Should so called “thanksgiving” be a national day of mourning?

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Do you know other cultures have Thanksgiving to celebrate the harvest? They didn’t all conquer North America.

So maybe we shouldn’t have based this holiday on the myth about “pilgrims and Indians”.

Schools are dropping any mention of Indians at all. It's not just turkeys and Pilgrims. Sounds like that ought to make some people happy, everyone will just forget about them.

Yup. They want to pretend like it never happened. Or the people aren’t still suffering today.

Revisionist history to the max.

Not so much revisionist as irrelevant. People are moving forward, why should they dwell on the past when it has nothing to do with them? Obviously the people who were hurt feel differently, but they aren't making much of an impact convincing anyone else to put their needs first. Everyone has their own problems these days.

Why do we bother to learn any history at all? It all happened in the past. Why dwell on any of it?

Maybe if we don’t sugar coat history just to make white people feel comfortable then we can learn from our mistakes and do better in the future.

Ha, as if white people are only bad. So do the Plymouth protestors also cover the section in history where native Americans own African slaves? Yes, it really existed:

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smithsonian-in...narrative-180968339/

Let's also not even get into the entire violent and oppressive histories all across Asia, the Arab slave trade, etc. It's almost as if everyone's history is filled with oppression.

Go crawl under a rock and cry about it, because it will never end.

Strawman. We are talking about *our* history and treatment of indigenous people.

Yes, enslaving people is bad. Also, mass murdering and oppressing indigenous people is wrong.

Why is it so difficult for some people to acknowledge that?

Indigenous history is our history. They owned slaves. Why are we whitewashing native American history? They were slave owners.

Right. The Asian and Arab slave trade is not our history.

As I already said, yes, enslaving people is bad. No one has claimed otherwise.

Also, mass murdering and oppressing indigenous people is wrong. Wouldn’t you agree?

Sure oppressing people is wrong. Germany is wrong for killing millions of Jews. Japan is wrong for killing millions during WW2 too. I don't think Germany and Japan need to be forced to 'mourn' or have a day of 'repenting' for what they did. History is history.

Germany and Japan each paid massive reparations and we do have memorial days. ??

These are people living within our country. Our responsibility continues. Acknowledging their loss is the least we should do.

We already have Indigenous Peoples' Day. And yet, that's not good enough even thought that's what you're asking for. So, what do you really want to happen?

I’m not personally asking for anything.

On Thanksgiving, I do think we, the people in the US, should acknowledge the reality/perspective of the other people who were at this feast of our lore. If we are reflecting on all that we have, we can acknowledge there was also a massive human cost behind it.

Outside this holiday, we, the people of the US, should fix the wrongs that still persist today.

Exactly how would you like people to acknowledge the human cost? Should Grandma say "I'm sorry for the Trail of Tears, but thankful for my health" every year? What does that accomplish exactly? Say whatever you like at your table but the performative aspect of what you are suggesting is ridiculous. And until you give up your home and property to fix the wrongs you're a hypocrite. We also means you.

We could acknowledge it in public schools. Include multiple perspectives of history.

In addition to pardoning turkeys, the POTUS could host a function for tribal leaders. Broadcast between football games.

If they are part of “the story”, include their voice.

Cool, you get on that PSA. Your average person isn't going to tune into a function for tribal leaders. And they will be using the restroom between football games. Are you always this ineffective at change? Lot of lip service with no real impact. Embarrassing. Are you an actual adult?

Yes, many Americans are indifferent and willfully choose ignorance.

Please share with us what you have done to right this wrong? Flowery statements acknowledging the history do nothing, what actual things have you done to make a tiny bit of difference? Put your money where your mouth is.

How exactly can I make millions of Americans less indifferent or ignorant? That’s a tough one.

You’re a hypocrite. As expected. All bark and no bite.

Yup. And terminally, terminally smug and boring. No one’s going to give her and her attitude the time of day. Such a turnoff.

Uh, we're discussing issues, not particular peoples' personalities. A turnoff is someone trying to engage in an intellectual exchange who resorts to shallow insults like the ones above. Sheesh, up your game, PPs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Thanksgiving is a day during which the typical American stuffs their face with several thousand calories of fat, salt, and sugar before embarking on a three-week spree of buying cheap crap manufactured overseas.

Sounds like a national day of mourning to me!

I can tell you’re well liked.

And what does “Sounds like a national day of morning to me [EXCLAMATION POINT]” even mean? None of the shit you said had anything to do with mourning. And why exclaim it? Did you think that was clever?

You’re a twerp and a loser. You’re gonna read this and feel embarrassed. You’ll probably quickly shut your browser and go do something else, but deep down you’ll know: nobody liked your post, it was really stupid and banal, no one laughed or agreed with it. It’ll exist forever in the bowels of the internet, just hanging there like a moist gym sock sling over a shower rod. A smelly and utterly forgettable eternal testament to you being a tedious and boring person.

