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Comment by b6 | Hacker News Reader

> It is high time for non-Native Americans to come to terms with the fact that the United States is built on someone else's land.

Land has been changing hands more or less continuously, forever. Before North America was "seized" by the people who came to be called Americans, parts of it were being seized and re-seized and re-re-seized by various groups of people who lived there at that time.

What is the author's reason for saying that it was at such-and-such a particular time that things were exactly as they should be, that everyone was occupying their proper piece of land?

I mean, it was violent bloodshed before the invaders arrived, and then it was ... more violent bloodshed after they arrived. People were being mean to each other long before the invaders arrived, and also after -- and ever since, everywhere in the world. Does the author think it's particularly bad to be mean to people who are of different ethnicity?

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If a party owns land the US, by what moral authority can they block others access to it? By what moral authority can they demand rent on threat of eviction? Why wouldn't any democratic agency simply have the right to take it from them without compensation?

The reason this is a deeply interesting topic is because there are exceptionally strong claims to property rights made in the US and that same property was almost entirely all stolen in the recent past.

And because one gets such inconsistencies as claiming the theft occurred in the "mists of time" when, by definition, the constitution itself is further back in those same mists of time.

And the logically absurd (and patently false claims) that one can't locate a parcel's original possessor therefore some arbitrary purchaser down an illicit chain can make nearly unlimited exclusive claim to owning it.

And of course endless use of tu quoque.

So the authors intention is an utterly uninteresting red herring. It is a remarkable opportunity for thoughtful people to examine their own inconsistent views. The rest will simply shut their ears and convince themselves their is no reason for contemplation.

"by what moral authority can they block others access to it"

Actually, here in Scotland there is a fairly widespread recognition (apart, perhaps, from some large landowners) that a lot of land was acquired by rather dubious means. I think this provides a fairly decent justification for the "right to roam" we have over most land.

>that same property was almost entirely all stolen in the recent past.

Was there some sort of native American title office that the European settlers missed? Was every square mile of what would become the United States occupied, used, and accounted for?

The English were brutal, no doubt about it, but the French, for one, lived for a couple of centuries side by side with many native peoples in frontier areas without forcefully taking land and treating the natives as a population of people to be dealt with on an equal footing. There was plenty of room for everyone and huge areas of unclaimed, un-worked, un-owned land in every meaningful sense of the word.

And it wasn't just low intensity use by French trappers alongside natives but even higher intensity use such as the US southern states along side Chickasaw, Choctaw, and Seminole agricultural societies that was working perfectly well [1] (until it was annihilated by Andrew Jackson et al contrary to a supreme court decision prohibiting it)

And indeed those tribes very much had land title offices, legal system and even constitutions echoing the US document.[2]

[1]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Five_Civilized_Tribes

[2]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cherokee#Treaties_and_governmen...

Replace "America" with "Germany" and "Eastern Europe" and consider whether you would like to uphold your position.

The author's point was that the common narrative of European settlers colonizing an empty continent, alternatively European colonists bringing civilization to wild, barren lands has to be extended with European settlers bringing mass extermination to the indigenous population, through many different means.

I don't think I'm strongly pushing any particular position -- I think the author is, and I'm asking why.

Basically, what makes this particular story of human savagery, out of all of them, crucial right now? If it's high time for Americans to acknowledge that the US is built on someone else's land, is it also time for everyone else in every other country to do the same thing? Is there any country whose borders don't include territory that used to belong to people of some other ethnicity or culture?

Are we even sure we understand how to determine who really owns what piece of land? I'm genuinely asking. It seems very basic, but I don't know how to answer it.

Please note, I'm not trying to claim that any particular instance of violence was alright because everybody else was being violent too. Without a doubt, it was appalling, atrocious savagery, and will hopefully never be repeated. It's just that, in the field of appalling, atrocious savagery, there's a lot of competition.

