. Yeah. And they're all, yeah. And one of them grabs a funnel of some sort and begins playing it like an improvised instrument, kind of like what we saw in the previous cartoon of Betty Boo. Yeah. And another one grabs two wooden spoons, keeping rhythm. Another one plays a liquor jug, whilst another still loops his suspenders or his belt. I couldn't tell through the table boards and plucks away as though that's the base. I think it was the suspenders, but yeah.

Yeah. And then one of the women goes to stir more batter and she sees herself in the mirror and throws a biscuit at the mirror because she thought that was a hostile face. Get it? She's broke and she's ugly. And then the fighting starts again and that's yeah, he loads up his rifle with biscuits and the oven becomes the conveyor belt for biscuits, which are now as good as bullets, right? So. And then yes, there's the cannon. And when it's time to pass the

bandage, it's a set of long johns. And he ties them around his wounded forehead very ineffectively. Yeah. And then it ends with the woman in properly straddling. Well, I would say properly straddling the back end of a a cannon and they're firing the biscuits so effectively that it actually sinks a boat. Yeah, which is a little surreal. But I mean, the whole thing on a certain level is kind of surreal,

so that shouldn't really be a shock. What occurs to me now as we're talking about it, is there is a subconscious kind of a parallel to the home front war effort. And the oven turning into a kind of conveyor belt, all of a sudden it's pumping out, you know, pumping out all the ammunition at that point in the, in the story, you know, although we did see that in the Betty Boop cartoon as well. That's true. That's a good point.

But you're still, I still think that that's a valid, yeah. Yeah. So, yeah, there's, there's so much classism going on here. There is there is so much Well punching down at at people who are Who are poor right and who are portrayed as being in some ways poorer than they actually are yeah They're poor and rural. Yeah, there's a hill folk kind of affect going on. Yeah. And it's a weird kind of, it's, it's performative in a way, in a way that, and this is,

this is a flawed analogy, but it's the first one that comes to mind in the same kind of way that blackface is a is performative punching down. I was this is like, I was going to kill Billy face. Right. Right. I was going to ask you actually, does this kind of fit in with your analysis that it's comedia del arte because these are stock characters at this point. I think you know what they really are. And and I hadn't made that jump in my own head yet.

But yes, you're right. I think I think this is this is a technologically advanced kind of comediodilarte skit going on. Mm-hmm. Um, and yeah, they're they're stock characters or trained, very broad cardboard cutout kind of roles. So, I mean, into the extent there is any plot in it, it's a very straightforward, Trophy kind of story. Yeah. Yeah. It's, it's, I would, I would say that it's a little bit of a, of a dig at Community Del Arte in this particular case, just because in Community Del Arte, there was, there was a beginning of middle and end to a story, and this

is kind of a character sketch. But it's in that same kind of, it's in that same kind of milieu. Sure. And yeah, it's, it's, it's a punch and down really hard. Like, you know, I know that it is tiring sometimes to hear folks argue about, well, you know, rural whites are the only acceptable targets anymore, you know, as a complaint and a lot of the time that's coming from not all the time, but there are plenty of times that that's coming from people who are using it as a complaint because they want to be punching down

in a different group of people. But like this is a really clear case of that happening. And in the middle, and I really, it strikes me that this is in the middle of a nationwide mobilization. One wherein these states that are represented by these caricatures, and I would say that these caricatures end up broadening the states they're representing. I don't think anybody thinks of these characters as only well, that's only Western, uh, West Virginia and Eastern Kentucky. Like I don't, I think it's Appalachia or even, yeah, even more inaccurately the Ozarks. Like I think

that's becoming the trope is that it's actually broadening out and grouping that larger area. Are you in the South or a border state? Mm-hmm. And do you live in the hills? Right. If those things apply, then oh, hey, look, here's your stereotype. Yeah, it would be akin to a movie set in Louisiana. And you automatically take it to a bio, a bio and you play band-ro music.

Yeah. You know, it's the same kind of idea. Yeah. So, well, so, so there's that one. And then three years later, the war is over. Okay, it's been over. And there's a comedy novelty song called the Martins and the Coise. Now this was originally written in 1936, but in 1946 it gets used for a Disney short by the same name. Okay. So again, during the war, hundreds of thousands of people from rural areas continued to move into cities and city centers for work. So it wasn't just going off to war. It was also, remember, there's this whole depression on. There's a dust bowl going on. There are a lot of people moving, like again, I think 12 million tons of topsoil was blown into Chicago in the 1930s and hundreds or thousands and thousands of people From the Midwest move to Chicago presumably to be with their farms

But so you have you do have this People from the rural areas coming into the cities For work, especially during the wartime industries, right? Yeah. And interestingly enough, in 1944, this song was actually worked into an opera ballad for the radio, which was a new deal project to entertain the troops and to encourage people to sign up for the fight. The feuding families in this decided to put aside their feud to fight Hitler together. Okay. So now we're using the Hatfields and the McCoy's,

although they're called the Martins and the Cois, to sell war bonds, you know, to encourage enrollment. And so in 1946, Disney released something called Make Mine Music, Exclamation Point. And it was a musical anthology animated film and it was the eighth Disney animated feature film. And this particular anthology was the result of two things. One, unfinished ideas and two,

a ton of animators who'd been drafted for the war. And so, you just have this. And that means that the ones who are left were tasked with writing and producing propaganda pieces for the government with very little time or pay. So anthologies that do not tie together a whole arc of a story become easier, right? Because you have to have this desk doing this and this desk doing that. So this gets slapped together. And the first of the 10 different segments in the film was the Martins and the Cois. So this is the intro. This is the open. And later it gets centered due to the gun violence depicted in the cartoon. Oh wow wow. Now, the opening title cards were of overalls, Cornlicker, a guitar, a floppy hat, and a rifle,

just kind of like these images for the titles, and then Corn as well, like, you know, it fades to Corn, and then a stump that has had all of its bark stripped away, which is then riddled with bullets that give us the title, The Martins and the Cois. Okay. So I'm gonna give you the lyrics to the song first, and then we'll get into it.