We're worried about you, son. I know the internet is an addictive place, but we wish you would start using your skills in a more useful way instead of squandering them on DCUM.

DP. Meh, the previous post was equally if not more childish. At least this post shows an attempt at creative writing.

Agree. That's what's being squandered on DCUM.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There were other “thanksgivings” in that era. I wonder why we don’t include others in our history books.

Here was another one days after the 1637 massacre:

“A day of thanksgiving. Thanking God that they had eliminated over 700 men, women and children.”
- John Winthrop, governor of Bay Colony

While I was totally open to this interpretation, Snopes rates as "false" the claim that the Pequot massacre was the basis for our modern Thanksgiving. https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/thanksgiving-massacre-pequot-tribe/

We spoke to David Silverman, professor at George Washington University, and author of the book “This Land is Their Land: The Wampanoag Indians, Plymouth Colony, and the Troubled History of Thanksgiving.” When asked about the connection between the 1637 day of thanksgiving and the holiday we know today, he said: “There is no question that Connecticut and Massachusetts had a thanksgiving after [those events], a lot of people did it [...] but to draw the connection between that and the modern holiday is untenable. Thanksgivings were a tradition amongst English people often to mark a gift from god [...] [The quote’s usage] is taking that particular thanksgiving out of context. There were hundreds, if not thousands of thanksgivings, some of them were related to military conquests of Indian people and most were not.”

This viewpoint was echoed by Chris Newell, director of education of Akomawt Educational Initiative, and the former education supervisor at the Mashantucket Pequot Museum and Research Center. “When it comes to the 17th century English 'days of thanksgiving,' they have no resemblance to the holiday we celebrate today,” he told us. “That holiday was not created until the 19th century. The English day of thanksgiving would have been a day of prayer. If they won a victory in battle that would have been a day of thanksgiving, which was normally a day of fasting, totally different from a feast.”

Instead, Lincoln established Thanksgiving as a gesture of reconciliation. "In October 1863, Lincoln issued the Thanksgiving Proclamation, after the victory of the Union over the Confederacy: 'I do therefore invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United States, …to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next, as a day of Thanksgiving….' Thanksgiving day owes its origins in part to Sarah Josepha Hale (a woman also known for penning the nursery rhyme 'Mary Had a Little Lamb'), who lobbied through a letter-writing campaign to members of Congress and other government officials for such a holiday."

And yes, the Wampanoag participated in the feast, but it wasn't a simple gathering of friends. "The so-called first Thanksgiving was the fruit of a political decision on Ousamequin’s [the Chief of the Wampanoag] part. Violent power politics played a much more important role in shaping the Wampanoag-English alliance than the famous feast. At least in the short term, Ousamequin’s league with the newcomers was the right gamble, insofar as the English helped to fend off the rival Narragansetts and uphold Ousamequin’s authority. In the long term, however, it was a grave miscalculation. Plymouth and the other New England colonies would soon go on to conquer Ousamequin’s people, just as the Frenchman’s curse had augured and just as the Wampanoags who opposed the Pilgrims feared that they would."

You misread.

I said there were “other thanksgivings”, not that the massacre thanksgiving was the basis for future thanksgivings.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Do you know other cultures have Thanksgiving to celebrate the harvest? They didn’t all conquer North America.

So maybe we shouldn’t have based this holiday on the myth about “pilgrims and Indians”.

Schools are dropping any mention of Indians at all. It's not just turkeys and Pilgrims. Sounds like that ought to make some people happy, everyone will just forget about them.

Yup. They want to pretend like it never happened. Or the people aren’t still suffering today.

Revisionist history to the max.

Not so much revisionist as irrelevant. People are moving forward, why should they dwell on the past when it has nothing to do with them? Obviously the people who were hurt feel differently, but they aren't making much of an impact convincing anyone else to put their needs first. Everyone has their own problems these days.

Why do we bother to learn any history at all? It all happened in the past. Why dwell on any of it?

Maybe if we don’t sugar coat history just to make white people feel comfortable then we can learn from our mistakes and do better in the future.

Ha, as if white people are only bad. So do the Plymouth protestors also cover the section in history where native Americans own African slaves? Yes, it really existed:

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smithsonian-in...narrative-180968339/

Let's also not even get into the entire violent and oppressive histories all across Asia, the Arab slave trade, etc. It's almost as if everyone's history is filled with oppression.

Go crawl under a rock and cry about it, because it will never end.

Strawman. We are talking about *our* history and treatment of indigenous people.

Yes, enslaving people is bad. Also, mass murdering and oppressing indigenous people is wrong.

