Giving smallpox to the Native Americans
When the Europeans came to this continent, it was already inhabited by millions of indigenous peoples, originally and (erroneously) called “Indians” by the invaders, and later known by the more PC term “Native Americans” (although, just to confuse things even further, it appears that those Native Americans now consider certain variations of either term acceptable).
What happened to the native population of North America? Why did its numbers plummet so drastically?
In the 60s it became commonplace to emphasize the anti-Indian racism of early settlers in this country, as well as their predilection for wiping out Native Americans. There’s no question that these accusations are not based on complete fabrication. But you may or may not be astonished to learn that the vast majority of indigenous peoples on the North American continent were not deliberately eliminated by the Europeans (and I mean the vast majority—scroll down in the following link to the category “depopulation from disease” for details) but were instead killed by diseases the Europeans inadvertently brought with them.
According to the evidence and our best knowledge of what happened, these illnesses were spread by initial sporadic contact, so that by the time permanent settlers were arriving the native population was already quite sparse in certain areas. For example, close to 90% of the Indians in some parts of the continent (100% in some islands) are estimated to have died of disease fairly soon after first contact (see this and the previous link for more details).
Europeans died in droves of disease, as well, and syphilis may or may not have been a “gift” the Indians inadvertently gave them in return. But although diseases such as smallpox ravaged European populations, they were far more virulent among Native Americans, who had not been exposed to them before.
In circles in which it has become fashionable to attribute the worst of all possible motives to Westerners, it is an accepted truth that the history of US settlers vis a vis the native population is one of unrelieved murder and mayhem. And make no mistake about it, there was plenty of that to go around. The settlers believed it was their business to take over, and were ruthless about doing so.
It is far beyond the scope of this post to review the history of European and Native American contacts and relations, but any idea that the latter were some sort of ideal people, free from violence and conflict prior to encountering the settlers, is absolutely false. Native Americans had their share of inter-tribal conflicts, and in fact some of the early wars between the settlers and the Indians exploited these already-existing rivalries.
If you read the links, however, you’ll discover that the earliest contacts between settlers and Indians were basically friendly and mutually respectful. But clashes were inevitable as the settlements grew and began to be a greater threat to traditional Indian life. In this there is nothing unusual about American history; such is the way of the world, unfortunately, and conflicts between previously-existing groups and new arrivals are often bloody and vicious.
The acknowledgment that Native Americans had been mistreated in this country for centuries is certainly a statement of fact. But, as with so much of history, misconceptions abound, and the tendency is to err on the side of imputing even greater villainy to the settlers than is warranted. Many people who are not aware of the role of disease in the picture have the idea that the settlers came in and wiped out millions by indiscriminate and intentional slaughter, certainly an erroneous point of view (and see this, by the way, for the difficulty of even estimating the actual pre-Columbian indigenous population figures).
Both the early settlers—and the Indians themselves—tended to believe that the decimation of the native population by disease, and the relative immunity of the Europeans, were examples of the workings and will of the deity. This reaction is not hard to imagine psychologically—such things are often seen as punishment for sins by those (in this case, both groups) who don’t understand the science of viruses and disease resistance. The resultant fear and depression in the native populations, as well as the disorganization of communities that had lost so many important members, could arguably have contributed to their marginalization, as well.
The vast majority of us no longer see disease as a consequence of divine will. But it is still seen by some as an aspect of political ill will, perpetrated by those nefarious Western invaders. Thus, the legend of the smallpox-infected blankets, given by settlers to Indians to deliberately infect them with disease.
Legend, you say? Isn’t it amply documented that this in fact happened?
It turns out, however, that the story rests on two foundations, one utterly discredited and one not. The first we can deal with quickly: our old friend Ward Churchill (yes, the very same) fabricated a story (thoroughly discredited here by a scholar relatively reluctant to debunk him) that the US army attempted to give smallpox to native Americans in the 1830’s. Not true.
