A celebration of mass murder (Columbus Day)

[OriginalGumby]

http://socialistworker.org/2009/10/15/celebration-of-mass-murder

Dahr Jamail, author of The Will to Resist: Soldiers Who Refuse to Fight in Iraq and Afghanistan (http://www.haymarketbooks.org/product_info.php?products_id=1773), and Jason Coppola, director of the documentary Justify My War (http://www.justifymywar.com/), document the real history of Christopher Columbus and the conquest of the "New World."

[Vanguard1917]

The article puts forward a disappointingly one-sided analysis -- and it ends up welcoming ahistoricism of the most crude kind, comparing the colonisers to the Nazis. There is no Marxist analysis in the article.

It's definitely true that the European discovery of the Americas went hand in hand with human degradation and mass human slaughter. We should indeed recognise, explain and expose this when putting forward our materialist analysis of the historical facts.

But such a materialist analysis of history also means that we need to recognise that the European discovery of America was also a monumental and epoch-making event in human history, without which there could not have been the creation of a genuinely global world economy -- thus no end to feudalism, no modern capitalist society, no international proletariat, and no possibility of an international movement of workers for socialism.

Marxists should not have an idealised view of historical developments; they should seek to appreciate the contradictions inherent within epoch-making historical changes.

[Pawn Power]

But such a materialist analysis of history also means that we need to recognise that the European discovery of America was also a monumental and epoch-making event in human history, without which there could not have been the creation of a genuinely global world economy -- thus no end to feudalism, no modern capitalist society, no international proletariat, and no possibility of an international movement of workers for socialism.


And then, you would have never been born. :crying:

What a bizarre statement. How could you possibly know what history would look like with an alternative development, say the African 'discovery' of the Americas?

[Vanguard1917]

How could you possibly know what history would look like with an alternative development, say the African 'discovery' of the Americas?


A good example of what i was referring to as a non-materialist, idealised concepteption of history. We shouldn't be in the business of 'what if' scenarios, but should study actual historical occurances and the underlying material dynamics which drove them. In this case, we know that the European discovery of America played a pivotal role in the birth of the revolutionary capitalist era, with all that that gave way to (the international working class, socialism, etc.).

[Vanguard1917]

Incidentally, Marx and Engels saw the European discovery of America as a decisive development in the destruction of feudalism and the revolutionary development of society:

'The discovery of America, the rounding of the Cape, opened up fresh ground for the rising bourgeoisie. The East-Indian and Chinese markets, the colonisation of America, trade with the colonies, the increase in the means of exchange and in commodities generally, gave to commerce, to navigation, to industry, an impulse never before known, and thereby, to the revolutionary element in the tottering feudal society, a rapid development.

[...]

'Modern industry has established the world market, for which the discovery of America paved the way. This market has given an immense development to commerce, to navigation, to communication by land. This development has, in its turn, reacted on the extension of industry; and in proportion as industry, commerce, navigation, railways extended, in the same proportion the bourgeoisie developed, increased its capital, and pushed into the background every class handed down from the Middle Ages.'

(http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx...festo/ch01.htm (http://www.anonym.to/?http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-manifesto/ch01.htm))

[Pawn Power]

A good example of what i was referring to as a non-materialist, idealised concepteption of history. We shouldn't be in the business of 'what if' scenarios, but should study actual historical occurances and the underlying material dynamics which drove them. In this case, we know that the European discovery of America played a pivotal role in the birth of the revolutionary capitalist era, with all that that gave way to (the international working class, socialism, etc.).

But that isn't what i was talking about.

The fact that the Americas were 'discovered' by Europeans and that they then proceeded to slaughter most of the people who lived here, does not necessarily mean (even in a materialist sense) that this exact progression of events was necessary for the current outcome, in general terms.

On a side note, doesn't vanguard seem to relish a bit too much in the europeans developments as an imperialist power? kinda creepy.

[Pawn Power]

Incidentally, Marx and Engels saw the European discovery of America as a decisive development in the destruction of feudalism and the revolutionary development of society:

'The discovery of America, the rounding of the Cape, opened up fresh ground for the rising bourgeoisie. The East-Indian and Chinese markets, the colonisation of America, trade with the colonies, the increase in the means of exchange and in commodities generally, gave to commerce, to navigation, to industry, an impulse never before known, and thereby, to the revolutionary element in the tottering feudal society, a rapid development.

[...]

'Modern industry has established the world market, for which the discovery of America paved the way. This market has given an immense development to commerce, to navigation, to communication by land. This development has, in its turn, reacted on the extension of industry; and in proportion as industry, commerce, navigation, railways extended, in the same proportion the bourgeoisie developed, increased its capital, and pushed into the background every class handed down from the Middle Ages.'

(http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx...festo/ch01.htm (http://www.anonym.to/?http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-manifesto/ch01.htm))

good for them.

[Vanguard1917]

But that isn't what i was talking about.

The fact that the Americas were 'discovered' by Europeans and that they then proceeded to slaughter most of the people who lived here, does not necessarily mean (even in a materialist sense) that this exact progression of events was necessary for the current outcome, in general terms

What other progression of events would you have preferred? Because that's what we're essentially discussing here, isn't it?: your preferences on how history should have proceeded, rather than the way that it did proceed. Hence the 'what if' scenario you put forward earlier: what would have happened if the discovery had been made by Africans rather than Europeans?



On a side note, doesn't vanguard seem to relish a bit too much in the europeans developments as an imperialist power? kinda creepy.


You don't have to be a supporter of colonialism (the stage of imperialism came later) to see that there was a progressive side to the European the discovery of America.



good for them.


Indeed.

[Invader Zim]

Many of the unflattering documents have been known for the last century or more, but nobody paid much attention to them until recently. The fact that Columbus brought slavery, enormous exploitation or devastating diseases to the Americas used to be seen as a minor detail--if it was recognized at all--in light of his role as the great bringer of white man's civilization to the benighted idolatrous American continent. But to historians today this information is very important. It changes our whole view of the enterprise.

Eh? What do they mean 'ignored' until recently? Work noting the brutal treatment of native peoples during the conquest of the Americas (and after) has been noted by historians for years. J. H. Elliott, for example, has been writing about the Spanish conquest of the Americas since the 1960s. Though admittedly I've only read his 2005 book Empires of the Atlantic World, but Columbus is not left undiscussed.

[Invader Zim]

But that isn't what i was talking about.

The fact that the Americas were 'discovered' by Europeans and that they then proceeded to slaughter most of the people who lived here, does not necessarily mean (even in a materialist sense) that this exact progression of events was necessary for the current outcome, in general terms.

On a side note, doesn't vanguard seem to relish a bit too much in the europeans developments as an imperialist power? kinda creepy.


'Slaughter most of the people who lived there'? Slaughter implies intention, which is of course a hell of a stretch of the facts. The vast majority of those native people who died fell victim to the various diseases brought over by the Europeans, to which the indigenous peoples had no defence or immunity to. So what were common illnesses to the sailors, soldiers and explorers who went to the new world transformed into fatal pandemics to indigenous population. I've read accounts, particularly in the North, of deliberate attempts to spread small-pox, through sending blankets which had been used in the treatment of infected Europeans, as a crude form of biological warfare. But naturally these events were hardly common, and the diseases doubtless spread rapidly without the morbid aid of the invading European migrants.

Of course this is not to dismiss the widespread atrocities committed by European migrants, but to suggest that European migrants deliberately exterminated the majority of the indigenous population strikes me as a polemical fantasy as opposed to actual history, which is gruesome enough without exaggerating.

[Jimmie Higgins]

Of course this is not to dismiss the widespread atrocities committed by European migrants, but to suggest that European migrants deliberately exterminated the majority of the indigenous population strikes me as a polemical fantasy as opposed to actual history, which is gruesome enough without exaggerating.

While slaughter may not have been their intentions, while each individual farmer or plantation owner may not have written in their day planner: "Tuesday: kill off the native population", settlement needed the land to be cleared for farming and trade and railroads and so on and in order to do that the people using that potential farmland, mill-site, port and so on had to be either integrated into those plans (like Spain turning populations into slaves or the French turing native populations into trade partners) or moved out of the way (killed or relocated).

So while there have been a lot of different kinds of relationships between colonizers and the native populations in the Americas (outright slaughter, conversion and forced integration, relocation, and so on) the cause of it in the US and Mexico and most of Latin America has been to clear the land and accumulate wealth and that is very deliberate.

It would be like saying the US wasn't deliberately trying to kill people in Afghanistan... well sometimes they are deliberately out to kill some people to send a message, other times the kill people unintentionally at a checkpoint or during a raid. The point is that the project they are trying to accomplish requires subjugation of the population of the area they want to control and this leads to slaughter weather it is deliberate or not.

[OriginalGumby]

I know Native Americans that protest on columbus day by claiming it for themselves as Indigenous People's Day speaking the truth about what columbus means to them. columbus day is to Native Americans what the Nakba is to Palestinians. This day marked the beginning of a long process of genocide and ethnic cleansing of the American continent including what is now the United States. I don't know what country you are from Vanguard but in the US where I live this historical fact is not common knowledge. It is obscured behind nationalistic nostalgia about the "era of exploration and discovery" and it is celebrated for being that! I think that this article is thoroughly Marxist in it explanation of the real life columbus and the imperialist myth still supported and widely believed today. The article also put this perpetuation of this myth in a context of a country that exists as a result of expropriation and colony building. Ultimately the celebration of columbus is a celebration of imperialism and Marxists are right to point this out in all its insidious details.

It was an ongoing policy of forced expulsion, betrayal, manipulation, brutality, and genocidal physical and cultural eradication of indigenous peoples that made the country of the US possible. It was state policy as it is in israel and turning it into an unintentional process that removed indigenous people from this entire continent is an absurdity.

What I do not understand is how marxism can be distorted such that we are not able to understand history and correctly identify with the oppressed. Socialists are nothing if not the memory of the working class but also all oppressed people. Vanguard would you have us appreciate the historical significance of colonialism in Africa and elsewhere by dogmatically appreciating the great part that brutal exploitation contributed to the development of capitalism in Europe or would you recognize that yes capitalism is developing this way and yes it is a precondition for socialism but STILL you are unequivocally on the side of the oppressed fighting for self determination and survival against the colonizers and the imperialists. Do you take the side of the exploited within capitalism against the capitalists? Why not with the oppressed and exploited against the pre-capitalist ruling classes?

Oh and I think the intention of any comparison to the Nazi's was not to say that columbus or other colonizers were fascists or whatever. Instead the article pretty clearly compares the scale of fucked up historical events with how they are portrayed and understood.

from the article
Noam Chomsky holds a similar view. "We have [World War II] Holocaust museums all over the place about what the Germans did," Chomsky told Truthout. "Do we have one about what we did? I mean about slavery, about the Native American population?

This is to point out the hypocrisy of the US ruling class in talking about the horrible atrocities of others while sweeping its own under the rug.
The other one asks you to imagine a Germany that still celebrated that history. I would hope that any good radical would see this as similar to what columbus day is today. The article does not really make comparisons beyond that so I don't know what the big deal is and why it means there is no Marxist analysis.

Recognizing revolutionary historical change does not mean you support the destruction it wrecks. It does not preclude you from taking the side of the oppressed.

[Plagueround]

Of course this is not to dismiss the widespread atrocities committed by European migrants, but to suggest that European migrants deliberately exterminated the majority of the indigenous population strikes me as a polemical fantasy as opposed to actual history, which is gruesome enough without exaggerating.

While it is true that disease wiped out a majority of the native population, the ones that survived were met with white house ordered massacres of their towns and villages, executions with no trial, death marches, deliberate attempts to starve entire tribes by cutting off or burning their food supplies, reservationism, and the constant threat of an encroaching population that outnumbered them approximately 8 to 1 and viewed them as savages or animals. If a bunch of soldiers rounded up your entire family and neighbors, shot the men, raped the women and children, shot them too, then made trophies and bridal reigns out of the remains, I somehow doubt you would view this as lacking intent. And it's not as if these are isolated incidents I speak of, this was the common practice and accepted government policy at the time.

Far from "lacking intent", it's not as if these people were peacefully removed by a benevolent people concerned with the wellbeing of those who's homeland they wanted. Those that did manage to survive or who were "fortunate enough" to be living in a time when the government encouraged cultural annihilation or assimilation were met with concentration camp like conditions, were beaten or shot for participating in their tribal rituals or even speaking their tribe's language, forced to cut their hair and wear european clothing, and sit back as their children were sent to boarding schools where they were forced into similar assimilation and subjected to physical and sexual abuse, in some instances children were murdered by their instructors and later on found boarded up in floors or walls.

To this day they're still uncovering the full terror that native people were subjected to, and much of it may not ever be known because there isn't anyone left or an evidence to tell the full story. However, to take the known events and dismiss any critique of them because of their impact global progress or to attempt to differentiate the native american genocide from others because disease got there first is utterly infuriating. For some reason, I can't help but think of the people claiming the civil war was purely a states rights issue.

[Pawn Power]

What other progression of events would you have preferred? Because that's what we're essentially discussing here, isn't it?: your preferences on how history should have proceeded, rather than the way that it did proceed. Hence the 'what if' scenario you put forward earlier: what would have happened if the discovery had been made by Africans rather than Europeans?


Exactly what I am not talking about.



You don't have to be a supporter of colonialism (the stage of imperialism came later) to see that there was a progressive side to the European the discovery of America.
Progressive for who? Surly it wasn't very 'progressive' for the people already living in the Americas?

You know what I don't hear a lot (indeed, not at all) from my indigenous brothers and sisters saying here in the state; "you know what, that whole european conquest thing of the Americas was brutal and all, but, in the end, it was for the best."

Think about what you are saying here.

[Pawn Power]

'Slaughter most of the people who lived there'? Slaughter implies intention, which is of course a hell of a stretch of the facts. The vast majority of those native people who died fell victim to the various diseases brought over by the Europeans, to which the indigenous peoples had no defence or immunity to. So what were common illnesses to the sailors, soldiers and explorers who went to the new world transformed into fatal pandemics to indigenous population. I've read accounts, particularly in the North, of deliberate attempts to spread small-pox, through sending blankets which had been used in the treatment of infected Europeans, as a crude form of biological warfare. But naturally these events were hardly common, and the diseases doubtless spread rapidly without the morbid aid of the invading European migrants.

Of course this is not to dismiss the widespread atrocities committed by European migrants, but to suggest that European migrants deliberately exterminated the majority of the indigenous population strikes me as a polemical fantasy as opposed to actual history, which is gruesome enough without exaggerating.

The Founding Fathers of the US used words said the Indians needed to be "exterminated." I don't know how much more intentional the words must be for people to except the indigenous population was purposefully exterminated by europeans.

[Pawn Power]

If "exterminated" isn't clear enough, how about this.

