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The narrative is cemented in place: native Americans lived wonderfully until the western powers settled America, took their land, and did terrible things to the natives.
Where, in this longstanding narrative, do inconvenient facts fit?? Such as the native tribes "stealing" each other's territory on a regular basis? Or the tribes who killed elderly members once they became a burden? Or the slaughtering of other tribes' babies and children as retaliatory "justice" during times of conflict? (I can go on). Were these things good?
I am not saying we should idealize the colonizers either. Perhaps a more balanced view??
The narrative is cemented in place: native Americans lived wonderfully until the western powers settled America, took their land, and did terrible things to the natives.
Where, in this longstanding narrative, do inconvenient facts fit?? Such as the native tribes "stealing" each other's territory on a regular basis? Or the tribes who killed elderly members once they became a burden? Or the slaughtering of other tribes' babies and children as retaliatory "justice" during times of conflict? (I can go on). Were these things good?
I am not saying we should idealize the colonizers either. Perhaps a more balanced view??
The idea of a pre-contact utopia certainly exist, but it is by no means dominant. It hardly is the only idea.
I live in Minnesota. The pre-settlement history of the Native Americans here is one of continual war between the Chippewa and the Dakota. And this history is everywhere here, in our schools and our historic landmarks.
Senicide? There's this idea that it was common among the Inuit. It never was. It did happen, yes, but not with the ubiquitous frequency that has crept into modern assumption. There was also senicide - also rare - in the classical world. But I don't recall that being covered in any history classes. Where's your annoyance over that? Note: I'm not annoyed by it as it seems to have been sufficiently rare that it hardly needed to be a part of high school curriculum, but the same is true of the practice among Native Americans.
Ever read War Before Civilization: The Myth of the Peaceful Savage, by Lawrence Keeley? It was published in 1996 - over 20 years ago. It was warmly received by no less a mainstream publication than the New York Times. It was a finalist for the Booker Prize.
Information about intertribal warfare? It's abundant at American universities.
The massive work Handbook of North American Indians by the Smithsonian Institute (dating back to the 1970s) certainly covers it.
The Encyclopedia Britannica (can you get any more mainstream?) makes mention that 'a period of exceptional conflict occurred in the 14th century'. https://www.britannica.com/topic/Plains-Indian
As for more cultural (less scholarly) attitudes, ever hear of Dances With Wolves? Sure, the U.S. Army treats the Natives Americans brutally. But the film also depicts brutal intertribal warfare. And that's not just some unknown film. It won Best Picture.
As I said, the cartoonish Disney-esque view of pre-contact Native Americans exists. But there's a similar cartoonish Disney-esque view of knights and chivalry in Medieval Europe that is all about courtly manners and jousting and rescuing princesses (and not so much about slaughtering as many of the peasants of your lord's rival lords as possible). Johnny Depp and the various Pirates of the Caribbean films are hardly the reality of piracy. But none of these are massive conspiracies to conceal the truth, but just the way all history is turned by some into fantasy.
Now let's go back to what you wrote: "The narrative is cemented in place: native Americans lived wonderfully until the western powers settled America, took their land, and did terrible things to the natives."
No. It's not. You're raging against a monolithic view that doesn't exist. In fact - as I've demonstrated - there is a far more widespread nuanced view.
Unsettomati, you make some good points. But not enough. History is moving too fast for your points. The Encyclopedia Brittanica hasn't been important for 20 years. The New York Times would never even mention that book in 2017, much less review it positively. Columbus Day hangs on by its fingernails. Times have changed---fast. And the narrative I mentioned has become the dominant one (by far) within just the last ten years.
(By the way, it certainly was not only the Inuit who killed their feeble).
Unsettomati, you make some good points. But not enough. History is moving too fast for your points. The Encyclopedia Brittanica hasn't been important for 20 years. The New York Times would never even mention that book in 2017, much less review it positively. Columbus Day hangs on by its fingernails. Times have changed---fast. And the narrative I mentioned has become the dominant one (by far) within just the last ten years.
(By the way, it certainly was not only the Inuit who killed their feeble).
In my previous post I requested that you provide some sourcing for what you claim regarding the "dominant narrative. Instead you provide the above which strikes me as a lot of styling devoid of substance.
Do you have any substance to offer? If this narrative is indeed in "cement" as you state, then surely you should have no problem locating so static a target.
I am not here as the champion of any particular narrative. Others here may attest that I'm the cynic who has always argued that property rights are a matter of force and power, not morality. I am here because you are offering an undisciplined, blunderbuss complaint, but not providing us with any basis for it.
Unsettomati, you make some good points. But not enough. History is moving too fast for your points. The Encyclopedia Brittanica hasn't been important for 20 years. The New York Times would never even mention that book in 2017, much less review it positively. Columbus Day hangs on by its fingernails. Times have changed---fast. And the narrative I mentioned has become the dominant one (by far) within just the last ten years.
(By the way, it certainly was not only the Inuit who killed their feeble).
First, the narrative is not the dominant one. Note that I provided all sorts of links to back up my assertions. And you? Just a 'Nuh uh!'. You have nothing. I've shown widely-acclaimed films and books. I've put up website after website. You? Nothing. Nada.
