When I was seven, in 1949, our neighbors Edward and Ruth bought a television set. My parents didn’t get a TV until the Sixties, when I was away at college. (Many members of our family have been “late adopters.”) The upshot was that on Thursday nights, if I remember correctly, I was allowed to walk up Big Creek Pike to visit with Edward and Ruth and watch The Lone Ranger and Tonto vanquish bad guys.
They were great role models--loyal to each other, defending the weak against injustice, never mean, never cruel. I now know that Jay Silverheels was playing a stereotype, but at the time I was convinced that if Indians were like Tonto, they were to be emulated. I also don’t think the Lone Ranger ever shot anyone. He was always able to shoot the gun out of the bad guy’s hand.
Will I go to see the new Lone Ranger movie? The one where Johnny Depp plays a different stereotype. The one where a bad guy cuts open a victim and eats his heart. The one full of explosions and violence and computer-generated graphics. No thanks. I have my standards.
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