Two Modern American Myths

Mounted border patrol agents break up a refugee camp. Photo by Paul Ratje for AFP

Two stories achieved critical levels of awareness in America this week. In Texas, Border Patrol agents on horseback, wearing Stetsons and chaps, broke up an encampment of Haitian refugees. Many Haitians had hiked from as far as Brazil, where they’d fled after the devastating 2010 earthquake. The agent in the most widely shown photograph waves something at a refugee; commentators argue whether it’s a whip, a strap, or a lariat.

Almost simultaneously, a massive dragnet in Wyoming’s Grand Teton National Park found human remains consistent with missing “van life” vlogger Gabby Petito. Her fiancé, with whom she’d been traveling when she disappeared in August, has gone missing, apparently with his family’s assistance; circumstantial evidence and bad PR make it appear increasingly likely he’s responsible for her death. Millions of Americans follow the story with tightly held breath.

The jagged contrast between these stories speaks volumes about our identity as Americans—volumes that, sadly, don’t reflect well on us. The copious attention paid to a young, good-looking White woman’s disappearance contrasts poorly with the many disappearances of Native American women in the same area. As tempting as I find it to make flippantly cynical comments about looks and influence, I fear a darker narrative is in play here.

Narratives about defending women, especially White women, permeate American propaganda myths. “Wives and daughters back home” get used to justify atrocities by troops abroad, and by militarized police at home. Historian Kathleen Belew writes how White Power cells use language of marriage and motherhood to justify race-based violence against the state. Womanhood, implicitly White in the mythology, continues justifying America’s worst impulses in the world.

(I’ll briefly acknowledge that many people following Gabby Petito’s story are women, including women of color. As cultural critic Sady Doyle notes, women’s aggregate attraction to true-crime narratives may reflect their awareness of their precarious position in a violent, patriarchal society. This true-crime myth, and the “wives and daughters” myth, likely have wide overlaps. But I only have space to address one.)

Historically, the myth that White womanhood needs defended against an encroaching Black criminal class, has justified egregious vigilante violence. Carolyn Bryant’s claim that teenager Emmett Till wolf-whistled at her justified her extended (male) family torturing and murdering Till—even though we now know Bryant lied. That’s just one highly visible instance where protecting White women weighed larger than either Black men’s lives, or American ideals of justice.

A still of “van life” vlogger Gabby Petito, taken from hew video history

In fairness, I doubt strongly that anyone popularizing Gabby Petito’s story has consciously racist motivations. Nevertheless, the absence of matching coverage for the area’s many missing Native American women, and the massive outlay of resources and manpower to investigate Petito’s tragedy, follow the time-honored script. And events in Texas, while perhaps not directly motivated by Petito, still reflect how myths of White womanhood steer myths of White manhood.

The Border Patrol agents’ cowboy garb, and slave-catcher tactics, reflect a belief that some uniquely American essence is under attack. Maybe it is. The increasing popularity of “van life” culture, propelled by Internet charisma, suggests that important parts of the American Dream, including home ownership, stable employment, and parenthood, are dwindling. Whether the Dream is dying because of kids living frugally, or adults paying starvation wages, goes unexamined.

It’s always been easier to blame dark-skinned outsiders for unwanted change, than to examine the economic and power dynamics that make people’s choices for them. Fear of refugees at the southern border, joins past narratives of “uppity” Black men, “Indian outrages,” or the “Yellow Peril,” to provide a ready-made narrative. As Yale historian Greg Grandin demonstrates, racist violence on America’s margins always increases after overseas wars, especially unsuccessful ones.

American youth increasingly don’t believe home ownership and participation in capitalism are desirable, or even possible. American military might can’t silence restive populations internationally. Human greed and environmental decay mean youth increasingly don’t believe they have a future. The generation that still holds power in America’s government and economic institutions believes their systems of control are failing, because in fairness, they are.

Gabby Petito’s death provides a neat, linear narrative that White womanhood is beleaguered, and not, the powerful rejoice, from above. Rather than address patriarchal attitudes that make violence less emasculating than a breakup, America has retreated into that other myth we foolishly believe, that shows of strength can bring the hammer of justice, in the best John Wayne style. The result is ugly all around.

America is showing the world its worst face. Worse, we’re showing that our mythology doesn’t work anymore.