Gather round me children, and I'll tell a story of the mountains in the days when the guns was law. When two families got disputed, it was bound to end in shooting, so just listen and I'll tell you what I saw. Oh, the Martins and the Cois, they was reckless mountain boys

and they took up family fudent when they'd meet ever during time. They would shoot each other quicker than it took your eye to flicker. They could knock a squirrel's eye out at 90 feet. All their fight and started one bright Sunday morning, I remember, when old grandpa Koi was full of mountain, do, ooo, ooo, and then a hiccup sound.

Do, ooo, ooo, hiccup, do, ooo, hiccup. Just as quiet as a church mouse, he stole in the Martin's henhouse because the Koi's they needed eggs for breakfast too. And then you hear the the clucking of a chicken, you know, and then, you know, you know, but it's a coin, a coin, a coin. Oh, the Martins and the coins, they was reckless mountain boys, but all grandpa, Koi had, has gone where angels live. When they found him on the mountain, he was bleeding like a fountain because

they punctured him till he looked like a sieve. So it does, it does. That's pretty dark. So the coins start right out to avenge him and they didn't even take the time to mourn and they went out to do some killing where the Martins was distilling and they found Old Abel Martin making corn. Corn is, you know, liquor.

Yeah. Oh, the Martins and the Coise, they was reckless mountain boys and Old Abel Martin was the next to go. Though he saw the Coise a common, he had hardly started running when a volley shook the hills and laid him low. So just like, yeah. After that, they started out to fight and earnest and they scarred up the mountains with shot and shell. There was uncle's brothers cousins, why they bumped them off and dozens, just how many

bit the dust it's hard to tell. Kids grew up in a much much like, wow. Yeah. Oh, the Martins and the Coise they was reckless mountain boys at the art of killing they become quite deaf they all know they shouldn't do it but before they hardly knew it on each side they only had one person left so now the sole remain in Martin was a maiden and as pretty as a picture was this grace, and then you hear a wolf whistle.

While the one surviving boy was the handsome Henry Coe and the folks all knew they'd soon meet him, they'd soon meet face to face. Oh, the Martins and the Coes, they was reckless mountain boys, but they're shooting and they're killing Sherplayd Hobb. And they didn't bring no joy to know that grace and Henry Coe

both had sworn that they would finish up the job. So they're going to kill each other. So they finally met upon a mountain pathway and Henry Coy he aimed his gun at grace right at grace. He was set to pull the trigger when he saw her pretty figure. And you could see that love had kicked him in the face like even love. Yeah, I'm a breaking in. I was. Yeah. It's love blood and retching school. You can have da da da da da.

But right. Blood and compulsory. Yes. Their whole blood you see. It just reminds me of my junior prom where my date kicked me in the face. So okay, I want to put a pin in that. Yeah, sure. Maybe not for on the air, but yeah, sure. Sure. Okay. All right.

Who knows? Maybe she's listening. If you are Jenny, I, I, I, I bury you know ill will, but you knew that already. So oh, the Martins and the Coise, they was reckless mountain boys, but they say they're ghostly cousin gave you chills because the hatchet sure was buried once we graced and Henry married it broke up the best-durn feud in these here hills.

Like we're grading them now? Right, well not only are we grading them, but there's a label, every single time we've seen this, there's a level of entertainment to it. There's a level of, oh, they enjoy it. Or, you know, how those people are, you know, it's that kind of, yeah, that kind of, you may think that this is where the story ended, but I'm telling you them ghosts don't cuss no more since, because since Grayson Henry wedded, they'd fight worse than all the rest did and they carry on the feud just like before. So holy shit. So the streets are not okay. No. So let's, let's, let's normalize partner violence. Well, while we're at it, and we have everything else, oh yeah, everything else. Let's just let's throw that in there because, you know, it's

the 1940s. And, you know, the boy, you know, they've been for and. And like, you know, yeah, it happens, right? Yeah, it shouldn't fucking happen. Anyway. Oh, wow. There's in another layer on the onion there. Oh, yeah. And that's not even describing the animation yet. Yeah.

That's just the lyrics. Yeah. You know. Yeah. So, oh my god. So now the cartoon, the two family houses on top of mountains with a river between them. And I have a note here to show you a screen cap. So hold on. Actually, while while you were talking about it, I actually went to the Disney fandom website and found the page about this feature. Oh, good. And so I have, so I have a gallery of images in front of me. And yeah, so I see, I see the image you're talking about here.