But isn't "same old, same old" a dangerous position? I understand what you are saying, there have constantly been wars in every possible inhabitable area, everywhere in the world and especially at the end of the 19th century. So the US is not special in that respect. But the outside view of the US is that they deem themselves special - the shining beacon on the hill - a narrative that cannot be accommodated with its history. Germany had to come to terms with its past, acknowledge its past, is it too much to ask American citizens to do that as well, and continue onwards with a little more humbleness? The history of the US is not particularly nasty in comparison to other countries' histories, but it is not particularly exemplary as well.

>Replace "America" with "Germany" and "Eastern Europe" and consider whether you would like to uphold your position.

That would strengthen the OP's position by anyone who has even a basic understand of European history.

America has long held itself up as "better" than other countries - more virtuous, more wise, more free, more advanced, etc. etc.

When you actually look into it you see: a) the utterly brutal dispossession and extermination of a weak and technologically primitive existing population b) the callous and self-serving enslavation of vast numbers of people c) vicious and destructive interference in weak countries across the 20th and 21st century to facilitate the wholesale theft of natural resources.

I'm not saying that the rest of the world doesn't have its own sins, or that any other country would have been particularly better if they had the opportunities that America has had, but please, get down off your high horse. The ignorance and self-infatuation of American people is why they are so widely hated.

I don't think I'm on a high horse. I'm actually extremely critical of the US. Rereading my comment, is it possible you attributed viewpoints to me that I didn't actually express?

They are widely hated by Europeans who do not even realize they are a vassal state. Most of the rest of the world would do anything to get to America.

"Most of the rest of the world would do anything to get to America."

I find this to be just a self-enforcing attitude (which one may get a chance to feel when entering a USA consulate).

Some decades ago, when there was a big difference in the quality of life between USA and "the rest of the world" (thanks to WW2 outcome), it made sense to claim such a thing. But things change, you know?

Spoken like a true American (with all that implies).

Most of the world would want America to fucking live them alone.

Everything you are saying here is oversimplified to the point of being grossly inaccurate (for example, 600,000 Americans died in a war to END slavery---why do you ignore that?). Basically, this is an apologia for hating Americans.

It is selectively historicizing something to justify your final sentence, which is an apologia for hating Americans.

If you hate Americans, maybe you shouldn't post on a website full of Americans.

And don't say you don't hate Americans. There is no reason to present a bunch of completely slanted history and just be like, "oh yeah, this is why other people hate Americans, but they are ignorant because they are selectively historicizing it." That is clearly not your attitude or your point.

By the way,

- Natural resources do not belong to whoever happens to live near them but simply ignores them. They belong to the person who extracts them. Property rights are acquired by use, not by where you were born or by your nationality.

- There were many cases of peaceful co-habitation with Native Americans and many cases of Native Americans initiating force against the settlers. Probably these categories account for a lot more than the category of outright brutality against natives, though that did happen some, particularly under Andrew Jackson (which is relatively late in our history!).

- It is worth recognizing that Americas founders were adamant about maintaining neutrality, so foreign interference is in many ways un-American. Moreover, it is worth recognizing that America has a moral right to interfere in foreign countries that threaten force against its citizens or their property, as does any country.

Natural resources... belong to the person who extracts them.

Wow, you must be a legal scholar. So let's say one day you come home to find that I've demolished your house and started drilling for oil. You're cool with that, I'm sure.

There were many cases of peaceful co-habitation with Native Americans and many cases of Native Americans initiating force against the settlers.

Good job at whitewashing. Let's say one day you come home and I'm camped on your front lawn. You tell me to get off so I beat you and take your living room as punishment for your "bad behaviour." A few weeks later you get angry and try and force me out again. This time I kill your wife and kids and give you the basement as a "reservation." Shouldn't have initiated force against me, right?

