Europeans genocide of native Americans - Page 2 - Historum

Olustee · July 15th, 2012, 06:44 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Fox

The entire history of the world consists of people squabbling over land rights. No one has an intrinsic right to a given patch of land, especially in situations like the North American continent, where the land in question was being drastically under utilized by a population merely a fraction of what the land could reasonably support.

I have serious problems with this. By your logic, if someone finds a precious diamond on a beach, is it okay for me to steal it from them on the grounds that their having found it gives them no inherent right to it? I don't think so. And by your reasoning, if another country invaded and conquered the U.S., today's Americans would have no right to say they were wronged, since they have no more intrinsic right to the land than the Native American tribes did.

Furthermore, how do you define "under utilized"? Who makes the decision as to whether land is being adequately utilized? It sounds like a self-serving rationalization by the colonizers.

Virgil · July 15th, 2012, 07:11 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by antocya

The US Congress did make an official apology to the Native Americans. If you're talking about individuals, well many Americans feel that it was a terrible thing about American history but if you think Americans should approach American Indians and offer an apology, well that seems a bit daft.

Perhaps the native Americans should have to apologize to the mountain lions, deer and rabbits that they killed when they invaded this land. They may have been the first humans, but they are not the first living creatures. Perhaps only some form of microbes are the only true Americans.

RoryOMore · July 15th, 2012, 07:32 AM

In case anyone wants to refer back to the very recent thread:

http://www.historum.com/history/3067...-genocide.html

**AlpinLuke** · July 15th, 2012, 07:47 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Olustee

I have serious problems with this. By your logic, if someone finds a precious diamond on a beach, is it okay for me to steal it from them on the grounds that their having found it gives them no inherent right to it? I don't think so. And by your reasoning, if another country invaded and conquered the U.S., today's Americans would have no right to say they were wronged, since they have no more intrinsic right to the land than the Native American tribes did.

Furthermore, how do you define "under utilized"? Who makes the decision as to whether land is being adequately utilized? It sounds like a self-serving rationalization by the colonizers.

Context ...

as usual dealing with historical processes and phenomenons far in the past we have to keep in mind the context of that age.

What is not ethical today was normal in a more or less far past, we we have to pay attention to judge with our meter of measure the persons who lived that past.

For example, in an other thread about colonialism I underlined that slavery was legal, I would say considered normal, by Western and Arabs as well. Arabs took part to Western colonialist slavery supplying African slaves [in several important region of "exploitation of slavery" Arabs were the local lords in that time].

But, as I mentioned in that occasion, it was curious that in an American colony women had the possibility to vote for the elections [possibility they lost in early 1800].

In other words, today we have the duty to endorse the rights of the peoples, centuries ago, it seems it wasn't a so fundamental duty ... on the contrary.

While Europeans were colonizing America, Ottomans were ending their age of conquests and they didn't joke during that age ...

History is there to be understood. And to teach us to avoid the same mistakes, the same wrong behaviors.

But we cannot project our morality, our values on persons who lived in a different world. In 1600 the world had different values. As said it was a different context.

Then, with the present context, I've got no trouble in condemning what Europeans did in America. But I was born in 1972, not in 1572 ...

antocya · July 15th, 2012, 08:18 AM

Well personally I do not want to try to justify the American destruction of American Indian cultures and people but I also recognize that it is not something unique to history and the US government has made an official apology on the issue and many Americans feel that it is a regretful part of the history. American Indian history and scholarship on the subject is thriving in academia and literature. It is not something that is denied or ignored. What more do people feel needs to be done?

Virgil · July 15th, 2012, 08:38 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by antocya

Well personally I do not want to try to justify the American destruction of American Indian cultures and people but I also recognize that it is not something unique to history and the US government has made an official apology on the issue and many Americans feel that it is a regretful part of the history. American Indian history and scholarship on the subject is thriving in academia and literature. It is not something that is denied or ignored. What more do people feel needs to be done?

My own history and culture was probably destroyed by others hundreds of times in the past. There is no way to know what conquests happened before recorded times. There is no way to know if a particular native American tribe conquered another tribe in the past. We do know of horrific examples such as the Mayans and Aztecs who captured slaves and brutally murdered them on top of pyramids. Should all American Indians be blamed for what the Aztecs did?

antocya · July 15th, 2012, 08:45 AM

No I'm not blaming anyone. What I'm trying to point out is that every once in awhile some people post that Americans should acknowledge the tragedy of the American Indians history and I'm saying, that is already acknowledged, what more do you want people to do about it? I wouldn't go to the other extreme and say, well who cares because this has happened in other countries too.

**botully** · July 15th, 2012, 08:54 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by AlpinLuke

Trying and keeping the discussion on a historical / social level; it would be quite odd that today all Europeans apologize for what happened in America.

There are two main categories of Europeans who weren't involved in that long historical phenomenon.

First of all Europeans who didn't take part to the first phase of colonization: Italians came after the violent age of the conquests, but we can add Germans [they arrived at America quite late too] ... and others, what about Russians?.

The second category is made by those people who live today in Europe, being European now, but coming from other lands. In this category there are dozens of millions of immigrants [more than 30,000,000 of Muslims live in Europe from Portugal to Russia, and then we should add the immigrants coming from China, India ... they are Europeans too].

In any case to put the European colonization next to the Holocaust is odd as well. No Italian apologizes today for the bloody war against the Jews run by the Romans with the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem [and Jews don't expect Italians to ...]

The point is about time: Holocaust is still an alive matter [some Nazi criminals are still alive]. Also Armenian genocide is quite near in time. About that particular matter I note, with a bit of curiosity, that just Israelis are against the usage of the word "genocide" for that event ...

This said, also the reference of Christians apologizing to the Jews for the Holocaust is not that correct: not only Christians apologize for that [overall because it was a lay social phenomenon with ideological bases].

Not just "Europeans", of course. As you touched on, many American ancestors arrived after the Indian Wars were over. Now it's all muddled up, with many people having ancestry from Natives and "others". They can apologize to themselves, I guess.

hisstoryin · July 15th, 2012, 08:57 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Olustee

I have serious problems with this. By your logic, if someone finds a precious diamond on a beach, is it okay for me to steal it from them on the grounds that their having found it gives them no inherent right to it? I don't think so. And by your reasoning, if another country invaded and conquered the U.S., today's Americans would have no right to say they were wronged, since they have no more intrinsic right to the land than the Native American tribes did.

Furthermore, how do you define "under utilized"? Who makes the decision as to whether land is being adequately utilized? It sounds like a self-serving rationalization by the colonizers.

I have to agree. I don't get your point about "under utilization". It may be true but it has no bearing on the morality of almost completely destroying an entire continents indigenous population. THE line I would draw between your two points is this; colonizers at this time had completely different worldviews, a lot of it based on the notion of 'savagery'. They wanted to destroy the natives and bring about civilization. They had the means and will to do it and they did. I wouldn't blame any natives at that time for hating Europeans, but that's really beside the point. The big question that remains is should we, as a collection of people who benefits from that civilization, pay reparations to the ancestors of natives? It's an ethical question, not a historical one. I don't believe there's any right answer to this but my opinion is no, if only because it would set a precedent that could be used by almost any minority in America (Example: Chinese railway workers).

Buflineks · July 15th, 2012, 12:03 PM

Have the Iroquois ever apologized to the Hurons for eradicating them in order to gain more hunting ground so they could get more trade goods?

In addition, have the Commanches ever apologized to the Apaches?