The second allegation has more legs to it. There is strong evidence that such a plan was at least discussed in letters exchanged between General Jeffrey Amherst and Colonel Henry Bouquet, British (not American; the time was pre-Revolutionary) commanders during the French and Indian War. Although there is no indication that they ever followed through on their plot, they certainly contemplated it while at the same time expressing intense hatred for Indians.
Another allegation to back up the previous story is the mention of blankets donated from a smallpox hospital in order to “have the desired effect.” It occurs in the Journal of William Trent, commander of the local militia. However, a more careful reading of Trent’s journal indicates that the “desired effect” in Trent’s eyes (there’s no evidence he knew of the plans of Amherst and Bouquet, or of whether smallpox could be spread in this way) was to cement good relations, not bad (see this; scroll down about halfway].
That’s it, however. Hardly a lengthy history of death-by-intentionally-donated blanket. The truth of this aspect of US history—treatment of indigenous peoples—is bad and sad enough, although hardly unique in the annals of the planet. But the temptation to portray the conduct of the settlers as even worse than it was is apparently irresistible.
[ADDENDUM: This post was sparked by a discussion in the comments section of yesterday’s entry, see this and this. Regarding the subject matter of the first comment—whether smallpox was in fact brought over by the first Europeans to come to the new world, I believe the answer is that indeed it was. Columbus’s first voyage, for example, took thirty-two days (from the Canaries), and if some of his sailors had been infected with smallpox at the outset and infected others on the ship, there could easily be sailors still infectious when they disembarked. Most smallpox victims survive (and some have relatively mild cases), the disease is spread through aerosol dispersion, and the infectious period lasts up to three weeks after symptoms appear, which in turn can be up to seventeen days after initial exposure to the infection. Thus, the period between exposure and the end of the possibility of transmitting the disease to others can be up to thirty-eight days. And this, of course, does not even factor in the previously mentioned sailor-to-sailor spread, which could increase the time period for infectiousness of the crew significantly.]
Since the biological nature of viruses and epidemiology (along with the mechanism that provides the ability of the pox to infect to infect) didnt come into our understanding in science until the 1900’s, how did cowboys on the frontier manage to figure it out so far ahead of the learned mean of science?
(Remember, this is a time when the world still believed that malaria wasnt caused by an infected mosquito, but instead it was caused by “bad air”(hence its name…) )
By no means do I believe that our treatment of native americans is anything but atrocious, but this particular slander has always bothered me.
That being said, the fact is that a stone age culture of any sort living side by side next to a modern industrial civilization has virtually no chance of survival, even under the most generous of terms.
Frank: if you read the actual letters of the two British commanders involved, it’s clear that, for whatever reason, they did think blankets might spread the disease to the Indians. However, that doesn’t mean they had any real understanding of the mechanism that would have been involved (and in fact, it’s one of the weakest means of infection, and some even dispute whether it’s possible). People have always had theories about diseases and their spread, and some of them are quite magical. It stands to reason, though, that some of them came from empirical observation and hit the nail on the head, although without a deeper understanding of what was behind the phenomenon.
Also, has anyone noticed that all the terrible things that happened to my people occurred between the Rio Grande and the 48th parallel? I guess Canadians and Mexicans and Latin Americans lived and still live in harmony with their “indigenous” populations. People decry what we “did”, but ignore what is “happening today” in Chiapas, for example. They decry the slavery of our past, but ignore slavery “happening today” in Africa and the Islamic world.
I stand corrected and instructed.
…in the paraphrased words of Doctor McCoy “I’m a techie not a doctor!”
Frank,
You sure you didn’t mean “trekkie”?(wink, wink)
Even if those two British commanders thought they could give the Indians smallpox in that manner, it still hardly counts as biological warfare—they certainly couldn’t have controlled the outcome, and, let’s face it, any outbreak of infectious diseases would have threatened whites as well as Indians, so why would these two commanders want to risk such a thing? (Okay, I admit, I’m dubious of that whole story.)
