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6 Ridiculous Lies You Believe About the Founding of America
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May 9 2013 at 12:03:49 GMT Latest comment by : JackSparrow on May 9 2013 at 12:27:12 GMT |
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History... Interview: The Trivium Method vs. The Classical Trivium: A Briefing by Kevin Cole
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May 4 2013 at 06:38:44 GMT Latest comment by : JackSparrow on May 4 2013 at 06:38:44 GMT 
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Suppressed Ancient Discoveries From Around the World
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Apr 14 2013 at 14:19:36 GMT Latest comment by : rebbonk on Apr 14 2013 at 15:59:05 GMT 
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Graham Hancock's "Quest For The Lost Civilization" **FULL MOVIE**
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Apr 11 2013 at 08:28:36 GMT Latest comment by : JackSparrow on Apr 11 2013 at 08:28:36 GMT 
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Graham Hancock Debunks David Morrison Astrobiologist
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Graham Hancock: The Question of Humanities True Origin
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Mar 13 2013 at 19:05:23 GMT Latest comment by : JackSparrow on Mar 16 2013 at 20:28:38 GMT 
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Ancient Discoveries: Mega Structures Of The Deep
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Jan 22 2013 at 23:14:11 GMT Latest comment by : JackSparrow on Jan 22 2013 at 23:14:11 GMT 
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The History of Rome - Engineering the Roman Empire
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Dec 23 2012 at 01:51:24 GMT Latest comment by : JackSparrow on Dec 23 2012 at 01:51:24 GMT 
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U.S. had plan to nuke the moon in 1950s
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Dec 8 2012 at 10:57:56 GMT Latest comment by : JackSparrow on Dec 12 2012 at 08:48:30 GMT 
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A different story about ancient Egypt and our origins.
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Dec 7 2012 at 19:57:36 GMT Latest comment by : JackSparrow on Dec 7 2012 at 19:57:36 GMT 
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1. How Indians Influenced Modern America
The Myth :
After the natives helped the pilgrims get through that first winter, all playing nice disappeared until Dances with Wolves. Even the movies that do portray white people going native portray it as a shocking exception to the rule. Otherwise, the only influence the natives seem to have on the New World and the frontiersmen is giving them moving targets to shoot at, and eventually a plot outline for Avatar.
It's pretty much just this and Kevin Costner until Wounded Knee.
The Truth
The fake mystery of Roanoke is a pretty good key for understanding the difference between how white settlers actually felt about American Indians and how hard your history books had to ignore that reality. Settlers defecting to join native society was so common that it became a major issue for colonial leaders -- think the modern immigration debate, except with all the white people risking their lives to get out of American society. According to Loewen, "Europeans were always trying to stop the outflow. Hernando De Soto had to post guards to keep his men and women from defecting to Native societies." Pilgrims were so scared of Indian influence that they outlawed the wearing of long hair.Ben Franklin noted that, "No European who has tasted Savage Life can afterwards bear to live in our societies." While "always bet on black" might have been sound financial advice by the time Wesley Snipes offered it, Ben Franklin knew that for much of American history, it was equally advisable to bet on red.
"It's this, or powdered wigs and sexual repression."
Franklin wasn't pointing this out as a critique of the settlers who defected -- he believed that Indian societies provided greater opportunities for happiness than European cultures -- and he wasn't the only Founding Father who thought settlers could learn a thing or two from them. They didn't dress up like Indians at the Boston Tea Party ironically. That was common protesting gear during the American revolutions.
For a hundred years after the American Revolution, none of this was a secret. Political cartoonists used Indians to represent the colonial side. Colonial soldiers dressed up like Indians when fighting the British. Documents from the time indicate that the design of the U.S. government was at least partially inspired by native tribal society. Historians think the Iroquois Confederacy had a direct influence on the U.S. Constitution, and the Senate even passed a resolution acknowledging that "the confederation of the original thirteen colonies into one republic was influenced ... by the Iroquois Confederacy, as were many of the democratic principles which were incorporated into the constitution itself."
If we'd incorporated their fashion sense, C-SPAN would be more interesting.
That wasn't just Congress trying to get some Indian casino money. The colonists came from European countries that had spent most of their time as monarchies and much of their resources fighting religious wars with each other. They initially tried to set up the colonies exactly like Western Europe -- a series of small, in-fighting nations stacked on top of each other. The idea of an overarching confederacy of different independent states was completely foreign to them. Or it would have been. But as Ben Franklin noted in a letter about the failure to integrate with one another:
"It would be a strange thing if six nations of ignorant savages should be capable of forming a scheme for such a union and be able to execute it in such a manner as that it has subsisted ages and appears insoluble; and yet that a like union should be impracticable for 10 or a dozen English colonies."
Join, or die (or plagiarize from the Indians).
In 1987, Cornell University held a conference on the link between the Iroquois' government and the U.S. Constitution. It was noted that the Iroquois Great Law of Peace "includes 'freedom of speech, freedom of religion ... separation of power in government and checks and balances."
Wow, checks and balances, freedom of speech and religion. Sounds awfully familiar.
One of the strangest legacies of America's founding is their national obsession with the apocalypse. There's a new JJ Abrams show coming this fall called The Revolution about a post-apocalyptic America, and of course The Hunger Games. Go to a gift shop in Arizona and see dug-up Indian arrowheads, and never think "this is the same thing as the stuff laying around in Terminator or The Road or that part in The Road Warrior where the feral kid finds a music box and doesn't know what it is."
We love the apocalypse as long as nobody acknowledges the truth: It's not a mythical event. America lives on top of one.