If seventeenth-century Puritans were to witness the Mardi Gras of today, I think their first reaction would be, "I told you so!" The excesses of this bacchanalia would only confirm their belief in the total depravity of the human being. In a way, though, I think even Jonathan Edwards might see the point of Mardi Gras, even if he would never condone it: humans are reveling in (what he would consider to be) the worst of vices (even though we just see it as a good time today) in preparation for the season of Lent, a time of repentance, sacrifice, and humility. What would the point of Lent be if we had nothing to ask forgiveness for?
What I think the Puritans would have really had a problem with is the way Mardi Gras started out in Mobile, Alabama (
the home of Mardi Gras in the United States). Towards the end of the Civil War, while Union troops were occupying Mobile, a man named Joe Cain dressed up as a fictional Chickasaw Indian chief and paraded the streets of downtown with a few of his buddies, thumbing their noses at the Union forces. Such a blatant public display of political dissent would have been outrageous to the Puritan community, who valued obedience and conformity above all else.
Joe Cain, dressed in his first Mardi Gras costume:
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