The Sad Cases Of The Human Zoos...!

I know it's hard to imagine how cruel and uncivilized something like this is, but these actually did exist.

It wasn't that long ago that we found a new way to humiliate and degrade our fellow man. Not what you wanted to hear this morning, I know. However, it's only by exposing these terrible forms of "entertainment" that we can prevent them from showing up again!

The US Put Defeated Filipinos On Display

Photo via Wikimedia

After the war between the United States and the Philippines, the victorious US decided that they would further humiliate their defeated foes by putting them on public display as “savages.” Many Filipinos today are still angry about the way their people were treated. The beginning of the 1904 World’s Fair in St. Louis coincided nicely with the end of the war, so the United States put together multiple living people exhibits, among them a 47-acre exhibit housing mostly Filipinos from the Igorot tribe.

This tribe was known primarily because they occasionally ate dog, so as part of the “curiosity” of it all, Igorots in the living village exhibit were made to kill and butcher dogs constantly for the amusement of onlookers. This was all made to reinforce a stereotype that they themselves knew wasn’t true; they only ate dog very occasionally as part of certain ceremonies. While some people may think that history has forgotten these things, there are those who are still taking the time to reflect on this chapter in their history well over 100 years later.

This is wrong on so many levels that I can't even begin to say. I had no idea that this went on in our country, but I have to admit that it doesn't really surprise me!

Coffee out on the patio again this morning!