Pesky Redskins

[JessicaH (imported)]

Actually, I'm a mix of cajun french,cherokee, apache, english, german and irish. I'm still not getting into an uncivil dialogue.

[Conscientious (imported)]

I don't know about rape among pre-Columbians. Do you? What's your source? Rape is part of war everywhere. Why would pre-Columbians be the sole exception? Anyway, that's a minor quibble. The point is that neither whites nor reds enjoy a moral high ground. Only Conscientious does that.

I doubt pre-Columbian American Indians are the sole exception. There are a number of speculations as to why rape was so uncommon - from the effeminacy of the males to the availability of the females. Whatever the reason was they did not mix war and sex. Incest was also forbidden. American Indians did not own land and took only what they needed to survive so there was seldom reason for war. That is not a fair assessment of me for defending a minority who are still being victimised and defamed nor would you see it as a minor quibble if it was directed at your own people. Hence..

I understand that among "liberals," all people are praiseworthy with the exception of WASP Americans, who are devils. That's why we need "liberals" - to tame the savage WASPs. As A-1 helpfully remarks, "

One of the ways to totally annihilate a people is to tell lies about them.

"

Always the politician. My heart f'n breaks.

[Dave (imported)]

I agree with Stacy. Not everything has political implications or deserves being raised to the level of a big effing deal.

[moi621 (imported)]

I agree with Stacy. Not everything has political implications or deserves being raised to the level of a big effing deal.

I guess neither of you are going to the Stephen Colbert,

Keep Fear Alive

rally in Washington, D.C. this October 30th.

[devi (imported)]

Actually in the southwest (US) most Indians had become Mexican or Hispanic cowboys all the way from Louisiana to Oklahoma and Kansas west. And even at one point (before the boundary changes of 1850) almost all cowboys were of Indian blood who had given up managing and hunting buffalo (what Coronado had identified as "native" cattle) and had turned their experience with managing and processing the "native" cattle to that of managing more domesticated species of bovines in more stationary "ranches". The technology for these changes were mostly imported from deep within Mexico and the beginnings of cowboy culture were from Andalucia (Spain). Many times the missionaries were instrumental in this conversion since ranching was considered a civilized trade whereas following buffalo routes was not. Most missionaries were opposed to slavery and any persons under Hapsburg (Spanish) control who had a civilized trade were not to be considered as enslaveable whereas hunter-gatherers were considered inslaveable. It was hard for the crown and the papacy to abolish slavery outright since it was so lucrative. So what we had in much of the southwest were many Indians having left much of their traditional ways, who at first spoke Spanish, dropping their original languages and later English becoming cowboys. Later after the Civil War many more easterners than before were willing to become cowboys too and then somehow later on it became romaticized in some strange perverted way. I think the "Legend of Billy Jack" was the strangest twist in stereotypical westerns that just somehow was not able to shake off all that old baggage, replacing it with other weirdisms. And oddly enough a movie that Elvis Presley starred in was actually the most realistic that I had ever seen but then I don't normally watch westerns.

[A-1 (imported)]

Actually, I'm a mix of cajun french,cherokee, apache, english, german and irish. I'm still not getting into an uncivil dialogue.

TOO LATE!

You are "IN LIKE FLINT"!

By the way, since you are part Cherokee perhaps you can tell us some family tales about "The Trail of Tears"?

We are all ears, just like a bunch of Republican Dumbos (http://daffy.files.wordpress.com/2010/0 ... o_hugs.gif)!

[bobover3 (imported)]

"

I doubt pre-Columbian American Indians are the sole exception. There are a number of speculations as to why rape was so uncommon - from the effeminacy of the males to the availability of the females. Whatever the reason was they did not mix war and sex. Incest was also forbidden. American Indians did not own land and took only what they needed to survive so there was seldom reason for war. That is not a fair assessment of me for defending a minority who are still being victimised and defamed nor would you see it as a minor quibble if it was directed at your own people. Hence..

