Who's Laughing Now?
n the 18th century, the sentiments towards American patriots varied from simple annoyance, to being the British army�s most feared enemy. Through a series of laws called the Coercive (Intolerable) Acts, passed by the British Parliament, American revolutionaries found a profound motivation to rebel against their mother-country. This �rebellion� took many shapes. From harmless cartoon mockery, to fierce hand to hand warfare, American revolutionaries began to sew seeds of freedom. When an oppressed society has reached its limit, they will bind together for freedom and collectively denounce injustice. This is exactly what the Americans did. The revolutionary war was a success to the American patriots because the British underestimated their activism and rebellion, thus causing the British defeat and American independence.
A British cartoon titled �Society of Patriotic Women at Edenton, North Carolina (1774)� mocked
American women for not accepting imported tea. This shows that not even women were safe from the British mockery (Davidson 139). This cartoon shows the intensity of the political propaganda at the time, which is only one of the many forms of conflict during this revolutionary period. The picture depicts women using their sexuality, instead of education,
for a voice in politics. The women in this picture are exaggerated by the cartoonist to the point that they look more masculine. This is reflected by heavy drinking, masculine facial features, and un-attended children and household chores. This is the British�s interpretation of American women going out of their roles in society.
The difference between British and American ideals is encapsulated by the previous cartoon (Society of�North Carolina). With careful observation, the distinction between the two societies is clear. The British hold on to their conservative morals when it comes to women in politics. Thus, we have a mockery from a British cartoonist, which shows their disapproval of new and �radical� American 
beliefs. Women have far more say in what
they believe is to be true in American culture than that of British culture. British overconfidence in their own abilities and beliefs caused their own failure to keep America under its imperial grasp. In the end, Britain�s inability to take the American activism seriously proved to be a fatal flaw in their plan, perhaps the most fatal of all.
Davidson, James West et al. Nation of Nations: A Concise Narrative of the American Republic. New York, NY: The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., 2006.
_____________________________________________________________________________________
Sometimes working in a group can be difficult; our inital plans were fairly hetic and crazy. Firstly, we found it difficult to decide how excatly this blog was going to get written, and by whom. So for starters, we all talked through how we wanted to meet and work on this blog. Many ideas were thrown around about emailing, chatting online about the assignment, and everyone just writing their own thing and passing it along. Finally, several of us got together and started writing out our assignment with the input of our other members. The assignment was completed to the satisfaction of every one of our group members and best of all, it was completed on time. Booyah!
Comments