There's, there's two houses. If you want to call them that, that's, that's a, that's a generous description. They are very rickety looking. That's a generous description. They are very rickety looking. And each of them is on top of a lift, really, with a ravine between them and, yeah, a river. Yeah, it's, you know, and if you, if you look at the, the young lady, and you look at the man,

it's very, very iconic for that time. Yeah. She is, you know, very, very demure, very small, but her feet are kind of big because these are mountain folk. Yeah. Oh, yeah. She's very well away. And he is just like rock hard, like just lab cited. Yeah. Yeah, big

His head his head is a rectangle and and he has a jaw that a Spanish Habsburg would look at me all we're related. Yeah, yeah, so So yeah, here's you know, here is the, let me grab the screenshots that I have of it. Yeah, there we go, drag and drop. There you go. And now the depiction of the rest of the family. First of all, we don't see any other women in the family. Doesn't look like there from the images I'm looking at. And they are all bearded. They all have particularly long shaggy beards. Oh, you know what? Don't look at these pictures then because I think this is from a later cartoon. Oh. Yeah. Yeah. No, no, this is from Martins and the Cois. Actually, I apologize. Yeah, these are

there. Okay. Yeah. Shaggy looking beards. They're all they're all wearing the same hat. They clearly go to the same haberdasher. Yep. Same shoe shop too. Yeah. Yeah. Which is to say. Yeah. If you look at the third picture that I give you. Okay. There's a grandpa. Oh, there we go. Who is, you see the drop dripping? Yeah, yeah, fall asleep under a still. And so that actually, he would roll over. He will roll over. And everyone wakes up because once they all, alcohol hits the ground, it explodes.

Again, tying back to the Betty Boop thing where they use it to fuel her roadster. So everybody wakes up to that, guns are ready. And then they realize what it is and they immediately go back to sleep. So you have again, this, it is and they immediately go back to sleep. So you have again, this, they are ready both for complete and total loafing or ultraviolence, right? Yeah. And there is no in between exactly. And the same thing happens on the martenside too, but those are the redheads. So if you take a look, that's, oh, yeah, okay. A check, a check and pecking in the beard of one of them because the beard is so long. And they're and they're just completely passed out. Which now, you know, the thing is, um, the, the, I find it

interesting that whatever group you were trying to punch down that, um, whether you are a racist white person denigrating African Americans, or you are a city slicker denigrating rural folk. There is this thing that goes together, that seems to always be tied together of well, they're poor and they're lazy. And it's like you never met poor people, have you?

Right. Because everybody I know who has struggled with poverty, they are some of the hardest hustling people I know. Because either they're hustling real hard to get out of it or they're hustling real hard to make ends meet. And but there is this caricature that always ascribes indolence and slothfulness to them. And I'm wondering if that's rooted in, you know, the Calvinism Protestantist, Protestant kind of religious ideas that so much of our culture revolves around from the pilgrims, you know, the idea that if you're one of the elect, you are morally superior.

And so these are all the signs that we have of that, even though Calvin himself said, you can't tell who it is, nobody knows, but God. But, you know, I don't know, at this point, I'm just ranting, but the tying of, well, you know, look, look at, look at how poor they are. And look how lazy they are. Ha ha.

It's like, you know, they're actually looking at real people like, no, you are, you are dehumanizing now. Yeah. And I don't care. Yeah. So. And so, uh, grandpa, Koi, full of mountain duped. So he's drunkenly sleepwalking and goes over

to the mountainside, like down the valley, back up. And he stumbles into the henhouse and causes his ruckus and the hen goes to the martens. And I think that's what you see in the fourth picture that I sent you, is the hen getting ready to wake them. Oh, no, no, she's scratching. There's another hand that shows up. And she awakens them by clock, clocking McCoy McCoy McCoy. So they all wake up guns ready and they take it. And what's interesting is even the pig wakes up guns ready and takes aim. So talk about the humanizing, right?

By anthropomorphizing the others. So grandpa Koi is using his beard as an apron to carry all the eggs out. He sees them all ready to shoot. And he escapes under hail of bullocks having thrown the eggs in the air. The Martins, for their part, they're cheering him on from their side. The Martins for their part, they're cheering him on from their side. He gets shot in the rear. He falls down the mountain and I was only able to find the 1952 version. So it's possible there's more to it than that. But everyone starts shooting at each other at this point. OK.

At the end of all the shooting, the houses are down to the studs and a shit ton of ghosts rise up from the scenery because there's tons of dead people on both sides. And they're all in bed shirts and hats. Interestingly, they all end up in heaven on clouds. And they're of course very lazy up there too. And the clouds themselves start weeping at the amount of dead. It's dark, man. It's like, yeah, and then we're left with one on each side. The pretty lovely figure red head woman from the Martin side and the very well built slab cut, like you said, lawn boy on the coy side. Oddly blonde since all of his male relatives are dark hair. Like no, no, no, wait a minute.

Well, I've known I've known plenty of people who start off as toeheads and end up very dark hair. So yeah, I, okay, I've known a couple of them, but that change usually takes place before puberty. Yeah, probably. So, so, yeah, I'm, I'm still thickened that, you know, Hey, coins, maybe, maybe you need to worry about somebody else, somebody ought to be feuding with right rather than rather than that family. Maybe he's caught in top.

No, no, no, okay. All right. So they both have guns. Neither one is wearing shoes. Both are cheered on to keep up the killing by their ghostly relatives who are up on their clouds. Yeah. And then we are treated to the view of looking down his rifle and we see her silhouette and it definitely looks like his penis is aiming right at her. Like speaking of paging Dr. Freud. He's immediately struck by her beauty and he is, and he starts leaping and dancing about. And at this point, she sees him, she is similarly struck. And all of this is to the consternation of both of their dead relatives. And now the two of them tie their guns in a bow like you do. And they're enjoying each other's company in a field

of flowers. You cut to them being then wed with a gelopy out front saying just married. And then there's a good old-fashioned hoedown in the Possum Tracks schoolhouse. Yeah. So we get to see all the mountain square dancing how hoedown stereotypes here, including using a spittoon to punctuate the end of a song. And you finish the cartoon in their house says, quote, Henry runs back ready to punch someone like he's, you know, why I ought to. And he flies right into graces out fish out, outstretched fist instead. And then this is followed by multiple household items being thrown right back at him. Henry, Henry runs against the tide of everything that's coming his way to try to get back inside, almost like Thanos going after Iron Man. And then we don't see him hit her, but it's clear that two people are getting hit. And we zoom out to see the new marriage home is set in the valley between the two broken down homes with tons of violence happening inside and bookended by the two

still destroyed house clans or clan houses. And the dead relatives are all laughing at these two fighting. Get it. Get it. Mutual spousal abuse. Get it. Ha, ha, ha. Now I will point out that this is 46 when this comes out. When was the honeymooners on? Did honeymooners start in 50s? Yeah. Because that is a few years later. True. And the...

