Outlaws and Terrorists: The Difference?
Harry Longbaugh & Etta Place, New York, 1902
As a nation we seem to love outlaws and hate terrorists.
Outlaws are rebellious and romantic. They tweak the system (whatever that is), and stick it to the Man (whoever he is).
Terrorists are after our way of life; they’re not afraid of killing innocents; they can strike at any time, willing even to give their lives for a cause we view as “fanatical.”
Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (and their companions like Etta Place and Ben Kilpatrick) fit our notions of the outlaw perfectly. As far as was possible in such a lawless atmosphere, they truly were Robin Hoods of the West. Butch was not known to have ever killed anyone during a criminal career that spanned more than two decades. There are many stories about him giving money and help to poor people who needed it, including riding his horse over two states to bring back medicine for a sick woman he didn’t even know. Etta was known for being polite and articulate at all times, even when robbing banks and trains.
But I wonder: if you’re the one facing the business end of the gun, what difference does the motive make? If terrorism is defined as striking fear into the victim to further your own agenda, than who cares how evil or good your assailant is the rest of the time? I don’t know about you, but if someone sticks a gun in my ribs and demands my wallet, I really am not concerned about how much of my hard-earned money he puts in the collection plate on Sunday.
As entertaining as it might have been in the movie, Butch and Sundance actually did blow up that train car on June 2, 1899. The mail clerk, a fella by the name of Woodcock, was probably scared to death when it happened and if you’d asked him if the boys were “terrorists” at that moment, he’d probably have said yes.
Authors like me aren’t blameless. In Etta, I certainly use our hero-worshipping of the outlaw to my advantage. I exploit all its romance and adventure to try and tell a good story.
But sometimes I think we’ve lost our power to tell the difference between truth and fiction. Who knows how many people have stocked up on guns because they spent their childhood watching some character played by John Wayne extoll the virtues of an American code; a code that never existed in an Old West where most adversaries weren’t killed in fair and square showdowns, but shot in the back.
In the real world, violence is violence; and if you’re on its recieving end, the label given to the perpetrator doesn’t matter much.
Tags: ben kilpatrick, butch cassidy, etta place, john wayne, terrorism, the sundance kid
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