(Even more) problems for Kerry...

Many slaves were murdered by the slave owners. Tortured too. Families ripped apart.

 

I wonder why someone would murder their "investment"?

 

I think it should be pointed out that most Native Indian populations were wiped out as a consequence of diseases rather than outright conquest. It's been estimated that up to 75% of Cherokee Indians were wiped out due to smallpox alone.

In Florida, half of the natives died from bubonic plague brought from Europe. Similar casualty rates can be seen in Mexico and to a lesser extent in Canadian native populations. Large epidemics of "old world" diseases like measles, scarlett fever, cholera, influenza, tuberculosis, etc., wiped out almost 90% of Native American populations in many areas. In fact on island nations like the Dominican Republic, virtually all of the natives succumbed to disease.

Sadly, the wholesale decimation of the Native American population due to diseases is what precisely led to the African slave trade. Africans tolerated "old world" diseases better than Indians, and hence were enslaved to replace the lost Indian labor.

-peekay

 

To set an example - slaves were killed for trying to run away for example. Killing slaves also occured when a slave became "unmanagable" - like refusing to work for free. Or refusing to accept the destruction/seperation of his or her family. i'm sure there are many other reason why slaves were killed.

 

In certain situations, death is preferable to being alive. (Not trying to minimize what was done to Native Americans)

 

Best new sig line of the month: Aerodynamics is for people who can't build engines. Enzo Ferrari

Papa, did he really say that??

 

I don't know that for a fact. I read it.

 

Does this somehow excuse genocide, enslavement, and forced relocation of the survivors?

I'm asking because I'm wondering why you bring up death by an agency that people could not control or foresee in the context of overt, deliberate acts of cruelty and viciousness?

 

Umm, not even worth commenting.

-peekay

 

Rodger, are you trying to assign some moral equivalence between the acts of individual slave owners and deliberate genocide by the government?

Not trying to pick a fight here, I'm just wondering about how you are rationalizing this if you are in fact trying to come up with a moral equivalent.

 

Yeah, I didn't think you'd be able to explain how it was relevant.

 

S&S:

I'm not trying to rationalize anything. Slavery and genocide that you speak of were practiced both by private parties and by governments (Union and COnfederate).

My only point was that both were abominations and that it seemed pointless to argue about which was worse.

Rodger

 

And much of the disease that Peekay talks about was puposely speada to the Indians, IIRC. Clearly a part of the genocide.

 

Agreed. FYI I was not using "rationalize" in the context of "rationalizing one's incorrect behavior." I was using it in the context of "interpreting from a rational standpoint."

Agreed on that too. So why are you arguing something pointless?

For clarity's sake I'll point out that it was not I who began the attempt to rank one horror over another. Sillyness begets sillyness.

 

Not correct. This is an area I've studied in great detail.

Most of the Old World diseases were brought by the Spanish and Portuguese conquistadors. They had no idea they were disease carriers, and had no concept of biological warfare. They were just lucky.

They believed that the natives dying en masse from Old World diseases was a fortuitous Act of God, and both the natives and the conquistadors believed that this was proof that God was on the side of the conquistadors.

 

Umm, no.

-peekay

 

No kidding!!

What about the disease infested blankets being given to the Indians, maybe befoer the trail of Tears??

Don't ask me where I heard this - probably about 25-30 years ago when I read Black Elk Speaks.

 

Can you define "disease infested blanket" in a meaningful way?

I mean, I've heard this phrase before, and it sounds really awful, but what does it mean? Pasteur's germ theory wasn't proven until the last half of the 19th century, and most medical men didn't believe it for another 40 or 50 years.

So how is it that prior to that someone figured out how to culture viruses and bacteria in a blanket and keep the cultures alive long enough (in an era without climate control) to deliver a sufficient number of pathogens to spread communicable disease?

I've always considered "giving Indians firewater and disease-infested blankets" as a direct cause of their downfall to be hyperbole.

 

Hey, I just heard it. I didn't invent it! Give a parrot a break!

In the clear light of pseudo-adulthood, I'm not sure it makes sense, but you're the reserach genius, look it up and get back to me.

 

Rodger you're arguing that early American colonists had sophisticated knowledge about germs and diseases, and conducted what amounted to biological warfare.

In reality, it wasn't until the 1860s (decades after the Trail of Tears) that a Frenchman by the name of Louis Pasteur struggled to convince his contemporaries that germs actually existed and was in fact the cause of diseases. Even then his ideas were considered controversial, and the Germ Theory of Diseases we take for granted now was not accepted for many many years.

-peekay