The greatest call back line of that series. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, Alice. Right. As in, I'm going to punch you. Yeah. I'm going to knock you that you land on the moon. Yeah. Yeah. And wife of mine. Yeah. Yeah. So like the normalization of partner violence is just endemic, which I mean, isn't an excuse for it, but it's not necessarily tied to the problematicness of the caricaturization of poverty involved here. But yeah, that's one of those artifacts from an ancient era that one generation is going to look at and go, oh yeah, no, that was good you know, good wholesome, clean fun. Ha, ha, ha. And younger audiences will look at and go, what the fuck, Grandpa?

Well, even modern audiences. Now, I, I think that you see the divide between the Volgate and the critic. Because the nation had an author, a reviewer named James A, a G, a G, a G, E, um, He criticized it as infinitely insulting. Okay. So the critics had... Oh, he's for him, I suppose. Yeah. Well, and I would say it is, but it's kind of like depends on what the people are really still laughing at though, right? The common wheel called it tasteless.

And so you have reviewers calling it out for what it is. And what's happening here is that the Hatfields and McCoys are becoming shorthand for white folks who are like black folks. That's really what's happening. Mm. Mm. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. They're hillbills right and that is sure yeah for white people who are just as bad as black people Okay, I think that's what's going on in 1946

Because you've got the GI bill Okay, time magazines reviewer said that hillbilly Ballad, like this, depicted in the Disney anthology, would quote, offend those who think such caricatures as insulting as the hush-ma-mouth kind of comic contempt for the ends. So he doesn't say the N word, but he says that the one where four which there's still a United College formal. Okay, the formal term from which the slur is derived. Right. Okay. And he said that or the the reviewer said it depicted a quote, phony popular attitude about hillbillies and quote, and it was part of the vulgate and joy depiction of white folks who didn't measure up to white sensibilities and standards.

In post-war America, this was an increasingly popular trope, especially when you accompany, you have these two things colliding. You have Jim Crow and the GI Bill, right? Okay. And the GI Bill. And you've got these Jim Crow-styled caricatures of Black people, still in the popular sphere, as also seen in Make Mine Music's final piece about a whale who gets killed.

But in heaven, he sings short and in bread with a chorus of dolphins doing similarly to back him up. I vaguely remember that cartoon from when I was eight years old and yeah, so now that I know now that I know the the unfortunate problematic history behind a lot of that. I don't think I could watch that again. Shit. Damn.

So you've mentioned the GI bill a couple of times. And there's something that I kind of want to pick at with that. When you're talking about the GI bill, and we're talking about this group of white people who aren't measuring up to the idea of like what you need to be in order to qualify as white, right? Do you do you think this is a reaction to Well now we've got all these uncultured hillbilly, you know, fuckwits showing up at universities and getting ideas above their

station. Do you think it's a knee jerk reaction by the bourgeoisie to that? Or is it just a punching down because now the bourgeoisie are taking advantage of all of these things and look look look what we've look what we've elevated ourselves from ha ha ha. I think it's more the former than the latter and by mentioning the GI Bill, I like that you brought up the college thing and not the housing thing because as we know, the housing thing was far more restrictive for black veterans, right? That doesn't mean that the specter

of desegregating neighborhoods didn't exist. It certainly did. There's all kinds of videos of women being upset that they moved to a suburb that they thought was gonna stay white, even though they're not racist. But. That was people, right that was people right.

Oh my God. Um, but the, the GI Bill did enable a lot of black veterans to leave the South and go to universities in the North and Midwest. Yes. Okay. And now that means places that had formerly been white hamlets that didn't have any race issues. All of a sudden, yeah, these veterans are bringing all these race issues to us. You know, so it's like, no.

Let's work on our framing here. Right. Jimmy. let's work on our framing here. Right. Jimmy. So, but yeah, I, you know, I think that tension. Yeah. Whitey. Check. Yeah. Biff. Yeah. Dude. Yeah. But I do think that that tension that existed with Jim Crow existing and de facto Jim Crow existing the February, North, New England. Yeah. Now again, there were plenty of instances of black neighborhoods,

black middle class neighborhoods getting started as a result of the war. We live just north of one, its Richmond. Sacramento itself was enormously helped by the war effort, especially Black neighborhoods in Sacramento. Oak Park became a huge hub for Black arts culture. A lot of money started moving through there. And what have you, Oak Park is a neighborhood in Sacramento for folks that are not fluckled from that area. Yeah. Yeah. But Richmond, surely more, Dr. Shirley Moore wrote an incredible book about the the birth of the middle class and Richmond due to the Kaiser shipyards. You see the same thing in Minnesota. You see the same thing in in Massachusetts. You see

the same thing in Massachusetts. You see Chicago. And on top of that, you have the Great Migration, or the Second World Migration, right? And so you've got all of that, and you still have like the Jim Crow attention. And so, yes, that's there. Additionally, you have the movement of poor white people along the same avenues. Oh, you've got this increased tension of like, you know, again, we talked about last time with bum brigades, right? You know, keeping the wrong kinds of white people out. That kind of stuff. And the further that had failed Zimakoy's got from the country, the more short-based and look at these robes, the entertainment got, and it becomes shorthand for that area. It's mimetic, right? Because these

folks are again now in the cities for the first time in living memory, and their farms have largely collapsed. And you yeah, you don't see the ones who stayed. And what have you. So that's what you're seeing through about 46. Now in 1949, somebody finally thought that the story was yet again ready for a future film. Oh, God. Yes. And now the story doesn't stick to history at all. It doesn't even really try. It's as though somebody took the name of the feud, took the idea of the Romeo and Juliet plot and decided to play with all the rest.

