Happy Post-modern Indigenous People’s (Columbus) Day
In honor of Columbus Day, I refer you back to this post from twelve years ago by Dr. Sanity. Nothing much has changed since then regarding respect for our western traditions and history except that things have gotten worse.
And in line with those thoughts, today I discovered this quote from Jim Bennett (hat tip: Instapundit):
This is primarily an effect of the Calvinist Puritan roots of American progressivism. Just as Calvinists believed in the centrality of the depravity of man, with the exception of a minuscule contingent of the Elect of God, their secularized descendants believe in the depravity and cursedness of Western civilization, with their own enlightened selves in the role of the Elect.
Meanwhile, fall is a tad delayed in New England, but it’s getting here. Columbus Day is traditional leaf-peeping time, and supposedly it’s arrived in the far north, so here’s a photo I took in years past:
Last year there was a face-off between members of the (sizable) local Italian-American population and the usual suspects when the city of New Haven removed the statue of Christopher Columbus from the square where it had stood for 125 years: “‘Growing up in New Haven, we grew up with all ethnic groups and we all had harmony because we all respected each other and every ethnic group today is struggling here in the United States as we all know. But it’s not about erasing history, but it’s about coming together as one in the future to all live in harmony and all have equality. We just want everybody else to respect our ethnic group as well,’ Louis Pane said.
Peter Criscuolo grew up in Wooster Square and looked up to Columbus for 70 years. He said the statue should have stayed, and a plaque could have been placed there detailing more of Columbus’ troubling impact on the world. ‘If we’re looking for a hero that did everything right and did nothing wrong at all, we’ll have no heroes,’ said Criscuolo. ‘Do we get emotionally upset when someone gives us money with pictures of dead presidents on it with pictures of slave owners?'”
https://www.nbcconnecticut.com/news/local/group-opposing-removal-of-new-haven-christopher-columbus-statue-gathers-in-wooster-square/2292779/
I am rereading “Admiral of the Ocean Sea,” Morrison’s superb history of Columbus and his voyages. The deconstructionists are ignorant savages.
Double thumbs up.
Just mentioned that – or alluded to it – to Zaphod last week.
A fascinating work. Should be on everyone’s book shelf
DNW–
Samuel Eliot Morison and Henry Steele Commager were the joint authors of the two-volume Growth of the American Republic, used as a textbook in a number of colleges when I was a kid. My high school history teacher used the 1962 edition as the textbook for our junior year American history class. Both volumes came to over 1200 pages in total, but they were a delight to read as well as providing a solid grounding in American history. Sadly, Morison died in 1976 and Commager in 1998. Interestingly, Commager was considered a liberal during his teaching career.
Not much color here on Nantucket.
Columbus Day is not completely embraced in Michigan (town offices are closed but trash pickup proceeds apace) unlike here in Mass.
Surprisingly, the local lefties did not appreciate my support for their campaign to rename Columbus Day. Perhaps it was my suggested replacement name “See What Happens If You Don’t Control Immigration Day”.
Humans do and have done many, incredible things, but I’m hard pressed to think of any lengthy, concerted undertaking as impressive as sailing across oceans prior to motorized vessels and radio communication. Especially into uncharted areas. The number of skills required is immense and the variation and degree of risks nearly incomprehensible.
I don’t know if Columbus brushed his teeth regularly, or subscribed to the “New York Post,” or donated to LGBTQ causes, but he did something few people who walked this planet were capable of doing. And he did it multiple times. Put James Cook right up there with him.
I’ve never understood the enchantment with the Native Americans. They were quite literally stone age barbarians who practiced genocide, homicide, infanticide, human sacrifice, and cannibalism. They also practiced polygamy and slavery, about their only non lethal sins. Oh, and women were basically baby factories and field hands, and comfort toys for visiting chiefs. I think re-establishing the Aztec empire and the Iroquois Confederacy would be a very rude shock for the SJWs that they likely wouldn’t survive,
The term “Indigenous People” is rhetorical sleight of hand, meant to imply that the Siberian-Americans who arrived before the Europeans were somehow native to the land. There were no humans indigenous to the Americas, just like there were no potatoes or tomatoes outside of the Americas.
Paul in Boston:
Your description is too much of a generalization. There was a lot of cultural variety in the Americas, and although some were as you describe, others were pretty well-organized and peaceful, and in some tribes women even held a certain amount of power.
But they also appealed to the attraction some westerners have to the idea of human beings being free of some of the more onerous trappings of civilization. In addition, they were seen as victims by many because of their having succumbed to the ravages of disease and cultural collapse and decline.
And the hippies of the 60s loved them.
Everything still quite green here in northern Florida 🙂 Autumn could be quite spectacular in Connecticut…I was really impressed when I first moved there, but by about 20 years later I realized it was just to warn about the impending 6 month+ winter soon to come. I still can’t believe the 2011 Halloween snow storm after which we were out of power for 6 days. Not missing New England at all, and I suspect that will increase with November, December……
I know…summer here can be tough, but as my daughter who’s has lived in Orlando for 6 years says, “July and August in Florida is like November through March in CT, you just hang inside. And it’s only 2 months not almost half the year.”