John Quincy Adams stated "that hapless race of native Americans, which we are exterminating with such merciless and perfidious cruelty… "

[Vanguard1917]

columbus day is to Native Americans what the Nakba is to Palestinians.

But the discovery of America and the Nakba represent two very different things. To conflate the two is deeply ahistorical. At best, all you will find is superficial similarities in attempts to compare capitalist expansionism in its revolutionary period and the imperialist reaction which the 20th century assaults on Palestine represented.


What I do not understand is how marxism can be distorted such that we are not able to understand history and correctly identify with the oppressed. Socialists are nothing if not the memory of the working class but also all oppressed people.

We should undertand and expose the fact that, from its very birth, capitalism went hand in hand with the degradation of human beings. But is that the same as saying that the the birth of capitalism was not a progressive phenomenon compared to what existed prior?

[black magick hustla]

i dont get all this rage about colombus day. every important "celebration" today is smeared with blood. i dont get what is useful about making value judgement of a man who lived in the 15th century who had no conceptual framework to even utter all this ideas of "tolerance" and "equality" we grow up today. it was an ugly affair, but honestly what is there to protest? yea he murdered a bunch of natives. natives also murdered each other. its called class society.

[Invader Zim]

the ones that survived were met with white house ordered massacres of their towns and villages, executions with no trial, death marches, deliberate attempts to starve entire tribes by cutting off or burning their food supplies, reservationism, and the constant threat of an encroaching population that outnumbered them approximately 8 to 1 and viewed them as savages or animals.

Your point strikes me as being anachronistic. We are, or should I say were, discussing Columbus Day, and Columbus was a product of the 15th century and the conquistadores such as Cortés the 16th. And it is in this century, and the beginning of the next, that the indigenous population suffers massive numerical decline. Within 160 years at least 80% of the native population had been wiped out by desease or at the hands of the European invaders. The vast majority being the former. The policies of the USA don't come into play until long after the vast majority of the damage had already been done. So what happened to the 'ones that survived' doesn't really impact upon the fact that Pawn Power's claim was false, and manifestly so.



If a bunch of soldiers rounded up your entire family and neighbors, shot the men, raped the women and children, shot them too, then made trophies and bridal reigns out of the remains, I somehow doubt you would view this as lacking intent.

As I said attrocities did occur, I didn't deny that and it isn't what I took issue with. My problem was with the contention that Europeans deliberately killed the majority of the indigenous population. That, manifestly, was not the case. You are making an argument to a point that nobody has made.


I don't know how much more intentional the words must be for people to except the indigenous population was purposefully exterminated by europeans.

Yet, while Adams lamented the treatment of the indigenous population, a in the 1830s the Souix were being offered vaccination against Small Pox, which was one of, if not the, most deadly desease of the day. To list a couple of examples of just how deadly the desease was, the 1837 smallpox epidemic halved the Hidatsa population and reduced the Mandan population from 1,600 to 125. Vaccinating a people against a desease that has done more to damage them than any single policy or collective group policies could ever hope to achieve seems counter productive to a desire, at the highest levels of government, to destroy that same population. That is not to say that there wasn't a policy of genocide, but the issue certainly isn't anywhere near as clear cut as you imagine.

But of course this is a complete change of tack, I took issue with your claim that the European mingrants deliberately destroyed the majority of the population. The policy of the US government centuries after the vast majority of the damage had already been done isn't relevent to that point.

[FreeFocus]

Thanks for posting this, the article was excellent, particularly this point:


Never has this process been as blatant and overt as in recent years when the time has come for America to legitimize the idea of global domination. A Department of Defense report titled Joint Vision 2020 calls for the U.S. military to be capable of "full spectrum dominance" of the entire planet. That means total domination and control of all land, sea, air, space and information.

That's a lot of control.


How might this become accepted as "Policy" and remain unquestioned by almost an entire population?


The one word key to that is: Myths. The explanation is that the myths the United States is built upon have paved the way for the perpetuation of all manner of violations.
In addition, this piece was brilliant, the author quoted Paul Woodward:



Historical revisionism and amnesia are critical for nation-building, opines Paul Woodward, the writer and author of the blog War In Context. He elaborates:
Every nation is subject to its own particular form of historical amnesia. Likewise, imperial powers have their own grandiose revisionist tendencies. Yet there is another form of historical denial particular to recently invented nations whose myth-making efforts are inextricably bound together with the process of the nation's birth...


Whereas older nations are, by and large, populated by people whose ancestral roots penetrated that land well before it took on the clear definition of a nation state, the majority of the people in an invented nation--such as the United States or Israel'--have ancestry that inevitably leads elsewhere. This exposes the ephemeral link between the peoples' history and the nation's history.


Add to that the fact that such nations came into being through grotesque acts of dispossession, and it is clear that a psychological drive to hold aloft an atemporal exceptionalism becomes an existential necessity. National security requires that the past be erased.Now on to the bullshit comments some have made in this thread..



The article puts forward a disappointingly one-sided analysis -- and it ends up welcoming ahistoricism of the most crude kind, comparing the colonisers to the Nazis. There is no Marxist analysis in the article.

It's definitely true that the European discovery of the Americas went hand in hand with human degradation and mass human slaughter. We should indeed recognise, explain and expose this when putting forward our materialist analysis of the historical facts.

But such a materialist analysis of history also means that we need to recognise that the European discovery of America was also a monumental and epoch-making event in human history, without which there could not have been the creation of a genuinely global world economy -- thus no end to feudalism, no modern capitalist society, no international proletariat, and no possibility of an international movement of workers for socialism.

Marxists should not have an idealised view of historical developments; they should seek to appreciate the contradictions inherent within epoch-making historical changes.


There's no problem with the article being "one-sided," because it was a statement of facts and eliminated imperialist and racist propaganda. I don't object to things being "one-sided" when it's on the side of facts.


Yes, the Euro discovery of the Americas was a "monumental and epoch-making event in human history," because the bloodiest, ugliest 500 years in human history were ushered in, seeing the unparalleled destruction of entire peoples, regions, cultures, unparalleled death, and the development of murderous systems of oppression. Surely I do not applaud the development of the "modern capitalist society," which grinds billions of people under and removes any hope for a decent life. I strongly object to the notion that capitalism must precede any type of socialism. You may define socialism as a system in which workers have control, fine, fair enough. I don't see it as necessary that we needed to have bosses in between. Moreover, socialism is essentially a system in which all people are able to fully realize their potential. Socialism strengthens communities and is a system under which every person is equal. Humans worked together in groups for millennia without capitalists controlling our lives. We may have still had some type of hierarchy, which of course should have been combated, but there's nothing written in stone that says "capitalism must precede socialism," or, if you want to define socialism in the strict 19th-century European sense, there's nothing written in stone that says "capitalism must precede a socialist-like system."


Nonetheless, history happened and there's nothing that can be done to change it. We can acknowledge that, for Europeans and to a lesser extent Asians, economic development followed the feudalism to capitalism mold, and we say that socialism should be next. However, civilizations in Africa, the Americas, Australia, and Oceania didn't necessarily follow this mold. Few civilizations in the Americas followed feudalism and none followed capitalism. However, some did follow what I would consider socialism - not a perfect form of it, but everyone was provided for, and institutional barriers to self-realization and community-building didn't exist, like racism.


Capitalism is largely a Eurasian development that was forced on the rest of the world by European colonialism and imperialism. Even if Natives and Africans suffered under feudalism, feudalism was not capable of wiping entire cultures and peoples off the earth and forcing 15 million Africans across an ocean into a foreign land, losing their culture and identity, to toil under possibly the most degrading system of oppression devised in history.



But the discovery of America and the Nakba represent two very different things. To conflate the two is deeply ahistorical. At best, all you will find is superficial similarities in attempts to compare capitalist expansionism in its revolutionary period and the imperialist reaction which the 20th century assaults on Palestine represented.

We should undertand and expose the fact that, from its very birth, capitalism went hand in hand with the degradation of human beings. But is that the same as saying that the the birth of capitalism was not a progressive phenomenon compared to what existed prior?


See, this is the basic problem. You view capitalism as having a "revolutionary period," and that it was "revolutionary" for the entire world. Perhaps it had some revolutionary value in Europe, which had feudalism as its economic base. It was hardly revolutionary for peoples who already had forms of socialism or other economic systems.



Basically, you have a very parochial, Eurocentric view on politics and global development - not surprising given that the majority of our (leftist) thought comes from European analysis of European problems. Still, it's problematic because it is offensive and chauvinistic to watch you sit here and degrade the importance of, yes, mass murder and the devastating effects of European capitalist expansion into the Americas.



This shit pisses me off. Perhaps it makes you feel better inside by trying to play it down or write it off saying it represents an advancement for humanity. Hmm, that's funny, conquistadors, settlers, and these other fucks said the same exact thing.

[Vanguard1917]

Humans worked together in groups for millennia without capitalists controlling our lives.

Really? Prior to the capitalists controlling our lives, there were no feudal lords, slave masters, or tribal chieftains? This rosy vision of pre-capitalist society is obviously flawed and does not stand up to historical reality. As dada pointed out below, people were fighting and killing each other in America long before Columbus arived, just as they were everywhere else in the world.



We may have still had some type of hierarchy, which of course should have been combated, but there's nothing written in stone that says "capitalism must precede socialism," or, if you want to define socialism in the strict 19th-century European sense, there's nothing written in stone that says "capitalism must precede a socialist-like system."


Which is what we refer to as utopianism. The development of the productive forces under capitalism was absolutely necessary for establishing the material preconditions for both a socialist movement and the possibilty of a socialist society.



However, civilizations in Africa, the Americas, Australia, and Oceania didn't necessarily follow this mold. Few civilizations in the Americas followed feudalism and none followed capitalism.


Actually, with the exception of a few tiny and cut-off groups of people, the rule of capital characterises virtually every society in the world. Africa, the Americas, Australia and Oceania -- history has shown that capitalism is indeed a world system.

You're free to claim that capitalism is somehow alien to non-Europeans (as though they have some inherent cultural or genetic aversion to it), but actual reality does not back that up. Historical developments have proved that what Marx emphasised is correct: capitalism is a global, universal phenomenon, not something particular to certain races.



Few civilizations in the Americas followed feudalism and none followed capitalism. However, some did follow what I would consider socialism


Did they? Which ones? We obviously have very different definitions of what socialism is.

[Plagueround]

Really? Prior to the capitalists controlling our lives, there were no feudal lords, slave masters, or tribal chieftains?

You know absolutely nothing about what native american tribal chiefs were, or how their societies functioned. While there were certainly chiefs that functions as kings, in most tribes they were democratically elected, or they were simply people with great influence in the community with no official title. Only when Europeans tried to define tribes under their terms did the concept of "chief as king" become a popular perception. As for warfare, yes some tribes lives revolved around warfare (estimated at about 30%), especially after Europeans showed up, but most only participated in self defense, and for many tribes "warfare" was often more like heavy contact sports. To say that indians are better off or that capitalism was more progressive for them is not only ahistorical, it's offensive.

I'm beginning to think Ward Churchill is right about most of the left.

[Plagueround]

i dont get all this rage about colombus day. every important "celebration" today is smeared with blood. i dont get what is useful about making value judgement of a man who lived in the 15th century who had no conceptual framework to even utter all this ideas of "tolerance" and "equality" we grow up today.

Because he's celebrated with falsified "patriotic" values he clearly did not demonstrate.


it was an ugly affair, but honestly what is there to protest? yea he murdered a bunch of natives. natives also murdered each other. its called class society.Most natives didn't have class based societies. Some did, many did not. Did you do any research into this before making such smug comments?

This thread does, however, reveal a larger problem in perceptions. A perspective I only really expected to find in OI, since that's where people spout their mouths off without doing any research. Native americans were not, and never will be, a homogeneous and uniform entity for people to try and judge as a whole, no matter how much that's what has been done since our contact with Europeans. Marx spent the time to do massive amounts of research on indians and particularly the Iroquois, it would be nice if his more vulgar followers did the same.

[bailey_187]

The discovery of America was both (historically) progressive and reactionary

The role it played in Europe was progressive with its contribution to the development of Capitalism/destruction of Feudalism. Its role played in, say Africa, was reactionary as it bought back/introduced*/reinforced slavery to many areas.

In my opinion, Columbus should not be celebrated.

*Not all societies have to go from Primitive Communism to Slavery, many went from Primitivism to Feudalism. Maybe because the ruling class in both modes of production are for the most part the same?

[bailey_187]

I dont think the primitive communism of Native Americans should be glorified as it is being in here. This seems to be common amongst Anarchists.

[Luís Henrique]

Progressive for who? Surly it wasn't very 'progressive' for the people already living in the Americas?
As compared to what?

Why would having your people massacred by the Aztecs or Mayans, with the survivors being sacrificed to the gods by yanking their hearts off while alive be any better than being massacred by the Spaniards? Perhaps more culturally "authentic"? Perhaps Mayans or Aztecs get a free pass when it comes to massacres because they were not European?

Luís Henrique

[Pawn Power]

As compared to what?

Why would having your people massacred by the Aztecs or Mayans, with the survivors being sacrificed to the gods by yanking their hearts off while alive be any better than being massacred by the Spaniards? Perhaps more culturally "authentic"? Perhaps Mayans or Aztecs get a free pass when it comes to massacres because they were not European?

Luís Henrique

What's with the non-sequitur?

But to entertain you "logic"...

Take say, a recent example, like Iraq which has brutal dictatorship along with the brutal treatment of left political parties, women, gay people, etc.

I think we can confidently say that the invasion and destruction of millions on Iraqi lives was not progressive.

Perhaps one can argue otherwise, but then try telling that to an Iraqi.

[Plagueround]

I dont think the primitive communism of Native Americans should be glorified as it is being in here. This seems to be common amongst Anarchists.

It isn't being glorified so much as it's been defended against ethnocentric attitudes like yours, and it's not being defended by anarchists, it's being defended by native americans. I don't think we should have to suffer such stereotyped and condescending diatribes about who we were and how our ancestors fit into theories that weren't even written with them in mind. The man writing the theories apparently thought so too since he made extensive efforts to later expand on his works by researching north american indians.

I get tired of saying this all the time. Native society was not capitalism, it wasn't primitive communism, and it wasn't fascism (as one of our more sneaky racists once asserted). To try and pigeonhole societies that were so diverse in their social and economic structures they would vary from band to band, let alone tribe to tribe, as a single homogenous entity is convoluted at best and ethnocentric at worst (if not outright racist).

You are also extremely wrong to classify native americans as primitive. Please don't do it again.

[Jimmie Higgins]

I don't think he was calling native people primative, he was talking about the kind of society: primitive communism. This term just means the pre-class cooperative societies that existed throughout the world.

Never the less, as I understand, native Americans were not existing in primitive communism in most of the Americas at the time of European contact. For the most part native American societies were class societies but the class divisions and power inequality wasn't as severe in most - compared to feudal societies.