Why is it so difficult for some people to acknowledge that?

Indigenous history is our history. They owned slaves. Why are we whitewashing native American history? They were slave owners.

Right. The Asian and Arab slave trade is not our history.

As I already said, yes, enslaving people is bad. No one has claimed otherwise.

Also, mass murdering and oppressing indigenous people is wrong. Wouldn’t you agree?

Sure oppressing people is wrong. Germany is wrong for killing millions of Jews. Japan is wrong for killing millions during WW2 too. I don't think Germany and Japan need to be forced to 'mourn' or have a day of 'repenting' for what they did. History is history.

Germany and Japan each paid massive reparations and we do have memorial days. ??

These are people living within our country. Our responsibility continues. Acknowledging their loss is the least we should do.

We already have Indigenous Peoples' Day. And yet, that's not good enough even thought that's what you're asking for. So, what do you really want to happen?

I’m not personally asking for anything.

On Thanksgiving, I do think we, the people in the US, should acknowledge the reality/perspective of the other people who were at this feast of our lore. If we are reflecting on all that we have, we can acknowledge there was also a massive human cost behind it.

Outside this holiday, we, the people of the US, should fix the wrongs that still persist today.

Exactly how would you like people to acknowledge the human cost? Should Grandma say "I'm sorry for the Trail of Tears, but thankful for my health" every year? What does that accomplish exactly? Say whatever you like at your table but the performative aspect of what you are suggesting is ridiculous. And until you give up your home and property to fix the wrongs you're a hypocrite. We also means you.

We could acknowledge it in public schools. Include multiple perspectives of history.

In addition to pardoning turkeys, the POTUS could host a function for tribal leaders. Broadcast between football games.

If they are part of “the story”, include their voice.

Cool, you get on that PSA. Your average person isn't going to tune into a function for tribal leaders. And they will be using the restroom between football games. Are you always this ineffective at change? Lot of lip service with no real impact. Embarrassing. Are you an actual adult?

Yes, many Americans are indifferent and willfully choose ignorance.

Please share with us what you have done to right this wrong? Flowery statements acknowledging the history do nothing, what actual things have you done to make a tiny bit of difference? Put your money where your mouth is.

How exactly can I make millions of Americans less indifferent or ignorant? That’s a tough one.

You’re a hypocrite. As expected. All bark and no bite.

Yup. And terminally, terminally smug and boring. No one’s going to give her and her attitude the time of day. Such a turnoff.

Uh, we're discussing issues, not particular peoples' personalities. A turnoff is someone trying to engage in an intellectual exchange who resorts to shallow insults like the ones above. Sheesh, up your game, PPs.

I guess the PPs don’t have much substance behind their argument that Americans should be indifferent and ignorant about Native American history.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Do you know other cultures have Thanksgiving to celebrate the harvest? They didn’t all conquer North America.

So maybe we shouldn’t have based this holiday on the myth about “pilgrims and Indians”.

Schools are dropping any mention of Indians at all. It's not just turkeys and Pilgrims. Sounds like that ought to make some people happy, everyone will just forget about them.

Yup. They want to pretend like it never happened. Or the people aren’t still suffering today.

Revisionist history to the max.

Not so much revisionist as irrelevant. People are moving forward, why should they dwell on the past when it has nothing to do with them? Obviously the people who were hurt feel differently, but they aren't making much of an impact convincing anyone else to put their needs first. Everyone has their own problems these days.

Why do we bother to learn any history at all? It all happened in the past. Why dwell on any of it?

Maybe if we don’t sugar coat history just to make white people feel comfortable then we can learn from our mistakes and do better in the future.

Ha, as if white people are only bad. So do the Plymouth protestors also cover the section in history where native Americans own African slaves? Yes, it really existed:

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smithsonian-in...narrative-180968339/

Let's also not even get into the entire violent and oppressive histories all across Asia, the Arab slave trade, etc. It's almost as if everyone's history is filled with oppression.

Go crawl under a rock and cry about it, because it will never end.

Strawman. We are talking about *our* history and treatment of indigenous people.

Yes, enslaving people is bad. Also, mass murdering and oppressing indigenous people is wrong.

Why is it so difficult for some people to acknowledge that?

Indigenous history is our history. They owned slaves. Why are we whitewashing native American history? They were slave owners.

Right. The Asian and Arab slave trade is not our history.

As I already said, yes, enslaving people is bad. No one has claimed otherwise.

Also, mass murdering and oppressing indigenous people is wrong. Wouldn’t you agree?

Sure oppressing people is wrong. Germany is wrong for killing millions of Jews. Japan is wrong for killing millions during WW2 too. I don't think Germany and Japan need to be forced to 'mourn' or have a day of 'repenting' for what they did. History is history.