RTF: About Columbus’ courage in sailing westward from Europe in the fifteenth century: VDH discusses the difference in difficulty between sailing across the Mediterranean during the classical period and sailing across the Atlantic in his video on “From the Mediterranean to Northern Europe: Why Did Power Shift Northward in the 16th & 17th Centuries?”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YI_wdCxldz8&list=PLER2GpHL7yGYN22cVGcpGeau1jCYQKsjn&index=6&ab_channel=AmericanFreedomAlliance
LOL My father had Commager’s Documents of American History on his bookshelves when I was a kid. Apparently he had used it in college in the early fifties.
I was able to mystify and annoy my high school teachers by referencing the material in it; as we seldom used primary sources in our classroom work. And if you have those sources you can drive a spike into the skull of your opponent pretty readily if they are peddling BS. Even a teacher.
I have repeatedly recommended also his “Civil War Archive”. It might not prove a good read for everyone, however.
In reading the first hand accounts of the participants, I a Yankee – at least by location of birth and upbringing – began to really, and with an intensity that surprised even me, despise Northerners; despite their having by and large the proper overall attitude toward slavery.
We don’t have to get into issues of the rejection of compensated emancipation, and the desire for consolidated government on the one hand versus the rabid proclamations of southern fire-eaters and dreamers of slave empire on the other, here. I am talking of the interior psychology and moral assumptions of the relative parties as revealed by their own letters and journals.
McClellan is often reprobated for his supposed lack of vigor in prosecution and unwillingness to sufficiently sacrifice his men on the altar of the union cause. But after reading the letters and journal entries within the Archive, I agreed with him, that the proper thing would have been the extermination of the populations of both Massachusetts and South Carolina, and then to proceed to discuss the question from there.
Well, he did not go quite that far as that, but you get the idea. We are still feeling the effects of that secular religion impulse so widespread during the war, today. Puritans, to Unitarians, to Social Gospel Activists, to the Woke in four easy steps.
Which Indian tribes were those? I can think of tribes which might be termed matrilineal: i.e. the Iroquois perhaps; or, wherein women had the right to divorce the male – Apaches, I believe; but neither was peaceful.
In fact I cannot thing of any Indian tribe that was fundamentally peaceful. The Zuni, maybe? Sorta?
The entire history of the Indian “nations” was one of war. Where a peaceful and benevolent – even comparatively speaking – Indian tribe lived is a mystery to me. Maybe you are thinking of the Caddo?
Paul in Boston on October 11, 2021 at 2:41 pm said:
You are very much more right, than anything resembling wrong. Anyone who has read the accounts of the Beaver Wars, or the Jesuit Relations, or some of the accounts of the Spanish explorers would be disabused of the notion of a North American Indigenous paradise.
Thanks, PA Cat. I look forward to watching it!
DNW,
I’m a complete incompetent when it comes to memorizing tribal names, or what tribe was in which region, but my recollection of history mirrors neo’s and I was working on a similar comment when she posted hers. I know some such tribes were covered in Martin Duggan’s recent, Bill O’Reilly vanity project, “Killing Crazy Horse.” I also know there were quite a few peaceful and cooperative tribes outlined in Stephen Ambrose’s, “Undaunted Courage” with documentation direct from the Lewis and Clark expedition.
Also, although I believe the conquest by Europeans of indigenous Americans was unavoidable, as a human I can relate to the tragedy of much of it. Weren’t 1/3 or more simply eradicated by disease? Watching loved one’s perish is never enjoyable for any tribe or group, regardless of their culture. And there was some awful, cultural stuff going on in Europe in the 15th-18th centuries. Because there were some bad actors in Europe then I don’t think a genocide would have been warranted to account for their sins.
I don’t know if Columbus brushed his teeth regularly, or subscribed to the “New York Post,” or donated to LGBTQ causes, but he did something few people who walked this planet were capable of doing. And he did it multiple times. Put James Cook right up there with him.
I sailed in Columbus territory and now I am in James Cook territory. Their is a lot of bad blood towards Columbus with indigenous people, but what he accomplished was truly extraordinary.
Cook has a better reputation and sailed around the world. He was a great sailor, navigator, and cartography. But the ‘Friendly Islands’ (Hawaii) killed him in end.
‘The esteem which the islanders nevertheless held for Cook caused them to retain his body. Following their practice of the time, they prepared his body with funerary rituals usually reserved for the chiefs and highest elders of the society. The body was disembowelled and baked to facilitate removal of the flesh, and the bones were carefully cleaned for preservation as religious icons in a fashion somewhat reminiscent of the treatment of European saints in the Middle Ages. Some of Cook’s remains, thus preserved, were eventually returned to his crew for a formal burial at sea.’
