VIDEO: "The American Revolution" - Ken Burns' new, woke version

For the last couple of nights, I've been watching bits and pieces [There was hockey on the other channel. Ed.] of The American Revolution, the latest offering from revisionist historian cum film-maker Ken Burns. It's streaming (also avaible over the air) on PBS, the soi-disant Public Broadcasting System, which is like so-called National Public Radio (NPR), only with pictures.

The fact that this new series is on PBS should tell you what to expect, which is not exactly what they tell you in the introductory summary...

"Thirteen American colonies unite in rebellion, win an eight-year war to secure their independence, and establish a new form of government that would inspire democratic movements at home and around the globe. What begins as a political clash between colonists and the British government grows into a bloody struggle that will engage more than two dozen nations and forever change the world.'

...or in the official trailer.

 

Do you see any warning signs there? No? Let me give you one. The narrator chosen by Mr Burns is one Peter Coyote (born Peter Robert Cohon).an American actor, director, screenwriter, author... and political activist. In "The Theater of Protest", Mr Coyote explains his approach to effective, nonviolent protest, which he developed while teaching a class at Harvard. He emphasizes that protests are ceremonies, an invitation to a better world. He says protests should be led by wimmin, for "inclusivity", and that "monitors with whistles" stop violence. Get the idea?

Other commentators, who I'd never heard of but are presented as historians and writers, include a good DEI mix of Jewish women (one of whom seems to have a slight palsy), black men (including one with blonde dreadlocks), and other mild-mannered, instantly forgettable liberals academics. No Shelby Foote here! 

I was not surprised, then, to learn that the American Revolution was not so much about freeing Great Britain's American colonies from the tyranny and taxation of King George III, as about partnering with Indians Native Indigenous Americans and strong, independent wimmin to obtain justice for the oppressed Negro African-American slaves. As Johnny Carson would have said, "I did not know that!"

The series suffers, in comparison with Ken Burns' The Civil War, in not having photographs to work with, so the visuals are mostly oil paintings of the principal actors involved -- politicians, soldiers, statesmen and the like -- all "marble men". 

We hear, occasionally, the words of common white people, taken from their letters, but we learn little about them. You'd almost think that the only common people of any consequence were the slaves who are quoted and talked about out of all proportion to the numbers of such people in America at the time. Even George Washington's black man-servant gets his 15 seconds of fame, plus a heroic image on his black self at Washington's side going into battle.

This is only a preliminary comment. If the rest of the series is like the first two episodes, I won't be writing about The American Revolution again. But I'm not going to say "Don't watch it." The accounts of the battles are pretty good, so you can just zap through the woke bullshit and still learn parts of the nantion's history that the too many Americans have forgotten.