Germany and Japan each paid massive reparations and we do have memorial days. ??

These are people living within our country. Our responsibility continues. Acknowledging their loss is the least we should do.

We already have Indigenous Peoples' Day. And yet, that's not good enough even thought that's what you're asking for. So, what do you really want to happen?

I’m not personally asking for anything.

On Thanksgiving, I do think we, the people in the US, should acknowledge the reality/perspective of the other people who were at this feast of our lore. If we are reflecting on all that we have, we can acknowledge there was also a massive human cost behind it.

Outside this holiday, we, the people of the US, should fix the wrongs that still persist today.

Exactly how would you like people to acknowledge the human cost? Should Grandma say "I'm sorry for the Trail of Tears, but thankful for my health" every year? What does that accomplish exactly? Say whatever you like at your table but the performative aspect of what you are suggesting is ridiculous. And until you give up your home and property to fix the wrongs you're a hypocrite. We also means you.

We could acknowledge it in public schools. Include multiple perspectives of history.

In addition to pardoning turkeys, the POTUS could host a function for tribal leaders. Broadcast between football games.

If they are part of “the story”, include their voice.

Cool, you get on that PSA. Your average person isn't going to tune into a function for tribal leaders. And they will be using the restroom between football games. Are you always this ineffective at change? Lot of lip service with no real impact. Embarrassing. Are you an actual adult?

Yes, many Americans are indifferent and willfully choose ignorance.

Please share with us what you have done to right this wrong? Flowery statements acknowledging the history do nothing, what actual things have you done to make a tiny bit of difference? Put your money where your mouth is.

How exactly can I make millions of Americans less indifferent or ignorant? That’s a tough one.

You’re a hypocrite. As expected. All bark and no bite.

Yup. And terminally, terminally smug and boring. No one’s going to give her and her attitude the time of day. Such a turnoff.

Uh, we're discussing issues, not particular peoples' personalities. A turnoff is someone trying to engage in an intellectual exchange who resorts to shallow insults like the ones above. Sheesh, up your game, PPs.

I guess the PPs don’t have much substance behind their argument that Americans should be indifferent and ignorant about Native American history.

You still haven't explained how your caring and knoweldge is making a damn bit of difference. Seems like you're just farting in the wind yelling at strangers. What have you done that actually matters?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Do you know other cultures have Thanksgiving to celebrate the harvest? They didn’t all conquer North America.

So maybe we shouldn’t have based this holiday on the myth about “pilgrims and Indians”.

Schools are dropping any mention of Indians at all. It's not just turkeys and Pilgrims. Sounds like that ought to make some people happy, everyone will just forget about them.

Yup. They want to pretend like it never happened. Or the people aren’t still suffering today.

Revisionist history to the max.

Not so much revisionist as irrelevant. People are moving forward, why should they dwell on the past when it has nothing to do with them? Obviously the people who were hurt feel differently, but they aren't making much of an impact convincing anyone else to put their needs first. Everyone has their own problems these days.

Why do we bother to learn any history at all? It all happened in the past. Why dwell on any of it?

Maybe if we don’t sugar coat history just to make white people feel comfortable then we can learn from our mistakes and do better in the future.

Ha, as if white people are only bad. So do the Plymouth protestors also cover the section in history where native Americans own African slaves? Yes, it really existed:

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smithsonian-in...narrative-180968339/

Let's also not even get into the entire violent and oppressive histories all across Asia, the Arab slave trade, etc. It's almost as if everyone's history is filled with oppression.

Go crawl under a rock and cry about it, because it will never end.

Strawman. We are talking about *our* history and treatment of indigenous people.

Yes, enslaving people is bad. Also, mass murdering and oppressing indigenous people is wrong.

Why is it so difficult for some people to acknowledge that?

Indigenous history is our history. They owned slaves. Why are we whitewashing native American history? They were slave owners.

Right. The Asian and Arab slave trade is not our history.

As I already said, yes, enslaving people is bad. No one has claimed otherwise.

Also, mass murdering and oppressing indigenous people is wrong. Wouldn’t you agree?

Sure oppressing people is wrong. Germany is wrong for killing millions of Jews. Japan is wrong for killing millions during WW2 too. I don't think Germany and Japan need to be forced to 'mourn' or have a day of 'repenting' for what they did. History is history.

Germany and Japan each paid massive reparations and we do have memorial days. ??

These are people living within our country. Our responsibility continues. Acknowledging their loss is the least we should do.

We already have Indigenous Peoples' Day. And yet, that's not good enough even thought that's what you're asking for. So, what do you really want to happen?

I’m not personally asking for anything.

On Thanksgiving, I do think we, the people in the US, should acknowledge the reality/perspective of the other people who were at this feast of our lore. If we are reflecting on all that we have, we can acknowledge there was also a massive human cost behind it.