You may recognize the name Billy Wiler. Bigly. Okay, he was formerly a producer for Samuel Goldwyn productions. Okay. Eventually we turn into MGM, right? Yeah. He left the company in 1946 over having his credit stolen for the best years of our lives by Goldwyn. Okay. All right.

Holdwyn didn't just steal a producer credit, by the way. He snubbed Wiler at the Oscars and the film won seven Academy Awards, including Best Picture and Best Director. Oh wow. And although the film was the highest-grossing film since gone with the wind, Goldwyn also cooked the books to deny Wiler his due pay, along with his due credit that he had been promised. Wow. Yeah. That's that's special spot in the bad place kind of shit. They're like, yeah, damn.

And because gold one was still bitter and mighty petty, uh, with, uh, over Wileh's departure, when Kathy O'Donnell, the, the actress who is originally slated to play Rosanna McCoy, she married Wileh's older brother, he replaced her with Joan Evans. What the fuck? Right. So the actress who is supposed to be in it married the older brother of the guy that I'm mad at.

Fuck her then. So, okay, so wait. What you're saying is he turned this into a family feud. In some ways, it was very one sided, but yes. Well, yeah, like, yeah. We're talking about clannishness here. Yes, dude, come on now. Yeah, I don't think this is a gold one being clandest so much

as I get where you're saying like he's he's going after every aspect of Wileh's family. But he's not trying to protect his family in any way. So that's all right. Yes. I hesitate. He's just being just being a dick. Yeah. So the woman who, well, not the woman, the woman who well not the woman the girl who plans plays Rosanna McCoy is Joan Evans and the reason I say that is because she's 14 Oh, no, yeah, but her parents said she was 16 so you've got kind of got this me look on this thing going on 16 hmm that's still less than like you know Pointing away from 18. Like, come on now. So it's a very creepy addition to the movie.

Especially when you look at the historical record, you find out that Rosanna McCoy was actually about three years older than John C. Yeah, and they were, and they were both grown ass adults. Yeah, about 28 at the time of their entanglement. Yeah, whole things grow. time of their entanglement. So, the whole thing's gross. Just fucking evil. You know, I'm reminded of the Wizard of Oz

and Judy Garland. I was too. But, God damn it. Hollywood, come on now. Yep. Yeah. And everybody wants to, you know, and there's this urge to romanticize this period

in Hollywood history. And he's like, no, right. The moment you actually learn the shit that was going on, you're like, no, please, can we not? It's, it's, please not. It feels like when people romanticize what like 1960s Australia was like. And I'm like, they hadn't figured out their septic system everywhere smelled like shit. We can't get away from that. That is an extremely niche. I had not known that until now. Sydney smelled like a Portipoli party. Like all the time. Like they finally figured it out like by the 90s.

Yeah. Port of poly hit like rock out of place. Right. Didn't wash. Didn't wash. Yeah. Bird of crap. Um, dropped your keys. Oh God. I'm, you know what? Someone else can have my car. I'm going to go buy another one. Fine.

It's okay. Yeah. Like, my God, she was 14. Yeah. Her parents did so like, there's so many, there's so much awful there. Yes. Her parents lie, oh, she's 16. Yeah. To get her the job as the romantic Anjaneu in a movie, she's 16. Like that makes it better.

And here's the thing. Do you somehow think that it does though? Not creepy. Like it's still awful, right? But it does make it better. And here's the thing. It does though. Creepy. Like it's still awful, right? But it does make it better because like, I mean, my grandma was, she met my grandpa when she was 15 and he was in his 20s. If she met him when she was two years younger, it would be way worse. I, I, I get what you're saying. Yeah, but like,

Oh yeah, I don't want to be on record saying that that's okay. I'm still full body, full body squicking. Yes. Like the whole thing. I teach 16 girls. Yeah. It's no, it's not okay.

It is not okay. It's so not okay. No. Anybody, anybody who's spent any meaningful amount of time around high school students is doing like, no. Just don't romanticize this, sit down, shut the fuck up, no. I had a student, my probably second year of teaching,

came to me and asked me if I could change her grade in my class because she was on a contract with her parents and she needed to get certain GPA so they would let her get married. Wow. Wow. What? That was early 2000s by the way. So this person is probably in their 30s. Wow. And based on that, probably has about five kids. But like, I don't know. I don't know.

