I realize that I should be okay with this. The backlash and subsequent nightmares from the 1997 Pioneer Sesquecentennial have finally died down, and I'm sleeping again at night. I should have been able to take it.
But today is Pioneer Day, and I just can't stand all the dead frozen baby stories.
Could there be a worse thing to keep telling stories about? "So this one time there was a dead frozen pioneer baby and the wolves ate it." "And this other time there was a dead frozen pioneer baby, and everyone was so sad that they froze and died too. Also they didn't have arms anymore, because they froze off. So you need to be nice about the pioneers." Seriously, how is this helpful?
Maybe my problem is that I don't have any dead frozen babies in my ancestry. My parents are converts to the LDS Church. So while I am very grateful to the pioneers in general for keeping the Church going long enough to produce the missionary who taught my parents, I don't have specific handcart/wolves/amputation stories to feel especially proud about.
Also, I think the whole concept of the handcart trek reenactment is a funny one. "Hey, they had to go walking around in dresses across the desert because no one had thought of cars and sunscreen yet. Let's do it too, so we'll know how much it sucked!"
People talk about how our challenges are much greater than the pioneers, so what will people do 150 years from now to commemorate us?
- Pioneers 2150: Attend a rave and avoid the pitfalls of drugs, alcohol, and STDs! Extra points if you call your parents to come get you--ice-cream party afterwards if you get your friends to leave too!
- EFY Activity 2153: Spend 3 hours on a 2005 Internet simulation while resisting pornography, online gambling, and sexual predators! Remember to Crash and Tell!
- High School 2005 (as reimagined in 2160): Enjoy a day of high school! Experience education the way your pioneers ancestors did--complete with emotional torture, ostracism, anti-Mormon teachers, and early-morning seminary!
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