[Plagueround]

As with most threads on native americans that crop up, I am fucking done with this one. When I first became interested in leftism I wondered why more indians weren't interested. Now I know why.

[Jimmie Higgins]

i dont get all this rage about colombus day. every important "celebration" today is smeared with blood. i dont get what is useful about making value judgement of a man who lived in the 15th century who had no conceptual framework to even utter all this ideas of "tolerance" and "equality" we grow up today. it was an ugly affair, but honestly what is there to protest? yea he murdered a bunch of natives. natives also murdered each other. its called class society.The establishment has no interest in promoting Columbus the 15th century individual - they are only interested in Columbus the symbol. It's the symbol that people are protesting and the left should support that.

The symbol that is propped up is that of the great smart forward looking European who bucked superstition and the idea that the world was flat and "found" a couple of continents. This myth has no relation to historical fact and we now know through evidence that many people traveled to or from the Americas in the pre-Colombian era. But just as the Romans knew of steam power and other technology but couldn't really apply it in a meaningful way in their form of society, Norse or Romans or African who came to the Americas really didn't know what to do with it. Columbus is Columbus because unlike the lost Norse sailer, this lost european sailor, came to the new world at a time when ruling classes were competing with eachother to gain trade routes and sources of materials for trade.

While I do believe that capitalism was absolutely a progressive historical development coming out of feudalism, this doesn't mean that it was objectively a great thing. We can see capitalism as progressive historical development while fully exposing how this progress was undemocratically and brutally carried out on the backs of people in Africa, the Americas and the majority of the European peasants and soon to be prols. While capitalism claims that it's progress is due to the invisible hand, Marx is very clear that it was actually an iron fist that grabbed up people and resources abroad while enclosing peasants and creating the working class in Europe.

[Luís Henrique]

Perhaps one can argue otherwise, but then try telling that to an Iraqi.

That would depend on what Iraqis do you ask, wouldn't it?

Anyway I would doubt that many progressive Iraqis would entertain the idea that Butcher Husain's dictatorship would be the Golden Age.

The anti-Columbus thing, of course, is full of European bon sauvage mythology, degrading and dehumanising of pre-Columbian people.

Luís Henrique

[Pawn Power]

That would depend on what Iraqis do you ask, wouldn't it?

Anyway I would doubt that many progressive Iraqis would entertain the idea that Butcher Husain's dictatorship would be the Golden Age.

The anti-Columbus thing, of course, is full of European bon sauvage mythology, degrading and dehumanising of pre-Columbian people.

Luís Henrique

To me, this is incomprehensible.

I think that you are saying that the ensuing one million deaths post US invasion is considered 'progressive' be some Iraqis. That might well be true.

Though it is not relevant to what is being talked about.

No one here is denying the brutality that existed in pre-Columbus America.

However, that does not mean that mass murder and colonization is the appropriate response. I think we can all agree on that.

Unless one can affirm that the purposeful destruction of a society is 'progressive,' then this position that a few here are taking is indefeasible.

[proudcomrade]

i dont get all this rage about colombus day. every important "celebration" today is smeared with blood.

With Columbus Day, though, it is especially in-your-face and unapologetic. The timing could not possibly be much worse, either, given the recent outbreak of worsened racism against Latinos in the US, particularly Mexicans, at the hands of Anglo rightists. Columbus represents the start and continuation of five hundred years' worth of oppression of Amerindians; and every October, it gets flaunted in the streets and taught to little schoolkids like it's some kind of picnic. And every single time anyone dares breathe a word of disagreement, out come the cops, the news reporters, and the Italian-American heritage groups to tell us what politically-correct meanies we all are.



i dont get what is useful about making value judgement of a man who lived in the 15th century who had no conceptual framework to even utter all this ideas of "tolerance" and "equality" we grow up today.Columbus' own contemporaries judged him- literally. He was eventually ordered extradited back to Spain in order to stand trial for his atrocities.



it was an ugly affair, but honestly what is there to protest? yea he murdered a bunch of natives. natives also murdered each other. its called class society.Such an analogy is like saying that civil-rights violations are no big deal because of the existence of occasional black-on-black crimes. It doesn't work that way. Sporadic skirmishes between Native individuals or tribes are not even a drop in the bucket compared to what was done to them by Europe and, centuries later, the USA.

[bailey_187]

it's not being defended by anarchists, it's being defended by native americans.

How many people here when listening to arguments of Communism VS Capitalism have heard an anarchist/ultra-leftist give an example of an Indigenous America group? Thats what i was getting at. How people hold up pre-1400s American groups as examples of how Communism can work today, as if that is ever going to convince present day workers of their potential future.
Now if Indigenous Americans believe that some of their ancestors way of life is superior to todays, fine. If anyone wishes to live like that, fine. But Marxists should not be advocating that. It should not be our "proof" on how the industrial proletariat can live a better life.

I apologise for saying the Native American groups were "primitive communist", but that is the only way i have had Native American societies explained to me. I do not know much of Native American societies. Maybe i should have followed Mao's advice of "No investigation no right to speak", as i did in my first post were i intentionally did not mention the effect of Columbus on Native Americans.

I'm now going to Neg you back, not because i disagree with your post, but because I am a dick.

[Vanguard1917]

To me, this is incomprehensible.

I think that you are saying that the ensuing one million deaths post US invasion is considered 'progressive' be some Iraqis. That might well be true.

Though it is not relevant to what is being talked about.

No one here is denying the brutality that existed in pre-Columbus America.

However, that does not mean that mass murder and colonization is the appropriate response. I think we can all agree on that.

Unless one can affirm that the purposeful destruction of a society is 'progressive,' then this position that a few here are taking is indefeasible.

The Iraq war signifies something completely different historically. There is no progressive element to the invasion of Iraq. There were, however, progressive aspects to the European discovery of America.

Also, it's not useful to judge historical events according to some abstact morality ('good', 'bad', 'appropriate', 'inappropriate', etc.). To understand historical events, you have to appreciate that they consist of contradictory elements. In this case, the discovery of America by Europeans had both destructive and creative consequences -- as with capitalism generally. Yes, it destroyed an old society and way of life (often brutally), but it also played a crucial role in giving birth, for the first time in human history, to a new and genuinely global social production, bringing the whole of humanity under its umbrella, with all the immense possibilities for human progress that that entailed, not least for communists.



The anti-Columbus thing, of course, is full of European bon sauvage mythology, degrading and dehumanising of pre-Columbian people.

Good point.

[Pavlov's House Party]

Though it is not relevant to what is being talked about.

No one here is denying the brutality that existed in pre-Columbus America.

However, that does not mean that mass murder and colonization is the appropriate response. I think we can all agree on that.

Unless one can affirm that the purposeful destruction of a society is 'progressive,' then this position that a few here are taking is indefeasible.

No one here is saying that mass murder was an appropriate response, but we have to look back at what colonized the Americas: capitalism. As Marx said; capitalism came into the world dripping from every pore with blood. However, this doesn't mean capitalism wasn't historically progressive: it advanced the means of production to an unimaginable level, created the working class and united every continent under capitalism. But all of these advances did not come without a price; millions of workers died because of squalid conditions in early capitalism, entire societies that stood in the way of profit were destroyed.

Marxists realize that past modes of production were barbaric, but at the point of their inception, also historically progressive. For example, feudalism was historically progressive for laying the conditions for capitalism when compared to the Roman system of mass slavery that preceded it.

[Pawn Power]

I think the detractors here are (perhaps purposefully) missing mine, and others, point.

To use the language of the materialist linearist, we are not talking about an 'abstract' history. We are talking about what happened as a result of the european 'discovery' of America-- that is, colonization and genocide. This is what actually and materially happened.

Now, you can say this was 'progressive' in the long run, but for who? To make the argument that colonization and genocide is progressive, then your view of progression is not only absurdly boundless, but also ignores the entire societies. As a result of European colonization some societies no longer exist. Surely they then cannot be included in the progress since they no longer endure today. But if you say it has been progressive for us, then that is, frankly, eurocentric and downright chauvinistic.

[manic expression]

Pawn Power, I don't see anyone saying that genocide is progressive. I think we all agree on that point. However, what of the point that the eventual introduction of the capitalist mode of production (which didn't happen right away, I'll get to that below) was progressive in various ways? It's been said that capitalism is inherently barbaric, and that its barbarism plays out on an industrial scale previously unimaginable (unlike wars between Mesoamerican peoples, for instance), but posters have also noted that capitalism also represents the march of history toward a classless society. Capitalism, from tribalism and feudalism, does bring forms of progress: the place of science and technology for one, as well as the concept of an equal citizenry before the law. However, most importantly, capitalism provides humanity with the contradictions which give us the chance to attain communism for the first time. That's progressive to me, that's progressive to everyone, and I don't find it Eurocentric to say as much.

Plus, Indian peoples adopted European "stuff" pretty quickly when they got the chance: once tribes in the plains region got a hold of horses, they soon became arguably some of the best horsemen in the world with absolutely no previous tradition. The horse came from Europe and the Indians mastered it, and in so doing practically revolutionized life in their societies. My point is that the technology brought by Europeans oftentimes impacted Indian peoples in positive ways, but it was the use of it by certain colonialists that created the real nightmare.

By the way, was Columbus or Cortez or Pizarro setting up capitalist businesses in the lands they conquered? Not really, the societies they created were drawn from the late medieval/early modern models of Europe. For crying out loud, it was only half a century since the Roman Empire fell, this isn't the industrial revolution we're talking about. The introduction of capitalism and the massacres of Indians during the first conquests are not necessarily the same thing. IIRC, the rise of industrial centers in the Latin America, for instance, liberated many Indians/mestizos from the centuries-old hacienda system of labor, so in many cases the two are in direct conflict.

I also have NO idea what analogies to the invasion of Iraq are doing in this argument, because there's absolutely no connection there. None.


Columbus' own contemporaries judged him- literally. He was eventually ordered extradited back to Spain in order to stand trial for his atrocities.

This is an excellent point, one which should be remembered a bit more. There was a great deal of anti-conquistador sentiment within the circles of Europe. The church in particular was quite outspoken in the rights of Indians as children of God, equal to any Spaniard. A few centuries later, the French and British both fought alongside various tribes in North America, dying together (and I would imagine buried together in some instances, although I could be wrong) as comrades in arms. Oversimplifying the European role in colonization is just as dangerous as oversimplifying pre-Columbian societies.


I get tired of saying this all the time. Native society was not capitalism, it wasn't primitive communism, and it wasn't fascism (as one of our more sneaky racists once asserted). To try and pigeonhole societies that were so diverse in their social and economic structures they would vary from band to band, let alone tribe to tribe, as a single homogenous entity is convoluted at best and ethnocentric at worst (if not outright racist).

Another excellent point. One thing we have to remember is that tribal societies are almost always very complicated, not only in the Americas but also in Africa, Asia and even Europe until a certain point (feudalism as we know it was only initially introduced to the British Islands in 1066, pre and post-Roman Celtic and Germanic societies were based to a large extent around tribal societal organizations). As revolutionaries, we're used to dealing with capitalism, which is a pretty simple structure: workers and bosses. Tribalism, like feudalism isn't nearly as polarized or clear-cut, and Marx made this quite clear in distinguishing capitalism from other epochs.

In fact, one of the hallmarks of tribal cultures is diversity: linguistically, culturally and finally politically. That's how you can have the Aztecs in the Mexico Valley with one of the most highly organized societies of its day, along with the not-so-centralized Apache not so far to the north.

[Pawn Power]

I can't believe this is a discussion on a supposed 'revolutionary leftists' forum. (Actually, I can.)

A note: bringing up the Iraqi war was not an example but in regards to a comment about the barbaric practices of indigenous peoples in the Americas. Because this is often used as an argument in imperialist and colonial war. Actually, it is one of the oldest arguments in the book. It was used back then-- we are bring civilization to these 'hapless' barbarians, to today-- we are liberating women in Afghanistan or brining democracy (i.e. neoliberalism) to Iraq.

[Luís Henrique]

With Columbus Day, though, it is especially in-your-face and unapologetic. The timing could not possibly be much worse, either, given the recent outbreak of worsened racism against Latinos in the US, particularly Mexicans, at the hands of Anglo rightists.

Mind this:


Latinos

Latium is a region in.......... Europe. Specifically in Center Italy.

How would us be Latinos South of Rio Grande without.......... Columbus?

Racism against Mexicans and other Spanish (Spanish = from Spain; Spain is a country in....... Europe) speakers has nothing to do with Columbus. It has to do with modern day racist North Americans.


Columbus represents the start and continuation of five hundred years' worth of oppression of Amerindians;

This is, of course, completely false. The colonisation of America by Spaniards, Portuguese, Englishmen, etc., cannot be in any meaningful way reduced to Columbus. We Latinos don't need opposing Columbus Day; we need the repeal of anti-immigration laws, the end of North American interventions against our countries, etc. Your Columbus Day you can keep it happily, it doesn't disturb us in the very least.


Columbus' own contemporaries judged him- literally. He was eventually ordered extradited back to Spain in order to stand trial for his atrocities.

Fine, if you think that Spanish late medieval judicial system is something to be taken in serious...

Perhaps you are also OK with Galileo's conviction, or witchhunts in general?


Sporadic skirmishes between Native individuals or tribes are not even a drop in the bucket compared to what was done to them by Europe and, centuries later, the USA.

So the conquer and extermination of other Amerindians at the hand of the Aztecs or the Tupi-Guarani are "sporadic skirmishes"?

Your reasoning is entirely racist: you believe that Amerindians are not human enough to actually persecute, exterminate, make war, etc. as Europeans are.

Luís Henrique

[Luís Henrique]

I apologise for saying the Native American groups were "primitive communist",

Please don't apologise for that. Darnit, that was what they were - except for those who lived in class societies every bit as oppressive as European or Asiatic societies of the time.

Luís Henrique

[proudcomrade]

You win, tough guy; guess I'm a racist. :rolleyes:

By the way, I can play the pedantic game, too:


"It has to do with modern day racist North Americans."Golly, the Mexicans are a bunch of modern-day racists, too? After all, North America includes Mexico geographically, does it not? Shame on those Mexicans and their racist, racist racism! What a bunch of racists! Nyah nyah, racists!

[manic expression]

I can't believe this is a discussion on a supposed 'revolutionary leftists' forum. (Actually, I can.)

A note: bringing up the Iraqi war was not an example but in regards to a comment about the barbaric practices of indigenous peoples in the Americas. Because this is often used as an argument in imperialist and colonial war. Actually, it is one of the oldest arguments in the book. It was used back then-- we are bring civilization to these 'hapless' barbarians, to today-- we are liberating women in Afghanistan or brining democracy (i.e. neoliberalism) to Iraq.