Outside this holiday, we, the people of the US, should fix the wrongs that still persist today.

Exactly how would you like people to acknowledge the human cost? Should Grandma say "I'm sorry for the Trail of Tears, but thankful for my health" every year? What does that accomplish exactly? Say whatever you like at your table but the performative aspect of what you are suggesting is ridiculous. And until you give up your home and property to fix the wrongs you're a hypocrite. We also means you.

We could acknowledge it in public schools. Include multiple perspectives of history.

In addition to pardoning turkeys, the POTUS could host a function for tribal leaders. Broadcast between football games.

If they are part of “the story”, include their voice.

Cool, you get on that PSA. Your average person isn't going to tune into a function for tribal leaders. And they will be using the restroom between football games. Are you always this ineffective at change? Lot of lip service with no real impact. Embarrassing. Are you an actual adult?

Yes, many Americans are indifferent and willfully choose ignorance.

Please share with us what you have done to right this wrong? Flowery statements acknowledging the history do nothing, what actual things have you done to make a tiny bit of difference? Put your money where your mouth is.

How exactly can I make millions of Americans less indifferent or ignorant? That’s a tough one.

You’re a hypocrite. As expected. All bark and no bite.

Yup. And terminally, terminally smug and boring. No one’s going to give her and her attitude the time of day. Such a turnoff.

Uh, we're discussing issues, not particular peoples' personalities. A turnoff is someone trying to engage in an intellectual exchange who resorts to shallow insults like the ones above. Sheesh, up your game, PPs.

I guess the PPs don’t have much substance behind their argument that Americans should be indifferent and ignorant about Native American history.

DP here.

Of course I regret colonization and the mass slaughter of Native Americans. And I can probably speak for everybody else here that they do, too.

On a much smaller scale, though, I regret performative bs like histrionics and insults on DCUM that accomplish nothing. Hypocrisy doesn’t further any cause, it undermines it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There were other “thanksgivings” in that era. I wonder why we don’t include others in our history books.

Here was another one days after the 1637 massacre:

“A day of thanksgiving. Thanking God that they had eliminated over 700 men, women and children.”
- John Winthrop, governor of Bay Colony

While I was totally open to this interpretation, Snopes rates as "false" the claim that the Pequot massacre was the basis for our modern Thanksgiving. https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/thanksgiving-massacre-pequot-tribe/

We spoke to David Silverman, professor at George Washington University, and author of the book “This Land is Their Land: The Wampanoag Indians, Plymouth Colony, and the Troubled History of Thanksgiving.” When asked about the connection between the 1637 day of thanksgiving and the holiday we know today, he said: “There is no question that Connecticut and Massachusetts had a thanksgiving after [those events], a lot of people did it [...] but to draw the connection between that and the modern holiday is untenable. Thanksgivings were a tradition amongst English people often to mark a gift from god [...] [The quote’s usage] is taking that particular thanksgiving out of context. There were hundreds, if not thousands of thanksgivings, some of them were related to military conquests of Indian people and most were not.”

This viewpoint was echoed by Chris Newell, director of education of Akomawt Educational Initiative, and the former education supervisor at the Mashantucket Pequot Museum and Research Center. “When it comes to the 17th century English 'days of thanksgiving,' they have no resemblance to the holiday we celebrate today,” he told us. “That holiday was not created until the 19th century. The English day of thanksgiving would have been a day of prayer. If they won a victory in battle that would have been a day of thanksgiving, which was normally a day of fasting, totally different from a feast.”

Instead, Lincoln established Thanksgiving as a gesture of reconciliation. "In October 1863, Lincoln issued the Thanksgiving Proclamation, after the victory of the Union over the Confederacy: 'I do therefore invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United States, …to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next, as a day of Thanksgiving….' Thanksgiving day owes its origins in part to Sarah Josepha Hale (a woman also known for penning the nursery rhyme 'Mary Had a Little Lamb'), who lobbied through a letter-writing campaign to members of Congress and other government officials for such a holiday."

And yes, the Wampanoag participated in the feast, but it wasn't a simple gathering of friends. "The so-called first Thanksgiving was the fruit of a political decision on Ousamequin’s [the Chief of the Wampanoag] part. Violent power politics played a much more important role in shaping the Wampanoag-English alliance than the famous feast. At least in the short term, Ousamequin’s league with the newcomers was the right gamble, insofar as the English helped to fend off the rival Narragansetts and uphold Ousamequin’s authority. In the long term, however, it was a grave miscalculation. Plymouth and the other New England colonies would soon go on to conquer Ousamequin’s people, just as the Frenchman’s curse had augured and just as the Wampanoags who opposed the Pilgrims feared that they would."

