First, I have never been, and have no intention of going...and the proper name for it is "Tȟuŋkášila Šákpe," which translates to "Six Grandfathers". I mean, it was the Lakota’s mountain first...so let’s call it by its real name, ok?
To me, Mt. Rushmore is just a spectacle of white men’s ego’s. A bunch of white men defacing a mountain because they can. Sure it was to lay “tribute” but it still is this ridiculous monument to toxic masculinity for me.
Can you imagine what kind of pariah I would be if I wanted to deface a beautiful mountain range and put up women’s faces? AND spend millions of dollars? Wouldn’t ever fucking happen! And I honestly don’t think if there were women in the world who thought to do this that they would ever think that having their likeness etched in stone for eternity on the side of a goddamn mountain range would be a good idea. No this seems to only be something men do. Which I do not understand.
Can you imagine a campaign in today’s world where we selected some poor mountain range and then wanted to carve it up with woman’s faces? Large, giant replicas of their likeness? I am rolling my eyes over here.
To me, Mt. Rushmore is representative of white man’s folly and privilege and bullshit. The fact they can do whatever they like still. The more I think about it, the more upset I get actually.
And then there is the Native American issue...they took land that was sacred to the Lakota Sioux and turned it into a tourist attraction. I mean, what the actual fuck? How can one’s ego be so large and disgusting that one would think that chiseling the likeness of four white men into the side of sacred land was ever going to be a good idea? It is tone deaf, it is offensive and it is just how white men have operated for years. Above the fray, able to do whatever they want, where ever they want, to whomever they want.
The fact that we have the governing body we have now just proves this point more, as if that needed to happen. Ask the African Americans, the Native Americans, and the women (particularly women of color) and they will all tell you the same story...their freedom in body, mind and spirit has only come because white men ceded it to them. The fact that I have any autonomy as a woman is because women fought for it for years. But in the end, it is because the white men allowed it. Which is a truth that is hard to tolerate and even harder to live with.
Lincoln, Washington, Jefferson and Roosevelt, while achieving the greatness of president of the United States...a title which now means literally nothing to me. When a convicted, womanizing imbecile can get elected and then re-elected, I have lost all respect for the position and the men who hold it. We hold up Washington and Jefferson as these great men...but were they? Jefferson raped his slaves and fathered countless children. Washington likely did the same. Lincoln, I mean he tried, but he inherited a shitshow and then plunged us into the civil war which is still being fought in this country today. Lincoln got the moniker of the guy who freed the slaves, but in truth, he was just the guy in charge when shit went down.
Teddy supported women’s suffrage...yay! Thanks!
To me it shall be called the Six Grandfathers symbolizing North, South, East, West, Sky and Earth. That is better. This makes sense. Not some comical farce of stone and granite that passes for something great today. I hope one day to live in a world where the things done to achieve things is more important than the end that is held out for all to see. That the feat does not obscure our view and understanding of how it all came to be.
And please, before you write me off as some sort of left wing nut job, I love many white men. I am not a man hater or a white man hater. I just cannot support the ridiculous egoic folly of something so ridiculous as Rushmore. Just not interested. We could have done so much more with the money spent. How about paying a fair amount to all the Native Americans whose land we took? All of those in tribute were dead so why did we need to honor them like this? They are fucking dead, what the fuck do they care? But the Lakota Sioux? They are still here. Let’s give it back to them with a sincere apology, some money and a firm pledge to never do anything this stupid again.
That is what I think of Mt. Rushmore...sorry, not sorry.
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