Well, I suppose I can see that, I'll re-read the context. However, there is a big, big difference between the truly monumental introduction of European technologies (guns, horses, steel/iron, paper, ships, new farming techniques, etc.) to the Americas and the invasion of Iraq, which brought nothing but death, destruction and good business for American imperialists. Sure, there might have been some similar justifications ("We're spreading the word of God" vs "We're spreading democracy and freedom"), but that doesn't change the nature of the thing.

Again, we all agree on the point of crimes against the peoples of the Americas. However, there simply is no denying that Europe brought many things that were improvements over the old: it was how they were used that was the real atrocity. Further, it's important to bear in mind that not all Europeans or white Americans were committing these crimes: the Trail of Tears was an illegal act by a president who blatantly told the Supreme Court to suck it, the genocidal slavery of Indians in Spanish mines was tirelessly fought by clergymen.

And if I really want to hit the irony button, I'd tell you to read up on the handful of Indian tribes that owned African slaves before and during the Civil War. Most Indians had nothing to do with this, just like most Americans weren't manning cannons at Wounded Knee or Sand Creek. Like I said, oversimplifying either the European peoples or the Indian peoples is unhelpful and frankly dangerous. It's way more complicated than Europeans = Genocide, that's really what I'm saying here.

[Luís Henrique]

By the way, I can play the pedantic game, too:

Golly, the Mexicans are a bunch of modern-day racists, too? After all, North America includes Mexico geographically, does it not? Shame on those Mexicans and their racist, racist racism! What a bunch of racists! Nyah nyah, racists!
North Americans to me are United-Statesans.

And so they are to most South and Central Americans.

Luís Henrique

[manic expression]

North Americans to me are United-Statesans.

United-Statesans, as in the citizens of Estados Unidos Mexicanos, the official name of Mexico? Just something to think about.

[Luís Henrique]

You win, tough guy; guess I'm a racist. :rolleyes:
First, I didn't say you are a racist; I explained why your reasoning is racist.

Second, being or not being a racist is not a personal option; racism is inherent to the fabric of a modern capitalist society. To pretend that we are not racist is to deny the fact that we are social creatures, socialised under racist hegemony.

What we can do is to fight against racism - which is totally impossible if we don't fight against it within ourselves.

"Political correctness" is a way to pretend to fight withtout actually fighting: change words, mount whole batrachiomiomachies about formalities like holidays, and ignore our own responsibilities on actual, real, material oppression that goes under our very noses.

If you want to cope with your white guilt through mind games, it is up to you, of course. But it has nothing to do with revolution or even actual fight against racism.

Luís Henrique

[Luís Henrique]

United-Statesans, as in the citizens of Estados Unidos Mexicanos, the official name of Mexico? Just something to think about.
I don't think any Mexicans can ever be in doubt about to whom the term Estadunidense refers...

Those are word jokes. There is a real boundary at the Rio Grande, and this is known both North and South of it.

Luís Henrique

[manic expression]

I don't think any Mexicans can ever be in doubt about to whom the term Estadunidense refers...

Those are word jokes.

Maybe word jokes to some, but to me it means something very important. North and South of the Rio Grande, we are all Americans, regardless of nationality. The fact that the two countries have a similar title is just another reminder of this.

[Vanguard1917]

We Latinos don't need opposing Columbus Day; we need the repeal of anti-immigration laws, the end of North American interventions against our countries, etc. Your Columbus Day you can keep it happily, it doesn't disturb us in the very least... "Political correctness" is a way to pretend to fight withtout actually fighting: change words, mount whole batrachiomiomachies about formalities like holidays, and ignore our own responsibilities on actual, real, material oppression that goes under our very noses.

Wise words.

[proudcomrade]

Wise words.

Not so wise when you consider the way he assumed that opposition to Columbus Day necessarily precludes all of those other goals as well. Calling me "racist" for opposing genocide is also especially rich; and that bit about "white guilt" was precious. Then the bit about "Unitedstatesans", as if I could not already have known that, as a lifelong Spanish speaker of Mediterranean ethnicity, raised right next door to an urban barrio. I love how he assumes that all of us in the US are precisely the same, all Anglo, all middle-class, all clueless, and all "guilty" about things like Columbus Day while unaware of anything broader.

The endlessly pedantic attitude trip was utterly unnecessary. With supposed comrades like that, who needs enemies? :rolleyes:

[Plagueround]

Please don't apologise for that. Darnit, that was what they were

I do feel the need to comment on this.

Primitive communism refers to pre-agrarian societies, not the highly developed tribal societies with advanced farming techniques and technology (for their time), who also possessed that had written democratic institutions and little to no class disparity, along with numerous other forms of governance, social structures, and communities that simply don't fit into the classifications you've pigeonholed them into. If people in the 19th century thought this label of "primitive communism" applied to the majority of american indians, they were mistaken, as are you. Once again we've seen the american indian reduced to either primitive but peaceful savage or the bloodthirsty conquering empires. I expected better from Revleft, and can only ask that some of you do some research beyond whatever generalized assumptions and propaganda you've been fed.

[Vanguard1917]

Not so wise when you consider the way he assumed that opposition to Columbus Day necessarily precludes all of those other goals as well.


I think his point was that you can oppose Columbus Day all you like, but Columbus's discovery of America in the late 15th century has very little to do with the problem of racism in the US today. The latter is caused by far more material and contemporary things, like anti-immigrant legislation and US intervention in Latin America. A highly astute point.

[proudcomrade]

Once again, I am well aware of that; however, that does not make Columbus Day neutral or too trivial to address at all. Genocide happened; the US does not acknowledge it; and there are comrades out there risking their asses to face police harassment, even brutality, in Colorado every year- all just to speak freely and try to get the mainstream to think beyond the one-sided nonsense they are taught about history, because that is what moves an ignorant nation that little bit further toward progress. That is not trivial.

Furthermore, the arrogance and the ad hominem attacks were absolutely unnecessary.

[Luís Henrique]

Maybe word jokes to some, but to me it means something very important. North and South of the Rio Grande, we are all Americans, regardless of nationality. The fact that the two countries have a similar title is just another reminder of this.
I fear that most Mexicans don't think of it as important, or, if they do, it is as an "important" sign of the servility and submissiveness of the Mexican bourgeoisie toward its imperialist lords.

Luís Henrique

[Luís Henrique]

I do feel the need to comment on this.

Primitive communism refers to pre-agrarian societies,

No, it refers to pre-industrial communist societies. Including the agrarian ones.

Luís Henrique

[Plagueround]

I think his point was that you can oppose Columbus Day all you like, but Columbus's discovery of America in the late 15th century has very little to do with the problem of racism in the US today. The latter is caused by far more material and contemporary things, like anti-immigrant legislation and US intervention in Latin America. A highly astute point.

This ignores the extent that, until very, very recently, Columbus Day and Thanksgiving were taught in our schools to solidify the perception that america was justified and righteous, and that the history of this continent in European terms was one of progress and enlightenment. I don't know if the other native posters here experienced this, but I can remember feeling a sense of shame and embarassment in school from these celebrations that had a rather deep impact. Keep in mind that Columbus Day and Thanksgiving were not continuously celebrated since the day they happened and were largely not part of the american culture or psyche by default. Both holidays were deliberately implemented as national holidays by the government to produce patriotism and a sense of moral justification in the american people. Only now are we seeing opposition to that produce any sort of results, and even then it is met with a fierce backlash. It is these very early foundations that reinforces the current attitudes that shape public perception of race and immigration. If we are to profess a commitment to pointing out the atrocious and anti-human attitudes of racism, we must not support things that have been institutionalized to uphold them. If you need further proof of the racism that things like these teach, I invite any one of you to come to the U.S. and take a tour with me to the reservations I've lived on (the Yakama, the Colville, the Rosebud, and the Apache).

[Plagueround]

No, it refers to pre-industrial communist societies. Including the agrarian ones.

Luís Henrique

Every shred of writing I've read on primitive communism emphasizes that agriculture leads to class. In any event, native americans largely don't apply.

[Pawn Power]

This ignores the extent that, until very, very recently, Columbus Day and Thanksgiving were taught in our schools to solidify the perception that america was justified and righteous, and that the history of this continent in European terms was one of progress and enlightenment.

They still are in most schools.

For real, we celebrate Columbus day, its a national holiday. It would be like if Germany won wwII and they now celebrated 'Himmler Day.'

The only reason Columbus Day is 'accepted' is because 'we' won.

[black magick hustla]

i remember going to some nationalist meetings of chicano activists about colombus day. they were reciting poetry about the aztecs and how our people must be like them. the white folks killed more than some of the "native american" empires like the aztecs but it was only because of the technological capabilities. believe me, if the aztecs had bigger guns, they would have blasted the whole world into oblivion. i just dont see what is the significance of protesting "colombus day". we can protest every damn formality then, all of them smeared with blood. july 4th, constitution day, christmas, etc etc.

its very american thinking. americans are obsessed with formalities and wordplay.

[ls]

i just dont see what is the significance of protesting "colombus day". we can protest every damn formality then, all of them smeared with blood. july 4th, constitution day, christmas, etc etc.

its very american thinking. americans are obsessed with formalities and wordplay.

There is nothing wrong with attacking any of them in my mind, I completely agree with you on the point that plenty of other days are smeared with blood too of course, still it does annoy me when people talk about thanksgiving like it's so wonderful and everything (especially spoiled rich petite-bourgeoisie idiots, which is common let's face it), whereas native-american indians are still in human rights violating conditions on reservations.

Call that 'liberal white guilt' if you want, idk but it does not sit amazingly well with me, nonetheless I can support workers who only use the time as an excuse to get stuffed full of turkey, drunk and the like.

[Il Medico]

all of them smeared with blood. july 4th, constitution day, christmas, etc etc.

How is Christmas smeared with blood? Could you elaborate a bit?

[Luís Henrique]

Every shred of writing I've read on primitive communism emphasizes that agriculture leads to class.
Eventually.

Listen, two things did not exist in the Americas before Columbus:

1) Post-industrial communism;
2) Class societies without oppression and exploitation.

So the point stands. Pre-Columbian societies where either primitive communist societies, or class societies based on exploitation and oppression.

Luís Henrique

[black magick hustla]

How is Christmas smeared with blood? Could you elaborate a bit?

christianity

[Plagueround]

Nevermind, I'm really done this time.

[OriginalGumby]

Oh my god, this is sort of absurd.

First, I understand how disrespectful labeling all Native societies as primitive communism is. Just saying the word "primitive" is bound to piss people off. Native people have been denigrated and caricatured as mascots, cartoons, "savages"(grrr) etc. The folks who continue to spout that formulaic jargon obviously have never known any Natives and will never convince them to join a socialist movement.
I think there is a shit load of propaganda that we are fed about "Indians" in all forms of media. I agree that the diversity of cultural expression and societal organization was much higher than the generalization gives credit.

I am glad to say that not all leftists are this way. I am a member of the ISO who grew up next to a reservation and hung out with a bunch of Native folks for most of my teenage years. My girlfriend is Menominee and we have talked about this at length. Personal experience organizing has been that while there is a lot of ignorance about the original inhabitants of this continent most people listen and are respectful when things are pointed out. Unfortunately not always the case on this site it seems...
Don't lose faith Plagueround.


This is, of course, completely false. The colonization of America by Spaniards, Portuguese, Englishmen, etc., cannot be in any meaningful way reduced to Columbus. We Latinos don't need opposing Columbus Day; we need the repeal of anti-immigration laws, the end of North American interventions against our countries, etc. Your Columbus Day you can keep it happily, it doesn't disturb us in the very least.

This is quite disturbing. How can you be a radical if you have no solidarity with others. Why the hell would you expect Natives to fight on you side if you don't support their causes. What the FUCK?

columbus day is similar to the Nakba in the most important way. It represents a day of historic pain for the barbaric actions against Native People. It is important to recognize what things mean to real people in the real world instead of an abstract historical record that exists without the involvement of anyone else.

Finally all this about historically progressive change and genocide(what a fucked up sentence...)

Human society has been changing for some time now in a direction that created the material basis for socialism and communism. This is that workers have congregated in large economic centers and productive forces exist to provide what is needed for all humans to survive if we make changes. This is all true and great but I am concerned about the way some people have presented it. I think this should not mean we applaud each brutal step as progress. Real Marxists have nothing but sympathy for the conditions of the oppress in this fucked up world. The emphasis of Marxists should not be dogmatic appreciation of progress for its own sake. It should be a gut instinct to stand in solidarity against oppression today and its historical symbols. I feel Vanguard1917 (and maybe others) see this the other way, making a fetish of "historic progress" in all of its injustices and then nominally aknowleging these injustices. I ask you Vanguard at the risk of being branded idealistic, which side would you have been on in 1492 and beyond? The side of "historical progress" and colonialization or the side of the oppressed fighting for self-determination?

[Luís Henrique]

First, I understand how disrespectful labeling all Native societies as primitive communism is.
I suppose it is also "disrespectful" to point out that the Pre-Columbian people had no iron metallurgy, no alphabet (and, in fact, with the exception of the Mayans and the people in Mexico, no writing system at all), made no use of the wheel, had domesticated a very small array of animals when compared to the Europeans, had no notion of the compass or magnifying glasses, had no ships that could move without oars?

Perhaps we are under some sort of obligation to say that their bows and arrows were as good weapons as Europeans muskets, or that their obsidian knives could be used with success against iron swords, in order to not offend them? Perhaps we could cut all this short by pretending that they weren't ever defeated by the Europeans?

There are some things known as historical facts. It is impossible to have a serious discipline of History if we can't state those historical facts for the fear that they will offend this or that group of people.

Luís Henrique

[OriginalGumby]

I suppose it is also "disrespectful" to point out that the Pre-Columbian people had no iron metallurgy, no alphabet (and, in fact, with the exception of the Mayans and the people in Mexico, no writing system at all), made no use of the wheel, had domesticated a very small array of animals when compared to the Europeans, had no notion of the compass or magnifying glasses, had no ships that could move without oars?

Perhaps we are under some sort of obligation to say that their bows and arrows were as good weapons as Europeans muskets, or that their obsidian knives could be used with success against iron swords, in order to not offend them? Perhaps we could cut all this short by pretending that they weren't ever defeated by the Europeans?

There are some things known as historical facts. It is impossible to have a serious discipline of History if we can't state those historical facts for the fear that they will offend this or that group of people.

Luís Henrique

Well no, thats not what I meant at all. I think people are able to recognize the historical facts about technology without many problems. I do think the problem is that it is inaccurate and offensive to call all Native American societies that ever existed primitive communism. It is both the term that is bound to be offensive and the sweeping generalization that I think is wrong. I know Marx used that term to describe pre-class society but realistically if you are going to win Natives to socialist you have to be conscious about this. You can not just push this forward and assume that you will be successful, because you won't. It is a matter of both respecting Natives by not insisting that their societies were all the same or that they were all "primitive"

It should also be said that before the numerous epidemics that reduced the Native population by upwards of 80-90% according to some estimates, Native societies definitely existed. After this occurred the societal ramifications were severe and obvious. The world fell apart. There is much more to be known than the term primitive communism in this discussion.