America has a moral right to interfere in foreign countries that threaten force against its citizens

This is just so laughable. If you think that the history of American 20th and 21st century foreign policy is about self-protection then... well, I guess you could say all those democratically elected leaders of third world countries were sort of threatening American citizens right? Threatening them with fair prices for natural resources maybe? Maybe if you consider all resources everywhere property of America, then anyone who refuses to sell you them for next to nothing and suppress their own citizenry for kickbacks is an aggressor...

I've been to America and the majority of the people I met - and this is in the nicer cities - were like big, stupid puppies, who thought America was the greatest country, and were completely confused when you said, well, no, actually... As I've said elsewhere there's no excuse for doing the wrong thing. Americans love to play the moral high card but they brutally annexed their country from a weak and vulnerable pre-existing population with much deeper historical and spiritual ties to the land. Then they've proceeded to do some of the nastiest things of the last few hundred years. Heaven forbid they be forced to admit any of that. The onus is on them though. The moral corruption of never acknowledging one's foundational guilt is inexorable.

So presumably, if some foreign power invaded the US next week, violently exterminated most of the population, and herded the survivors into a few tracts of land, you would be fine with that? After all, land changes hands continuously.

Not at all. Nor am I "fine with" what happened to the natives.

All I'm asking is, would it be any major abberration, considering human history? Or would it just be: after atrocious violence and savagery, land briefly under the control of vague human entity X now seems to be under the control of vague human entity Y, episode #37,093,840?

It would not be. And all of those instances make Robert Nozick's arguments about the sanctity of property rights as a first principle laughable on every continent. I've yet to find a another debate to which this is relevant.

Well, except perhaps the debate over that native american reservation that the federal government is currently seizing to hand over to a coal mining company.

Violence and war are not unusual historically. But the speed and thoroughness with which a whole continent was cleared of its native inhabitants, and the survivors were subject to all kinds of institutionalized abuse until their culture and traditions were erased, is certainly exceptional, and in recent history only compares in severity with what happened to the aboriginals in Australia.

Moreover, if there was official recognition of what really happened, even now much could be done to redress the original injustice and give these people some closure. Instead, schoolchildren are taught a sanitized version of American history which really adds insult to injury, from the point of view of the surviving natives.

> But the speed and thoroughness [...] is certainly exceptional

So? In a day, a modern celebrity can influence people with a "speed and thoroughness" that would be totally unthinkable to a Jewish celebrity 2000+ years ago.

... But that's due to technology, not due to the differences between Kim Kardashian and Jesus.

In 500 years, the bloody Annexation of Sol is going to be exceptionally speedy and thorough too, because it's easier to be speedy and thorough when you've got warp-drives and teleporters.

Well, putting aside the ease with which you deflect an prolonged episode of systematic repression based on ethnicity, did you look at the map?

The scale of the forced displacements is literately continent scale! Its probably the biggest settler colonization in history. Compare with the colonization of South America, where the Spaniards aimed to use the existing population for labour, and thus gave them some rights and allowed them stay. Or Africa, where the Colonial powers basically conquered for labor and not for land to settle.

I don't know that the pattern of forced displacement has ever occurred on this scale, and with so high compression. Usually when people are forced from their lands, there are some crappier lands somewhere else they go to. From the map this obviously was not what happened. The tribes where forced into extremely small areas over the course of just a hundred years.

And pales in comparison to Kahn.

>So presumably, if some foreign power invaded the US next week, violently exterminated most of the population, and herded the survivors into a few tracts of land, you would be fine with that?

I can tell you that I wouldn't expect to stand on my doorstep, facing the men with guns, saying, "ah, ah, ah, I own this land!" and have them turn away.

We do horrible things to other people, no doubt about it. Even worse, this specific moment in history isn't unique. So it goes.

>Land has been changing hands more or less continuously, forever. Before North America was "seized" by the people who came to be called Americans, parts of it were being seized and re-seized and re-re-seized by various groups of people who lived there at that time.

The scale and the speed were different. When a group of people moves in occupying part of the land, gradually over a long period is very different to one just moves in, kills all and takes everything.

