Read This: Real archaeologists think Indiana Jones is just a low-down, dirty tomb raider
It’s been pretty well established that Indiana Jones is a shitty archeologist (he couldn’t even get tenure from Marshall College). What makes journalist Erik Vance’s feature “Why Archeologists Hate Indiana Jones” special is the genuine–albeit well-founded–ire actual archeologists have for the fictional adventurer and his constant betrayal of a modern archeologist’s basic code of ethics. Take Tulane archeologist Marcello Canuto, for example, who bemoans Indy’s ignorance of the wonders of the temple in the opening scene of Raiders of the Lost Ark:
“[The temple builders] are using these amazing mechanisms of engineering and all he wants to do is steal the stupid gold statue.”