Questioning Robin Hood: Hero or possible terrorist?
Could the Robin Hood fairy tale contain similarities to bin Laden? In the classic story of good vs. evil, it could be hard to tell the difference.
COMMENTARY
Nathan Winkler

We should think twice about who the heroes are in the stories we will someday tell our children at bedtime. Since the twin towers fell over a year ago, the country has been on a crusade to rid the world of terrorist groups that pose a threat to us. I would like to suggest a new target to give some attention to: Robin Hood and his band of Merry Men.

No, this is no joke. Robin Hood used force against other people in order to coerce the government to conform to his ideological views. It fits the criteria for terrorism by the American Heritage Dictionary, 4th edition. In most of the modern tellings of the story he does not kill anyone, so how bad could he be? Don’t forget that the character supposedly got stripped of his lands while he was away fighting in the Holy Land, where he would have been killing Muslims because they didn’t believe in God in the “correct” way.

I can certainly picture an imaginative child named Osama bin Laden captivated by an Arabic story similar to Robin Hood. I have little doubt that he now sees himself in the same heroic light as Robin Hood, of helping the oppressed Arabic Muslims in the Middle East against the oppressive, self-appointed American hegemony. So why do we loathe and despise bin Laden, but hold Robin Hood as one of the good guys of his day?

We can sympathize with Robin Hood’s motives to help the poor, so it would be easy to say that Robin Hood had the “right” viewpoint and the hijackers had the “wrong” viewpoint, and that is what made them good and evil.

The first problem with that is the events of more than a year ago are still emotionally charged for us, so there is no way we could be objective in making that judgment. Second, those who hold viewpoints similar to the terrorists would not have to recognize those events as the crimes that they are.

Terrorism has to be wrong no matter what the ideological beliefs behind it, or else the term is arbitrary and therefore meaningless. As citizens of a democratic nation, we must believe that the use of violence to further political ends is always wrong. And if that is the case, then we should take a second look at Robin Hood as a hero.

Who else can be the hero in the Robin Hood story then? Let’s continue on a bit. Have you ever heard of the Magna Carta? The Prince John of Robin Hood’s story was promoted to King after the death of his brother Richard. He had taken advantage of not just the poor, but the noblemen as well. The nobles, however, dealt with their injustice by peaceful means (though it did come close to civil war). They forced John to sign the document, and by doing so eventually ensured basic rights, including having representation in taxation, for billions of people as the concept spread throughout the world and continues to this day. That action was originally probably just self-serving, but it remains a powerful example of the power of peaceful actions compared to terrorism.

Nathan Winkler is a sophomore speech communication major from Wichita, Kan.