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To the other person who quoted me on this, I'll get to you, but a bit later as I have plans I need to attend to in a bit and my response to you will be much longer. But first, listen to my response to this persons final sentence:
History is always over simplified. The American government in numerous instances created contracts with Native tribes then, almost always through dishonest means, abused those contracts and stole more land. Stole. Based on the definition of stole according to contract law. Even in a perfect Libertarian society, the US government violated contracts which would be highly illegal and classified as theft. But what's oversimplified is the numerous cases when white Americans and Europeans had good relations with Native tribes. There are documented letters of American citizens writing to Andrew Jackson telling them how disgusting they viewed his plan to be. So when I hear the conservative "argument" of 'you just hate white people' I just have no choice to but to laugh at the absurdity of that claim. I have an objective view on history. As such, it's dishonest to condemn white people but I feel no shame for criticizing my country, something that is apparently fine to do if the justification for that criticism is a modern Democrat...
Indigenous Peoples' Day is more liberal weenie nonsense. What are they going to do next? Get offended by Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny, or has that already happened?
No that's what liberals are doing to traditional America today. And they wouldn't even want a treaty to allow traditionalist to have sovereign territory.
A massacre during a battle is not genocide, such as Gen. Custer's companies being massacred with no prisoners taken. Until about 1930s or so the whole world operated under the right of conquest, the Indians did and so did Colonial America and the US. Multiculturalism worldwide was not a policy until after the 1960s or so. The Indians were in general a dangerous enemy to settlers. The first British lost colony in the US around 1587 was probably lost to "genocide" to a tribe. The Indians were recognized as sovereign entities, but since they were outsiders and the conflict was over territory treaties were broken and the US continued to shrink their territory. Keep in my several other countries and Mexico were trying to claim American territory over the years. You are looking back in history with the a modern liberal perspective.
Traditional America is liberal. I'm so tired of the fast food CNN definition of liberal. A liberal is someone who believes in liberty, equality, capitalism, democracy, and contract law. That's all mainstream political thought. Republicans are liberals. Democrats are liberals. There two different flavors of liberals, but ultimately, they're far more similar than they are different. At least in principle. To a socialist, as an example, voting for one over the other makes nearly no difference. They favor the Democrats only slightly because they're a Social Liberal party; they believe in regulated capitalism, but they still believe in a system that those outside of the liberal family think is the root of most problems in the world. Just getting that out of the way.
I am glad you brought up treaties though. According to liberal thought (again, not weird CNN version of liberal; actual liberalism), treaties are meant to be upheld by both sides and if one side does not uphold it, they lose valid claims in whatever is being disputed. The US government, on several occasions, violated these treaties and took the land anyway. No payment and no consultation. Now, you can say rule of conquest ruled the world, but there's something you're missing. It ruled the world until liberal critique. Within that realm of thought, conquest can still happen, but it has to be justified or else it's technically a violation on one's moral code. The moral code of course being that one cannot, without provocation, violate human rights. Are there instances when Natives attacked the Europeans? Yes. Obviously. But if the Lakota raided an American settler's village, are the Dakota equally guilty?
A court case was actually brought to the Supreme Court asking if the taking of Native Land was justified. Thea argument that said no was that according to liberal property rights, the same ones the US government upholds, that the Natives owned the land and taking it without payment was theft, which is illegal, and therefore a necessary retribution must be had to fulfill the demands of contract law. The Supreme Court ruled in favor of those saying it was justified. The reasoning: according to the laws of property, defined by John Locke in that one who puts labor into the land has objective property rights to that land, the Natives did not own land because they were hunter gatherers. The problem: that's not universally true. Quite a lot of Native tribes had agricultural systems. Even many that didn't utilize agriculture actually at one point did until they got horses and decided to become more nomadic as the tribe just happened to prefer the life style.
I bring this up because all of the principles that you say define classical America, seem to be violated with the treatment of Native Americans. I'll just be blunt: do you dispute that? Failure to answer that question means that you do but don't know how you can actually justify that. I don't like ultimatums like this, but that's the essential question to ask.
And I'll reiterate what I said earlier: you personally are not responsible for the genocide of the Natives, nor do you need to feel guilty, nor are all white people, past of present, guilty. History is often simplified. Plenty of white people in the 19th century found the treatment of Natives by the US government horrific and were extremely opposed to it. There were even Native Americans who willingly and happily assimilated to Western culture. There's not one universal things that happened. Instances where the Natives were treated fairly did happen. Instances of genocide also happened. To deny that this is the case is inaccurate.
No one was native or indigenous to this country/continent. All of our ancestors migrated here from somewhere else. Everyone born here is a native. I don't care about Columbus Day either, if we celebrate it or not or the reasons behind it either.