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Cook#Death
The push for replacing Columbus Day with “Indigenous People’s Day” rests upon the consequences of the European People’s arrival.
The Europeans were intimately familiar with being a victim of genocide; “On Indigenous Peoples’ Day Remember the Indigenous Europeans That Were Conquered and Enslaved by Other Races” https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2021/10/on_indigenous_peoples_day_remember_the_indigenous_europeans_that_were_conquered_and_enslaved_by_other_races_.html
The above article is highly informative.
Rufus,
Re: “there were quite a few peaceful and cooperative tribes outlined in Stephen Ambrose’s, “Undaunted Courage” with documentation direct from the Lewis and Clark expedition.”
I’ve read the book and would remind you that the “peaceful and cooperative tribes” that the Lewis and Clark expedition met were not peaceful and cooperative in their relations with the majority of their neighboring tribes. All indian tribes were territorial, a typical characteristic of tribes. The Lewis and Clark expedition was passing through and came bearing gifts. They also were heavily armed with guns.
The great majority of native Americans in the far more populous eastern region of the U.S. died of disease. No fault whatsoever of the Europeans. See Jared Diamond’s “Guns, Germs and Steel” for an eye opening treatise on the impact of Europeans meeting the native American tribes.
JHCorcoran,
Cook did many great things, but one of the feats I find most incredible was his proving there was no, great landmass in the southern hemisphere.
As the Earth’s surface began to be mapped during the age of exploration it just sort-of seemed to make sense there’d be as much land below the equator as above it. One of Cook’s missions was to disprove a negative, a very hard thing to do in any field, let alone one that requires multiple circumnavigations of the globe in uncharted territory, often in frigid temperatures and areas with hostile natives. Not to mention hurricanes, typhoons, violent storms and long stretches with little to no food or fresh water.
Cool animation. Thanks internet! https://digg.com/2018/ratio-between-land-and-sea-by-latitude
Although underestimating the Earth’s circumference, Columbus was trying to prove a positive, that something did exist (a northern route to the East Indies). So he had a limited stretch of latitude to navigate and could take advantage of favorable currents.
Geoffrey Britain,
I have read Diamond’s work. Also, I’ll remind you, although often cooperative with native tribes, Lewis and Clark’s nation didn’t always mix peacefully with the Brits, French and Spaniards who had joined them in their European conquest of the Americas.
For most of their history the Belgians were not very interested in war and conquest, but their neighbors to the north, south, east and west were. It was the same for many American Indian tribes.
I also disagree with your statement, “All indian tribes were territorial, a typical characteristic of tribes.”
Most tribes had no concept of personal property or property rights. (Did any?) This led to a lot of the conflict with settlers in New England. Treaties would be “violated,” but the Indians didn’t really have a concept of some of the notions in the treaties, like borders and property.
A different perspective.
https://barrelstrength.ca/2021/10/11/columbus-day/
Columbus Day
The day we acknowledge the contributions of an open border policy advocate, who as an immigrant brought diversity to North America.
I remember seeing a meme, with a WWII US Army sergeant, who was Apache, and the caption was, April 7, 1945, Jim Longhorse discovers Germany.
The first USN sailor killed in battle in the Pacific was coxswain Gustavus Engelbrecht in 1856 at Port Gamble Washington. He was killed in action against Tlingit and Haida slave raiders from (what is now) British Columbia and (what was then) Russian Alaska. The raiders were attacking the Port Gamble S’Klallam in a traditional slave raiding party. The S’Klallam had signed the Treaty of Point-No-Point in 1855 which required them to free their own slaves and not take anymore and some of them were employed at the Port Gamble Mill at the time of the attack.
DNW:
“Pretty peaceful” does not mean “entirely peaceful.” Of course there was fighting, as with any group. But there was a spectrum of relative peacefulness to extreme aggressiveness. The so-called “five civilized tribes” were on the more peaceful side of the spectrum.
Rufus T. Firefly
Thank you for the animation. It’s a keeper.
The earth is really an incredible place and the oceans are amazing. The Maori were considered great navigators with having settlements as south as Stewart Island. James Cook discovered all these areas of the world without a map. Impressive!
Rufus,
I think that you are melding a couple of distinct concepts: that of private land ownership, and that of territoriality.
So far as I know, no Amerindians were non-territorial. The Iroquois knew that they were invading Algonquin lands. They knew that they were invading Erie territory as they attempted to exterminate them. And those in the Lakes States will recall this …https://lermuseum.org/new-france-1600-1730/1600-1649/iroquois-offensive-and-the-destruction-of-the-huron-1647-1649
when “our Indians” were attacked and had to be rescued by the French. https://www.cbc.ca/history/EPCONTENTSE1EP2CH5PA5LE.html
The Commanches knew that they were driving the Apaches from their native lands into the mountains. The Shoshone were prevented from accessing the Buffalo by other tribes quite intentionally.
https://allaboutbison.com/natives/shoshone/
The Aztec empire you will recall, fell to an alliance of several hundred Spaniards and – other people usually forget – the republic of Tlaxcala.
neo on October 11, 2021 at 6:33 pm said:
Which civilized tribes were they? Cherokee? Creeks?