The spread of smallpox among the American Indians was unintentional, a result of their never having been exposed to the disease before. No one could have prevented it, and I seriously doubt even those with the worst will in the world could have done much to spread it.
Sily, Lee, do you really think the progressive Left is interested in doing anything about slavery today? The Left actually supports many of the governments carrying out said slavery and, as I said in the previous thread, they’re only interested in the Indians when they can be used to bash America with. (That’s why they ignore Candada, South America, Chiapas, etc. It’s also the reason why debates such as did Americans deliberately infect the Indians with smallpox, though Neo handles them intelligently, are beside the point. The Left doesn’t actually care about Indians. The Left cares about making America look bad, and blaming it for everything wrong on the planet.)
I am a real life,highwater pants, pocket protector, glasses wearing techie. (and yes, Im going to also admit publically to being just a bit into star trek, making me, uh, well, ok, im a trekkie too).
there, you got me to say it. happy?
Sorry, Frank..
I didn’t mean to “expose” you, it was just a joke. Now I feel bad.
frank should be proud of geekiness. I steered myself and my boys away from the strong family tendency to geekiness, and now wish I hadn’t bothered.
Another similar, useful exercise is to simply look at a map of the US and trace out how many people arrived from Europe in each 50 year period – most of us can make a rough estimate in our heads – and how much territory they covered. In America, most of the settlers were close, close to the Atlantic for almost 200 years, and there were fewer wars during that period than there were in comparable areas in Europe, Asia, and Africa. Still horrible. Still worthy of condemnation. But not any different than the entite previous history of the world.
I think we Americans place too much weight on motivations and not enough weight on results.
If you wind up killing thousands or even millions of people, does really matter if your heart was in the right place or not?
webscription.netYou know, Neo, the people going on about white settlers slaughtering folks would be the same ones leading Native Inds into retribution raids on white settlements in order to take slaves. You can never get rid of these incompetent folks that will consistently lead their own people to destruction. But that’s what war and human expansion are for, to weed out the weak and the foolish. Somebody’s going to win, that is inevitable; what isn’t evitable is who or even when.
I think a good look back at the time that you would enjoy Neo for its human compassion and understanding value, is Eric Flint’s recent novel about the Cherokee, the war of 1812, Andrew Jackson, and etc.
You can find the free copy here at baen. link
I learned a lot of history from that book, Neo, and what’s more, it isn’t just a dry historical account. It mixes history with alternative history, to postulate what could have alleviated Native Ind and American settler relations. And of course, My own post on the comanches tells the tale of initial meetings from both sides, as well, Neo. Although my bias is obviously with the Americans. But if you want to know about real American atrocities, read Eric’s book, Neo. He covers all the subjects that you don’t have time for on this blog, since he has done some real research. Good thing too, since I don’t have to.
Comanches
amazon.comRead “Guns, Germs, and Steel” by Jared Diamond.
http://www.amazon.com/Guns-Germs-Steel-Fates-Societies/dp/0393317552
Ymar, Elrond,
It’s also a novel, but Little Big Man by Thomas Berger is also insightful about the interaction, differences and similarities between “white” and “native” cultures, from the perspective of a white boy raised by the Cheyenne.
Or, watch the movie starring Dustin Hoffman. Not as good or detailed as the book, but a lot of the same jist. (my favorite movie of all time, by the way)
In fact, there’s a character, a “snake oil” salesman named Allardice Merriwether(Martin Balsam) who epitomizes much of the left when he says: “Two-legged creature will believe anything; and the more preposturous, the better. Whales speak French at the bottom of the sea. The horses of Arabia have silver wings. Pygmies mate with elephants in darkest Africa. I have sold ALL those propositions.”
Michael Moore, Oliver Stone, Alex Jones; the modern “Merriwethers”.
The whites in America didn’t exterminate the Indians. They married them. How many people in the USA nowadays have some Indian ancestors? It’s a point of pride with my wife that she had a Blackfoot great-great-grandmother.
