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Bandits, Legends and...
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lordwinterisle
Feb 21, 2024, 10:15:59 AMFeb 21
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As historian Eric Hobsbawm pointed out, the bandit in legends becomes a noble figure who is celebrated, feared, and admired.
The "noble" bandit's career also is characterized by the following:
1 . He begins not as a criminal, but as a victim of injustice. Pancho Villa, for example, avenged a sister raped by a landowner.
2. The noble bandit robs from the rich and gives to the poor.
3. He kills only in self-defense, or to exact just revenge.
4. He is the people's champion, the man who rights wrongs.
5. He is virtually invisible and invulnerable to the "authorities."
6. In the end, the legendary bandit is destroyed by treachery. Jesse James, for example, was betrayed by Robert Ford, and Billy "the Kid" was destroyed by Patrick Garret.
Handbook for Rebels and Outlaws: Resisting Tyrants, Hangmen, and Priests by Mark Mirabello, Mandrake of Oxford, Oxford 2009, p. 26
The "noble" bandit's career also is characterized by the following:
1 . He begins not as a criminal, but as a victim of injustice. Pancho Villa, for example, avenged a sister raped by a landowner.
2. The noble bandit robs from the rich and gives to the poor.
3. He kills only in self-defense, or to exact just revenge.
4. He is the people's champion, the man who rights wrongs.
5. He is virtually invisible and invulnerable to the "authorities."
6. In the end, the legendary bandit is destroyed by treachery. Jesse James, for example, was betrayed by Robert Ford, and Billy "the Kid" was destroyed by Patrick Garret.
Handbook for Rebels and Outlaws: Resisting Tyrants, Hangmen, and Priests by Mark Mirabello, Mandrake of Oxford, Oxford 2009, p. 26
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