I think it is, yes. Far better than what came before and far better than the alternatives on offer. Doesn’t mean I think there should be no regulation though, or welfare. I do support the NHS, for example. Anyway I don’t want to debate capitalism here.
Socialist states, the ones that were aiming for communism, polluted too.
I cannot speak on behalf of native peoples in North America. But here is what I know. There is no widespread (or even minor) demand that people with non-native heritage leave. That’s the frustrating thing about these conversations. People jump to that and then say, “well that’s not possible” and then shut the conversation down. It’s a straw-man argument.
Many first nations people were very happy to interact with and have a mutually beneficial relationship with the settlers. Until, of course promises were broken and the colonists tried to murder them. That actually started rather quickly. Since then there has been a long policy of genocide and forced assimilation, in addition to the breaking of treaty after treaty.
The vast majority of non-native people in North America know almost nothing of this history. And for native peoples, this is not history. It is the present. So to use another modern term, native peoples are being gas-lit. By doing something as simple as acknowledging the history of a place, we can put a stop to the gas lighting and “history is just in the past” thing. As I think I said earlier, no one believes that land acknowledgements are the solution to the problems that exist. But that doesn’t mean that they have no power.
Just to give people outside of this situation some perspective… The mascot for my high school was (and sadly still is) an Native American. And despite the fact that there were large numbers of native people on the land my town was built, we were taught nothing about them in school. And when the logo for the mascot was drawn, it depicts native dress that was never worn by the local people. The depiction of a native woman is painted into the floor of the gymnasium for people to walk on. I never attended sports, but I have no doubt that there were fake Native American chants and cheers done.
And if you were to point these things out to the people who live there now and find it perfectly acceptable, they would probably tell you that all the native people are dead, so why does it matter? But they aren’t dead, despite how hard people have worked to make that happen.
Now just imagine if for the last 400 years we had acknowledged the specific groups of people who lived on this land, rather than making them into caricatures for our entertainment. Would we be able to forget the crimes committed? Would we have the same attitudes towards people of native heritage that are still very much alive?
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That isn’t quite what I’m saying however. If it is stolen land then surely the people who don’t own it should leave, or at least get permission from the owners to stay? After the Second World War many Jews found that their former homes, which were stolen, were now occupied by other families. The moral thing to do IMO would be for those families to leave and return the property to their former owners. If modern day non-native Americans are living on stolen land, shouldn’t they then leave and return to Britain, Germany and so on? Of course, if you go back far enough European lands were also stolen one from the other at some point. I think in terms of human civilisation in general, the majority of us could claim to live on stolen land. Now, that doesn’t mean we don’t recognise what happened to the natives in America and Australia etc. Of course not, but I think we can do that without going down the stolen land narrative.
Yes. This is true; nonetheless, most people here in states live paycheck to paycheck, and work at jobs they hate. So, are things truly better? Or are they just wrapped up now into a system that exploits them only in a different way than before?
I feel you. Me either. Civilization in general isn’t too great in my opinion.
I wrote that I am not an expert, but here goes:
North America had a multitude of diverse nations with diverse cultures like Europe. The population of those nations was native to the continent ( migrated there from Eurasia about 20,000 years ago ).
Europe invaded. Took the land away from them. Killed entire villages, women and children to reduce the risk of an uprising to take the land back. The European invaders, later early Americans destroyed the wild herds of buffalo in order to starve the natives to death as that was the primary food source of many. They also gave them peace offerings laced with small pox to kill off even more natives. The early Americans repeatedly broke their treaties with surviving natives to push them onto smaller and lower quality tracts of land where they could not live out their culture ( hunter-gatherer ) or even produce enough food for themselves. The natives, not having immunity to diseases European invaders carried died off in very large numbers.
In brief, invasion and genocide.
I took a break to grab a midday meal and decided to explore this particular thread. It’s always been interesting to me to see how First Nation reservations and communities function within the United States now. Many are plagued with chronic unemployment alcoholism and drug abuse among their younger members, and because of lack of educational opportunities many of the younger members of the tribe seem quite uncertain about their futures. Along with drug and alcohol abuse there are mental health issues as well that are a proximate result of the genocides and quarantining these Noble peoples within reservations.
Some forms of reparations have been attempted in recent decades, including assigning to the Native American tribes the exclusive rights to casino projects so that the individual tribes can not only employ their own people within the casino but funding for the Native American communities is achieved through revenues from the casino. This is hardly an Optimum solution but one small way that the United States has addressed the historic genocide and maltreatment of the Native American peoples.
As Buddhists many of us are involved in altruism projects which I think at least as far as I’m concerned is an important part of my practice. I look at nonprofits like Buddhist Global relief with a sense of Pride at the way that that organization has reached out and helped so many people from across the globe. Perhaps one way the Buddhist Community could address this issue in both the United States and Australia would be for the Buddhist monasteries and communities to adopt altruistic projects that benefit First Nations peoples and perhaps organizations like Buddhist Global relief might include First Nation communities and its relief efforts. I’m not picking on vgr specifically but really by way of example this might be a focus for Buddhist considering in both the United States and in Australia which are host to some extraordinary and influential monasteries there might be some way to formalize an alliance with First Nation communities and provide some benefit to these historically damaged and underserved communities.
Apologies for the spelling and grammar errors as I’m dictating this into my Android phone which after 2 years still does not recognize my voice
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