Trimegistus,
While what you say is true, there are too many people who “claim” some descendance to Indians to be perceived as having some “cultural diversity” to impress their friends. And in virtually every case, they all descend from the Cherokees. If you say you’re part Blackfoot, Hopi, Kansa, I’ll believe you. If you say you’re “part Cherokee”, my BS-o-meter goes off.
alphie, the idea that we should discount intent seems interesting at first, but it would mean we should blame the Chinese for the Black Death wiping out Europeans, and the Native Americans who passed European diseases on to other tribes. Once we got going, we could blame bovines for the Chicago fire and Typhoid Mary for a bunch o’ death.
The law makes a distinction between Murder 1, Murder 2, and Involuntary Manslaughter for good reasons.
I don’t mean discount intent entirely, AVI, just bring it back into balance with results.
Would anyone object to, say, a single day in jail for anyone who kills, no matter what the reason or excuse?
And exactly what “results” do you propose would “bring it back into balance”?
Are you offering to “compensate” me for your ancestors “crimes” against my people?
I dunno, Alphie—does it matter?
The Left excuses the crimes of Russia, and the Gulags by using the “Their heart was in the right place” defense.
If you want to hate America, go ahead—just don’t pretend it’s for the sake of some long dead Indians you don’t really care about.
I mean, seriously, Alphie, if we put anybody in jail for the crime of giving the Indians smallpox, it would have to be the smallpox virus itself, since it seems pretty obvious that the settlers had neither the knowledge, nor the technical expertise, to spread it.
I mean, what next Alphie? Are you going to start suing friends and co-workers because they sneezed, and gave you a cold? Should we just kill people who have tuberculosis, because they might cause a death—or, better yet, throw them into jail, where they can spread it to even more people in close quarters? How do you go about punishing a disease germ?
(Of course, as I said before, this has nothing to do with the Indians; it’s about how much you hate America. Really, if you’re that upset about the Indians, why don’t you offer to start compensating Lee?)
Talkin,
The “you just hate America” line was old in 2003.
You guys need to come up with a new shtick fast before you wind up getting less votes than Nader’s party next year.
Why is it so hard to just say that European explorers and settlers killed hundreds of millions of New World natives?
Who cares what their reasons were…they’ve been dead for hundreds of years.
Why is it so hard to just say that European explorers and settlers killed hundreds of millions of New World natives?
It’s not any harder to say than saying that the moon is made of green cheese — it’s just that both are wrong.
That said, it’s unlikely that alph himself “hates America” since that would require enough thought to at least have a position, and alph gives no evidence of being capable of that. He’s just a troll, in other words, probably a little dimmer than average, whose sole purpose is to bait. Maybe it’s therapeutic for him, who knows, and maybe taking the bait is a way to kill some time, but no one should expect anything like a real argument from him — he wouldn’t know how.
Lee,
As far as your BS-o-meter, some of us are actually descended from Cherokee (largest of the 500+ recognized tribes). Mine from the Ozark Cherokee, which I didn’t know until a very detailed genealogy was done when I was 21, ostensibly for the purpose of saving souls. I do not know whether my great-grandmother was full-blooded, though she appears to be in the family photos from the 1890s.
And I have gone through others BS-o-meters. I really hate the “yeah, right, and she was a princess too, wasn’t she?”.
Alphie,
Because it’s inaccurate, ahistorical, simplistic, and morally anachronistic. Weren’t those Aztecs just the nicest people?
You try to deny millions of deaths and I’m a troll, Sally?
Too funny.
A little advice: The best propaganda is a tiny lie hidden amongst many large truths.
Ariel,
Do you nase your opinion of the Aztecs on Mel Gibson’ research?
How easily the vague nember “millions” is banted about. You don’t know there were millions of deaths because you don’t know there were millions of Indians. The best and most painstaking estimate I ever saw to the entire Indian population in what would become the U.S was 900,000, and I wouldn’t even bet YOUR life on that. There is good evidence the North American Indian cultures had been in substantial decline centuries before Chris got lost here on the way to Cathay.
