[paimei01]

We are "godless". See the first post of this forum about how indian children were raised. How are we raised ? Something like each on his own, forming his own values, mostly "no values" because there is nothing to value in this society.

[pup55]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'I') notice many Europeans love to romanticise about Indians (Native Americans)

[smallpoxgirl]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('pup55', 'W')e have obviously not done them any favors, but according to this, the so-called "average life expectancy" of these people before the white man showed up was only about 40, and I bet it was a pretty hard 40. Survive on what you can kill, live out in the open, no medicine, modern or otherwise.... Those of you who are living in the part of the country they used to inhabit will tell us how damn difficult this life must have been.

[Ludi]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('pup55', ' ')no medicine, modern or otherwise

[PenultimateManStanding]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('smallpoxgirl', 'B')ottom line, they lived free. That's something we Homo Domesticus will probably never know. For all our fancy philosophy, when it's all said and done, we are nothing more than caged rats.

[Ludi]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('PenultimateManStanding', ' ')I suppose that is why freedom was abandoned. Fear.

[smallpoxgirl]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('PenultimateManStanding', 'T')he time is coming, SPG, it's coming. With freedom comes danger.

[PenultimateManStanding]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('smallpoxgirl', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('PenultimateManStanding', 'T')he time is coming, SPG, it's coming. With freedom comes danger.

[Ludi]

They sure as hell didn't decide to give up their freedom because they were afraid of freedom, which is what it seemed like you were saying!

"Oh my GODS! We've been living this way for 20,000 years but now it's gotten all SCARY! Quick, let's become civilized and go live on a nice safe reservation!"

[smallpoxgirl]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('PenultimateManStanding', 'D')on't be mean, SPG. I was agreeing with you.

[PenultimateManStanding]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('smallpoxgirl', '
')Civilization does nicely at white washing the danger.

[Boris555]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('smallpoxgirl', '
')
The history of North America over the past 500 years is CLEARLY one of invasion, brutality, and ultimately extermination by the whites. Whites unilaterally broke every single treaty they ever made with the Indians. Ultimately they exterminated 99% of the Indians and shoved what remains onto the most desolate useless pieces of ground anywhere to be found. That's not racism. It's reality.

If you need to give yourself a good fright, forget about watching Freddy Kruger. Just pick up one of Bartolome de Las Casas' tales of the Spanish invasion of the Caribbean. No fiction writer would dare wander into such gore. Ships navigating from Island to Island by following the trail of dead Indian slaves floating the water. Indians having their hands or feet slow roasted over a fire while they were still alive as a form of torture. Every Spanish house with an Indian carcass or two kept hanging on the porch for use as dog food. Hack off an arm. "Here you go fido. Eat up." Dude was there. He saw it with his own eyes. He had no reason to lie about it unlike many white authors of the time who were desperately searching to justify their own actions to people back in Europe.

[smallpoxgirl]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Boris555', 'I') wasn't trying to justify the horrid behavior of any culture. And it IS culture, not race, that does these things. Saying the "whites" did all that is giving justification to people who say the "blacks" are violent and thieving. No, it's just the culture of having to survive as a second-class citizen for generations that does that, not their race.

Yes, it was mostly western Europeans, who are predominantly white, who came in and killed most of the citizenry of the native world. And mostly the Spaniards, the Portugese and the English cultures that did it. But by saying that all honkeys are responsible is racist. But it was culture, not race, that did it. Raise the defeated in the culture of the victor, and other than skin hue, you can't tell them apart.

[ReverseEngineer]

Just paranthetically, the Spaniards were very equal opportunity with torture. They put plenty of white folks feet and hands in the flames also. The Inquisition.

Reverse Engineer

[ralfy]

Nothing special about us, either?

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Boris555', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('smallpoxgirl', 'B')ottom line, they lived free. That's something we Homo Domesticus will probably never know. For all our fancy philosophy, when it's all said and done, we are nothing more than caged rats.

[vision-master]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('smallpoxgirl', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Boris555', 'I') wasn't trying to justify the horrid behavior of any culture. And it IS culture, not race, that does these things. Saying the "whites" did all that is giving justification to people who say the "blacks" are violent and thieving. No, it's just the culture of having to survive as a second-class citizen for generations that does that, not their race.

Yes, it was mostly western Europeans, who are predominantly white, who came in and killed most of the citizenry of the native world. And mostly the Spaniards, the Portugese and the English cultures that did it. But by saying that all honkeys are responsible is racist. But it was culture, not race, that did it. Raise the defeated in the culture of the victor, and other than skin hue, you can't tell them apart.

[Boris555]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('ralfy', 'N')othing special about us, either?

[Ludi]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('smallpoxgirl', ' ')The Crow kills the Lakota. The Lakota kills the Crow. There is balance, and the circle continues. It's not about stasis. It's about dynamic equilibria.

[threadbear]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('smallpoxgirl', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('PenultimateManStanding', 'T')he time is coming, SPG, it's coming. With freedom comes danger.

[efarmer]

I have known and done ceremony with a swath of
different native people, mostly Sun Dancers from
plains tribes. I don't know much about their ways
but I have been able to enjoy some time with them
and form some basis of thinking about such things.

I see these people as working hard to preserve some of the
best of their roots and traditions and also fitting in where they
find themselves now. Some get pulled out of line by adoring
people desperate for seeing if they can get a set of credentials
from native culture and some are working to synthesize the
best of what they come from and what is around to work with
now.

This suggests to me that there is a great yearning among many
folks to get knowledge and experience about living closer to
a system of cooperative community and cooperating with
natural systems instead of what they are living like at present.

I have confidence this will continue, but I think that we will synthesize
new forms based on multiple cultures and traditions as a result.
I don't believe natives returning to their ancestral lives is any
more probable than us returning to our romantic notions of
life in the villages of 1820 New England or wherever our
sense of the last time we lived in a semblance of natural
balance took place.

I do hope that human effort keeps getting applied to living
systems that are more sustainable and more naturally
resilient than what we slapped together between wars
with a temporary cheap energy exploit in the 20th century.

All my relations.