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The Revolution Continues's avatar

I apologize if you couldn't leave a comment on the post earlier and wanted to do so. Somehow the settings got changed and the comments weren't open to everyone. I've fixed that now, so it shouldn't be an issue. Comment away!

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Ohio Barbarian's avatar

As Julian Assange taught us, the goal is forever war, never victory because that would end the war and thus the grift. The grift must flow.

I'd like to focus on why the centuries-long ethnic cleansing campaign against Native Americans stopped short of genocide. Clearly, it did, because they are still here. The truth is that white Americans were starting to have doubts about their own actions no later than the mid-19th Century, and those doubts grew geometrically.

The near extinction of the buffalo in the 1870s was a wakeup call, the desperately brilliant campaign of Chief Joseph and the Nez Perce to escape to Canada was inspirational. More white people began to think of Native Americans as sympathetic human beings, and many, like Teddy Roosevelt, began to realize they had lost something with the demise of the free "Indian."

At that point, the dreams of the truly genocidal maniacs like Sherman and Sheridan dissipated. General Miles, who had fought Crazy Horse and later finally defeated Chief Joseph, changed his mind about the Indians being "savages." In fact, he made sure Chief Joseph's admirable tactics were taught at West Point, where they still are to this day, and advocated for lenient terms for the Nez Perce.

A key difference between America and Israel is simply time and space. It took centuries, not decades, for the European settlers to expand here. And there was a LOT more space and FAR fewer people involved.

THE key difference is time. Those settler ancestors of mine, and the natives they displaced, are long dead. I am not bound by their actions, but I do feel a duty to understand them, and I do, not only to honor my ancestors, but to learn from them what NOT to do as well as what TO do in the present.

As they knew that just because their ancestors had kings did not mean they had to have them, I know that just because my ancestors participated in an ethnic cleansing campaign does not require me to support ethnic cleansing campaigns by anyone against anybody NOW.

If I did, I would be dishonoring my ancestors by refusing to learn the lessons they taught me.

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