But, it probably makes people feel righteous to say millions of deaths. What we can say is, were there 2.2 million, two million would have died, ten million , and nine million would be dead, a billion, and 900 million would die.
The Hawaiians had more immunities than the Indians, but twenty years after Cook arrived, measles hit. One out of six survived.
Nature has even less sense of political correctness than the pioneers did.
Caucasians paid nature’s price centuries earlier, and kept on paying it. What kills you makes you stronger.
Also, has anyone noticed that all the terrible things that happened to my people occurred between the Rio Grande and the 48th parallel? I guess Canadians and Mexicans and Latin Americans lived and still live in harmony with their “indigenous” populations. People decry what we “did”, but ignore what is “happening today” in Chiapas, for example. They decry the slavery of our past, but ignore slavery “happening today” in Africa and the Islamic world.
Yeah, funny, that. Funny how most of the stories about the settlement of the New World, good and bad, focus on the East Coast and the Brits. Funny how people forget what the Spaniards and Portuguese were up to in other parts of the two continents. It’s not Evil European Invaders but Evil English Invaders in most of the stories the left spreads around. People think they know about the settlement of the Americas and European/Indian relations yet have never heard of Cortes, Coronado, Onate, to name the three most prominent and involved in territories now belonging to the US…odd how the voices most loudly decrying Anglocentricity (or any sort of undiversified anything) focus almost exclusively on Anglo history in America.
Just to continue an actual discussion with those interested — we should try to be clear about the scope and meaning of words here. E.g.:
– there’s a difference between the territory that would become the US and the “New World” as a whole;
– there’s a difference between Americans, or those living in the territories that would become the US, and “European explorers and settlers” generally;
– there’s a difference between “millions” and “hundreds of millions” (or billions);
– there’s a difference between the number of deaths and the number who were killed, just as there’s a difference between that number and the number who were killed by Europeans.
Ignoring or confusing differences like that is just SOP for trolls, of course, but it impedes genuine discussion.
Well, of course it focuses on Anglo history! That’s because, as I’ve said, it’s not about concern for Native Americans, it’s about hatred for America, and the Left’s desire pin all the evil of the world upon it, since it stands in the way of their utopian dream.
Yes, Alphie, it’s an old schtick by this time, but the Left never tires of it.
Alphie, do you base your opinion of the Aztecs on the politically correct Native American Spirituality class you took at PCU, which depicted them as gentle children of nature, romping happily through the jungles and building pretty pyramids for the fun of it until the eeeeeevil Anglos came along and deliberately infected them with smallpox?
Well, Sally and James,
Perhaps you could link to an actual credible scientific estimate of the number of natives alive in the New World before Columbus arrived?
We do know that there were people living up by the Arctic Circle all the way down to the tip of Chile, coast to coast and on all the habitable islands of the Carribean in some rather large cities and even Empires.
To suggest that fewer than one million died puts you guys in Ahmadinejad territory…and you know it.
You’re confused, as usual, about what’s being said or suggested here, alf — re-read the comments, including your own. And look up your own links while you’re at it — it’ll be a good exercise for you.
So Alph, you sacred river you:
If hating America was “old” in 2003 — why are you still doing it?
kiva.orgalphie Says:
July 5th, 2007 at 8:12 pm
“If you wind up killing thousands or even millions of people, does really matter if your heart was in the right place or not?”
Gee Alphie,
I guess you feel sorry for the millions of people who died from Malaria by banning DDT in the 3rd world based on inaccurate facts and feelings from the 1st world.
Or do you simply like to make up facts and go with your feelings?
If you are so concerned about helping people, why don’t you give a $25 micro-credit loan to http://www.kiva.org or are you all talk and no walk? Troll
Population, pandemics, et al.
I’m seeing larger than 900k — evidently most anthropologists are seeing between 2 and 4 million.
Trimegistus,
It goes deeper than just “hating America” with Alpo.
You see, he’s white, and that means he’s bad and evil. His ancestors murdered my people, and he now lives on stolen land, and he knows his children will never be more than greedy barbarians like himself, because as white people, they are born that way.
