The Myth of the Cowboy and Its Enduring Influence on Public Policy

The Myth of the Cowboy and Its Enduring Influence on Public Policy

Are we ushering in a new era of manifest destiny — and ultimately celebrating our own demise?America was raised on the ideology of rugged individualism, grit, and the mirage of freedom on a conquered landscape.Pop culture embodied this ideology as the gunslinging cowboy, who through more than a century’s worth of Western films, books, and TV shows — from Gunsmoke (1955) and Bonanza (1959) to Yellowstone (2018) — rode across the screen and lassoe…