a question regarding the historical settling of the United States (a rant of sorts)?

[kamikazeninja]

Why are Native American reservations usually located on undesirable lands such as the Badlands of the Dakotas, the desert Southwest, etc? You never see Native American reservations located in very desirable lands such as the California coastline, Florida, or anywhere else favorable and very desired by many. Manhattan Island was "stolen" for a mere $24. If foreigners came onto this land seeking refuge, shouldnt the Native American be the ones to dictate where we should live? shouldnt foreigners be the ones living on reservations instead? This would be like me coming over to YOUR house, and saying "Hey, nice place youve got here...I think Ill take it from you, and you can go live outside in your doghouse in the backyard." Thats really messed up. Some will argue and say that we tried to bargain with the Natives through various treaties and the like, and they simply wouldnt come to civil terms for discussion and instead wanted to form waring clans that rode on horses shooting arrows at cowboys weilding shotguns. Well, yes, that was indeed the "Old West", and it was indeed "Wild". ...but what about now? everyone is civilized these days...so why dont we return most of the lands that has been taken from the Natives, and let them decide where they want us to live. We should be fortunate enough to even live here as it stands alone. The whole idea of continuing to "celebrate" "Thanksgiving" annually is a total joke, ever since the peace that was initially established at the first Thanksgiving turned out to be a total lie to Native Americans everywhere. Much shame and disgust must be felt across many Native Americans that this holiday would even be celebrated at this day in age. As the song goes "This land is your land, this land is my land"...well, ALL of this land used to belong to Native Americans,..yet they are nowhere mentioned in that campy song, not to mention the unwarranted strife they had to endure at the hands of trespassing newcomers onto their sacred lands.
#6...youre referring to Oklahoma? that too got taken away from them once oil was discovered there.
#1 just because we conquered doesnt make it morally right. If you can take $100 from an elderly lady, doesnt mean you should do it. If you have a gun and can kill people in their own home, doesnt mean you should do that either. in essence, thats what we done though...kill people in their own domain, and took things that rightfully belonged to them.
#2 just because some people decide to live their lives under no institute system of law, doesnt give you the right to invade them and forcebly institute your law onto their domain. keep your laws on your own land, and leave others be. we try to place world police back then, and as still do to this day. our government's arrogance hasnt changed one bit.
#3 just because some other people arrived earlier than us, and killed off some of the natives (either willingly or unwillingly) doesnt provide us with the logic to slaughter off the rest of the tribes.
#4 the tribes had bows and arrows, we had advanced weaponry called guns. we cheated cause we were pusssies and didnt know how to fight like real men. besides, the tribes all basically arrived around the same time...we arrived later,...much, much, much later.
#5 noticed how you put that in parentheses. in the same fashion, the word "treaty" should be listed that way too, since they all turned about to be lies on paper.
#6 they have no prime land today, thats my point

#7 you call global warming, environmental endangerment, pollution, and other related matters "taking care of the land"?

 

[Ii’ni’da’amhosh]

1. You came, hungry, poor and unable to survive in this land without our help. We taught you to farm, hunt, fish, build houses, gave you food, taught you local medicine. 50 years after setting foot here, the settlers turned on their hosts and exterminated them, leaving only 13 survivors of that nation. Nice.
2. It is a myth that we didn't understand the concept of land ownership. We did. What we didn't practice was INDIVIDUAL land ownership. Land was owned in common by the tribe, clan or family.
3. True
4. False. Many tribes didn't even have a word for "war". Most of us got along just fine. The very fact that there were over 500 diverse tribes shows there were no wars of conquest going on. Yes, there was some raiding now and then, but stealing someone else's melons is hardly the same scale as genocide.
5. No. There was almost no intermarriage.
6. Almost all the reservations were placed on land no one else wanted, because it was worthless for farming or grazing. Interesting note, My people (Navajo) were allowed to keep our land -mostly desert- until oil and uranium were discovered on it. Then the government "relocates" people elsewhere.
7. We WERE working our lands. Most native american tribes were farmers, after all. In fact it was the fact that it was GOOD farmland that whites wanted, and that's why it was taken from them.

Over all, yes, it sucks. But the bigger problem facing us today is the fact that the government is STILL stealing our land and our resources. Damming the rivers to steal our water, drilling for oil and natural gas on our land and not reimbursing us. Embezzling tribal funds (several million dollars is inexplicably missing from our accounts) and trying to build golf courses on our property. The abuse and theft is STILL going on TODAY!

 

[LyndonC]

1) We came. We saw. We conquered.
2) Lots of indigenous people didn't have any concept of property ownership. No man could own land. We replaced this idea with our English common law based concept of private property, and added a condition that only white men could own property. See #1.
3) By the time England began colonizing the New World, Spain had a 100 year head start. In that interval, countless millions of indigenous people died from diseases brought over by the Spaniards. Subsequent Europeans brought more diseases, and in some cases, deliberately infected the remaining occupants with smallpox and other deadly communicable diseases. Indigenous people and their cultures were literally wiped off the face of the map. Empty land ready for the taking. The remainder were easily conquered. See #1.
4) Indigenous people weren't a single happy nation. They made war on each other. We took advantage and played faction against faction, allied with whichever one gave us the best advantage, and split the spoils. They did the same, a la French-Indian War, but when they lost, we played winner take all.
5) Some lands were "legitimately" acquired through intermarriage.
6) Originally, some reservations were on decent land. Some did get prime land, albeit, it was considered wasteland at the time because it was too far from civilization or impractical to exploit.
7) Some used Christianity as justification. God says to work the land. The indians weren't working the land. Ergo, move over and let someone who knows how take over. See Manifest Destiny.