You misread.

I said there were “other thanksgivings”, not that the massacre thanksgiving was the basis for future thanksgivings.

You specifically mentioned the massacre and gave a quote along with it. Why do you lie when you anyone can click on the previous posts link?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There were other “thanksgivings” in that era. I wonder why we don’t include others in our history books.

Here was another one days after the 1637 massacre:

“A day of thanksgiving. Thanking God that they had eliminated over 700 men, women and children.”
- John Winthrop, governor of Bay Colony

While I was totally open to this interpretation, Snopes rates as "false" the claim that the Pequot massacre was the basis for our modern Thanksgiving. https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/thanksgiving-massacre-pequot-tribe/

We spoke to David Silverman, professor at George Washington University, and author of the book “This Land is Their Land: The Wampanoag Indians, Plymouth Colony, and the Troubled History of Thanksgiving.” When asked about the connection between the 1637 day of thanksgiving and the holiday we know today, he said: “There is no question that Connecticut and Massachusetts had a thanksgiving after [those events], a lot of people did it [...] but to draw the connection between that and the modern holiday is untenable. Thanksgivings were a tradition amongst English people often to mark a gift from god [...] [The quote’s usage] is taking that particular thanksgiving out of context. There were hundreds, if not thousands of thanksgivings, some of them were related to military conquests of Indian people and most were not.”

This viewpoint was echoed by Chris Newell, director of education of Akomawt Educational Initiative, and the former education supervisor at the Mashantucket Pequot Museum and Research Center. “When it comes to the 17th century English 'days of thanksgiving,' they have no resemblance to the holiday we celebrate today,” he told us. “That holiday was not created until the 19th century. The English day of thanksgiving would have been a day of prayer. If they won a victory in battle that would have been a day of thanksgiving, which was normally a day of fasting, totally different from a feast.”

Instead, Lincoln established Thanksgiving as a gesture of reconciliation. "In October 1863, Lincoln issued the Thanksgiving Proclamation, after the victory of the Union over the Confederacy: 'I do therefore invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United States, …to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next, as a day of Thanksgiving….' Thanksgiving day owes its origins in part to Sarah Josepha Hale (a woman also known for penning the nursery rhyme 'Mary Had a Little Lamb'), who lobbied through a letter-writing campaign to members of Congress and other government officials for such a holiday."

And yes, the Wampanoag participated in the feast, but it wasn't a simple gathering of friends. "The so-called first Thanksgiving was the fruit of a political decision on Ousamequin’s [the Chief of the Wampanoag] part. Violent power politics played a much more important role in shaping the Wampanoag-English alliance than the famous feast. At least in the short term, Ousamequin’s league with the newcomers was the right gamble, insofar as the English helped to fend off the rival Narragansetts and uphold Ousamequin’s authority. In the long term, however, it was a grave miscalculation. Plymouth and the other New England colonies would soon go on to conquer Ousamequin’s people, just as the Frenchman’s curse had augured and just as the Wampanoags who opposed the Pilgrims feared that they would."

You misread.

I said there were “other thanksgivings”, not that the massacre thanksgiving was the basis for future thanksgivings.

You specifically mentioned the massacre and gave a quote along with it. Why do you lie when you anyone can click on the previous posts link?

Yes, please go back and re-read what I wrote. I never made the claim that “the Pequot massacre was the basis for our modern Thanksgiving”.

No “false claim”.

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Anonymous wrote:Do you know other cultures have Thanksgiving to celebrate the harvest? They didn’t all conquer North America.

So maybe we shouldn’t have based this holiday on the myth about “pilgrims and Indians”.

Schools are dropping any mention of Indians at all. It's not just turkeys and Pilgrims. Sounds like that ought to make some people happy, everyone will just forget about them.

Yup. They want to pretend like it never happened. Or the people aren’t still suffering today.

Revisionist history to the max.

Not so much revisionist as irrelevant. People are moving forward, why should they dwell on the past when it has nothing to do with them? Obviously the people who were hurt feel differently, but they aren't making much of an impact convincing anyone else to put their needs first. Everyone has their own problems these days.

Why do we bother to learn any history at all? It all happened in the past. Why dwell on any of it?

Maybe if we don’t sugar coat history just to make white people feel comfortable then we can learn from our mistakes and do better in the future.

Ha, as if white people are only bad. So do the Plymouth protestors also cover the section in history where native Americans own African slaves? Yes, it really existed:

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smithsonian-in...narrative-180968339/

Let's also not even get into the entire violent and oppressive histories all across Asia, the Arab slave trade, etc. It's almost as if everyone's history is filled with oppression.

Go crawl under a rock and cry about it, because it will never end.

Strawman. We are talking about *our* history and treatment of indigenous people.