"

The effeminacy of the males? Don't say that anywhere near a reservation. Ludicrous, not least because the thousands of American Indian tribes were highly diverse. No generalization about them all is likely to make any sense. Besides, you still present no evidence for your generalization. If there was one tribe for which this was true, there were hundreds for which it wasn't.

Incest is forbidden in all known civilizations, except under certain restricted situations, such as Rome during the Saturnalia.

Many American Indian tribes were intensely territorial. They may not have owned land as individuals, but as tribes, they wanted to defend and expand their source of food and trade goods. Brutal warfare was common among tribes, and there were Indian empires, such as the Sioux, who fought scores of battles to seize other tribes' buffalo lands. The Sioux made themselves rich among Indians by their stranglehold on precious buffalo hides. The history of the Indians, before and after the arrival of whites, is very much a history of warfare. If you ever visit a museum such as the National Museum of the American Indian, in Washington, you'll see displays of weapons such as saw-toothed cudgels, etc. Why were there weapons and warriors, if there were no wars? And no, they didn't just start after whites arrived. During the French and Indian war of the 18th century, whites allied themselves with various Indian tribes who were in the midst of a great war - the French with one side, the English with the other. The whites recognized the Indians as a major military power, and included them in their political calculus. It was only during the western expansion of the 19th century that the Indians were decimated wholesale. Two things did them in: white's monopoly on powerful guns, largely unavailable to the Indians; the railroads, which made commerce with the east coast fast and easy, breaking the back of the buffalo economy. When whites could slaughter the buffalo en masse, and use railroads to send the pelts east, the Indians became impoverished. Poor and outgunned, the mighty Indian military empires of the 18th century crumbled.

Today, Indians are a poor and troubled minority. That's sad. But being poor and troubled doesn't automatically ennoble anyone's character. The Indians are human beings, with human strengths and frailties. Those who put them on an inhuman and preposterous pedestal - "children of Nature, spiritual, etc." - are unwittingly racist. Flattering stereotypes are as patronizing as unflattering, because they mean you're seeing past people and substituting your own dreams for their reality. The first step in granting people their dignity is acknowledging their existence. You may dream that somewhere there is a gentle, epicene people, living a communal life in harmony with Nature and one another, but these people are not, and have never been, American Indians.

[Conscientious (imported)]

Modern humanity is vastly different to indigenous cultures and trying to make atrocities committed by the British colonialist a universal commonality between the two is what? Witting racism? Many American Indians today would agree that their ancestral culture was a far better way of life. A subjective view yes but not without reasonable rationality.

Claims of effeminacy is not just ludacris as a generalisation it was a British tool for conquering and subjugating other indigenous cultures too. I also mentioned the claim that the females were "loose" which is equally ludacris. These are among other speculations (not facts) as to why rape and war did not coincide. If you wanted my opinion I'd say it was because they had much better values. Call me racist again.

Now you are asking for evidence of something that didn't occur. Perhaps you should offer credible evidence of regular war, rape and pillaging because I guarantee it doesn't exist. North America was abundant in natural resources, and yes food shortages were a cause for war as it was a threat to survival. I did not state that war was non-existent, I said it was uncommon. Which is true.

Possession of sticks is not evidence of regular "brutal" wars. All societies living adjacent to one another had a means of defense. The animal kingdom is no different. I am very interested in your theory though and would like to know more about this war factory to produce "sticks". It sounds all so very sinister.

Further I made the specific distinction of the pre-Columbian era because I'm aware of the war culture that developed over the past 500 years beginning with the first European invasions.

Not too interested in discussing the Tea Party's libertarian benefactors I see.

[bobover3 (imported)]

This is the "Pesky Redskins" thread.

Your history is simply wrong. You need to read more and opine less.

[devi (imported)]

Of the above:

Dear LORD!!! So one sounds like an itiot and the other not only sounds like one but looks like the worst kind next to none!!!