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A Proud Member of the Reality-Based Community
About Me :
I'm a grownup nerd living in the Boston burbs. I write computer programs for a living and plays for fun.
I'm married to a wonderful woman, and we share a nice little house with our daughter and our cats.
I'm a humanist, a technologist, an artist, and an idealist. I believe in reason, freedom, love, equality,
and democracy. (Did I mention that I'm
an idealist? I did, OK.)
I'm also a pragmatist and an empiricist. I reject ideology and dogma, especially when they conflict with
practical facts (i.e., pretty much always). I particularly hate willful ignorance, which tends to go hand-in-hand
with ideology and dogma.
Like the alignment of the planets, this blog gets updated as I have the time, inspiration, and inclination to do so.
Like the alignment of the planets, this blog gets updated as I have the time, inspiration, and inclination to do so.
Wednesday, March 10, 2004
Confederate Bears
A few months ago, when my wife and I were in the mall doing our Christmas shopping, we wandered into the Franklin Mint Store. Not that we thought we were actually going to buy anything at the Franklin Mint Store, but you never know where inspiration might hit, you know?
It's hard to describe the Franklin Mint. I suppose that once upon a time, they were a specialty manufacturer of coins, gaming tokens, and medals - you know, the kind of things you'd expect a company that calls itself a "Mint" would manufacture. At some point, though, they started selling collectible plates, and I guess that was the beginning of the end. I mean, once you've crossed the line into collectible plates, the barriers are smashed, and before you know it, you're selling die-cast Harley-Davidson motorcycle models, ceramic Princess Diana dolls, Dale Earnhardt “The Intimidator” collector bears, and the Jeff Gordon collector knife.
It's easy to dismiss the Franklin Mint as just a sort of Mecca of High Kitsch, but it's really a fascinating place to visit. There is more than one cultural thread running through this company, and the fact that this store was in a solidly middle-class mall in the suburbs of Boston is proof that there are no class or regional differences when it comes to bad taste. For me, however, the single most interesting genre that the Franklin Mint carries is the Civil War. The thing about their Civil War coverage, you see, is that it's almost overwhelmingly one-sided. The Franklin Mint sells items like the Pride of the South Civil War Pendant, the Stonewall Jackson Collector Watch, the Pride of the Confederacy Dinnerware Collection, and every imaginable variation of Robert E. Lee (knives, sculptures, watches, rings, etc.) By contrast, Ulysses Grant gets a couple of knives, and George Custer gets one. One sort of senses that these products are less than enthusiastically produced and sold: variations on “Pride of the South” permeate the Mint's advertising copy on the Confederate products, but nowhere can you find a reference to anything like “Pride of the North”.
(Why do people romanticize the Confederacy? I just don't get it. Leave aside the fact that they lost the war. They were fighting for a manifestly evil cause – which may not have been evident at the time. It sure is now! “The Civil War wasn't about slavery,” a friend of mine from Georgia once said. I guess you know he's white. “It was about States' Rights.” Sure, OK – it was about a State's right to take away human rights.)
Bearing all this in mind, imagine how I felt when I saw the most bizarre cross-pollination I have ever seen at the Franklin Mint Store:
Confederate Bears.
There were actually teddy bears dressed up as Confederate soldiers.
One of the bears was just called “Pride of the South”. I think one was Robert E. Lee, and the other was Jeb Stuart. I might have the names a little wrong – but there were three brown bears, and they were all wearing Southern uniforms.
I was left shaking my head, with so many questions:
Why were there no Union soldiers?
Why were there no black bears?
Did bears only fight for the South? Did only brown bears fight for the South?
Did brown bears keep black bears as slaves?
Did bears have a position on the Missouri Compromise?
I can't give a link to these products on the Franklin web site – they seem to have been buried pretty quickly. But they were definitely there. Perhaps this was an attempt to appeal the to the wives of the men who were buying the 14 1/2” Robert E. Lee Battle of Fredericksburg Knife . Maybe they sold out the entire production run. Or maybe the idea was a total flop. Maybe there's just nothing cuddly and cute about traitors who wage war on their own country to preserve their “right” to own human beings. I'm not sure.