Yes, enslaving people is bad. Also, mass murdering and oppressing indigenous people is wrong.

Why is it so difficult for some people to acknowledge that?

Indigenous history is our history. They owned slaves. Why are we whitewashing native American history? They were slave owners.

Right. The Asian and Arab slave trade is not our history.

As I already said, yes, enslaving people is bad. No one has claimed otherwise.

Also, mass murdering and oppressing indigenous people is wrong. Wouldn’t you agree?

Sure oppressing people is wrong. Germany is wrong for killing millions of Jews. Japan is wrong for killing millions during WW2 too. I don't think Germany and Japan need to be forced to 'mourn' or have a day of 'repenting' for what they did. History is history.

Germany and Japan each paid massive reparations and we do have memorial days. ??

These are people living within our country. Our responsibility continues. Acknowledging their loss is the least we should do.

We already have Indigenous Peoples' Day. And yet, that's not good enough even thought that's what you're asking for. So, what do you really want to happen?

I’m not personally asking for anything.

On Thanksgiving, I do think we, the people in the US, should acknowledge the reality/perspective of the other people who were at this feast of our lore. If we are reflecting on all that we have, we can acknowledge there was also a massive human cost behind it.

Outside this holiday, we, the people of the US, should fix the wrongs that still persist today.

Exactly how would you like people to acknowledge the human cost? Should Grandma say "I'm sorry for the Trail of Tears, but thankful for my health" every year? What does that accomplish exactly? Say whatever you like at your table but the performative aspect of what you are suggesting is ridiculous. And until you give up your home and property to fix the wrongs you're a hypocrite. We also means you.

We could acknowledge it in public schools. Include multiple perspectives of history.

In addition to pardoning turkeys, the POTUS could host a function for tribal leaders. Broadcast between football games.

If they are part of “the story”, include their voice.

Cool, you get on that PSA. Your average person isn't going to tune into a function for tribal leaders. And they will be using the restroom between football games. Are you always this ineffective at change? Lot of lip service with no real impact. Embarrassing. Are you an actual adult?

Yes, many Americans are indifferent and willfully choose ignorance.

Please share with us what you have done to right this wrong? Flowery statements acknowledging the history do nothing, what actual things have you done to make a tiny bit of difference? Put your money where your mouth is.

How exactly can I make millions of Americans less indifferent or ignorant? That’s a tough one.

You’re a hypocrite. As expected. All bark and no bite.

Yup. And terminally, terminally smug and boring. No one’s going to give her and her attitude the time of day. Such a turnoff.

Uh, we're discussing issues, not particular peoples' personalities. A turnoff is someone trying to engage in an intellectual exchange who resorts to shallow insults like the ones above. Sheesh, up your game, PPs.

I guess the PPs don’t have much substance behind their argument that Americans should be indifferent and ignorant about Native American history.

DP here.

Of course I regret colonization and the mass slaughter of Native Americans. And I can probably speak for everybody else here that they do, too.

On a much smaller scale, though, I regret performative bs like histrionics and insults on DCUM that accomplish nothing. Hypocrisy doesn’t further any cause, it undermines it.

There is nothing “hypocritical” about wanting more public awareness of the real Native American story around Thanksgiving or wanting broader changes to make things right.

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As long as we keep natives segregated in confinement camps/ casinos, I am not sure any of this bs discussion matters.

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Anonymous wrote:Another attempt to ruin a holiday by shaming Americans.

Get your own holiday to cry over.

America does have a dark past. We should reflect on the massive human cost of building this country.

-Mayflower descendant

The funny thing is that the most obnoxious commenters on this topic likely arrived more than one hundred years after your family.

I arrived 44 years ago, almost to the day. What’s your point? I give two figs what some internet cosplay Mayflower descendant says? That entitles them to what, exactly, in terms of moral authority or understanding of the situation?

Best I can tell from your perspective an actual Mayflower descendant is up to their elbows in blood and owes all kinds of land and reparations. You should go over her house and take what you want from her garage. Leave me out of it. I’ll be sitting comfortably in my house with friends and family, drinking wine and watching football, thanking the good Lord I managed to navigate UMC American life without being indoctrinated to feel so much shame and joylessness about my country, culture, and self.

Enjoy your day of mourning.

None of what you’re enjoying would be possible without the genocide of indigenous people (and enslaved people). Pretty sh1tty you won’t even *acknowledge* that.

It’s not about shame, it’s about awareness and acknowledgement.

Let me say this clearly for the thick-headed and those in the back: We don’t care. Truly, we DO NOT CARE. Certainly not on Thanksgiving.

