wmw999 2,166 #1 Posted February 5, 2021 Yeah, the topic is about how the little guy triumphed in the end. The thing is that so much of what was done to discriminate wasn't blatant, it was all the exercising of "judgment," and therefore individual. The Jackie Robinson of Rodeo Wendy P. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
kallend 1,667 #2 February 5, 2021 We still see rationalization of that behavior in February 2021, in this very forum. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
winsor 187 #3 February 5, 2021 2 hours ago, wmw999 said: Yeah, the topic is about how the little guy triumphed in the end. The thing is that so much of what was done to discriminate wasn't blatant, it was all the exercising of "judgment," and therefore individual. The Jackie Robinson of Rodeo Wendy P. Oddly enough, a large percentage of the 'cowboys of the old West' were former slaves. With Western expansion, a significant number of people were needed who were skilled with livestock, were accustomed to bad food, bad pay and terrible conditions, and for former slaves this was nothing new. A great uncle of mine was lured to the West in the 1870s by romanticized popular literature of the time, and lasted a couple of years. He returned to Massachusetts, where he became a successful merchant and never looked back Rather a few cowboys of renown were former slaves, though not much was made of it at the time. Deadwood Dick comes to mind, in that you can read much about him that doesn't make mention of race. We tend to view the past and future as extensions of our own experience, but this can be misleading. In some cases where we might assume that, if things are not okay now they must have been worse in the past, this is not at all the case. Various prejudices that seem deeply entrenched now were almost unknown in the past, and vice versa ("no dogs or Irish allowed"). Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
