Miller said another myth is that Geronimo jumped hundreds of feet off a steep cliff at Fort Sill while being chased by the U.S. Cavalry during an escape attempt.
“This idea of jumping off Medicine Bluff during an escape is just nonsense,” Miller said.
“As (American Indians) became less dangerous, they take on this romantic element, and Geronimo kind of feeds into that as the most famous of these romantic people who are still around.”
Comment: Cecil Adams notes that the first jumper yelled "Geronimo!" followed by an Indian war whoop. This tells you what's really behind the "motivational cry." People see Geronimo and other Indians as foolhardy, crazy, death-defying to the point of suicide. In other words, savage and uncivilized.
No one would think of yelling "Custer" or "Patton" to indicate someone willing to throw his life away, literally, to win a war. But we believe Geronimo and other Indians are just that wild and irrational. They don't care about human life the way we do, we tell ourselves. They're like screaming madmen, banshees, or beasts compared to us.
For more on the subject, see Review of Geronimo.
1 comment:
I don't look upon Geronimo as savage and wreckless at all just because someone yells that jumping off stuff. In my memory, it's more like... "remember the Alamo" type thing; really more like "fight for what you believe in". Some people or events just represent FREEDOM. In my memory, that was what Geronimo was about. Freedom for his people. Heck, they even had a movie back then with Chuck Connors playing Geronimo as an honest character always striving to deal honestly with other peoples and doing his best to take care of his own. Of course, then some idiot in the American Cavalry or some cowpoke crosses the line and then you have the usual scenario. But in the movie that was plain to see. Now you know if white people made a movie like that, that his true life character had to have been of much strength to have made that much of an impression on prejudiced whites of that day and time. That is something to be respected. This is a perfect example of generational loss of knowledge. How easy it is for people to be led around by a past they don't truly know. White history has been done the same way; black history has been done the same way; all history has been done this way for a reason. Again, how easy it is for people to be led around by a past they don't truly know. Who we think is the problem, isn't as there are too many layers of control. Our solar system and planet are changing if nobody has noticed. We must change with it. There are many players and levels in the game. Feint within feint within feint. However, the most important battle is within, as you hold the prize....
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