Every single country, culture, civilization, race, ethnicity, and every other category of human being you can come up with has a history of murder, rape, genocide, conquering, seizing land, expelling others, committing atrocities, rewriting history, and myth making its own origin story. Point me to a group that didn’t do this and I’ll extend the timeline and show you you’re full of sh&t. Africans did more enslaving and slave trading than white Europeans. Asians were annihilating cities and stacking skulls 50 feet high well before Columbus. The Japanese created hell for Chinese and Koreans across centuries of war. Both returned serve, and hey look over there the Chinese are doing it to the Uighurs in real time! Persians and Muslims, right this way! The havoc and terror brought on South America by the Conquistadors and other Euro settlers was catastrophic… unless you compare it to the torture and misery doled out routinely by the Aztecs before they got there.

Humanity has been rough business. Get over it.

Tell me you have a piss poor knowledge of history without telling me you have piss poor knowledge of history. Everything you wrote is demonstrably false. What's worse is that, you wrote it with such confidence . If i were you, I'd refrain from talking about Africa unless you want me to embarrass and lay bare your idiocy masqueraded as knowledge of history.

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The fact that thanksgiving was giving different meanings depending on the era, tells you something wasn't right from the beginning. Furthermore, why the heck do i need a day to give thanks? and, to who am i supposed to give thanks to? and for what ? The good news is, with the rapid demographic changes taking shape in this country, that nonsense will be something celebrated only by a fringe group in the future.

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Anonymous wrote:Fixating on just one narrow piece of anything—including history—misses the big picture.

Yes, the Europeans who settled coastal MA and the colonizers who followed ultimately fought over land.

But our American history also includes defeating the British crown and building a new country that established a democracy and rule of law never before seen.

^^^
That never would have happened had we stayed in Europe. And it’s kind of a big deal.

It obviously wasn’t all good.

Slavery and the related human rights abuses that came with it and the inequality that wasn’t addressed until the 1960s are shameful.

But things are getting better. They usually do if you study history rather than fixate and navel gaze.

rule of law ??? try some self awareness and you might see what's wrong with what you wrote. But, i doubt that you have it in you.

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Anonymous wrote: The fact that thanksgiving was giving different meanings depending on the era, tells you something wasn't right from the beginning. Furthermore, why the heck do i need a day to give thanks? and, to who am i supposed to give thanks to? and for what ? The good news is, with the rapid demographic changes taking shape in this country, that nonsense will be something celebrated only by a fringe group in the future.

Wow. I’ve heard the “pilgrims were awful” argument against thanksgiving for years. But this might be the first time I heard someone object to the holiday because they hate giving thanks.

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Anonymous wrote:You cannot fault the Europeans, who at the time did not understand the germ nature of disease, for the killing of natives who had no immunity to European diseases. The stories of Europeans deliberately bringing smallpox to natives were true, but they were the exception not the rule. In the 14th Century Europeans nearly all went extinct during the Black Death--who you gonna blame for that?

We can certainly fault them for violence and oppression.

Who cares? Everyone who did whatever bad things you want to list is long dead.

My family came to this continent in 1981. I don't have any responsibility or guilt for something that was done by people centuries ago.

One of the great things about the US is that you're not held guilty for the sins of your ancestors.

The atrocities perpetrated on Native Americans are not just historical footnotes from long ago. The effects of centuries of oppression of Native Americans are still felt very keenly today. They continue to suffer disproportionately from poverty, alcoholism, lack of access to appropriate medical care, and domestic violence. Native American women and girls are murdered at a far higher rate than women in general. We don’t need to feel guilt over how we got to this place, but we certainly shouldn’t turn a blind eye to suffering and pretend that it’s not relevant to us.

+1000

Plus, if you step foot on this continent you are occupying stolen land.

How could it be “stolen” from people who had no private property that they owned to begin with?

Huh? Because they didn’t have written land deeds recorded at the county courthouse it didn’t belong to them?

A tribe can only hold onto land until a stronger tribe comes along and takes it from them. That's the way of the world.

No, we're not giving our land back to tribes that couldn't hold onto it in the first place.

Question here, would you support more modern day colonization? If the US is a "stronger tribe" why do we not just go overtake a lot more land mass than we already have? We are getting crowded and low on natural resources....why not go take them?

Trust me if we needed to, we would. The same way if your children were hungry, you'd steal from your neighbor.

But what does it mean to "need to." Did the early settlers "need to" take over this land? And later did the British government "need to" formally invade and take over?

I read the PP as saying that it is "the way of the world" for people to just take what they want as long as they have the force to do it.

Yes actually European immigration was largely based on necessity. Things like famine and class/religious persecution. The wealthy few were exploiting the whole thing for massive personal gain but that is still happening today.

This is not a well-informed viewpoint. The formal government of the country invaded, and it wasn't because of either famine or class/religious persecution.

no one country invaded the united states, your point is not well-informed either.