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To: MeeknMing
The saga of Bonny and Clyde, like so many other small people who have gotten favorable press over the years, has been embellished and retouched, to cover up the blemishes and create legend where none existed. Hollywood is complicit in this in no small part. Anti-authority, bad-boy-bad girl images, those that get away with nose-thumbing, all generate a picture of the little guy striking back. But this pair had little compassion beyond their own selfish interests, and they were in fact a cruel, sadistic and sociopathic couple who enjoyed murder and bloodshed. Yet they held a large audience in thrall, who were secretly pulling for their continued success.

What is this fascination with the gangster? Are that many people yearning to break free of the constraints of society, that they cheer on the renegade at every opportunity. Interesting psychology, and it may go far to understand the apparent inability for some people to want to avoid taking out dictators like Saddam Hussein, or fail to understand why the "Former Occupant of the Oval Office, 1993-2001" should have been removed from office after impeachment.

Sure, Bonny and Clyde were held up as an example of a morality tale, because after all, they were ambushed and destroyed in the end, but there was and is WAY too much morbid fascination with their exploits. Like not taking your eyes off a train wreck.
8 posted on 04/19/2003 9:52:50 AM PDT by alloysteel
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To: alloysteel
Hollywood is complicit in this in no small part. Anti-authority, bad-boy-bad girl images, those that get away with nose-thumbing, all generate a picture of the little guy striking back....

How right you are! And let's not forget this movie ("Bonnie & Clyde") was hardly a rarity. Two very famous one's that leap to mind are "Butch Cassidy & The Sundance Kid", and "Mutiny on the Bounty", w/ C. Laughton (sp?).... let's not even start with "Roots"!

19 posted on 04/19/2003 10:26:34 AM PDT by yankeedame ("Oh, I can take it, but I'd much rather dish it out.")
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