Yeah flag me down whatever, but this comes from a collegiate historian in San Antonio.

Let’s take Davy Crockett for example, his biographer, Marl Derr, wrote in 1994 that he was a “drunk, brawler, womanizer, adulterer, upstart, liar, loser, and hypocrite.”

Is this really someone to hold in such a high esteem?

Good way to promote false nationlistic ideas based on racial biases, Chris. Yes some American’s came-Stephen Austin- to the Mexican frontier and attempted assimilation. Others, however, were born under a flag with the predisposition of unprecedented growth, who would ultimately murder thousands in order to accomplish those pursuits.

If you want to give a history lesson, than I would recommend you not focus on revolutionaries because its always the victor’s story that typically gets told despite the fallacies, as apparent by your post.

Although there were a good number of squatters, most had swore allegiance to Mexico, became Catholic and were overall good Mexican citizens. A special dispensation was made for slave ownership, since a lot of them wouldn’t have made the trip without slaves. A very important fact to keep in mind is that they had sworn allegiance to the Constitution of 1824 which made Mexico a federal republic.

Several factors contributed to the Texian revolution. One was the end of the dispensation for slavery and the institution of customs between the US and Texas border (before then the Texians were able to import goods from the US duty-free); but this wasn’t that important. Another was the interest of the US government to expand towards the Pacific and had sent a number of agitators to incite the population. But they had been largely unsuccessful, greatly thanks to Steve Austin who honestly believed that the future of Texas should remain as part of Mexico.

The really big causes were the dreadful contempt and complete lack of attention from the part of the Mexican government to the northern provinces and territories. Basically nothing came from central Mexico. A survey carried out in the 1820′s already warned the government of this, and the dangers of not instituting better policies to make Texians feel more like Mexicans. A feeble attempt at sending more colonists from central Mexico was carried out, but completely unsuccessful.

However, the detonator, of course, was when Santa Anna took power and changed the government system from a federal to centralist, and basically handled like a dictatorship. Texas was no the only Mexican province to rebel. Chihuahua, Zacatecas, and Yucatán did as well. Only Yucatán and Texas succeeded, the first mostly because of the distance from central Mexico; the latter because of the unofficial aid it got from the US (I mean, courage is all well and good, but can only go so far).

Sure, Mexican disorganization, lack of funds, lack of navy, and the savage and barbaric way to conduct war which both emboldened the Texians and demoralized the Mexicans (not happy at all with the situation) contributed a lot. And perhaps that’s what we Mexicans don’t really like about it. Not so much that we lost, but how and why we lost it. Something we need to learn to accept if we ever want to grow up as a people.

Good work on being a marine, and excellent work on serving your country. That doesn’t give you a leave pass on accuracy though. Nor does it give you the right to talk down to those of us who think differently to you.

Don’t get hung up on my use of “snarl of defiance” – I was trying to illustrate a point that I think your judgement of Jim Bowie was unfair. Perhaps snarl of defiance is wrong, undoubtedly it’s purple prose, but IMO it’s a more accurate reflection of what happened based on the characters involved than what you portrayed.

Perhaps you aren’t a dumb@ss, but be reasonable; when you come out calling people who do not share your point of view retards, racists (from your use of the phrase “they killed some Mexicans that get some of you off?”) and that we should be ashamed of ourselves, then you’re acting like a dumb@ss whether you really are one or not.

I’m not young. I wish I was, but I’m not.

Also, no matter how much older I get, since I live in Oz, and you presumably in the US, we’ll never meet outside the “anonymity of the web”. Since you could do nasty marine attack things to me in the flesh, I’m pretty sure that’s a good thing. :-)

I served in the Marines in both Iraq wars. I promise you, there is plenty of men out there worth honoring. Many of which are no longer with us.

But in all honesty, when someone such as yourself uses terms such as ‘snarl of defiance’, I can only laugh. Seriously? Grow up. I’m not a dumb@ss, as you so eloquently put it, I’m just a grown man. Come back when you’ve gone out young pup, lived a little, and grown some hair on your nuts. Then we can talk. Outside of the ‘anonymity of the web’.

LOL. Tell us, which historical figures *do* meet with your approval? Because when we judge history by today’s standards there are precious few heroes/heroines left to admire. Are we allowed to admire the Spartans at Thermopylae; after all, they kept slaves. Are we allowed to admire Erwin Rommel; a brilliant general, but one working for the Nazis. What about Saburo Sakai of the Japanese air force in WWII? And how about Vietnam vets? Are we allowed to respect them? The list is endless. You would obviously disagree, but I think that for most of us it isn’t a requirement that a person shares our viewpoints before we adjudge them worthy of our respect.

@ Jason Whitney:

Wow, man, it’s almost like you were there with them when that old man selfishly killed all those young guys to validate his own existence. I wonder if that was his last thought, “Thank Goodness those men validated my existence before I died!” That sounds much more plausible than the snarl of defiance those of us who admire him think likely.

Please, next time you use the anonymity of the net to tell us all that we’re racists and retards who should all be ashamed of ourselves, display less dumb@ssery when you do it.

Bowie and Crockett were in love with their over-inflated personas and they were willing to sacrifice the lives of many men in order to preserve them.

If you want a hero, look at the men who despite their youth and families, stood there ground on the wall and obeyed their orders, even if they came from an old man dieing on his death bed willing to use another mans life to validate his own. And here you all are, doing it for them. Or is it just the fact that they killed some Mexicans that get some of you off? You should all be ashamed.