Patriotic mobs and harbor tea-dumping returned to Boston on Saturday as the city marked the 250th anniversary of the revolutionary protest that preceded America’s independence.

The commemoration of the Boston Tea Party included scheduled reenactments of the throwing of tea leaves into the city’s harbor and community meetings that preceded the defiant act on Dec. 16, 1773 — though this time, the symbolic protest was aided by spotlights and microphones. City officials were expecting thousands of visitors for the celebration.

Crowds who gathered to watch the reenactment quickly joined in, shouting “Huzzah!” along with the costumed actors as boxes of tea were dumped in the harbor. Later, they resoundingly booed an actor who read King George III’s order closing the bay, and they cheered as narrators detailed the drafting of the Declaration of Independence.

Tea for the reenactment was supplied by the East India Co., the same British company that was at the center of the raucous dispute.

  • ExLisper@linux.community
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    8 months ago

    When your founding narrative is the violence is the answer to problems, you continue to govern that way. When it is that peaceful negotiations that achieved independence, you continue to govern that way.

    I was wondering what’s the principal reason is that USA is so fucked up today. Clearly the main issue there is that they think USA is the best country in the world. This isolates them from the rest of the world, stops them from leaning from other countries, makes them unable to recognize their own faults and prevents them from ever improving their system. So economically the country is doing fine but the society is (and always has been) completely dysfunctional. But why? It clearly started with the revolution and myth that it was such a heroic fight for freedom but why were the American colonizers so susceptible to those lies? Why Canadians or Australians didn’t fall for it?