Because it sure was not the tribes of the Iroquois confederacy.
Dear Indigenous people on Columbus Day,
Metallurgy, literacy, algebra/trig/calculus, currency, schools/universities, banking, modern medicine, capitalism, steam engine, railroad, electricity, mass production, machine tools, internal combustion engine, refrigeration, etc. You’re welcome, don’t mention it.
I wonder how many people here actually grew up knowing, or even encountering more than once or twice, real Indians.
And I do not put that in quotes. But by that I mean American Indians, Mohawks, or Chippewa; or western Indians, who lived on reservations or native lands and who were and looked, and behaved unmistakably as Indians; and not 1/8 Cherokee farmers in Oklahoma.
If you have known them, you will not have to ask yourself, or try and remember if you have.
I wonder how many people here actually grew up knowing, or even encountering more than once or twice, real Indians.
My father had in his circle a man who practiced law in Santa Fe. Like other lawyers I’ve met, he liked to tell stories about his work. He began a story about one client thus: “he was unusual. A sober Indian…”
Rufus,
The tribes considered most civilized by white Americans at that time were the southeastern tribes and their war chiefs frequently raided other tribes. They engaged in occasional wars, fought in the French and Indian War and in our Civil War. They practiced slavery, especially of blacks. They took their slaves with them when they were forced upon the Trail of Tears and referred to their slaves as “moveable property”.
“Lewis and Clark’s nation didn’t always mix peacefully with the Brits, French and Spaniards who had joined them in their European conquest of the Americas.”
That is true, your point would be? We are discussing the “peaceful” tribes you referred to…
And yes, you are confusing the concept of private property with territoriality. A tribe’s territory was literally life or death for that tribe because their survival depended on control of their territory.
Native American tribes like their European cousins engaged in frequent violence against “the other”. That’s not to say that there were not peaceful individuals on both sides but they were not the norm. At that time, the thing most feared by white men in war with indians was to be captured and then, turned over to the peaceful native women.
I wonder how many people here actually grew up knowing, or even encountering more than once or twice, real Indians.
Growing up in Montana, living in Minneapolis and Wyoming, I have met and have friends that are American Indian. I have relatives that are the 1/8 Cherokee from Oklahoma type (that made me laugh). They have blond hair and blue eyes!
I agree with Neil Gorsuch the American Indian has been through a lot of hard times. They have, but the indigenous people I have met and know are not victims, have a sense of humour and a sense of self.
‘Wind River’ is an excellent fictional movie, that is true to the various people who exist in and around reservations.
https://youtu.be/CZgN0dpFoaE
DNW:
I fail to see what relevance today’s “real” Indians have to the topic at hand: whether all tribes were warlike at the time of the initial encounters and early contacts hundreds of years ago. Today’s native Americans, Indians, whatever term you want to use, are a remnant that bear little resemblance to whatever the past may have been, good or bad.
Most people aren’t aware, by the way, that by the time the setters came to North America (as opposed to the early explorers and traders), disease had already killed enormous numbers. In fact, “By the time significant European colonization was underway, native populations had already been reduced by 90%.”
So there had been enormous disruption and upheaval of native populations and cultures even before most settlers arrived.
I don’t idealize or romanticize native Americans. My main point is that they were not a unitary bunch with a unitary culture, and that there was a fair amount of variation.
DNW:
I already answered that question about which ones, in the comment I addressed to you at 6:33 PM. Didn’t you see it? Or do you just not feel like doing a search for the term “five civilized tribes,” to which I referred?
I like to think of it as a celebration of the beginning the the European conquest of the North American Continent …..(/s)
Geoffrey Britain,
Except for the specific names of tribes I know everything you wrote about in your comment and I don’t dispute it. I understand most Indians were not, noble savages when Europeans arrived on our shores, and I know, by and large, the Indians were more primitive. I know many tribes practiced brutal rituals and slavery was one of the better outcomes that might befall a captured enemy.
They did not have the benefit of 2,000 plus years of shared civilizational discovery and knowledge across cultures like Greece, Rome, Egypt, Alexandria, China, Persia, England, France, Germany, Italy, Portugal, the Netherlands… And there are certain, key things that usually grease the wheels of civilization that they had not yet developed; like a legal concept of property rights.
I’m not trying to start an argument, I’m merely trying to caution folks from painting with too broad a brush. All tribes were not territorial in the sense you mean. Most, yes, but not all. Otherwise Lewis and Clark would have never gotten to the mouth of the Columbia river. There were nomadic tribes, and some of those tribes shared territory with other tribes. There were tribes isolated by geographic barriers like deserts, mountains and swamps that kept them protected enough that they didn’t fear the occasional visitor who wandered into their region. There were cooperative, welcoming tribes. There were A LOT of tribes and a lot of variation in structure and local governance.
