38: Simulated Worlds
This episode appears to contain dynamically inserted ads. Transcript timestamps may be approximate.
It's not enough, some guys say, to have the right boots and the right 19th century authenticated gun and the right uniform made from the right fabric with the right buttons and nose zippers of course because they had no zippers back during the Civil War. No, it is not enough. But what is enough? Some guys come to Civil War reenactments and bring sodas and coolers and bandaids. There are guys who wear wristwatches and contact lenses. The thing about recreating the Civil War is that everyone draws the line somewhere else. It's better if I walk in than if I drive it. I don't wear no underwear. I don't carry pears or bananas or anything like that. Where are they going to get bananas during the Civil War? I.E. Romney. There are people here who believe that their impression is more authentic than somebody else's because they have fleas. A Chinese man came to me and wanted to join the unit. There were no Chinese in the hundred. My unit, I would prefer, I mean, to have just plain old Caucasian males. This tape is from a documentary by Jessica Yu called Men of Reenaction. And she found out that when men staged Civil War reenactments, there's some tension between the Union and the Confederate forces. But the real battle was the one within the ranks. Over who is properly authentic and who is not. And like any conflict that's big enough and important enough to people, this conflict has spawned its own vocabulary. The guys who do these reenactments call themselves either hardcores or farbs. You can guess what the hardcores are. Those are the guys who really want to be authentic. Farbs, well, far be short for, far be it from me. As in, far be it for me to judge what that person is doing right over there. A farb, a farb is someone who is not as authentic as you think of yourself. That's the easiest way I put it. A farb is anyone who would wear like tennis shoes or would wear modern eyeglasses or would wear cotton instead of wool. When I see someone in line and he's got modern glasses, that takes away from my event. It might not affect his event, but it takes away from mine. I'm in this for fun. I'm not really in the army. And so if I want to have an ice chest hidden in a wooden box that only I know is there, then I will do that. I draw the line at what the public sees and perceives. You know, it's hard to imagine people in other countries. English and French citizens reenacting the Norman conquest or North and South Vietnamese recreating their bloody civil war. The question here is why do Americans devote so much emotional energy to restaging the past? Welcome to WBZ Chicago. It's this American life in my reclass. Each week, of course, we choose a theme and invite various writers, performers, documentary producers to take a whack at that theme. Our program today, Simulated Worlds. We visit wax museums, simulated coal mines,
Transcription truncated.