More Baum

[Dave Monroe]

You know, I'm not so sure L. Frank Baum IS calling for the extermination
of Native Americans in those editorials
(http://www.dickshovel.com/TwistedFootnote.html).  Not exactly.  There's
more than a little ambiguity, irony, perhaps, even, going on there.
Almost as if he's saying, well, having mortally wounded them, might as
well put them out of their misery ("their glory has fled, their spirit
roekn, their manhood effaced, better that they die than live the
miserable wretches they are").  But nigh unto sarcsatically.

Note how Baum's alleged animosity is mitigated by stereotypically
romanticized, to be sure, but seemingly admiring nonetheless comments
like "proud spirit," "the nobility of the Redskin," "the glory of these
Grand Kings of the forest," and so forth.  And note that "original
owners" there, now there's a possibly incendiary sentiment in the midst
of Manifest Destiny in action.  That final comment about "when the
whites win a fight, it is a victory, and when the Indians win it, it is
a massacre" sounds not unlike Walter Benjamin's later comment that "evry
documenmt of civilization is also a document of barbarism"--history
written by the victors, indeed ...

Not exactly quite the right tone perhaps to take with an editorial,
perhaps not quite responsible editorial journalism, but ... well, think
Jonathan Swift's "A Modest Proposal," perhaps.  Time to get me a copy o'
The Wizard of Oz, I suppose.  Thanks!