And even in the tribes that were brutal and lusted for war and conquest, they were still human beings and it’s a darned, sad thing that they witnessed the eradication of their way of life and had to watch helplessly as 50% 70% of their children, spouses, mothers and fathers wasted away from European diseases.
The clash of civilizations was inevitable. The West’s conquest of the Americas was inevitable. If the Cherokee had figured out how to build ships able to cross the Atlantic and fight on horseback and smelt armor and fashion metal weapons before the Europeans did I think world history would have unfolded much worse than it did. But that doesn’t mean one can’t have empathy for those who were lost in the carnage.
@DNW:
And thanks for the memory jog. It’ll shelve nicely beside Beeching’s The Galleys at Lepanto.
James Cook and Sir Joseph Banks were one hell of a team. Cook one of many examples of merit being rewarded and upward social mobility contra modern woke historians’ lies.
Re Rimed Mariners who ended up on the menu: My part-time maid’s (Apparently the current approved Poz term for this is ‘Helper’) ancestors ate Ferdinand Magellan. If you ever meet anyone from Cebu, alluding to this is a sure-fire way to break the ice. Works every time. Zaphod Seal of Approval Guaranteed!
Rufus,
I’m not at all unsympathic to the fate that befell the American Indian. Nor is it my intention to start an argument. We disagree in emphasis. I agree that some tribes were far more warlike than others. In that world, pacifism was not an option. Every tribe had to be ready to defend itself for they might be raided at any time.
The Mississippian culture that existed in the early 1400s had a strong military component but they were not expansionist. They were the ancestors of The Five Civilized tribes.
I think my assertion that all indian tribes were territorial is beyond dispute.
The “tribes that were brutal and lusted for war” were cruel and enjoyed their cruelty. They were sociopathic cultures and deserve not a single gram of compassion. They would not experience even a moment of regret had that happened to another tribe. The jackel does not make sure his prey is dead before eating it.
I agree that clash of ways of life was inevitable. If not Columbus another would have discovered the New World. And I agree that had the contestant’s technology been reversed, it would indeed have been worse for they had no concept of mercy.
Yet another point remains, in the article on the many, many genocides our European ancestors experienced, their barbarians had no concept of mercy either. Mercy being arguably a Christian sentiment or at least most championed by that religion. Yet for all of the genocides the Old World experienced, civilization kept reemerging and arguably, reaching greater heights in each cycle. That alone should give hope that the human race will eventually grow out of its barbaric ‘episodes’.
I share your hope, Geoffrey Britain. The first half of the 20th century shows we had not yet achieved that goal, but the past 50 years show promise.
Neo says, ” …. But there was a spectrum of relative peacefulness to extreme aggressiveness. The so-called “five civilized tribes” were on the more peaceful side of the spectrum.
…”
DNW says,
“Which civilized tribes were they? Cherokee? Creeks?
Because it sure was not the tribes of the Iroquois confederacy.”
Neo says,
” …DNW:
I fail to see what relevance today’s “real” Indians have to the topic at hand: whether all tribes were warlike at the time of the initial encounters and early contacts hundreds of years ago …”
Give it another moment or two and I’ll explain the relevance.
Neo also says,
” … DNW:
I already answered that question about which ones, in the comment I addressed to you at 6:33 PM. Didn’t you see it? Or do you just not feel like doing a search for the term “five civilized tribes,” to which I referred? …”
OK. By now it has probably occurred to you where this is going. There has been talk of the Iroquois and matriarchy, and we all know how the woke ofvthis and earlier generations enjoy(ed) pointing to the supposed Constitution of the 5 Nations as a past and recommended model for our own society’s ordering.
As you stipulate, the context is the period of ” initial encounters … ‘
You also refer me to the ” … so-called ‘ five civilized tribes’ ”
I ask if if you meant to refer to the Cherokee and the Creeks as the Iroquois were not peaceful nor particularly civilized in behavior despite their nlate colonial towns.
Now you ask, implying that I don’t know, if I know who the five so-called civilized tribes were, and if I am too inert to look them.up.
But I just mentioned the two principle tribes, didn’t I.
Furthermore, anyone reading up on why and by whom they were called the civilized tribes will come across statements like this, ” ..The term “Five Civilized Tribes” came into use during the mid-nineteenth century to refer to the Cherokee, Choctaw, Chickasaw, Creek, and Seminole nations. … Americans, and sometimes American Indians, called the five Southeastern nations “civilized” because they appeared to be assimilating to Anglo-American norms.”
Why were they called “civilized”? When were they called” civilized”?
You may pardon me for asking if that is who you meant when you spoke supposedly in the context of initial contacts and relative peacefulness.
My eyes were too bleary to find all the corrections needed on this little cell phone. I should have left it, but wanted to respond before it escaped my attention for good.
