American Mythologies

[mrmitchell]

"I celebrated thanksgiving the traditional way. I invited all my neighbors over for a huge feast. Then I killed them and took their land."

[Dis]

btw it is Leif Ericcson I believe. Or his crew (he may have died)

[Dis]

Originally posted by mrmitchell
"I celebrated thanksgiving the traditional way. I invited all my neighbors over for a huge feast. Then I killed them and took their land."

that didn't happen till later

you people are hopeless. You are all filled with left-winger hate.

[Dis]

Originally posted by Ramo


1. You asserted that it wasn't true Columbus slaughtered Amerindians. Which is false.

2. I never heard of the specific details of Columbus' atrocities in any class (and evidently you haven't either). What I learned about Columbus in school was some bull**** about the Nina, the Pinta, and the Santa Maria (and apparantly you've only learned something equally insubstantial with the "in Dios" thing). And maybe some inspecific factoid about his discovery eventually leading to ethnic cleansing.

I didn't learn in school, for instance, about how Columbus, in a fanatic search for gold, decided to force an entire Haitian province to mine gold, killing those who failed to come up with the required amount. Except that there wasn't very much gold there (except for a little bit of gold dust in the streams), so the natives there were totally massacred.

And Columbus is not necessarily vilified in society. Columbus Day is a national holiday, mind you. It's just a handful of PC lefitsts who raise any objections to that sort of thing.

Columbus Day is not a holiday.

[Ramo]

You don't get off work/school, but it is a holiday.

[Jaguar]

http://snopes.com/history/american/hanson.htm

People like to think that Hanson was the first President because it makes them feel smart for being one up on all the stupid people with the misconception that George Washington was. However, it is far more correct to say that George Washington was the first president. Saying that the United States during Hanson's time was a country would be like saying that Europe is a country now.

[centrifuge]

Originally posted by Jaguar Warrior

http://snopes.com/history/american/hanson.htm

it is far more correct to say that George Washington was the first president.

Of course, I agree.

George was the first president as we know it, under the current constitution.

Hanson was the first president under the articles of confederation.

People have a tendency to believe that immediately after the revolution, Washington was elected president. This was not the case, first the country had to go through a process of trial and error.

[alva]

Any idea on when that process will come to a conclusion???

[MrFun]

Originally posted by Ramo


1. You asserted that it wasn't true Columbus slaughtered Amerindians. Which is false.

2. I never heard of the specific details of Columbus' atrocities in any class (and evidently you haven't either). What I learned about Columbus in school was some bull**** about the Nina, the Pinta, and the Santa Maria (and apparantly you've only learned something equally insubstantial with the "in Dios" thing). And maybe some inspecific factoid about his discovery eventually leading to ethnic cleansing.

I didn't learn in school, for instance, about how Columbus, in a fanatic search for gold, decided to force an entire Haitian province to mine gold, killing those who failed to come up with the required amount. Except that there wasn't very much gold there (except for a little bit of gold dust in the streams), so the natives there were totally massacred.

And Columbus is not necessarily vilified in society. Columbus Day is a national holiday, mind you. It's just a handful of PC lefitsts who raise any objections to that sort of thing.

But Ramo, according to adherents of anachronistic historiography, we are villifying Columbus by looking at such facts, such as Columbus enslaving the population of Hispaniola in gold mining.

To realize that atrocities were committed by all ethnic and racial groups is not to villify white people as one-dimensional villains.

[chequita guevara]

Originally posted by MrFun
To realize that atrocities were committed by all ethnic and racial groups is not to villify white people as one-dimensional villains.

No, but talk of Indian attrocities is usually meant to excuse attrocities by the European invaders. "Ah well, the Aztecs were scarificing tens of thousands of people, so our genocide of millions of Indians is really not out of the ordinary." It is possible that the Spanish killed on Hispaniola alone more people than the Aztecs ever sacrificed.

There's a saying, don't be so open-minded that yuor brain falls out of the hole in your head. Keep some perspective and realize that while the Indians were ordinary human beings, and perfectly capable of committing murder and doing nasty things to people, the genocide of the Amerindians was on a scale unprecidented in the history of the Americas.

[MrFun]

I agree, Chegitz -- but let's also look at how many Amerindian leaders saw early white settlers as a new people to use in their struggle for power with other Amerindian groups.

Let's also remember that there were Cherokee slave-owners of blacks.

And let's not forget . . . . .

well you get the idea -- exploiting other humans is inherent in all cultural groups, in all parts of the world.


So to include whites as one of those groups who did their share of massacres, enslavements, and so on, is more accurate, as long as we do not exlusively focus on white people as evil.

[SlowwHand]

boo-hoo-hoo

[Al B. Sure!]

i'm with sloww

[chequita guevara]

No, you're just slow.

[MrFun]

Originally posted by SlowwHand
boo-hoo-hoo

Whoa -- I'm impressed with your intelligent contributions to this discussion.