Second, you are clearly all bent out of shape over something that doesn't exist, though you are clearly invested in it existing - I suspect because you ache to feel 'oppressed' by such a narrative. To that extent, it exists and all evidence to the contrary is irrelevant and you need not actually demonstrate that what you assert is so. Knock yourself out with that, but don't expect anyone who has their eyes open to come along for the ride.
Want to be taken seriously? Stop claiming and start showing.
Columbus Day? Who cares? It's an absurd holiday, not because Columbus was particularly bad for the standards of his day but because he did nothing glorious vis-a-vis the United States. It's like a King Of England Day to commemorate the founding of the American colonies. How absurd would that be? Because those colonies were founded not for America, not for democracy or liberty, but for the enrichment of the English crown - just as Columbus' motivations were Columbus and, as a means to that end, the Spanish crown. That's how exploration was achieved in those days, but to celebrate the individual is silly.
(Not that I particularly care one whit about the holiday in October, but I'd prefer one that is actual relevant to what we are as a country and that celebrates an individual or thing worth celebrating - say, Benjamin Franklin Day or Constitution Day. Whine about that if you wish.)
PS - As far as senicide goes, you never bothered to answer why you're not upset over the lack of coverage over senicide in the classical world. Don't bother. I know. You don't care. (As noted, I don't either - but I'm not the one pretending that there's some diabolical cover-up of it here in the New World) It doesn't concern you one iota. Because you don't have an axe to grind over the fact that not every horrific skeleton is dragged out of the closet of western civilization. And by being completely uninterested in that, while fixating - but providing not a shred of supportive evidence - over what you apparently perceive as some sort of scourge of pre-Columbian offing of oldsters in the Americas, you make your motivations abundantly clear.
The narrative is cemented in place: native Americans lived wonderfully until the western powers settled America, took their land, and did terrible things to the natives.
Where, in this longstanding narrative, do inconvenient facts fit?? Such as the native tribes "stealing" each other's territory on a regular basis? Or the tribes who killed elderly members once they became a burden? Or the slaughtering of other tribes' babies and children as retaliatory "justice" during times of conflict? (I can go on). Were these things good?
I am not saying we should idealize the colonizers either. Perhaps a more balanced view??
You might read the book 1491, by Charles C. Mann.
The fact is whether or not native Americans lived peacefully for centuries before whites came and took their land, whites did indeed do this. And whites did practice what was in effect ethnic cleansing. It was all about Manifest Destiny, at least to many.
The Indians were simply in the way of people who wanted land for themselves. Or who wanted to find gold. Or who wanted to run stagecoaches and railroads and cattle.
I don't know how anyone could sugar coat this. And a major factor in all of this was the spread of disease among them--smallpox, measles and diptheria. Indians did not have any resistance to those European diseases.
Did you know that in colonial times, whites would abandon civilization and go live the Indians? It happened frequently, apparently.
The narrative is cemented in place: native Americans lived wonderfully until the western powers settled America, took their land, and did terrible things to the natives.
Where, in this longstanding narrative, do inconvenient facts fit?? Such as the native tribes "stealing" each other's territory on a regular basis? Or the tribes who killed elderly members once they became a burden? Or the slaughtering of other tribes' babies and children as retaliatory "justice" during times of conflict? (I can go on). Were these things good?
I am not saying we should idealize the colonizers either. Perhaps a more balanced view??
I'd say because we have no credible narratives of these stories. Even if these stories exist but were written by Caucasian, there is a credibility issue. Mainly because Caucasians have historically disparaged all cultures extremely harshly who were non-White, European-culture based people. This is especially true for those cultures that lived very traditional, in harmony with nature and natural surroundings and were non-technological progressive people: Africans and Indigenous/Native people. If credible stories that were written by Native authors or co-written by Native people existed in which they've stated what you have, people may possibly think differently.
Second reason and this may be eve more relevant. As it stand, Natives were defeated by all types of warfare, lies, deceit, trickery, schemes, theft and genocidal tactics committed against them by Whites. Since Natives are the unquestionably defeated victims in their encounter with Whites any story that shows these victims in less than honorable light in our day and age, won't be accepted by mainstream media and hence not by the public. It's like they've lost basiclly everything (at least 98%) over the past 200 years so what point is there in bringing up their failures about how badly they treated each other when it pales greatly in comparison to how badly White systematic racist structures have treated them.
The fact is whether or not native Americans lived peacefully for centuries before whites came and took their land, whites did indeed do this. And whites did practice what was in effect ethnic cleansing. It was all about Manifest Destiny, at least to many.
The Indians were simply in the way of people who wanted land for themselves. Or who wanted to find gold. Or who wanted to run stagecoaches and railroads and cattle.
I don't know how anyone could sugar coat this. And a major factor in all of this was the spread of disease among them--smallpox, measles and diptheria. Indians did not have any resistance to those European diseases.
Did you know that in colonial times, whites would abandon civilization and go live the Indians? It happened frequently, apparently.
Stories have come to light over the past few years that it wasn't just diseases that popped up and killed the Native Americans. There was a strategy in place in which some Whites in power practiced to eliminate the Natives. The Natives were given infected blankets and that along with NO medical care while being dislocated from their homes (being exposed to the elements, fatigue, etc) and relocated by having to WALK hundreds, if not thousands of miles, to some far outpost of barren land that no White person had decided they wanted for themselves yet.
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