Tuesday, June 20, 2006
The Genocide of Science
I am currently in the throes of reading "Recovering the Sacred," by Winona Laduke (who, by the way, will NOT be on the July 6th "Mitakuye Oyasin").
You all know how I feel about the alleged sciences of archaeology and anthropology and how I believe that it is used to minimize the historical and current act of genocide, here is what Winona has to say.
"The sociopathy of the United States rests on the colonialist history and, in particular, on the awesome weight of genocide. In attempting to dispel this burden, science has been instrumental." (pg. 76)
"Lewis Henry Morgan, the "father" of American anthropology, published the first ethnography of a Native American nation in 1851. Historian Robert Bieder notes that although Morgan was "critical of the insentsitivity expressed toward Indians by government policies to promote civilization among tribal peoples," he was responsible for placing the process of acculturation within biology, thus strenthening both the political and the academic arguments that would justify the collecting of human remains. Morgan's biological determinism allowed American policy and the collective American psyche to divorce itself from the responsibility later associated with colonialism--that is, the colonizers' responsibility to care for the colonized. As Bieder explains:
"The shift from an emhasis on external characteristics linked to the environment to internal characteristics linked to heridity allowed Americans not only to retain confidence in the American environment as a positive force for change but also to place the fault of Indian deficiency on their biology and heredity. This freed Americans from having to assume responsibility for the condition of trabal peoples and their future."(pg. 76)
In other words, the blame for the genocide of us Red Niggers is placed on our biological deficiency and NOT the actions of the Americans. It's not your fault, it's ours. Archaeology and anthropology are Jesus and have thus saved Americans from having to face justice for their genocidal activities. Science has told them so.
For those of you offended by my use of the term, Red Nigger, I will qualify it as this. Indians are not seen as human. We are characitures and pieces of a cultural historical past that no logner exists today. Thus, the reference to Indians as Red Niggers is legit, in my opinion, because we are still not seen as existing today and are therefore a "problem" to be solved by the colonialists who now have control over our societies and use tools like alleged "science" to prove that our genocide is not their fault, but our own for our biological deficiencies.
You all know how I feel about the alleged sciences of archaeology and anthropology and how I believe that it is used to minimize the historical and current act of genocide, here is what Winona has to say.
"The sociopathy of the United States rests on the colonialist history and, in particular, on the awesome weight of genocide. In attempting to dispel this burden, science has been instrumental." (pg. 76)
"Lewis Henry Morgan, the "father" of American anthropology, published the first ethnography of a Native American nation in 1851. Historian Robert Bieder notes that although Morgan was "critical of the insentsitivity expressed toward Indians by government policies to promote civilization among tribal peoples," he was responsible for placing the process of acculturation within biology, thus strenthening both the political and the academic arguments that would justify the collecting of human remains. Morgan's biological determinism allowed American policy and the collective American psyche to divorce itself from the responsibility later associated with colonialism--that is, the colonizers' responsibility to care for the colonized. As Bieder explains:
"The shift from an emhasis on external characteristics linked to the environment to internal characteristics linked to heridity allowed Americans not only to retain confidence in the American environment as a positive force for change but also to place the fault of Indian deficiency on their biology and heredity. This freed Americans from having to assume responsibility for the condition of trabal peoples and their future."(pg. 76)
In other words, the blame for the genocide of us Red Niggers is placed on our biological deficiency and NOT the actions of the Americans. It's not your fault, it's ours. Archaeology and anthropology are Jesus and have thus saved Americans from having to face justice for their genocidal activities. Science has told them so.
For those of you offended by my use of the term, Red Nigger, I will qualify it as this. Indians are not seen as human. We are characitures and pieces of a cultural historical past that no logner exists today. Thus, the reference to Indians as Red Niggers is legit, in my opinion, because we are still not seen as existing today and are therefore a "problem" to be solved by the colonialists who now have control over our societies and use tools like alleged "science" to prove that our genocide is not their fault, but our own for our biological deficiencies.
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