[Pavlov's House Party]

Just putting it out there, but it seems like many posters in this thread seem to think that Native Americans were uncapable of commiting terrible acts because their society was somehow more "pure" than Eurasian or African societies. When introduced to European technology, Natives often not only mastered it, but put it to use destroying or enslaving rival tribes.

In Eastern Canada and US, a complex class society called the Iroquois Confederacy preyed on smaller Huron tribes for hundreds of years before the French and British showed up. When this happened, the Iroquois sided with the British, who gave them muskets and swords to destroy the Hurons who were trading furs with the French. It was a mutually beneficial alliance for both the British and the Iroquois.

In the Southern USA, the Cherokee transformed from a loose confederation of tribes into a class society in almost a century after contact with Europeans. They even created an alphabet based off the latin alphabet, and traded slaves with Southern plantation owners. Yes, the Cherokee owned cotton plantations and engaged in the trade of African slaves.

I'm not saying that Native Americans are evil or something, just that every society is capable of doing things just as bad as the Europeans but they just didn't have historical pre-requistites to do so.

[OriginalGumby]

Just putting it out there, but it seems like many posters in this thread seem to think that Native Americans were uncapable of commiting terrible acts because their society was somehow more "pure" than Eurasian or African societies. When introduced to European technology, Natives often not only mastered it, but put it to use destroying or enslaving rival tribes.

In Eastern Canada and US, a complex class society called the Iroquois Confederacy preyed on smaller Huron tribes for hundreds of years before the French and British showed up. When this happened, the Iroquois sided with the British, who gave them muskets and swords to destroy the Hurons who were trading furs with the French. It was a mutually beneficial alliance for both the British and the Iroquois.

In the Southern USA, the Cherokee transformed from a loose confederation of tribes into a class society in almost a century after contact with Europeans. They even created an alphabet based off the latin alphabet, and traded slaves with Southern plantation owners. Yes, the Cherokee owned cotton plantations and engaged in the trade of African slaves.

I'm not saying that Native Americans are evil or something, just that every society is capable of doing things just as bad as the Europeans but they just didn't have historical pre-requistites to do so.


Yes, I hope that my statements are not taken to be arguing for a return to some idealized previous society or that Native Americans on the whole were egalitarian. I think you find the facts show great diversity which was the point of several posters.

My concern was with vanguard confusing emphasis and he not yet addressed it.

[Luís Henrique]

Well no, thats not what I meant at all. I think people are able to recognize the historical facts about technology without many problems. I do think the problem is that it is inaccurate and offensive to call all Native American societies that ever existed primitive communism.

Which no one was arguing. There were clearly class societies in Pre-Columbian America, some of which were remarkably oppressive, even compared to European standards (Aztecs, Toltecs). On the other hand there were (and to an extent still are) primitive communist societies among them, like the Tupi at the time of European arrival or the Yanomami today.


It is both the term that is bound to be offensive and the sweeping generalization that I think is wrong. I know Marx used that term to describe pre-class society but realistically if you are going to win Natives to socialist you have to be conscious about this.

To win anyone to socialism it is necessary to put up politics that address their material concerns, not to cherry pick words in order to "not offend" them. Frankly I don't see how the left is going to win Amerindians to socialism if it is unable to even maintain a social base among the working class.


You can not just push this forward and assume that you will be successful, because you won't. It is a matter of both respecting Natives by not insisting that their societies were all the same or that they were all "primitive"

Good grief. Nobody has more than me stressed that their societies are and were different. On the contrary, it is people who maintain a PC position that want us to think of Native Americans as an undifferentiated mass of hapless victims.

Their societies were not all the same!!!!!! Some were primitive communist, some were oppressive class societies. What do you want more? That I say that there also were non-oppressive class societies? Or that some were post-industrial communist societies?

Luís Henrique

[Pawn Power]

i remember going to some nationalist meetings of chicano activists about colombus day. they were reciting poetry about the aztecs and how our people must be like them. the white folks killed more than some of the "native american" empires like the aztecs but it was only because of the technological capabilities. believe me, if the aztecs had bigger guns, they would have blasted the whole world into oblivion. i just dont see what is the significance of protesting "colombus day". we can protest every damn formality then, all of them smeared with blood. july 4th, constitution day, christmas, etc etc.

its very american thinking. americans are obsessed with formalities and wordplay.

This may all very well be true, but it is irrelevant. That fact that there were/are indigenous tyrants and thugs does redeem genocide nor does in make colonialism progressive.

[black magick hustla]

nobody says its progressive or not. what i am saying is that it is completely worthless to make value judgements of events that happened half a millenia ago when the moral values were completely incommesurable to ours right now. i dont like this whole thing of "progressive" or not, in this age its really a question between communist revolution and everything else.

[Luís Henrique]

This may all very well be true, but it is irrelevant. That fact that there were/are indigenous tyrants and thugs does redeem genocide nor does in make colonialism progressive.
Nor does the fact that Europeans committed genocide against Amerindians makes the Amerindian societies of the XVth century peaceful or progressive utopias.

(By the way, the use of "tyrants" and "thugs" in your post it totally ahistorical; you are trying to understand the formation of class societies under the categories of an established class society. People could not be "tyrants" or "thugs" before the establishment of class society defined those terms.)

Also, I don't see how the "discovery" of the Americas equates the ensuing genocide. By that reasoning we should perhaps consider Albert Einstein personally responsible for Hiroshima?

Luís Henrique

[Pavlov's House Party]

Also, I don't see how the "discovery" of the Americas equates the ensuing genocide. By that reasoning we should perhaps consider Albert Einstein personally responsible for Hiroshima?

Luís Henrique

Or holding Marx responsible for Stalin's purges.

[Plagueround]

I suppose it is also "disrespectful" to point out that the Pre-Columbian people had no iron metallurgy, no alphabet (and, in fact, with the exception of the Mayans and the people in Mexico, no writing system at all), made no use of the wheel, had domesticated a very small array of animals when compared to the Europeans, had no notion of the compass or magnifying glasses, had no ships that could move without oars?

Perhaps we are under some sort of obligation to say that their bows and arrows were as good weapons as Europeans muskets, or that their obsidian knives could be used with success against iron swords, in order to not offend them? Perhaps we could cut all this short by pretending that they weren't ever defeated by the Europeans?

There are some things known as historical facts. It is impossible to have a serious discipline of History if we can't state those historical facts for the fear that they will offend this or that group of people.

Luís Henrique



Although blatant racism against American Indians is not as evident in textbooks and scholarly research materials as it was decades ago, subtle racism is alive and well.
Many books claiming to be fair, and even some labeled pro-Indian, are riddled with half-truths and mistruths based on false assumptions. Many Web pages also perpetuate the stereotype that American Indian accomplishments were inferior to those of Europeans. Subtle racism is every bit as dangerous as the obvious kind – perhaps even more so.
It can be difficult to detect because it often omits critical facts about both American Indian and European history. The fact that it is frequently written by well-respected scholars and authorities makes it even more difficult to detect. Like a low-grade infection, it works below the level of awareness, affecting students from elementary school to graduate school.
No matter how carefully educators and librarians choose materials and no matter how diligently we work to eliminate subtle academic racism, we need to know that in an open society students will encounter it.
Rather than waiting for the damage to be done, we can take immediate action by teaching them how to recognize, question and counter racist assumptions in books and online. These critical thinking skills can help to vaccinate them against some of the effects of the subtle racism infection.
Fiction:Europeans "discovered" scientific knowledge, but American Indians "stumbled upon" it – they didn’t know what they were doing.

Fact: All scientific knowledge comes from a process of trial and error – a messy guessing game that involves many false starts and much stumbling. Scientists first make an educated guess based on their observations. Then they test it and carefully observe the results to see if the guess was correct. If it wasn’t, they guess again. The haphazardness of this process led Albert Einstein to say, "If we knew what it was we were doing, it would not be called research, would it?"

Pre-contact American Indians used trial and error, carefully observing the results of these trials. Three pieces of evidence, selected from many, are:


Indians in the North American Northeast used foxglove (Digitalis purpurea) to treat heart problems. They administered it with extreme care since high doses were needed and the plant is highly toxic.
Manioc, a staple food crop of Mesoamerican, Circum-Caribbean and South American Tropical forest peoples, is poisonous in its natural state. Four to five thousand years ago indigenous people discovered a process to detoxify the plant and began cultivating it.
Indigenous people of Mesoamerica invented a four-step process to cure vanilla, transforming it into a flavoring ingredient. Vanilla processing plants were not established in Europe until the 1700s because Europeans couldn’t figure out the indigenous process.

Using loaded language to hide the fact that pre-contact American Indians gained knowledge in the same way all scientists do is not only biased scholarship – it is racist scholarship.

Fiction: American Indian knowledge and inventions sprung from hunches or intuitions, rather than rigorous and systematic study. Hunches and intuitions aren’t valid; linear thinking is.

Fact: Undoubtedly many American Indian scientific discoveries were initially based on intuition, as are many modern Western discoveries today. Intuition is a critical part of science. If knowledge based on hunches, intuitions and lightning bolts of inspiration doesn’t count, then organic chemistry is invalid. (Freidrich August von Kekule’s dream of a snake biting its tail enabled him to visualize the structure of the benzene molecule and birth the field of organic chemistry.) So is the periodic table of elements, an inspiration revealed to Russian chemist Mendeleev in a dream.

We can forget about neurochemistry. (A dream showed Nobel prizewinner Otto Lowei that the chemical messengers, we now call neurotransmitters, are responsible for the flow of information in the human brain.) We can write off pasteurization, penicillin, and hundreds of other modern discoveries and inventions while we’re at it.
Alexander Graham Bell used intuitions that he called "a conquering force within" to invent the telephone and Henri Poincare, the mathematician who created the science of topology, said, "It is through science that we prove, but through intuition that we discover."
Holding American Indians to a narrower definition of the scientific discovery process than is used for Europeans is not only unfair scholarship – it is racist scholarship.

Fiction:American Indians did not know about the scientific method, so their knowledge and inventions could not be scientific.

Fact: Even if the scientific method were the only way to make discoveries, American Indians can’t be faulted for not using it before 1492. Europeans didn’t use it either because it hadn’t yet been invented. Historical researchers seldom mention this critical fact.

Most scholars credit Francis Bacon, an English philosopher and statesman who lived from 1561 to1626, as the father of the scientific method. Sometimes Galileo, an astronomer, who lived from 1564 to 1642, is also credited. Both were born well after Columbus landed in the Americas. The fact that Galileo was arrested by the Catholic Inquisition in 1633 for heresy and held prisoner until he died in 1642 indicates that the scientific method was not only unwelcome in Europe for at least 150 years after 1492 – it was considered a sin and a crime.
Insisting that pre-contact American Indians ought to have used the scientific method before it existed is not only sloppy scholarship – it is racist scholarship.

Fiction:American Indians (the Maya) independently invented the wheel, but it isn’t a real invention because they only used it for toys.

Fact: Many European scientific inventions started out as toys or "curiosities." These include the telescope and the microscope. "We are more ready to try the untried when what we do is inconsequential," wrote philosopher Eric Hoffer. "Hence the remarkable fact that many inventions had their births as toys."

Scholars who use wheeled transportation as a benchmark for measuring civilization rarely take the natural environment into account. Suitable draft animals did not exist in the pre-contact Americas. The two largest animals – bison and llamas – weren’t easily domesticated to pull carts or chariots
Terrain was another factor that discouraged the development of wheeled transportation in the Americas. European new to North America often found their wheeled wagons inappropriate for the land they were trying to cross. Frequently they traded this clumsy transport for American Indian forms of transportation – the canoe, snowshoes and toboggans. Indigenous people throughout the Americas used runners to deliver communications. The Inca built a road system that included suspension bridges for their runners.
Failing to consider the environmental context in which American Indian science arose is not only superficial scholarship – it is racist scholarship.

Fiction: American Indian people were living in Stone Age culture at the time of conquest.

Fact: Although the polar Inuit near Baffin Bay did use meteorites to make iron blades, for the most part, other American Indians did not work with iron (a prerequisite for entering the Iron Age). American Indians did begin making metal tools before Europeans did. The people of the Old Copper Culture in the Great Lakes region of North America 7,000 years ago are considered by many scientists to have been the oldest metal workers in the world. They developed annealing to strengthen the tools they made.

Pre-Columbian metal workers invented sophisticated techniques for working with other metals. Pre-contact metallurgists living in what are now Ecuador and Guatemala learned how to work with platinum, a metal that has the extremely high melting point of 3218 degrees by developing a technique called sintering. Europeans were unable to work platinum until the 19th century. Metal workers in other parts of the Americas knew how to solder, could make foil and used rivets to fasten pieces of metal together.
In areas where no metal deposits lay close to the surface, American Indians made tools of bone, wood and stone. The blades of their flint surgical instruments were so thin that the incisions they made could not be duplicated until the advent of laser surgery.
Focusing on the Iron Age while failing to mention the metallurgical abilities of many American Indian culture groups is not only ignorant scholarship – it is racist scholarship.

Fiction: The Aztec use of ritual sacrifice proves they were bloodthirsty and barbaric. This deserves our attention, not their accomplishments.

Fact: The Aztec did practice did practice ritual sacrifice, using large numbers of prisoners of war in these rituals. The Old World has a history of ritual sacrifice and killing prisoners that could just as easily be termed bloodthirsty and barbaric.

Hammaurabi’s Code, considered a sign of emerging civilization by scholars, established the death penalty in Babylon for 25 crimes in the Eighteenth Century B.C. By the Seventh Century B.C., the Greeks of Athens had established the Draconian Code that established death as the punishment for all crimes. Roman law in the Fifth Century B.C. mandated drowning, impalement, live burnings, drowning or beating to death for executing prisoners.
According to limited archaeological evidence, some groups of the Celts, a dominant tribe of Western Europe that settled in what would become the British Isles, practiced both ritual sacrifice and headhunting. By the Eleventh Century A.D. William the Conqueror outlawed the death penalty except during war, but in the Sixteenth Century, Henry VIII ordered an estimated 72,000 people executed. Favored methods were burning at the stake, boiling, beheading hanging and drawing and quartering. In the 1700’s Britain had 222 crimes punishable by death including stealing a rabbit and cutting down a tree.
The Inquisition, begun by the Catholic Church in the early 13th century and that peaked between 1550 and 1650, focused on eliminating heresy. Researchers who studied court documents estimate that between 50,000 and 100,000 people were put to death in Europe. Many more were tortured. Victims included midwives, herbal healers, single women who owned property and lived alone, pagans, people whose neighbors didn’t like them, and those who were in the wrong place at the wrong time.
Emphasizing Aztec sacrifice in order to minimize the culture’s accomplishment while turning a blind eye to European historical violence is not only self-serving scholarship – it is racist scholarship

Fiction: European scientific knowledge was more advanced than that of Indigenous Americans at the time of contact.