I mean, I hope that they live a very, well, I already said she, I hope that she's living a very happy and like fulfilling life. I genuinely do hope that. Yeah, yeah. But, and I told her, I said, if you knew that going in, then shouldn't you have worked harder the whole time so that you don't have to come to me and ask me about this? And also, if you're unable or unwilling to put that work in, perhaps maybe you should

reconsider getting married right now, since delayed gratification hasn't been a strong suit. Maybe needs to be something you work on. What I didn't tell her is I think you've sabotaged yourself on purpose so you can get out of it. You're okay. Yeah. Yeah. But anyway, so yeah, you've got a 14 year old playing Rosanna McCoy. In the movie, Rosanna McCoy gets stung by a hornet while picking flowers and John C anonymously comes to her aid over the sting. And when she finds out his name, she

reproaches him as being part of that clan that shot and injured her mom so long ago. We're gonna get to that because that's actually not far from the mark of what happened. But the thing that that is referencing, it's not referencing it on purpose. But the thing that it fell over into referencing is chronologically way out of order. So John C's response was that it was Mounts Hatfield, who everyone knows is mentally deficient. And so he did it on accident and she's not having it. So just, oh my God, so many problems. So there's a lot. problems. So there's there's a lot.

Like just digest that. The ableism on on top of everything else. Let's throw in right. All right. Wow. Yeah. Also mounts wasn't the guys first name. It was Ellison mount. It just. Yeah. Okay. Well, you know what? I'm not even going to grade any of these things on

historicity. Good point. At this point, I'm just going straight by how fucked up is this? Right. So later though, he does whatever red, red blooded male does when faced with a teenage girl who doesn't want anything to do with him. Oh no. He forces a kiss upon her, which of course, we'll make her change her mind as it is. Yeah, you're right. Yeah, I'll be. Yeah. Now what's interesting here is that the actor who played John C. was a guy named Farley Granger who was a fairly openly bisexual actor

who was a bit of a thing for a few years there from like the 40s and the 50s. You might remember him as the tennis star from Stranger's on a train. The Hitchcock film that inspired throw mama from the train. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Chris Cross. Yeah. Chris Cross. Well, swap murders. That guy.

No, the guy that that guy's talking to. I am. All right. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Um, okay. Yeah. Now, he was nine years her elder, but he thought he was only seven years her elder. He thought I'm 23. I'm kissing his 16 year old. Ew. Ew. Yeah. Right. Right. There is an extra layer of ew. Like because he's actually two years younger. It shouldn't be that big of an difference, but it is. But it does. Yeah. And. And all of it, that just makes all of it worse.

When I, I'm thinking back to when I was 23, uh-huh. There, there was no way when I was 23 that I would have been okay with, with, with that kind of contact with a 16 year old. Right. Like I don't, I don't understand the mindset of guys who are like, well, you know, she's, she's, you know, it's so far away. I'm like, she's, you know, like, no.

Well, and also, well, it's not like she's 14. That's you missed the point. You missed the point. Like you ran at the point full speed and, and with right past it, like headbutted it so hard that you drove it away. You're trying to capture a butterfly and you headbutt it like yeah, yeah, and the only and the only reason that that you didn't suffer trauma from it is there's no brain in your head to be injured, right?

Right. So, okay. So anyway, um, use 23 kissing a 16 year old, because it's forced to buy the studio. Uh, okay. On some level. I mean, there's, I mean, you know, because it's being forced to by the studio. Okay. On some level. I mean, there's, I mean, you know, even my studio system, right? Yeah, financial financial considerations, but you think a job is a job. Okay. But still. Yeah. Now off screen, we, we will discuss a little bit more of that, but for the purposes of this. So now Rosanna is hot for John C because he forced that kiss on her and now she's convinced. But nobody realizes that her little brother, little Randall,

was watching the whole time. So that's going to come up later. John C. takes her across to his parents across the tug to introduce her to them and gain their blessing for a marriage. Now for some reason devil and protests, but he's also happy. He protests it, but he's also happy because it means that he can renew his feud with McCoy. And Anson, his sons leave Ellison and Cap, or his sons Ellison and Cap, they leave and they start fighting again with the McCoy's. So, John C. Goes off to find a preacher leaving in Rosanna with Levisa or Levacy, who they begin bonding together, Rosanna and Levacy.

But in the ensuing violence cap gets injured. Anson Levacy tend to him in John C's absence and then Mounds Hatfield shows up while Rosanna is alone in the Hatfield cabin. Anson ends up rescuing her from Mounds. Rosanna then goes to fetch water to help out and her brother, Little Randall, approaches her and convinces her to come home to the McCoy's. She tells John C. Goodbye, but tells him to call her on her at her father's house and speak with Old Randall, which he eagerly agrees

to do, planning on doing it the following night. Of course, on his way over, John C. stops at the store of the man who proposed to Rosanna earlier in the film, whoopsie-dupesie, and her brother's famer little Randall and Tober, just happened to be there and then Mount Swoxin, and there's a brawl that turns into a shootout, and then the shopkeep, Fad, who wanted to marry Rosanna, carries the wounded toll-bert

home to Randall McCoy after the fight. And he tells Randall and Rosanna who are awaiting Johnson that little Randall is stuck in the store still with Johnson and Mounce. And Randall and Rosanna come to the store and Johnson orders his relatives to cease fire, admitting Fad back into his own store along with Rosanna and Randall and Rosanna come to the store and John C orders his relatives to cease fire, admitting Thad back into his own store along with Rosanna and Old Randall. Mounts then turns on John C and uses him, Rosanna and Little Randall as human shields

and he skidattles effectively enough to upset Old Randall into declaring an all out war on the half fields. Hey, yeah. Feel free to rewind this a couple times war on the half fields. Okay. Yeah. Feel free to rewind this a couple times so that you can get pieces. Those you I know what? No.

Yeah. Yeah. So then Johnson, you were talking. Okay. Yeah. Listen to the listeners. Yeah.