PS:I just tried to find these bears again. I went back to the mall to find the store; I wanted to take some photos, but the Franklin Mint store wasn't there anymore. I guess General Sherman had finally gotten to Burlington. There were some carpetbaggers running one of those shoestring stores in its place, selling Bonsai trees.
A few months ago, when my wife and I were in the mall doing our Christmas shopping, we wandered into the Franklin Mint Store. Not that we thought we were actually going to buy anything at the Franklin Mint Store, but you never know where inspiration might hit, you know?
It's hard to describe the Franklin Mint. I suppose that once upon a time, they were a specialty manufacturer of coins, gaming tokens, and medals - you know, the kind of things you'd expect a company that calls itself a "Mint" would manufacture. At some point, though, they started selling collectible plates, and I guess that was the beginning of the end. I mean, once you've crossed the line into collectible plates, the barriers are smashed, and before you know it, you're selling die-cast Harley-Davidson motorcycle models, ceramic Princess Diana dolls, Dale Earnhardt “The Intimidator” collector bears, and the Jeff Gordon collector knife.
It's easy to dismiss the Franklin Mint as just a sort of Mecca of High Kitsch, but it's really a fascinating place to visit. There is more than one cultural thread running through this company, and the fact that this store was in a solidly middle-class mall in the suburbs of Boston is proof that there are no class or regional differences when it comes to bad taste. For me, however, the single most interesting genre that the Franklin Mint carries is the Civil War. The thing about their Civil War coverage, you see, is that it's almost overwhelmingly one-sided. The Franklin Mint sells items like the Pride of the South Civil War Pendant, the Stonewall Jackson Collector Watch, the Pride of the Confederacy Dinnerware Collection, and every imaginable variation of Robert E. Lee (knives, sculptures, watches, rings, etc.) By contrast, Ulysses Grant gets a couple of knives, and George Custer gets one. One sort of senses that these products are less than enthusiastically produced and sold: variations on “Pride of the South” permeate the Mint's advertising copy on the Confederate products, but nowhere can you find a reference to anything like “Pride of the North”.
(Why do people romanticize the Confederacy? I just don't get it. Leave aside the fact that they lost the war. They were fighting for a manifestly evil cause – which may not have been evident at the time. It sure is now! “The Civil War wasn't about slavery,” a friend of mine from Georgia once said. I guess you know he's white. “It was about States' Rights.” Sure, OK – it was about a State's right to take away human rights.)
Bearing all this in mind, imagine how I felt when I saw the most bizarre cross-pollination I have ever seen at the Franklin Mint Store:
Confederate Bears.
There were actually teddy bears dressed up as Confederate soldiers.
One of the bears was just called “Pride of the South”. I think one was Robert E. Lee, and the other was Jeb Stuart. I might have the names a little wrong – but there were three brown bears, and they were all wearing Southern uniforms.
I was left shaking my head, with so many questions:
Why were there no Union soldiers?
Why were there no black bears?
Did bears only fight for the South? Did only brown bears fight for the South?
Did brown bears keep black bears as slaves?
Did bears have a position on the Missouri Compromise?
I can't give a link to these products on the Franklin web site – they seem to have been buried pretty quickly. But they were definitely there. Perhaps this was an attempt to appeal the to the wives of the men who were buying the 14 1/2” Robert E. Lee Battle of Fredericksburg Knife . Maybe they sold out the entire production run. Or maybe the idea was a total flop. Maybe there's just nothing cuddly and cute about traitors who wage war on their own country to preserve their “right” to own human beings. I'm not sure.
PS:I just tried to find these bears again. I went back to the mall to find the store; I wanted to take some photos, but the Franklin Mint store wasn't there anymore. I guess General Sherman had finally gotten to Burlington. There were some carpetbaggers running one of those shoestring stores in its place, selling Bonsai trees.