Remember his dismissive giggles and avoidance of the question whether he was a nazi? It’s because as a white man, he knows he was born a nazi. Sad, really. If only he had just a hint of color in his blood he could supress the urge to commit atrocities and pursue wealth. So he screams “I’m sorry, I’m sorry!” He just wishes he wasn’t alone, and you would join him in his guilt, and help him wash the blood of my people off his hands.
I also have to admit to being tickled by the fact that NeoNeoCon addresses population issues (and has links) in the blog post proper, and that the to-and-fro of the debate so quickly sailed beyond the post itself that I’m pretty certain that the links weren’t read.
It’s a pity, really, for blogging to revert to the much more two-dimensional format of op-eds, given the inherent potential in the medium.
Neo and Ymar:
I recommend reading “Comanches”, by the eminent Texas historian TR Fehrenbach (Knopf, 1979).
The Comanches were semi-Islamist in their dealings with the Texas frontier, making deals, breaking deals when it suited them, voracious raiders and inventive torturers of male captives (Comanche women were the more malicious!). Their hit-and-run tactics led in the 1830s to the creation of the Texas Rangers, who as individuals on the frontier were charged with raising posses to pursue the killing raiders, and kill them, however far that took them into Comancheria (which covered much of TX, and OK, KS, and NM. The Comanche displaced the Apache from West TX through non-peaceful means!
The anti-Comanche struggle gave birth to the idea that “The only good Indian is a dead Indian”, precisely because they wouldn’t honor treaties. They raided, murdered, raped, and enslaved Indians, Mexicans, Anglos, anyone not Comanche…That was their culture and way of life.
Tom
There is some evidence that the venereal diseases which swept Europe in the 1500s were brought back from the New World, and that the people they were caught from had relative immunity. Anyone want to blame descendents?
It has also been suggested recently that the term “Indian” comes from the French indegene, in which case it would be politically correct. Sorry.
I recommend reading “Comanches”
I already described some of the things you said was in the book, in my post. So what would the book offer that is new?
Btw, the Comanches weren’t semi-Islamist, they were clan based and tribe based. Because the Islamic Jihad is also based upon tribes and blood ties, that is why you see the similarities. It’s better to find the common root source rather than make parallel comparisons between two societies in different times. Clan warfare has stayed unchanged since the beginning of the human race.
Ymar, you posted a link to a blog. I posted a reference to the definitive work.
And if there is no utility to “Parallel comparisons between two societies in different times”, why study history? I think you are just being argumentative.
P.S., another really good read on Native America is “1491”, by Charles C. Mann, an amalgam of not widely reported recent research on Indian demography,societies, land management et al. Smallpox is a topic.
Someone above had mentioned Jared Diamond’s Guns, Germs & Steel. Diamond writes that Small Pox had decimated 95% of the pre-Columbian Native American population since the disease was inadvertently introduced to the continent by the Spaniards in the 1490’s. He goes on to say that many large civilizations like the Mississippian chiefdoms in North America disappeared long before Europeans made their first settlements along that same river. (p. 77 – 780
sciam.comFrom “Scientific American”:
“Anthropologists have searched for peaceful societies much like Diogenes looked for an honest man.”
http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?articleID=000B3718-5941-1F03-BA6A80A84189EEDF
According to this article Native Americans were nasty, uncivilized brutes who killed each other with great abandon long before the arrival of Europeans.
I think you are just being argumentative.
I think you’re not answering the question.
If you don’t want to answer the question, fine, but don’t act like a child about it, okay?
Ymar, you posted a link to a blog. I posted a reference to the definitive work.
No, you wrote Neo and Ymar, my name being the latter. I’m perfectly in my rights to ask what your book has to do with me when I’ve already covered most of the points listed. Or do you just name people for no good reason and start up conversations that only interest you?
I find it ironic that you would attempt to call me argumentative when you just admitted that you posted the so called “definitive” work because of my blog post. Get rid of your mirrors, please.