Yeah. Okay. Uh, uh, Johnson and Rosanna will not be denied and they meet in secret. And of course, in not being denied, they're also not very careful, which leads to mounts finding them. And he tries to shoot them both, because if I can't have her, no one will, and then I'll kill the one who wanted to.

But Johnson shoots mounts first, and then he escapes with a rosanna by horse. Mounds is still, has enough in him that he takes aim and gets ready to kill Johnson, but that's when devilance have field kills mounts. And this, of course, is enough that both sides lay down their weapons, allowing love to win. Wow.

Did I mention that there was some witchcraft and superstition in the beginning? I feel like I should have. You didn't, but I kind of feel like we should have all assumed that. Yeah. Based on all of the other, you know, ugly stereotype tropes. Right. And I wanted to put a pin in the idea of witchcraft, by the way, because it's going to come up later. No, no, really. Yeah. No, no, really. Yeah.

You know, I mean, like, okay, so kind of as a side, from the folklore and for lack of better term mysticism, I'm not sure what other term I can use that wouldn't come across as pejorative, because I don't mean to be pejorative. But the folk spiritual beliefs and the lore of Appalachia in particular is a really rich, fascinating example of the blending of several different cultures coming together. blending of several different cultures coming together.

And, and some of it is legitimately goddamn terrifying. Like, if you, I, I really want to see somebody do a horror film built around Appalachian lore because actually hasn't. Dr. Cruz has mentioned this a couple times to me. There is a podcast. I don't know the name of it that does deep horror set in Appalachia. Oh, wow. Yeah. So it's adjacent to what you're asking for.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Because the thing is, you know, everybody ever since the exercise, everybody wants to do, you know, demonology, Catholicism, the nun, you know, it's like a big deal. Like, okay, yes, nuns are terrifying. Not going to argue with that. But with that being said, like, no, no, no, you, you wouldn't talk about some scary shit. Like just scratching surface of, of Appalachian spirit lore is it's scary. Because it's like lily-pucional, you know, folk lore from like Ireland

brought over and then dozed heavily with like Fire and brimstone and tent revival. Well, fire and brimstone and tent revival and then also introducing folklore and the fauna of the area. Yeah, well, the fauna of the stories about how to ward off some of the Spooks and evil spirits involved, it's taken directly from legends from West Africa. So there's a very clear crossing over of law between multiple different groups of people. Yeah, that's true. And I mean, you know, from a historical anthropological standpoint, it's amazing. And I really want to see it as a source of lore, get more respect. I guess is what I'm trying to say.

And I would actually like to see somebody do kind of an overlay and see where their go instruments does their go lore. Because I bet you, and this is not a pun, this is actually genuinely curious, because you mentioned West African stuff, and I'm like, oh, stringed instruments from West Africa. They're way into abolition. And like I'm just like, hmm, this would be interesting too. Yeah. So yeah, it is. Yeah. So there are stories galore. Yeah, there's the pun. Just in case people were wondering if I caught it. Um, but if I caught it. Um, so, so, so Basley Crowder, you, you can be angry. Basley Crowder, he was a famous reviewer for the New York Times at the time.

Oh, I think he's the reviewer for this. And if not, this is what his replacement for that day said. It's, it reads like Basley Crowder, to be honest though. Okay. So I'm crediting it to him. I might be wrong. Quote a chapter out of American folklore comes to fit full life on the screen in Rosanna McCoy, the Samuel Goldman production that was presented yesterday at the capital. There is much feud and fussan and loving in this pictorially handsome recreation of the fabulous enmity between the Hatfields and the McCoy's. But the characters lack the stature of true persons. The famous mountain families have been satirized and distorted in jokes and in comic strips for so many years now that it is difficult to take them seriously.

This is a handicap. The picture does not entirely overcome. Rosanna McCoy, as adapted by John Collier, or by Joan Collier, does not entirely overcome. Rosanna McCoy, as adapted by Joan Collier, does not have as much heart or narrative integrity as did the Alberta Hanum novel on which the film is based. There was a Romeo and Juliet quality to the written romance that does not come through on the screen. The director has pointed all his action toward the inevitable gun clash between

the clans. It is a lively noisy battle, but somehow its effects is anti-climactic and the spectators in this spectator's opinion heightens the feeling that Rosanna McCoy is not a valid dramatic achievement that the producers strove to recreate an authentic picture of early American superstitions and ignorance is quite evident. Okay. So more settings and depictions from what we've seen in the last few iterations, but this time with romance and action at the core, not animation or singing, right? So it's essentially same prejudices with new skin. And you can hear that in the review. So that's that movie, which then brings me to the one that you probably know best, the 1950

Mary Melody's cartoon, Hillbilly Hair. Yes. Now this one is important because it not only features Bugs Bunny, but it also mixes in the Rowan County War with the Hatfields and McCoys. Okay. The Hatfields and McCoys was not even the bloodiest of the feuds that was in that area in that time period. There were a bunch. Oh, yeah. Well, because you have number one, a great many of them are coming from a scotch Irish background. Yeah, those fuckers don't let a grudge go at all. No, it is.

Is that related to them? Yes, same. You know, being, you know, a descendant of a river family is myself. I can say, no, it was a cultural feature that they brought over with them. And then you also have the fact that your family and your extended family were critically important to your survival. You know, there'd be institutions were not strong enough in, you know, the kind of rural areas where they were living for you to be able to reliably count on the protection of the law. You had to count on the protection of your family. And additionally, everybody was living very close to the edge of survival. Yes.