In my neck of the woods the Indians are doing pretty well with their casinos. As for the others we have just as many poor blacks, whites, etc. as they do. I don't identify myself by my ancestry. I am an American, period. Do I practice a certain culture and language? Yes, I do. It's the American identifying culture and our language is English. I don't practice the culture and language of my European ancestors. We all deserve recognition as Americans.
There are many different theories from various scientists and historians about this, you choose to believe one side and that's your right, but it doesn't make it 100% fact that there were no indigenous people here in the Americas since the beginning of time.
Indigenous Peoples' Day is more liberal weenie nonsense. What are they going to do next? Get offended by Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny, or has that already happened?
The Easter Bunny is culturally appropriating bird culture by passing out eggs.
There are many different theories from various scientists and historians about this, you choose to believe one side and that's your right, but it doesn't make it 100% fact that there were no indigenous people here in the Americas since the beginning of time.
There are many different theories from various scientists and historians about this, you choose to believe one side and that's your right, but it doesn't make it 100% fact that there were no indigenous people here in the Americas since the beginning of time.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Oldglory
It does if you believe in the Bible.
To be fair: ALL people are the SAME species. I say that cause we can interbreed and, our kids can also interbreed. We're kinds like house cats; some are black, some are brown, some are tan, some are white and other kitties can have ALL colors like a Calico.
Looking at DNA; there's something to at least the "Eve" thing since ALL women alive in 2016 can trace some of their genes to 1 of 4 woman way back when.
Traditional America is liberal. I'm so tired of the fast food CNN definition of liberal. A liberal is someone who believes in liberty, equality, capitalism, democracy, and contract law. That's all mainstream political thought. Republicans are liberals. Democrats are liberals. There two different flavors of liberals, but ultimately, they're far more similar than they are different. At least in principle. To a socialist, as an example, voting for one over the other makes nearly no difference. They favor the Democrats only slightly because they're a Social Liberal party; they believe in regulated capitalism, but they still believe in a system that those outside of the liberal family think is the root of most problems in the world. Just getting that out of the way.
I am glad you brought up treaties though. According to liberal thought (again, not weird CNN version of liberal; actual liberalism), treaties are meant to be upheld by both sides and if one side does not uphold it, they lose valid claims in whatever is being disputed. The US government, on several occasions, violated these treaties and took the land anyway. No payment and no consultation. Now, you can say rule of conquest ruled the world, but there's something you're missing. It ruled the world until liberal critique. Within that realm of thought, conquest can still happen, but it has to be justified or else it's technically a violation on one's moral code. The moral code of course being that one cannot, without provocation, violate human rights. Are there instances when Natives attacked the Europeans? Yes. Obviously. But if the Lakota raided an American settler's village, are the Dakota equally guilty?
A court case was actually brought to the Supreme Court asking if the taking of Native Land was justified. Thea argument that said no was that according to liberal property rights, the same ones the US government upholds, that the Natives owned the land and taking it without payment was theft, which is illegal, and therefore a necessary retribution must be had to fulfill the demands of contract law. The Supreme Court ruled in favor of those saying it was justified. The reasoning: according to the laws of property, defined by John Locke in that one who puts labor into the land has objective property rights to that land, the Natives did not own land because they were hunter gatherers. The problem: that's not universally true. Quite a lot of Native tribes had agricultural systems. Even many that didn't utilize agriculture actually at one point did until they got horses and decided to become more nomadic as the tribe just happened to prefer the life style.
I bring this up because all of the principles that you say define classical America, seem to be violated with the treatment of Native Americans. I'll just be blunt: do you dispute that? Failure to answer that question means that you do but don't know how you can actually justify that. I don't like ultimatums like this, but that's the essential question to ask.
And I'll reiterate what I said earlier: you personally are not responsible for the genocide of the Natives, nor do you need to feel guilty, nor are all white people, past of present, guilty. History is often simplified. Plenty of white people in the 19th century found the treatment of Natives by the US government horrific and were extremely opposed to it. There were even Native Americans who willingly and happily assimilated to Western culture. There's not one universal things that happened. Instances where the Natives were treated fairly did happen. Instances of genocide also happened. To deny that this is the case is inaccurate.
I'm not going to go through all this, but you're talking about classical liberalism, not neo-liberalism. But back then even classical liberals weren't all against even slavery, that's why it endured after the constitution. Classical liberals did not believe in egalitarianism, socialism or big government. They are like today's libertarians.
Do the "Indigenous" people get together and lament the fact that they lost this entire continent to guys in wooden sailing ships from thousands of miles away?
I'm not going to go through all this, but you're talking about classical liberalism, not neo-liberalism. But back then even classical liberals weren't all against even slavery, that's why it endured after the constitution. Classical liberals did not believe in egalitarianism, socialism or big government. They are like today's libertarians.
So you're not going to engage in the discussion? Why waste your time here?
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