Why JFK?
So there's been a question bugging me a bit. I'm Hungarian and I've never actually been to America, I just know a lot about it since most of the TV shows I like are made or were made in America, as well as a lot of music and literature I like and I could go on. I also happen to like the things that are about the civil rights era and the '60s, and true crime is one of my favourite themes for books, films or series. So of course I was interested in this show.
Anyways, I've always seen and heard that the whole nation - like literally the whole nation - got totally shocked by the assassination of John F. Kennedy and that parties were cancelled for months etc. And I know about some of the important things Kennedy did as a politician, so it's clear to me why a lot of people would mourn him, but since he stood for a lot of things that were at the time controversial - how dare he say that blacks aren't worth less than whites, for instance - I don't really get why the whole country would be so universally sad and desperate about the death of a single person. And it doesn't seem like a simple "celebrity dies and fans cry" situation, because it's a historical fact that the assassination was the big "where were you when that happened" event before 9/11. Even though we know how many assassinations happened those years, from Medgar Evers to Martin Luther King etc.
So dear American friends, maybe you can explain to me this whole thing so that I can understand it better. Why was the death of one person such a historically important event, why did people feel so close to him that they got affected by it as if they had lost a family member? I'm not being insensitive, I really am curious.
- marciel0