Principal, not principle, tribes, obviously. No V in the middle of two words, possibly more. No ability to block quote.
Anyway, you will have to read through it as is.
DNW:
As I already explained, I was referring to the “Five Civilized Tribes.” I capitalized it and put it in quotes to indicate that it was a particular term referring to a particular group. The Iroquois were not among those tribes.
And I certainly never referred to matriarchies. I wrote “in some tribes women even held a certain amount of power.” That merely meant that in some tribes they had a little bit of power (as opposed to none), not a lot of power. Nor did I write that tribes where women had a little bit of power (as opposed to none) were also the more peaceful tribes.
Beautiful scene, favorable lighting, quality framing.
Good discussion.
I’m one of those 1/64th Cherokee descended from ranchers in Texas rather than farmers in Oklahoma, and I do know some genuine Indians (Navajo) but only as recent friends, so I’m going to just pass the baton to Steven Hayward here.
https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2021/10/columbus-day-in-pictures.php
Here’s a post in praise of Columbus and his achievement, but I wonder if the marvels he cites as evidence on the “pro” side would have happened even if the American continents had never been “discovered” by the Europeans, who were well on the way to all of the advancements anyway.
https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2021/10/columbus_changed_to_world_forever_and_for_the_better.html
What was the contribution of the colonization / settlement of the Americas (and specifically North America) to this material & scientific progress?
Just throwing it out for discussion; I haven’t thought it through to any kind of conclusion or even examples one way or the other.
Because of course they would ..
https://babylonbee.com/news/columbus-statue-to-be-replaced-with-statue-of-elizabeth-warren
Well, somebody had to do it.
https://redstate.com/alexparker/2021/10/12/ron-desantis-takes-a-radical-stand-signs-a-columbus-day-declaration-n455424
As a direct descendant of Dena’ina Athabaskan people that made first contact with Captain James Cook in Alaska; the newly minted Indigenous People’s Day really brings out the not-so-closeted bigots- that in their rush to NOT idealize or romanticize describe them (us) as Stone Age barbarians, use overgeneralized labels, reference an example of a non-sober Native…. I suspect what I’ve always perceived here at this blog…mostly Caucasian folk; some bigots namely Z, but a host of others on this thread- with the height of arrogance and ignorance on full display. I find the historical ill-informed narrow, cherry-picked “scholarly” articles bandied about, well, pathetic. This newly claimed October 11th revamp is for me personally an acknowledgment, celebration and honor for the many and varied Native people of North America. The vigorous denouncement here demonstrates that shallow ill-informed “debate/ discussion” cannot transcend patently idiotic dogmatic tripe regarding North American Native Americans. Not even a little bit a snowflake but the proud great granddaughter of YUQ’ HDNIL’ANEN. Pride in heritage trumps sloppy jingoistic blather nonsense. I do appreciate Neo’s remarkably objective anchor on all topics.
@ Copperdawg,
As one who proclaims himself a proud direct descendant of Athabaskan people, well aware of the ” varied Native people of North America” , I am sure you would not presume to speak for all the pre European settlement people of North America, especially,let’s say, the Zuni. http://www.sjsu.edu/faculty/watkins/navajo.htm
Certainly you would do that no more than would an Inuit speak for the Dorset … who it is believed they exterminated.
Nonetheless you might have the names of those largely peaceable Amerindian (we are not speaking of Athabascans as they are distinct) tribes with feminist sensibilities, at least in embryo, at the time of initial contact.
Feel free to use any links or citations you care to, whether popular government web sites, native people’s traditions and folklore sites, or university links.
I’m not bigoted about that, when conidering the evidence prior to sorting it. So much better than emotionalism, wouldn’t you agree?
Emotionalism? How patronizing. I speak for myself. I don’t feel required to defend; legitimatize; compare or support any tribal groups expressions of their culture. I currently live in Albuquerque where there are 23 distinctive Native groups (in New Mexico). So some of my awareness and experience of SW Natives is subjective How could I, or would I be compelled to analyze degrees of aggressive and/or pacific orientations? How is that remotely relevant to the creation or legitimacy of Indigenous People’s Day? Geez. While pondering this concept is perhaps of some merit to some-it is a stinkin’ red herring. Also grammatically I am not a pronoun “himself”
Robert Pirsig, author of “Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance,” made an intriguing argument in his second book, “Lila,” that Native Americans made a substantial contribution to the American character, which differentiated us from the Europeans. Pirsig illustrates this by comparing Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn from Mark Twain’s books:
________________________________________
Tom was an Eastern person with the manners of a New Englander, much
closer to Europe than to the American West, but Huck was a Western
person, closer to the Indians, forever restless, unattached, unbelieving in the
pompousness of society, wanting more than anything else just to be
free…Of all the contributions America has made to the history of the world,
the idea of freedom from a social hierarchy has been the greatest…The idea
that “all men are created equal” is a gift to the world from the American
Indian. Europeans who settled here only transmitted it as a doctrine that
they sometimes followed and sometimes did not.
