Hundreds of pillow-wielding kids descended on Union Square Saturday afternoon for a fluff battle of epic proportions, and nearly as many came wielding cameras, to record the event for history, or for their photo blogs. "Like, wow," said one combatant exiting the fray, "this must have been what the Crusades were like." Um, yeah. —Everett Bogue
A pillow fight indeed. Only with cannibalism.
[Thanks, Holly!]
6 comments:
More proof that if Americans knew what the Crusades were, they'd be really surprised at some of their more disturbing analogies to them.
Are medievalists the only people in this country who realize that crusades are NOT a good thing? (clearly I have residual annoyance from the last time our President used the word...which may have been years ago, given that I've been in an exam-reading cocoon for a few months now...but yup, I'm still more than a little bitter...)
I think that you'll find that generalising about what "medievalists" think of the crusades is somewhat more complex a proposal than you suggest above. I guess it depends whether you are talking about crusades, as a general concept, or "The Crusades"...
this must have been what the Crusades were like
Obvious the combatant has read Herzog Ernst, a popular German chivalric narrative in which Duke Ernest and his companions encounter, and are chased away by, a Saracenized city of crane-headed people. The crane-headed folk fight with arrows and other missile weapons, making it impossible for the Christians to close with them; they're also far more technologically advanced than the Christians (Ernst luxurates in a bath with running water). And the defeat, in not being really a defeat, allows the crusaders to disavow their defeat as the result of unfair, even monstrous tactics, rather than their own failings.
This almost makes me miss the flash mobs of yore. Almost.
Er. What I mean is that if you fight cranes, feathers get everywhere....
please could you delete your link to violetsaunders, who no longer exists.
thanks
vs
Post a Comment