Fact: Pre-contact American Indian healers had developed a sophisticated system of medical treatment compared to European healers of the time, who relied on bloodletting, blistering, religious penance, and concoctions of lead, arsenic and cow dung to treat disease. In addition to performing surgery, American Indians from several culture groups understood the importance of keeping wounds sterile and used botanical antiseptics. They made syringes out of bird bones and animal bladders to administer plant medicine.

Indians of North, Meso and South America had developed so many botanical medications by the time of contact that the Spanish King, Philip II sent physician Francisco Hernando to the Americas in 1570 to record Aztec medical knowledge and bring it back to Europe. Eventually 200 American Indian botanical remedies were included in the U.S. Pharmacopoeia, an official listing of all effective medicines and their uses.
Another area of scientific knowledge in which American Indians excelled was plant breeding. American Indian farmers, who had formed a working knowledge of plant genetics between 5200 and 3400 B.C., used seed saving to create hundreds of varieties of food crops.
By comparison Europeans showed little interest in plant genetics. In 1865 when Gregor Mendel made public his experiments with hybrids, the European scientific community scorned him. Not until the early 1900s did European scientists begin to take agricultural experimentation seriously.
Omitting the scientific and technical accomplishments of American Indian while ignoring the shortsightedness of the European science is not only incomplete scholarship – it is racist scholarship.

Fiction: American Indians have invented a number of positive things, but they also invented scalping.

Fact: American Indians probably learned the practice of scalping from the Europeans. Although archaeologists have found a few prehistoric human remains in the Americas that show evidence of cut marks on the skulls, they disagree about whether these marks are evidence of scalping. Absolutely no evidence exists that scalping was a widespread practice in the Americas before European contact. If it was practiced, it was done by very few tribes and then very infrequently.

On the other hand, scalping was a well-established tradition for Europeans. Ancient Scythians (Russians) practiced it. Herodotus, the Greek Historian, wrote of them in B.C. 440, "The Scythian soldier scrapes the scalp clean of flesh and softening it by rubbing between the hands, uses it thenceforth as a napkin. The Scyth is proud of these scalps and hangs them from his bridle rein; the greater the number of such napkins that a man can show, the more highly is he esteemed among them. Many make themselves cloaks by sewing a quantity of these scalps together."
Much later the English paid bounties for Irish heads. Because scalps were easier to transport and store than heads, Europeans sometimes substituted scalping for headhunting. Records show that the Earl of Wessex England scalped his enemies in 11th century.
In 1706 the governor of Pennsylvania offered 130 pieces of eight for the scalp of Indian men over twelve years of age and 50 pieces of eight for a woman’s scalp. Because it was impossible for those who paid the bounty to determine the victim’s sex – and sometimes the age – from the scalp alone, killing women and children became a way to make easy money.
During the French and Indian Wars and later during the war between the British and the Colonists, both the British and the French encouraged their Indian allies to scalp their enemies providing them with metal scalping knives.
The practice of paying bounties for Indian scalps did not end until the 1800’s.
Disparaging American Indian culture by blaming Indians for scalping while omitting reference to the long standing European tradition of bounties for scalps is not only partial scholarship – it is racist scholarship.

Fiction: Syphilis originated in the Americas. This cancels out any positive contributions American Indians made.

Fact: Archeological evidence provides strong evidence that syphilis was present in Europe before Columbus and his men returned from their first voyage to the Americas.

Excavations at a friary in Hull, England, have uncovered at least a dozen skulls displaying evidence of three-stage syphilis. These have been carbon dated to between 1300 and 1450 A.D. Pre-Columbian skeletons with syphilis have also been found elsewhere in Europe, including Ireland, Naples and Pompeii, as well as at an excavation in Israel. This physical evidence lends credence to historical writings from Europe that place syphilis in Europe between 150 and 200 years before Columbus set sail on his first voyage.
Proponents of the theory that syphilis originated in the Americas often cite historical reports that an epidemic of syphilis laid waste to French soldiers in 1494. Because the damage that syphilis does to the body progresses at a slow rate, it is unlikely that it could have been contracted the year before.
Authors who claim as fact that syphilis originated in the Americas, often fail to note that an estimated 65 percent or more of American Indians died from small pox, typhoid, scarlet fever, influenza, dysentery, diphtheria, chicken pox and cholera brought to the America by Europeans. (Smallpox alone had a mortality rate of 90 per 100 cases.)
Claiming that syphilis originated in the Americas is not only scholarship that draws hasty conclusions from flimsy evidence – it is racist scholarship.

Fiction: The indigenous peoples of the Americas were defeated by the European military because the Europeans were intellectually superior to the Indians.

Fact: Indigenous populations of North, Meso and South America were decimated by disease brought from Europe, diseases against which they had no immunity. Modern military historians believe that disease was the major factor in the military defeat of American Indians.

By 1495, two years after Columbus’ first voyage, fifty-seven to eighty percent of the native population of Santa Domingo had died from small pox according to R.S. Bray, author of Armies of Pestilence-The Impact of Disease on History. (1994). By 1515, two-thirds of the Indians of Puerto Rico were dead from the disease.
Ten years after Cortez arrived in Mexico, 74 percent of the indigenous people there had died from disease so that only six million remained. Indians living in New England and Canada also died in great numbers. All the time, more Europeans continued to arrive on the continent.
Later small pox would sweep across the North American continent, leaving death in its wake. According to some estimates that about one million one hundred and fifty thousand Indians lived north of the Rio Grande in the early sixteenth-century. By the early 1900s only about four hundred thousand Indians lived in this area. Most died from European disease.
Not only were American Indians outnumbered, one can only imagine the fear, grief and social disruption these plagues caused them. In addition to taking lives and land, Europeans took Indian technological knowledge, claiming it as their own.
Asserting that European military domination of American Indians occurred because Europeans were intellectually superior and, at the same time, ignoring the hundreds of Indian inventions that Europeans co-opted is not only shoddy scholarship – it is racist scholarship.

Fiction: Europeans had guns. Indians didn’t. This proves Europeans were far more intellectually advanced than Indians.

Fact: While it is true that European colonizers had firearms, this technology was a relatively new invention. After obtaining guns from traders and trappers, American Indians quickly became expert marksmen. Despite their skill using guns and keeping them in working order, they were not able to manufacture them or able to get their hands on as many guns as the Europeans possessed.

Although history books often leave the impression that Europeans were accomplished gun manufacturers well before contact, firearm technology was still in its infancy when Columbus set sail. The English did not have handguns until the 1375. The Italians did not have them until 1397. The first mechanical device for firing the handgun was not invented until 1427. Europeans used crossbows as weapons of war until 1485 when half of the English army was equipped with guns. Europeans did not use guns for hunting game until 1515.
Basing a claim of innate superior intelligence on an invention that was only 117 years old and not in general use in 1492 is not only ridiculous scholarship – it is racist scholarship.

Just thought I'd share that before moving this thread where it belongs.

[black magick hustla]

man if there was a huge strawman is this. congratulations plagueround for being a big fuckin dick and an all around crybaby that puts its detractors in "opposite ideologies". yeah we said native americans didnt have scientific knowledge.:rolleyes: yea we said europeans were more progressive.

But then again you are probably monstruosly ignorant, and base your politics from stupid intuition than from any sort of reasonable discourse. i mean after all colombus was white and mean and us dumb reactionaries imply europeans were better and bathe in the blood of the indigenous. (Even if some of us are mestizos)

[Plagueround]

Chirst, where is Miles when you need him?

I just copied and pasted the text, doesn't mean all of it applies, but some of it certainly does. If you know of a technical way to move a thread containing such ethnocentrism, eurocentrism, genocide denial, and justification for conquest to stormfront, let me know and I'll move it there. Until then OI seems to be the most appropriate place.

P.S.
Someone hand dada an infraction for flaming please. Lord knows he's had enough verbal warnings for it lately. This is ridiculous.

[Red Icepick]

This thread is a joke. I think it's funny how some of the people here seem to think that Columbus founded the USA or something. The holiday could basically be called "discovery of the new world" day because no one actually cares about the man Christopher Columbus. Most people are well aware that he's a horrible person, and they take that with black humor(if they even care beyond getting a day off). That's probably the most appropriate response. When you start acting like a humorless goon about things like Columbus Day, you just become a joke yourself.

Extra credit goes to the guy who compared Columbus to Heinrich Himmler. You, sir, are a testament to internet credibility. You can pretty much tell the depth of someone by how long it takes them to start slinging "Nazi" around. Believe it or not, you look just as foolish as Glenn Beck's legions of dullards who think it's fun to say Obama is Hitler. Columbus wore tights, captained ships, cut people's tongues out if they disagreed with him, and thought that he'd touched down in Asia when he reached America. Heinrich Himmler wore a skull on his cap, practiced occultism in a castle, fainted at the sight of blood, and orchestrated the executions of millions of innocent people who he deemed inferior. Completely different people and it's pretty irresponsible when you start confusing the two.

[AvanteRedGarde]

Denver Kolumbus Day Reportback
(http://raimd.wordpress.com)


On Saturday October 10, 2009 there was another wack ass parade of white settlers celebrating Columbus Day, disrespecting Native peoples, and engrossing themselves in settler parasitism. Denver has been an epicenter of resistance to this celebration of genocide and racism, as Colorado was the first state to officially celebrate Columbus Day over 100 years ago.


This year’s protest was different, as the official organized opposition to the parade, Transform Columbus Day, did not put out a call to protest the parade this year. Colorado AIM put out an advisory for Native elders and children to avoid downtown Denver and the parade. Nevertheless the controversy over the parade stayed in the news, mainly because of an attempted media prank by a Columbus Day opponent where a press release was sent out saying the parade was canceled. This later turned out to be a hoax.



We at RAIM thought that a bunch of cracker settlers celebrating being cracker settlers couldn’t go off without an anti-imperialist response. So we issued a call to be out to confront the parade, not to take over leadership of this protest but to show that settler colonialism would not go off in Denver without resistance. RAIM, along with about 20 other activist allies and others who came to protest the parade, made their presence known.



All of us gathered in this freezing Saturday morning to show opposition. We chanted “Down With Columbus Day, Settlers (and Occupiers) Go Away!” To liven up the anti-colonial festivities we brought a pinata of Uncle Sam. Protesters had whacks at it with a shoe, in honor of Al-Zaidi in Iraq. The media and parade pigs made a big deal about dwindling numbers at the protests, but the parade itself had fewer numbers too, even factoring in the weather. As usual, it was made up of mostly gas-guzzling Hummers and empty flat bed semis. There was lots of pigs out. Some group of right wing assholes in camo gear stood across the street, one was visibly carrying a sheathed knife.



It seems that the celebration of Columbus Day overall is declining. A corporate media report (http://online.wsj.com/article/SB125512754947576887.html) states the declining interest in Kolumbus Day, of course not all for reasons of celebrating the beginning of the largest genocide in history.



Despite the smaller turnout at the protest, the parade organizers were spurred to respond to it this year. From www.columbusdayparade.org:


” Columbus Day Parade – Denver, CO


A Message from the President


Written by Richard SaBell
Sunday, 11 October 2009 18:15


Thank you all for your support and participation! The parade was a success despite the weather and the weak attempt at cancellation. The October newsletter will be out shortly with a full recap of the day. The following is copy of the letter sent to all the same people that received the phony cancellation email.



Letter to the Media October 11, 2009



As evidenced by the wonderful but cold Columbus Day Parade on Saturday, the parade was not cancelled and was never in danger of being cancelled. Some have called the attempt to disrupt the parade a hoax but in truth the criminal impersonation of anyone is a serious matter. Denver Police have informed me the investigation is ongoing. As a private citizen, as President of the Columbus Day Parade committee, and as a member of the National Order Sons of Italy in America and Grand Lodge of Colorado, I will pursue this matter to the fullest extent of the law.



It is important to remember that in addition to honoring a brave explorer and acknowledging Italian American contribution to this country, Columbus day commemorates the beginnings of America itself. A National American holiday of great importance. I feel it is long overdue for a close look at who and what opposes this celebration. We have multimedia documentation of protestor signs reading “I hate the U.S.A.,” “Victory to Afghanistan,” “Death to Empire,” and an effigy of Uncle Sam used as a pinata and beaten with a shoe. Shouted slogans over a loudspeaker of “occupier go away,” and “hey little kid, your dad is a racist.” This yearly abuse of the Italian American community at the hands of individuals with no regard for the law of the land or the rights of their fellow citizens is a disgrace. Know that the Columbus Day Parade will take place next year despite any opposition, even Mother Nature.



To avoid any confusion or misunderstanding in the future I suggest you check ou! r website for up to date info and a full contact list of anyone you may need. You may also call me direct 720-323-4260. If you reach my voice mail, please leave a message and I will return your call directly.



G. Richard SaBell



President

Columbus Day Parade Committee”

Sabell does accurately reflect the signs and pinata that were at the protest. He is wrong to say that all who oppose the parade are against Amerika, but we at RAIM definitely are. He is accurate in saying that the Columbus Day holiday commemorates the legacy of Amerika, that of racism, colonialism, and genocide. He attacks the supposed unsavory characters who protest the parade but ignores the shady supporters of the celebration that include white supremacists (http://white-pride.org/2009/10/cold-weather-drives-off-anti-white-bigots-at-denver-parade/), neo-Nazis (http://www.preterhuman.net/texts/unsorted/Denver%20National%20Vanguard%20-%20Supporting%20the%20Columbus%20Day%20Parade.htm) , the John Birch Society (http://www.thenewamerican.com/index.php/history/american/2076-celebrating-columbus-day), and those who honor bringing Western civilization to the so-called New World because it is a “superior culture (http://www.aynrand.org/site/PageServer?pagename=objectivism_columbus),” no matter the atrocities it brought.



This year’s protest kept alive a tradition of resistance to the racist parade and holiday, which started in Colorado over 100 years ago. Worldwide this resistance continues (http://colorado-aim.blogspot.com/2009/10/indigenous-resistance-day-venezuela.html).

[AvanteRedGarde]

nobody says its progressive or not. what i am saying is that it is completely worthless to make value judgements of events that happened half a millenia ago when the moral values were completely incommesurable to ours right now. i dont like this whole thing of "progressive" or not, in this age its really a question between communist revolution and everything else.

I don't think its a matter of a misplaced value judgment. I think it's about opposing racism and white supremacy in the form of celebrating kkkolumbus day.