As for comparative analysis, I said it is better to find root sources connected to both, not that parallel analysis is useless.
As a student of history who has sat in and taught more American History courses than I care to recall, I have noticed a view increasingly shared by students and professors alike: a willful tendency to view history as melodrama. Folks just have to have their good guys and their bad guys. The nuances of history and a holistic, objective picture of it are, sadly, lost on most.
Ymar: I think you’re not answering the question.
Haven’t read the book, Tom, and I’m jumping in here, but if the question was “So what would the book offer that is new?” over Ymar’s post(s), I’d venture to suggest a basis in historical research as opposed to historical fiction (not to mention readable prose). Or would that just be argumentative?
You know, if the Native Americans only had washing machines, they could have dramatically shifted the balance of power and re-written history, long before historical revisionism was hip and cool.
Isnt that right Alfie?
You bet it is.
Following Alphie’s logic, the next time I catch a cold from my wife, I’m going to call the police and file assault charges against her. The arguments he uses approach moral idiocy.
Here’s another discussion of the issue.
“The settlers believed it was their business to take over, and were ruthless about doing so.”
an idea that has arguably persisted in US political culture
Oh, your so right elvis, because Saddam Hussien wasnt all bad and after all, democracy is something that has to be shoved down people’s throats. Isnt that right?
The real Elvis is ashamed of this fake Elvooo!
BRD left a reply to my understanding that there may have been as few as 900,000 Indians in the future U.S.–Attention Alfie: leaving “us” without means to kill 400 million– linking to a sound article suggesting a population of 2-4 million. That may well be so, yet for our purposes it is a distinction without a difference. As other posters have pointed out, those (white) people with the need to display guilt for things they haven’t done will not be be limited by less grandiose numbers. To have 90% killed by desease or bullet is not enough if it is only a milliion or two. Several hundred million is more satisfying.
It is fortunate for us that the most foolish have no restraints and no judgement, or they would be more effective dissemblers. Overwhelming guilt not in proportion to terrible wrongdoing is but a sin of spiritual pride and self-importance.
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Neo: ‘It is far beyond the scope of this post to review the history of European and Native American contacts and relations, but any idea that the latter were some sort of ideal people, free from violence and conflict prior to encountering the settlers, is absolutely false. Native Americans had their share of inter-tribal conflicts, and in fact some of the early wars between the settlers and the Indians exploited these already-existing rivalries.’
I’m in the middle of reading David Stuart’s ‘Anasazi America’ (David Stuart being an archaeology/anthropology professor of some importance at UNM), which covers the history of the Ancestral Puebloans from prehistory through the Chacoan civilisation down into modern times. (I’m at the part about the rise and fall of the Chacoan civilisation.) It’s a book you might find interesting – it’s all about the social dynamics of the Puebloan people throughout history as they created (as oxymoronically as it may sound) an empire ‘on the edge’, in one of the more inhospitable corners of the world, and what modern America can learn from the archaeology and the data this archaeology has produced.
Well, the data do indeed indicate that here was at least one civilisation that managed to survive – indeed, surviving multiple disasters including the fall of the centre of their civilisation in Chaco Canyon – without the need for a formal military and (for a time) without the need for fortification and defense against invasion (though they almost certainly were within easy reach of the far-more-militaristic Aztecs). And though they were raided often by the Navajos and the Utes (hence the later need for fortifications), there is a telling lack of evidence of any kind of formal warfare in the Chacoan or post-Chacoan period up until the revolt of 1688 (against the Spanish).
They had their hang-ups – a rigid, ritualistic system of societal organisation and a need for constant, sustained economic growth proved the downfall of Chaco Canyon – but I still think it an extreme over-generalisation on your part to lump all Native Americans into a single category, as much as it is an extreme over-generalisation to accuse students of Native American history (many of whom happen to be liberal) of tending to romanticise Native American societies or make black-legend vilifications of the Europeans (whose overall impact on Native civilisations was undeniably detrimental), in spite of the data.