Thoughts about Bernadette's Presentation

I was thinking after class yesterday about Bernadette's presentation and what Deborra said in relation to Crone's motives. I think that Deborra's point makes a lot of sense-- as people in these positions do not usually believe they are doing anything wrong.
At the risk of appearing disrespectful towards anyone's religion, (I apologize if I offend you ahead of time) I can see many parallels between Frank Crone's actions in the Philippines and that of missionaries. I was researching English language use in Colombia for another class and I stumbled upon this and it made me think about its relationship to Bernadette's presentation. This is what I found. (here)
It essentially summarized all of the accusations made against an evangelical Christian missionary group-- we brought up many similar accusations when discussing the U.S.A.'s involvement in the Philippines. For example, the missionaries were accused of acting with disregard for the cultures of the area and attempted to "Christianize" and in many ways "Americanize" the people. An example the article uses is that they taught the people not to eat "unclean" animals, which were primary food staples, and to not drink traditional alcoholic beverages and instead drink Coca-Cola. This particular missionary group focused on translating the Bible into the languages native to the area (they are still active throughout the world today). SIL-WBT as it is called, was even expelled from Colombia under accusations of attempted imperialism.
The main thing to remember about this, though, is that these missionaries don't act in a malicious fashion. They don't set out to intentionally destroy local cultures. They genuinely believe that they are doing something good, as it is part of their religious belief that they must "make disciples of all nations." They act out of genuine concern for the people in the areas in which they work. This by no means excuses them of their actions or the fact that they do indeed destroy local cultures.
I believe Frank Crone had similar inclinations toward the Philippines. The people were his project and he genuinely cared about making them more "American." He probably had the viewpoint that Western culture was inherently better than that of the Philippines and out of concern for the Philippine people's wellbeing, he wanted to educate them. I don't think that what he was doing was right or good for the Philippines by any means, but it is important to remember that he was of a different time. Many Americans believed that American culture was superior and should be spread. Frank Crone was part of this.
I was trying to avoid bringing up my personal experiences in this blogpost, but I think it will really help illustrate my point, so I am going to anyway. My parents were missionaries for many years and I spent a good portion of my childhood in Kenya. I actually went to an elementary school run by SIL-WBT. I am not personally religious and I don't like to bring up what my parents did in Kenya, because honestly, I find it rather embarrassing, despite the fact that my parents are no longer missionaries. I don't think that they acted out of some sort of horrible want to destroy local customs. They acted out of genuine concern for the people, even though their actions often had negative outcomes. I guess this can be illustrated with the use of the cliche "The pathway to Hell is paved with good intentions."
In fact, we have quite a few scrapbooks much like Crone's. "Here is this person that we brought to Christ," "Here is a woman who was so entrenched in sin before we got here" are the types of things that they would say when they brought out pictures to show people. We would often speak at churches and so naturally the photos would be toted around and shared with everyone along the way, along with stories of how certain people have dramatically improved. I can just imagine that Frank Crone (although not a missionary going to churches) would have been doing the same thing when he returned to the United States. People state-side want to hear about what you are doing and they want to see "progress." Without progress, people in the United States see what you are doing as irrelevant and not worthy of funding. That is why it is necessary to provide success stories and whatnot upon return. I am inclined to believe that this is true of government officials working overseas as well. I can just hear him saying something to the effect of "Here is a Filippino that used to wear a loincloth-- look at him now! The education effort is working." It is visual proof that he is doing his job. This is why I don't think he believed the order of the pictures necessarily mattered. I can assure you my parents' photo-albums were arranged out of order as well. An American audience wouldn't be looking at them in terms of "oh this took place in the South at a certain time and this picture was in the north at a later date". They see them as "O look at this strange place with exotic people and look how well the missionaries [or Americans in the case of the Philippines] are doing!" I don't believe these scrapbooks are done for accuracy so much as the ability to show other people the work being done in a certain country. An average American is not going to tell the difference between years or places when they are looking at a foreign country. An aesthetic presentation would probably be much more suited. I am assuming that he shared these with people, of course. Is that a correct assumption? Bernadette mentioned that many of the photographs were printed in newspapers and other publications. Can we assume that the scrapbooks were shared as well?