And so in those kind of circumstances, you have an environment where one family and another, there's every opportunity for blood feuds out of the middle of the beaches, basically, to show up. the middle of the ages basically to show up. And patronage, like when there were issues of institutional strength, patronage became a thing because of all the cultural background I'm already talking about. And, you know, I mean, yeah, it was,

so this was a, You know, I mean, yeah, it was so this was a, this was a cultural holdover and a cultural reaction to the circumstances in which everybody in that region was living during this, during that time period. Mm-hmm. So, and actually, I think I want to leave it there because it's easier to cut off before I get into it than after. Because then I want to cut some important stuff in in in half. So, that is that is actually a really good way to lead into. that you've gleaned from this discussion of some fairly short and funny things ending with a mellow drama at best. I feel like there is a weird conflation of romanticizing and lampooning going on kind of all at once like I think both are inherently exploitative and yeah, and they objectify it like they they're not authentic to it. It's really easy to gloss over details or to choose to conveniently overlook the ugly reality

of that kind of violence when you have turned it into a you know, you look at this story with, you know, the movie that you just talked about. And then you look at West Side Story, which is literally an adaptation of Romeo and Juliet, right? Yes. And there is a similar kind of broadening of the for lack of a better term, the emotional color palette. In the case of West Side Story, it's technical or so, it's literally a broadening of the color palette. Yeah, a lot of old, bold solid colors for people. Yeah. Yeah. And, and the characterizations are all generally very broad.

Now, the characterizations in West Side Story are more sympathetic, but they're still melodramatic and they're still broadened in that way. I think they're also still white-lensed. Oh, yeah. You know, I think that he's been saying, yeah. Well, I think it's worth saying, though, because we're talking about a region that is considered less than white in terms of its depiction. And so I would say that if we don't want to bring the colorism in, because it is white people depicting white people, we fully knowledge

that there is a caste system in America. It's certainly at the time that these movies were made if people want to read between the lines at all. They still is. But, there is a layer of these are worthy whites. These are unworthy whites. And so, I think you can say it's still a white lens, but if people want to say there's still a class lens, I, okay, fine. But well, I think it's both both apply. And in the case of West Side Story, the white lens thing,

I think is important because remember the sharks are for a recon. Correct. And so like, yeah, the whole white lens thing applies there. And they're all working class. So the class lens applies there. Again, in that film, they're all portrayed more sympathetically than we're seeing the hill folk, a portrait in these. But I think there's a similar a portrait in any of these, but I think there's a similar less extreme dehumanizing involved. Is what you get when you have white guys writing

or re-conpeable? Yeah. Is what you get. I mean, we saw this with comic books. What you get when you get a white guy writing, what do you think black people are? And, you know, you know, you're, we're seeing the same thing here. You're getting a certain class of white folk writing what they think are these things and not too interested in, in finding out more to be honest. Yeah, well, they don't think it's necessary. Right. Well, and they know what they need to know, man, like, come on. Exactly. Exactly.

And I will say this, though, I think if you went into that area with a notepad and something to write on, it would not be successful. Yeah. To partly because by going in there like that, you'd be going in for exploitative and extractive purposes They're used to that and you've got the clannish nature of it that is true those things do exist But I do think just by the way that they would go and ask I mean it reminds me of I Forget I think was Sherman Alexi who said cut you know first the government sent the the Calvary and then the university sent the anthropologists um you know it's just that

wow is that vibe of tell me everything about your culture so that I might depict it like no fuck off how about no right I don't want to so I don't know how much success they would have had. They gone into those places and asked for those voices. Because they're very questions wouldn't have worked. Yeah, but the lack of trying says it is very telling. Yeah, you know, yeah. And again, I think you nailed it with they didn't think they had to. So yeah, yeah. Well, cool. I know that you now there are us really want to be found

anymore. So, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, I do. I do. I very, very highly recommend Karen Winfone's Dad's Hell's Moving Castle, the book upon which the animation was based. It is a, I love the film. Like, I am absolutely over the moon about the movie. But the book is, there is a wonderful quality to the author's voice in the book that I very highly recommend. So there we go. How about you? recommend. So there we go. How about you? I'm going to recommend a book called The Injustice of Place by Catherine J. Eden, H. Luke Schaefer and Timothy Jane Nelson. It's subtitle is uncovering the legacy of poverty in America. And what they did was they kind of errant-righted it, but they did

it more as a study instead of an experiential kind of gonzo journalism. They, they're huge scholars of poverty and they basically went to the poorest places in the United States. They set out like basically a matrix for what makes for poverty and so on. And they went to the four, like the four, I think it's four or five poorest places, one of which is in Appalachia. The rest are in the cotton and tobacco belts of the deep south and south Texas. And they looked at why are these places poor

and why do people keep pointing to Chicago, even though it's nowhere near as bad as it is there. And so the discussion of it is just phenomenal. So I really recommend that, especially given what we're about to get into. So. Hey, real fast, I need to correct myself. The author in question is Diana Wynn Jones. So my apologies to Miss Jones and Miss Fondstad. Diana Wynn Jones is the author of

The Novel House Moving Castle and it is amazing. Very cool. Sorry about that. No worries. All right. Where can we be found? We can be, well, I mean, we don't, we individually know what we want to be found, but you've somehow found us collectively, if you're listening to this, our podcast is available from our website at www.gaggistoryoftime.com, or you've found us either on Spotify or the Apple Podcast app. Wherever it is that you have found us, please take the time to subscribe and give us the five star of you that you know Damien has earned with his exhaustive research on this topic. And yeah, that's I think about it. Cool. Well, for a geek history of time, I am Damien Harmony.

And I'm Ed Blalock and until next time, get off my land. history of time, I am Damien Harmony. And I'm Ed Blalock and until next time, get off my land!