–Robert Pirsig, “Lila”
________________________________________
I had earlier read arguments that Native Americans were an important influence when the US Constitution was written:
________________________________________
When the delegates to the Constitutional Convention met in 1787 to debate what form of government the United States should have, there were no contemporary democracies in Europe from which they could draw inspiration. The most democratic forms of government that any of the convention members had personally encountered were those of Native American nations. Of particular interest was the Iroquois Confederacy, which historians have argued wielded a significant influence on the U.S. Constitution.
https://www.history.com/news/iroquois-confederacy-influence-us-constitution
Copperdawg:
I live in Albuquerque. I’ve made another friend from neo’s here. Perhaps we could meet sometime.
I’m at the Satellite Cafe across from UNM most mornings. I’m the older guy studying linear algebra.
“Copperdawg on October 12, 2021 at 1:37 pm said:
Emotionalism is clownish and contemptible is it not? I assumed that you would agree it is imperative to avoid it at all costs.
Yeah, that’s what I said. DNW,
See?
Good for you. It did seem as though you were circling about prefatory to making some point in support of Neo’s contention regarding relatively peaceful tribes at the time of “initial contact”, as she put it.
I guess you were just spouting … unemotionally, then.
I never thought you were a pronoun.
I’ll keep searching for your capitalized instances.
The two instances of your use I quoted were not.
Now, Geoffrey did. But you are not Geoffrey, so far as we know.
Sorry, DNW but yer posts r pure gibberish. You seem to think you cornered me with your clever sophistry and I somehow conceded to your masterful “logic”. ? You could admit you are out of your depth and consider you are NOT very knowledgeable about Native history culture character or ethos. I do not purport expertise or academic qualifications to support my POV….I do NOT need to.
Huxley,I appreciate your subtle Pirsig analogy. *I’ll look you up soon at Satellite.
Apropos on almost nothing, here is Brewer and Shipley’s song written by the late Jim Pepper, a Native American jazz saxophonist, who incorporated elements of his Creek and Kaw ancestors’ peyote songs. Very sweet. https://youtu.be/L9HXClusp_E
No one seems to have considered implementing an Indigenous Peoples’ Day, or week, or month in addition to celebrating the achievements of Columbus, which I would fully support.
Why do you suppose that is?
Copperdawg:
Just in case … that’s the Satellite Cafe on Central Ave. (There’s also a Satellite on University and one within the campus proper.)
Logic, that is to say, reasoning according to the rules of valid inference, is the last thing I would expect you to concede to.
Nevertheless, I did not mention logic with reference to you, and I don’t know why you even bothered to bring it up as if you actually knew anything about it.
And frankly, Direct descendant of Dena’ina Athabaskan people … proud great granddaughter of YUQ’ HDNIL’ANEN, I doubt that you know either.
A separate one do you mean? I don’t know why that is, but in the context of the first sentence of this reply, I could hazard a guess.
I think it would be a pretty good idea on the level of the several and various states. Perhaps, even nationally.
It is possible that in attempting to honor Amerindians in some cases in the past, Anglo-Americans have offended others who spuriously claim to be, or to speak on behalf of, North American (Continental U.S.) indigenes. Or these efforts have been thought condescending and paternalistic.
Some of those more excitable ones might even be latecomer activists themselves: descended of such as the Apache and Navajo, who were late Athabaskan intruders into Amerindian occupied lands.
This reminds me of the clueless Delaware dwelling European who proclaimed in the context of the American West, Southwest and California, that it was only natural that quasi-native peoples crossing the U.S. border should want to reclaim their land. Of course in context he was referring to modern Guatemalans and Maya, “reclaiming” Wyoming, California and the staked plains of Texas.
Americans have by and large had a mixed relationship with the aboriginal natives; with many among them finding many admirable traits and noble seeming qualities, mixed in with the most abominable barbarism.
I attended a school named after an Indian tribe or “nation”, and they were extremely common in the region of my childhood: Ottawa, Ojibwa, Chippewa, Algonquin. Perhaps that positive feeling and sentiment was the result of generally more peaceful and productive relations in the formerly French settled regions than were experienced on the Great Plains and South West.
This information is not hard to come by. Anyone with the energy to expound on the matter, should have the energy to read the primary and contemporary sources.
But, emotion reigning supreme as it does among some people, perhaps it is not surprising that these same, do not.
You don’t need to have 1/8 Cherokee relatives from Oklahoma (or Springfield Missouri) or travel the ferry to Walpole Island, to recognize that. You don’t even have to be Athabaskan.
No one seems to have considered implementing an Indigenous Peoples’ Day, or week, or month in addition to celebrating the achievements of Columbus, which I would fully support.
AesopFan:
We could call it “Indigenous and Non-Indigenous Lives Matter Day’!