I think what the author is saying is that the history taught in schools and colleges should not omit the part about the how the lands were acquired from the native americans.

And the OPs point is that we should not stop there either, because it is an arbitrary point in history. Also, as the number of immigrants increase in US schools, White guilt and other forms of self flagellation lessens. If you are not European, and your parent immigrated you have less of a complex about where the land came from, and are less likely to want to carry some burden foisted on you by some one with a funny political agenda.

It's interesting to me how we finally got rid of Original Sin, but now have replaced this with other, atheistic forms of this, like trying to make our children feel guilty about Native Americans and Slavery. I personally think this is the best way to increase tensions.

Yes. Ideally history taught in schools should present all sides in an unbiased manner without leaving parts out and go all the way to the present. But it happens all too often that parts of history are left out because of political agendas, ignorance, or lack of data. My understanding of the article is that the auther is pointing out one part of history that is consistently not taught (but should be).

They should also teach that Native Americans owned Negro slaves, but that doesn't fit the narrative.

I don't think that a few sentences can do a complicated topic justice, but it would folly to point out what you are saying without also acknowledging that Europeans are indeed the people that brought that specific form of slavery to Native Americans. No Europeans, no Native American ownership of Africans, but I agree that a holistic view of Native American culture should be presented in textbooks, etc.

Claudio Saunt, the historian who wrote the Aeon article above, is quite literally a leading expert on this exact topic (see his book "Black, White and Indian" with Oxford University Press).

Well, one possible perspective is that during a lot of the 20th century the US held itself to be morally superior to the "colonial" powers as they didn't have an empire.

However, the US - like Russia, didn't colonize other "nations" it appears to have mostly completely supplanted them in the areas it grew into.

Of course, this is only of historical interest, but as a wise man once wrote: "Who controls the past controls the future".

The Philippines?

I should perhaps have said "likes to think it didn't colonize other nations".

In US the government sold land that it didn't own to armed civilians and then sent its armies to help with negotiation and settling things. Russia occupied Siberia by sending explorers and then government officials to siberian chieftains requiring submission under Russian tsarists crown by threatening them with military invasion. Then it was not uncommon in Russia for various ethnic populations to be moved (willingly or not) from one place to another in order to accomplish some political agenda. So neither US nor Russia have not "grew into" just like that.

Children (and adults) should, as much as possible, get the entire picture. Even if it means acknowledging that, yes, the former national narrative of the brave conquest of the West by proud white immigrants is less than accurate.

Sorry, this article is about taking responsibility. Criticising the tribal struggles of the people you dispossessed, exterminated and then wrote out of history, as if there's some sort of moral equivalence in play here, that's the worst form of evading responsibility. White people had the choice to steal land and dispossess, they chose to do it. White people had the choice to buy land that had been stolen and ignore its provencance, they chose to do that. White people should deal with their crimes.

And as far as more modern immigrants? Sorry, people knowingly chose to immigrate to a land which has been stolen. Again, there's a choice to do the right thing or not, and people are choosing to do the wrong thing. People should take responsibility, full stop.

The history and deeds of the native tribes of America have nothing, absolutely nothing to do with the current invading population. No non-native American has the moral right to even allude to it, let alone point fingers and try and force moral equivocations. It's the worst form of hypocrisy.

> It's interesting to me how we finally got rid of Original Sin, but now have replaced this with other, atheistic forms of this, like trying to make our children feel guilty about Native Americans and Slavery. I personally think this is the best way to increase tensions.

Time and time again people like to derail important discussions about the nature of Native American genocide and slavery by claiming this. Acknowledging this history is not about making people feel guilty, it is about understanding how those people are treated today and how their treatment is an extension of this history. The nature of racism and its history and legacy should not be trumped because it makes someone somewhere feel bad.

The best way to increase tensions is to ignore the past and continue to let that past influence how people are treated in the present, both socially and politically.

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