[Tungsten]

Extra credit goes to the guy who compared Columbus to Heinrich Himmler. You, sir, are a testament to internet credibility. You can pretty much tell the depth of someone by how long it takes them to start slinging "Nazi" around.


Godwins law for the win. We skeptics have a collorary for measuring the credibility of 9/11 truthers: "TTFL" - "Time to first lie".

"TTFNC" - "Time to first nazi comparison" seems to fit here.

But I digress. The idea that the native Americans were any better than the Europeans who discovered and later invaded them is a Hollywood fantasy.

After reading that article anyone would have thought that America invented war, slavery and genocide and that no one ever dreamed of doing anything like these things before 1492.

"Anthropologists have searched for peaceful societies much like Diogenes looked for an honest man." - Steven A. LeBlanc, Harvard archaeologist.

[Luís Henrique]

Just thought I'd share that before moving this thread where it belongs.

What follows is not only an incredible strawman, but also a quite dishonest text.


Fiction:Europeans "discovered" scientific knowledge, but American Indians "stumbled upon" it – they didn’t know what they were doing.


Fact: All scientific knowledge comes from a process of trial and error – a messy guessing game that involves many false starts and much stumbling. Scientists first make an educated guess based on their observations. Then they test it and carefully observe the results to see if the guess was correct. If it wasn’t, they guess again. The haphazardness of this process led Albert Einstein to say, "If we knew what it was we were doing, it would not be called research, would it?"

Pre-contact American Indians used trial and error, carefully observing the results of these trials. Three pieces of evidence, selected from many, are:


Indians in the North American Northeast used foxglove (Digitalis purpurea) to treat heart problems. They administered it with extreme care since high doses were needed and the plant is highly toxic.
Manioc, a staple food crop of Mesoamerican, Circum-Caribbean and South American Tropical forest peoples, is poisonous in its natural state. Four to five thousand years ago indigenous people discovered a process to detoxify the plant and began cultivating it.
Indigenous people of Mesoamerica invented a four-step process to cure vanilla, transforming it into a flavoring ingredient. Vanilla processing plants were not established in Europe until the 1700s because Europeans couldn’t figure out the indigenous process.

Using loaded language to hide the fact that pre-contact American Indians gained knowledge in the same way all scientists do is not only biased scholarship – it is racist scholarship.

This is, evidently, ridiculous. Scientific method is not just about trial and error. It is about trial and error with controlled variables. To say that "pre-contact American Indians gained knowledge in the same way all scientists do" is therefore false, and a foolish idealisation of the state of science in pre-Columbian America.

Knowledge can be achieved without science; up to the XVIth century that was what all mankind was doing - learning the hard way, by speculation and unscientific experimentation. Much of this knowledge can be impressive - and because of its assystematic nature, it was unevenly spread; even the most advanced civilisation (China, not Europe) failed to discover or invent things that were first hit in Africa, Europe, the Middle East or pre-Columbian America.


Fiction: American Indian knowledge and inventions sprung from hunches or intuitions, rather than rigorous and systematic study. Hunches and intuitions aren’t valid; linear thinking is.

Fact: Undoubtedly many American Indian scientific discoveries were initially based on intuition, as are many modern Western discoveries today. Intuition is a critical part of science. If knowledge based on hunches, intuitions and lightning bolts of inspiration doesn’t count, then organic chemistry is invalid. (Freidrich August von Kekule’s dream of a snake biting its tail enabled him to visualize the structure of the benzene molecule and birth the field of organic chemistry.) So is the periodic table of elements, an inspiration revealed to Russian chemist Mendeleev in a dream.

We can forget about neurochemistry. (A dream showed Nobel prizewinner Otto Lowei that the chemical messengers, we now call neurotransmitters, are responsible for the flow of information in the human brain.) We can write off pasteurization, penicillin, and hundreds of other modern discoveries and inventions while we’re at it.
Alexander Graham Bell used intuitions that he called "a conquering force within" to invent the telephone and Henri Poincare, the mathematician who created the science of topology, said, "It is through science that we prove, but through intuition that we discover."
Holding American Indians to a narrower definition of the scientific discovery process than is used for Europeans is not only unfair scholarship – it is racist scholarship.

But evidently there is no problem with intuition. Science is not a method to have new ideas, it is a method to test ideas. All those inventions mentioned may have started as intuitions, but scientific testing - with controlled variables - was necessary to transform them from intuitions into actual inventions.


Fiction:American Indians did not know about the scientific method, so their knowledge and inventions could not be scientific.

Fact: Even if the scientific method were the only way to make discoveries, American Indians can’t be faulted for not using it before 1492. Europeans didn’t use it either because it hadn’t yet been invented. Historical researchers seldom mention this critical fact.

Most scholars credit Francis Bacon, an English philosopher and statesman who lived from 1561 to1626, as the father of the scientific method. Sometimes Galileo, an astronomer, who lived from 1564 to 1642, is also credited. Both were born well after Columbus landed in the Americas. The fact that Galileo was arrested by the Catholic Inquisition in 1633 for heresy and held prisoner until he died in 1642 indicates that the scientific method was not only unwelcome in Europe for at least 150 years after 1492 – it was considered a sin and a crime.
Insisting that pre-contact American Indians ought to have used the scientific method before it existed is not only sloppy scholarship – it is racist scholarship.

But this is a strawman. Evidently nobody used the scientific method before it was invented. Whomever invented the wheel, or gunpowder, or iron smelting, did it without the scientific method. I have never found the claim - much less in the academy - that this makes these inventions somehow invalid.

But the fact that no one used the scientific method up, and beyond, Columbus, does not mean that the amount of knowledge amassed through pre-scientific methods absolutely must have been the same in all regions. The Chinese notoriously invented gunpowder, the compass, blast furnaces, chinaware, etc., before - in some cases much before - Europeans. Indians invented positional representation of numbers (much) before Europeans. Why would there be a problem in admitting that pre-Columbian Americans did not invent any of those things, except for positional representation?


Fiction:American Indians (the Maya) independently invented the wheel, but it isn’t a real invention because they only used it for toys.

Fact: Many European scientific inventions started out as toys or "curiosities." These include the telescope and the microscope. "We are more ready to try the untried when what we do is inconsequential," wrote philosopher Eric Hoffer. "Hence the remarkable fact that many inventions had their births as toys."

Scholars who use wheeled transportation as a benchmark for measuring civilization rarely take the natural environment into account. Suitable draft animals did not exist in the pre-contact Americas. The two largest animals – bison and llamas – weren’t easily domesticated to pull carts or chariots
Terrain was another factor that discouraged the development of wheeled transportation in the Americas. European new to North America often found their wheeled wagons inappropriate for the land they were trying to cross. Frequently they traded this clumsy transport for American Indian forms of transportation – the canoe, snowshoes and toboggans. Indigenous people throughout the Americas used runners to deliver communications. The Inca built a road system that included suspension bridges for their runners.
Failing to consider the environmental context in which American Indian science arose is not only superficial scholarship – it is racist scholarship.

But evidently the issue is not whether inventions "start" as toys, but whether they are put to practical use. Hieron of Alexandria invented the steam engine during the hellenistic period - but no one could figure a use for it - in hellenistic "environmental context" it made no sence, because they would use slaves or cattle a power sources. Which means it was a wasted invention, the potential of which was not realized. Just lilke the Mayan wheel.


Fiction: American Indian people were living in Stone Age culture at the time of conquest.

Fact: Although the polar Inuit near Baffin Bay did use meteorites to make iron blades, for the most part, other American Indians did not work with iron (a prerequisite for entering the Iron Age). American Indians did begin making metal tools before Europeans did. The people of the Old Copper Culture in the Great Lakes region of North America 7,000 years ago are considered by many scientists to have been the oldest metal workers in the world. They developed annealing to strengthen the tools they made.

Pre-Columbian metal workers invented sophisticated techniques for working with other metals. Pre-contact metallurgists living in what are now Ecuador and Guatemala learned how to work with platinum, a metal that has the extremely high melting point of 3218 degrees by developing a technique called sintering. Europeans were unable to work platinum until the 19th century. Metal workers in other parts of the Americas knew how to solder, could make foil and used rivets to fasten pieces of metal together.
In areas where no metal deposits lay close to the surface, American Indians made tools of bone, wood and stone. The blades of their flint surgical instruments were so thin that the incisions they made could not be duplicated until the advent of laser surgery.
Focusing on the Iron Age while failing to mention the metallurgical abilities of many American Indian culture groups is not only ignorant scholarship – it is racist scholarship.

Well, saying that pre-Columbian Americans (in general) were living in the Stone Age is of course ridiculous - though evidently some were. But from this to say that the pre-Columbian American metallurgy was as developed as European (not to mention Chinese) metallurgy is completely bogus. They didn't master iron metallurgy, or even bronze metallurgy. They used copper, which is a soft metal; copper blades are no match for good silex blades, and so they never had armies armed equiped with metallic weaponry.

Platinum may be a fine example of how they attained some knowledge that the Europeans ignored - but platinum is a soft, rare metal, very useful for making jewels, not for armour, arrow points, or swords.


Fiction: The Aztec use of ritual sacrifice proves they were bloodthirsty and barbaric. This deserves our attention, not their accomplishments.

Fact: The Aztec did practice did practice ritual sacrifice, using large numbers of prisoners of war in these rituals. The Old World has a history of ritual sacrifice and killing prisoners that could just as easily be termed bloodthirsty and barbaric.

Hammaurabi’s Code, considered a sign of emerging civilization by scholars, established the death penalty in Babylon for 25 crimes in the Eighteenth Century B.C. By the Seventh Century B.C., the Greeks of Athens had established the Draconian Code that established death as the punishment for all crimes. Roman law in the Fifth Century B.C. mandated drowning, impalement, live burnings, drowning or beating to death for executing prisoners.
According to limited archaeological evidence, some groups of the Celts, a dominant tribe of Western Europe that settled in what would become the British Isles, practiced both ritual sacrifice and headhunting. By the Eleventh Century A.D. William the Conqueror outlawed the death penalty except during war, but in the Sixteenth Century, Henry VIII ordered an estimated 72,000 people executed. Favored methods were burning at the stake, boiling, beheading hanging and drawing and quartering. In the 1700’s Britain had 222 crimes punishable by death including stealing a rabbit and cutting down a tree.
The Inquisition, begun by the Catholic Church in the early 13th century and that peaked between 1550 and 1650, focused on eliminating heresy. Researchers who studied court documents estimate that between 50,000 and 100,000 people were put to death in Europe. Many more were tortured. Victims included midwives, herbal healers, single women who owned property and lived alone, pagans, people whose neighbors didn’t like them, and those who were in the wrong place at the wrong time.
Emphasizing Aztec sacrifice in order to minimize the culture’s accomplishment while turning a blind eye to European historical violence is not only self-serving scholarship – it is racist scholarship


This is again nonsence. Of course the argument Porterfield is criticising is absurd, but it certainly isn't used in academy. Barbaric religious practices have nothing to do with discoveries and inventions, one cannot minimise the other no more than the other can justify the one.

Comparing religious sacrifices to death penalty is totally dishonest; albeit both things are despicable, they are completely different. Killing innocents to please the gods is not the same thing as killing people as retribution for some thing they did, or are suspect of doing.

Nobody denies Medieval/Modern Europe was a violent society. What I am trying to discuss is the fact that so was pre-Columbian America - against the bourgeois mythology of the bon sauvage, that some people seem to have swallowed as scientific truth and even as a leftist tenet.


Fiction: European scientific knowledge was more advanced than that of Indigenous Americans at the time of contact.

Fact: Pre-contact American Indian healers had developed a sophisticated system of medical treatment compared to European healers of the time, who relied on bloodletting, blistering, religious penance, and concoctions of lead, arsenic and cow dung to treat disease. In addition to performing surgery, American Indians from several culture groups understood the importance of keeping wounds sterile and used botanical antiseptics. They made syringes out of bird bones and animal bladders to administer plant medicine.

Indians of North, Meso and South America had developed so many botanical medications by the time of contact that the Spanish King, Philip II sent physician Francisco Hernando to the Americas in 1570 to record Aztec medical knowledge and bring it back to Europe. Eventually 200 American Indian botanical remedies were included in the U.S. Pharmacopoeia, an official listing of all effective medicines and their uses.
Another area of scientific knowledge in which American Indians excelled was plant breeding. American Indian farmers, who had formed a working knowledge of plant genetics between 5200 and 3400 B.C., used seed saving to create hundreds of varieties of food crops.
By comparison Europeans showed little interest in plant genetics. In 1865 when Gregor Mendel made public his experiments with hybrids, the European scientific community scorned him. Not until the early 1900s did European scientists begin to take agricultural experimentation seriously.
Omitting the scientific and technical accomplishments of American Indian while ignoring the shortsightedness of the European science is not only incomplete scholarship – it is racist scholarship.


This is ridiculous. Of course knowledge was more advanced in Europe than in pre-Columbian America. I have noticed the main differences before - iron and steel, the wheel, alphabet, gunpowder, compass, glasses, sailing against the wind - so I won't insist on these. But saying that the pre-Columbian Americans had a better grasp of "genetics" is completely false. They had - just like the Europeans; how do you think Europeans had achieved the varieties of wheat we are used to - a practical grasp based on breeding plants. But "genetics" was way out of their comprehension.


Fiction: American Indians have invented a number of positive things, but they also invented scalping.

Fact: American Indians probably learned the practice of scalping from the Europeans. Although archaeologists have found a few prehistoric human remains in the Americas that show evidence of cut marks on the skulls, they disagree about whether these marks are evidence of scalping. Absolutely no evidence exists that scalping was a widespread practice in the Americas before European contact. If it was practiced, it was done by very few tribes and then very infrequently.

On the other hand, scalping was a well-established tradition for Europeans. Ancient Scythians (Russians) practiced it. Herodotus, the Greek Historian, wrote of them in B.C. 440, "The Scythian soldier scrapes the scalp clean of flesh and softening it by rubbing between the hands, uses it thenceforth as a napkin. The Scyth is proud of these scalps and hangs them from his bridle rein; the greater the number of such napkins that a man can show, the more highly is he esteemed among them. Many make themselves cloaks by sewing a quantity of these scalps together."
Much later the English paid bounties for Irish heads. Because scalps were easier to transport and store than heads, Europeans sometimes substituted scalping for headhunting. Records show that the Earl of Wessex England scalped his enemies in 11th century.
In 1706 the governor of Pennsylvania offered 130 pieces of eight for the scalp of Indian men over twelve years of age and 50 pieces of eight for a woman’s scalp. Because it was impossible for those who paid the bounty to determine the victim’s sex – and sometimes the age – from the scalp alone, killing women and children became a way to make easy money.
During the French and Indian Wars and later during the war between the British and the Colonists, both the British and the French encouraged their Indian allies to scalp their enemies providing them with metal scalping knives.
The practice of paying bounties for Indian scalps did not end until the 1800’s.
Disparaging American Indian culture by blaming Indians for scalping while omitting reference to the long standing European tradition of bounties for scalps is not only partial scholarship – it is racist scholarship.