My main point:
*Glad for Indigenous Peoples Day
*Pointed out non-material to subject issues; especially highly inappropriate or insensitive remarks
*Feel zero responsibility to cite defenses of my views on anything Native
*Kinda irked by meaningless snark— but can’t invest my attention to a person’s (that I don’t know) commitment to obfuscate their obvious confusion about a topic they know very little about…
—discussion closed
And with a figurative stomp of the foot and a pert shake of the head, the indignant, and yet still knowing nothing of logic, Direct descendant of Dena’ina Athabaskan people … proud great granddaughter of YUQ’ HDNIL’ANEN, has informed one and all that the discussion is closed.
Ah, Direct descendant of Dena’ina Athabaskan people … proud great granddaughter of YUQ’ HDNIL’ANEN, if only you were the queen which you imagine yourself to be, then your pronouncements might actually issue to some effect.
As it is, you are not and they don’t. But have a nice day anyway.
Buzz off condescending doofus. Your snark is repugnant—ad hominem; still ignorant as piss
Direct descendant of Dena’ina Athabaskan people … proud great granddaughter of YUQ’ HDNIL’ANEN, says:
Sometimes letting people speak for themselves, says it all; even if what it says is not what they think it says.
More confushion….you are an online bully. Satisfied? What I said is measured and substantive. Your comments: drivel and like I said, ad hominem snark. Bully much? You are expert at cut/paste. Bravo
So, I and others make statements about the question at hand, and you attack us instead of addressing the issue.
I respond, and you become even more vitriolic and more personally abusive; saying that you have neither the obligation nor the intention to address the issues raised.
I then hold a mirror in the form of your own words up to your face, and you call the ugly image you are forced to confront, bullying.
Is this what you are reduced to when your attacks redound upon your own head, Direct descendant of Dena’ina Athabaskan people … proud great granddaughter of YUQ’ HDNIL’ANEN … ?
I’m not your friend. I don’t owe you anything – certainly not indulgence.
Grow up.
Neo, if you are reading this. This will be my last reply to Direct descendant of Dena’ina Athabaskan people … proud great blah blah blah
Cut/paste bully. I couldn’t be prouder of my Alaskan heritage. Why are you so hung up on constantly repeating it? To embarrass me? Oh cuz bully….you are pix·i·lat·ed and mostly make no sense!! I’m sure you’ll cut/paste these scintillating remarks too because you are positively a dingleberry that has scant knowledge of Native people and/or contempt for someone that does. You are not well.
Wouldn’t it be nice if all media outlets were obliged by law to screen Apocalypto non-stop for 24 hours every Columbus Day?
” Zaphod on October 12, 2021 at 10:22 pm said:
Wouldn’t it be nice if all media outlets were obliged by law to screen Apocalypto non-stop for 24 hours every Columbus Day …”
LOL That would be good. Or read about the Maya kings piercing their genitals in order to bleed in some ritual, or about the cannibalism, or about the recent research confirming historic accounts of massive Aztec human sacrifice ( as if anyone doubte) or read about the life-ways of the Apache, an invasive Athabaskan race, that made raiding the basis of their economy, I think it is fair to say ( and historians do.) Or read about the cannibalism ritual and otherwise … Did I mention that? And speaking of cannibalism, how about that Issac Jogues, escaping captivity with the loss of only parts of his fingers which were chimp chewed off, as was apparently a practice of the Iroquois women with captives.
But yeah, lots of nice beadwork and shit. And potatoes; and corn of course. They call it “maize”, by the way.
Might not have been bad people, many of them, if they were not so infernally savage. No doubt that is why Jesuits like Jogues thought that they had souls worth saving and tried to tell them about it. As we see though, you run across the wrong party and there is no reasoning with them, and no escape from their unreason if they can help it. They just start shouting and chewing.
Not overly concerned about “Indigenous Peoples Day.” Also not particularly concerned with the litany of terrible things they did. To be honest, the Europeans of the time of Columbus were hardly saints themselves.
To be honest, the reference to Dr Sanity piqued my interest more. She was one of my favorite bloggers and I was surprised and saddened when she suddenly, as she put it, “went dark.” No explanation as to why, though we were entering an era where tolerance for opposing opinions was raising it’s ugly head and she simply didn’t want to expose herself to it.
Sad because I’ll say she was one of the most insightful and intelligent writers I’d encountered. Kept checking back hoping it was only a temporary hiatus, but eventually had to accept it was permanent. Still return to her blog periodically to reread some of her posts.
Loren Gartee:
But see this from Dr. Sanity – she’s written a book.
@DNW:
Dream Catchers. That’s where it’s at!
And slot machines.
Zaphod on October 13, 2021 at 11:51 pm said:
Yeah, LOL. You could install a gazing ball on a wrought iron pedestal, and mount a metal bumblebee with a propeller in its nose, on a spring stake in my front yard, before I’d allow one of those ridiculous things in a breezeway to the garage.
https://youtu.be/z21ETp6K-dE