Must be a very different academy in the United States that is spreading the lie that Amerindians invented scalping. It is widely recognised, at least out of Hollywood film industry, as something introduced by Europeans. Moreover, putting into question all other aspects of pre-Columbian societies because of scalping is like questioning the French Revolution because of the guillotine. So this is again dishonest - fighting something that does not actually exist, as if it was mainstream academic reasoning.


Fiction: Syphilis originated in the Americas. This cancels out any positive contributions American Indians made.

Fact: Archeological evidence provides strong evidence that syphilis was present in Europe before Columbus and his men returned from their first voyage to the Americas.

Excavations at a friary in Hull, England, have uncovered at least a dozen skulls displaying evidence of three-stage syphilis. These have been carbon dated to between 1300 and 1450 A.D. Pre-Columbian skeletons with syphilis have also been found elsewhere in Europe, including Ireland, Naples and Pompeii, as well as at an excavation in Israel. This physical evidence lends credence to historical writings from Europe that place syphilis in Europe between 150 and 200 years before Columbus set sail on his first voyage.
Proponents of the theory that syphilis originated in the Americas often cite historical reports that an epidemic of syphilis laid waste to French soldiers in 1494. Because the damage that syphilis does to the body progresses at a slow rate, it is unlikely that it could have been contracted the year before.
Authors who claim as fact that syphilis originated in the Americas, often fail to note that an estimated 65 percent or more of American Indians died from small pox, typhoid, scarlet fever, influenza, dysentery, diphtheria, chicken pox and cholera brought to the America by Europeans. (Smallpox alone had a mortality rate of 90 per 100 cases.)
Claiming that syphilis originated in the Americas is not only scholarship that draws hasty conclusions from flimsy evidence – it is racist scholarship.

But of course "claiming" that pox, plague, tuberculosis, or leprosy originated in the Old World isn't, I suppose.

Diseases originated somewhere. In some cases we don't know where; in other case we do know. Most of them originated in Africa or Eurasia. Pre-Columbian America was a remarkably healthier environment than the Old World (this actually was to Amerindians detriment - their immunologic system was not up to the task when Europeans introduced a plethora of new unheard of diseases). Maybe syphillis originated in Europe. Maybe it originated in America. If so, I can't see how it would be racist to acknowledge it.

And of course, the "reasoning" that syphillis "cancels out any positive contributions American Indians made" is another ridiculous strawman. Perhaps Porterfield is confusing the academy with some Bible belt fringe church?

More later.

[Hiero]

I suppose it is also "disrespectful" to point out that the Pre-Columbian people had no iron metallurgy, no alphabet (and, in fact, with the exception of the Mayans and the people in Mexico, no writing system at all), made no use of the wheel, had domesticated a very small array of animals when compared to the Europeans, had no notion of the compass or magnifying glasses, had no ships that could move without oars?

Perhaps we are under some sort of obligation to say that their bows and arrows were as good weapons as Europeans muskets, or that their obsidian knives could be used with success against iron swords, in order to not offend them? Perhaps we could cut all this short by pretending that they weren't ever defeated by the Europeans?

There are some things known as historical facts. It is impossible to have a serious discipline of History if we can't state those historical facts for the fear that they will offend this or that group of people.

Luís Henrique


It can be racist by selectively choosing what to emphasise about a society. So creating this dicohomy between pre-sceintific thought of indiginous/non western/eastern thought and scientific western thought is a racist imaginary.

What is the point by saying "Their bows and arrows were inferior to muskets"? When one could say "the structural component of Indian myth is as complex as the classical music of Mozart". Why is our history text books in society tell history in such way?

It is such a western ethnocentric style of history to point the differences in technology between groups and natons.

[Luís Henrique]

It can be racist by selectively choosing what to emphasise about a society. So creating this dicohomy between pre-sceintific thought of indiginous/non western/eastern thought and scientific western thought is a racist imaginary.

It is false more than racist. Science is a modern creation; it was not available to the conquistadores.


What is the point by saying "Their bows and arrows were inferior to muskets"? When one could say "the structural component of Indian myth is as complex as the classical music of Mozart". Why is our history text books in society tell history in such way?

Because an army equiped with muskets is practically unbeatable when confronting an army equiped with (simple) bows, while an army equiped with Amerindian myths won't necessarily be at any advantage against an army equiped with Mozart's music?


It is such a western ethnocentric style of history to point the differences in technology between groups and natons.

Only if you think that technology isn't a very important thing concerning social organisation.

Luís Henrique

[Pawn Power]

nobody says its progressive or not. what i am saying is that it is completely worthless to make value judgements of events that happened half a millenia ago when the moral values were completely incommesurable to ours right now. i dont like this whole thing of "progressive" or not, in this age its really a question between communist revolution and everything else.

No, in fact, vanguade1917 is saying it has been 'progressive' in the long run.

My "value judgment" is that it was not 'good thing' for indigenous people in America-- mainly because there society was destroyed and the people who survived descendants today live with some of the highest rates of poverty and under some of the most oppressive conditions. This is directly related to colonialism, obviously. Call this a "moral value" if you want.

As far as 'communist revolution' goes, you don't got much support there for that 'moral judgment' of yours.

[Bud Struggle]

No, in fact, vanguade1917 is saying it has been 'progressive' in the long run.

My "value judgment" is that it was not 'good thing' for indigenous people in America-- mainly because there society was destroyed and the people who survived descendants today live with some of the highest rates of poverty and under some of the most oppressive conditions. This is directly related to colonialism, obviously. Call this a "moral value" if you want.

As far as 'communist revolution' goes, you don't got much support there for that 'moral judgment' of yours.

We really have to stop this kind of "factionalism." It doesn't matter who was "better." It doesn't matter who we wish won the fight for civilization.

History isn't some role playing cyber game. It happened, it's done, it's over--now move on. If one is a materialist it's not about what was "right and wrong", it's about what actually happened.

History happened--now how are we going to deal with the consequences?

[Plagueround]

We really have to stop this kind of "factionalism." It doesn't matter who was "better." It doesn't matter who we wish won the fight for civilization.

History isn't some role playing cyber game. It happened, it's done, it's over--now move on. If one is a materialist it's not about what was "right and wrong", it's about what actually happened.

History happened--now how are we going to deal with the consequences?

I would agree with you on this Tom, except the oppression of native americans in the US is still ongoing, despite progress made and despite the recent resolution of an "apology".

I think you can probably infer a lot about what a person actually intends for you by the way they behave toward others now and the way they view the past, present, and future. If some of the "communists" on this forum get a hold of things, we're pretty screwed.

[black magick hustla]

No, in fact, vanguade1917 is saying it has been 'progressive' in the long run.

My "value judgment" is that it was not 'good thing' for indigenous people in America-- mainly because there society was destroyed and the people who survived descendants today live with some of the highest rates of poverty and under some of the most oppressive conditions. This is directly related to colonialism, obviously. Call this a "moral value" if you want.

As far as 'communist revolution' goes, you don't got much support there for that 'moral judgment' of yours.

it doesnt really matter if i dont get "support", I am a communist and this is what I believe.

every single demographic "who lost" in history is fucked and opressed and dispossessed. the natives are not the only ones. however, it is odd to talk about what was good or bad for certain peoples various centuries ago. The matter is that today there are folks who are dispossessed and revolution is necessary to build a new "city of light". Beyond this fact, whether you are black, brown, amerindian, etc the identity does not really matter because at the end of the day it is quite dubious to talk about a "who is to blame", in this case colombus, when today there is the whole weight of the system on the minds of men.

[Bud Struggle]

I would agree with you on this Tom, except the oppression of native americans in the US is still ongoing, despite progress made and despite the recent resolution of an "apology". Without a doubt what you say is true out there in America. But WE don't have to continue that behaviour here on RevLeft. I actually got a lot out of your post about the truth and falsities about Native American culture. I really didn't know most of the negative accusations but I have no doubt such thing could be leveled about Native Peoples. Anyway--the post was informative.


I think you can probably infer a lot about what a person actually intends for you by the way they behave toward others now and the way they view the past, present, and future. If some of the "communists" on this forum get a hold of things, we're pretty screwed.

No comment here. :rolleyes: :lol:

[RHIZOMES]

But such a materialist analysis of history also means that we need to recognise that the European discovery of America was also a monumental and epoch-making event in human history, without which there could not have been the creation of a genuinely global world economy -- thus no end to feudalism, no modern capitalist society, no international proletariat, and no possibility of an international movement of workers for socialism.

So capitalism never would have developed if we hadn't found America? ok


Incidentally, Marx and Engels saw the European discovery of America as a decisive development in the destruction of feudalism and the revolutionary development of society:

'The discovery of America, the rounding of the Cape, opened up fresh ground for the rising bourgeoisie. The East-Indian and Chinese markets, the colonisation of America, trade with the colonies, the increase in the means of exchange and in commodities generally, gave to commerce, to navigation, to industry, an impulse never before known, and thereby, to the revolutionary element in the tottering feudal society, a rapid development.

[...]

'Modern industry has established the world market, for which the discovery of America paved the way. This market has given an immense development to commerce, to navigation, to communication by land. This development has, in its turn, reacted on the extension of industry; and in proportion as industry, commerce, navigation, railways extended, in the same proportion the bourgeoisie developed, increased its capital, and pushed into the background every class handed down from the Middle Ages.'

(http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx...festo/ch01.htm (http://www.anonym.to/?http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-manifesto/ch01.htm))

I agree with everything you quoted. But that has nothing to do with idolizing a genocidal ethnic-cleansing dick. It's like saying how great slavery was because it helped develop capitalism in it's early stages.

[Jazzratt]

While it's worth taking the long view and recognising that good can come out of horrific events in the past it seems going a little far to say the events were "ultimately progressive/good". Nothing is that clear cut, whilst the arrival of Europeans in America did bring with it some good (as some have mentioned) this was mainly good for the Europeans and their descendents in America. Native peoples however got the worst of bad deals. Does this invalidate the good that came of contact? No, I don't really think it does as horrific as it was but, by the same token, I do not think the good invalidates the suffering brought either. For this reason I do not see that columbus day, thanksgiving and the like are worth celebrating. Commemerating, perhaps but not celebrating.

As for PC liberal white guilt I do not think that trying to end, or at the very least give context to, these celebrations is necessarily a liberal pursuit but I do think it should be playing second fiddle to attempts to fix actual material inequality and racism as it exists.

[Vanguard1917]

So capitalism never would have developed if we hadn't found America?

Well, you just said that you agree with the below quotes from Marx and Engels -- i.e. with the argument that the European discovery of America 'paved the way' for capitalism. Marx and Engels recognised that the European discovery of America played a pivotal role in the revolutionary rise of the capitalist epoch.

------------------

'The discovery of America, the rounding of the Cape, opened up fresh ground for the rising bourgeoisie. The East-Indian and Chinese markets, the colonisation of America, trade with the colonies, the increase in the means of exchange and in commodities generally, gave to commerce, to navigation, to industry, an impulse never before known, and thereby, to the revolutionary element in the tottering feudal society, a rapid development.

[...]

'Modern industry has established the world market, for which the discovery of America paved the way. This market has given an immense development to commerce, to navigation, to communication by land. This development has, in its turn, reacted on the extension of industry; and in proportion as industry, commerce, navigation, railways extended, in the same proportion the bourgeoisie developed, increased its capital, and pushed into the background every class handed down from the Middle Ages.'

(http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx...festo/ch01.htm (http://www.anonym.to/?http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-manifesto/ch01.htm))

[Robert]

For this reason I do not see that columbus day, thanksgiving and the like are worth celebrating.How about Christmas and Easter?

Don't answer that.

Americans give little thought to Columbus or native Americans on Thanksgiving Day. We celebrate it because it's a traditional excuse to serve roast turkey, cornbread dressing, baked onions, acorn squash with pecans and brown sugar, cranberry dressing, and ... what else? Oh yeah, to see old friends and remote relations because it's so delightful to see them again (When are they leaving?)

It would probably make a little more sense to celebrate Thanksgiving on the Autumnal Equinox, but I'm glad we don't; it isn't cool enough in September.

[Pawn Power]

Nor does the fact that Europeans committed genocide against Amerindians makes the Amerindian societies of the XVth century peaceful or progressive utopias.

(By the way, the use of "tyrants" and "thugs" in your post it totally ahistorical; you are trying to understand the formation of class societies under the categories of an established class society. People could not be "tyrants" or "thugs" before the establishment of class society defined those terms.)

Also, I don't see how the "discovery" of the Americas equates the ensuing genocide. By that reasoning we should perhaps consider Albert Einstein personally responsible for Hiroshima?

Luís Henrique

This may all very well be true. But I don't see how it is relevant.

My comments have been relation to the proclamations made about the "progressive" nature of the discovery of America (read- colonization of America).

I actually have time to discuss those other points, not that there is much to discuss besides the overall tone, and probably won't comment if prompted.

[Pawn Power]

it doesnt really matter if i dont get "support", I am a communist and this is what I believe.

every single demographic "who lost" in history is fucked and opressed and dispossessed. the natives are not the only ones. however, it is odd to talk about what was good or bad for certain peoples various centuries ago. The matter is that today there are folks who are dispossessed and revolution is necessary to build a new "city of light". Beyond this fact, whether you are black, brown, amerindian, etc the identity does not really matter because at the end of the day it is quite dubious to talk about a "who is to blame", in this case colombus, when today there is the whole weight of the system on the minds of men.

Again, this may all be true. But preach what you want about revolution, it is irrelevant to this discussion.

[Pawn Power]

Here is a very understandable piece of commentary by Chomsky, which Arunadit Roy quotes here (http://www.chomsky.info/onchomsky/20030824.htm). It pretty clearly explains a few of my points.


During the Thanksgiving holiday a few weeks ago, I took a walk with some friends and family in a national park. We came across a gravestone, which had on it the following inscription: "Here lies an Indian woman, a Wampanoag, whose family and tribe gave of themselves and their land that this great nation might be born and grow."

Of course, it is not quite accurate to say that the indigenous population gave of themselves and their land for that noble purpose. Rather, they were slaughtered, decimated, and dispersed in the course of one of the greatest exercises in genocide in human history... which we celebrate each October when we honour Columbus — a notable mass murderer himself — on Columbus Day.

Hundreds of American citizens, well-meaning and decent people, troop by that gravestone regularly and read it, apparently without reaction; except, perhaps, a feeling of satisfaction that at last we are giving some due recognition to the sacrifices of the native peoples.... They might react differently if they were to visit Auschwitz or Dachau and find a gravestone reading: "Here lies a woman, a Jew, whose family and people gave of themselves and their possessions that this great nation might grow and prosper."