The Post Your Thoughts of the Moment Thread 2

[Waddle Bro]

:]

[braix]

Thought of the moment: What would happen if the amount of active users on the forums someday just shot up into the thousands?

[FireArrow]

Me too.

But I do agree that living in Canada would nice but every country has its problems. The U.S has its problems, Canada has its problems, China has its problems etc.
Personally, I like how our country's roots and how it was started. :p
Not really a big fan of it today though haha

Manifest Destiny, AKA, let's kill all these Native American's because THIS IS THE LAND OF THE FREE. I hate how our education system highlights the genesis of America as some revolutionary amazing thing - it was a genocide.

[Ruto]

Manifest Destiny, AKA, let's kill all these Native American's because THIS IS THE LAND OF THE FREE. I hate how our education system highlights the genesis of America as some revolutionary amazing thing - it was a genocide.

Yeah, I remember the ugliness was never taught in elementary school, but they start talking about slavery and labor movements in middle school and then go into genocide by high school. Some schools go into detail about how nutty the Pilgrims and Puritans were, but not that many. I think we really need to stop teaching that America was da best and never did anything wrong.

Yup, I'm angry because some old hicks keep trolling about why America was da best and then accusing everyone else (who have a better grasp of history) of slander and ignorance. If anyone finds these people in real life, please record the conversation and give them an earful.

[Sebastian]

Ok.....let's agree to disagree

[SlowPokemon]

Yeah, I remember the ugliness was never taught in elementary school, but they start talking about slavery and labor movements in middle school and then go into genocide by high school. Some schools go into detail about how nutty the Pilgrims and Puritans were, but not that many. I think we really need to stop teaching that America was da best and never did anything wrong.

Yup, I'm angry because some old hicks keep trolling about why America was da best and then accusing everyone else (who have a better grasp of history) of slander and ignorance. If anyone finds these people in real life, please record the conversation and give them an earful.

Yeah hardcore conservatives will tell you America has done nothing wrong and is incredible and the best but,,,,nah

[Sebastian]

Yeah hardcore conservatives will tell you America has done nothing wrong and is incredible and the best but,,,,nah

Well, I'm "hardcore" conservative and I don't think America is perfect. I do think the Puritans and Pilgrims were good Christians though and didn't commit genocide. But since I can't convince and of you and you can't convince me, let's not argue

[FireArrow]

Well, I'm "hardcore" conservative and I don't think America is perfect. I do think the Puritans and Pilgrims were good Christians though and didn't commit genocide. But since I can't convince and of you and you can't convince me, let's not argue

The Native American population was reduced to 250,000. While it's hard to know how many natives there were before Europeans came, estimates go up to 12 million. Meaning up to ~11.75 million people died, a number very similar to that of the holocaust. Of course, a lot of the deaths were from smallpox, however, that's not an alibi for the pilgrims - 4,000 people died from the trial of tears alone, which in and of itself could be considered a genocide.

Yeah, I remember the ugliness was never taught in elementary school, but they start talking about slavery and labor movements in middle school and then go into genocide by high school. Some schools go into detail about how nutty the Pilgrims and Puritans were, but not that many. I think we really need to stop teaching that America was da best and never did anything wrong.

Yup, I'm angry because some old hicks keep trolling about why America was da best and then accusing everyone else (who have a better grasp of history) of slander and ignorance. If anyone finds these people in real life, please record the conversation and give them an earful.

Well, I'm taking my high school course on U.S. history (not AP thank god) this coming year, so we'll see. My experience from these though is that there's so much emphasis on "Our founding fathers were so perfect" and "Look at all this freedom, every white-landowning-male can vote!" that it creates this environment where all the stuff that happens somehow becomes O.K.

[Ruto]

Well, I'm "hardcore" conservative and I don't think America is perfect. I do think the Puritans and Pilgrims were good Christians though and didn't commit genocide. But since I can't convince and of you and you can't convince me, let's not argue

So, the war with the Pequots began. Massacres took place on both sides. The English developed a tactic of warfare used earlier by Cortes and later, in the twentieth century, even more systematically: deliberate attacks on noncombatants for the purpose of terrorizing the enemy. This is ethno historian Francis Jennings's interpretation of Captain John Mason's attack on a Pequot village on the Mystic River near Long Island Sound: "Mason proposed to avoid attacking Pequot warriors, which would have overtaxed his unseasoned, unreliable troops. Battle, as such, was not his purpose. Battle is only one of the ways to destroy an enemy's will to fight. Massacre can accomplish the same end with less risk, and Mason had determined that massacre would be his objective."

So the English set fire to the wigwams of the village. By their own account: "The Captain also said, We must Burn Them; and immediately stepping into the Wigwam ... brought out a Fire Brand, and putting it into the Matts with which they were covered, set the Wigwams on Fire." William Bradford, in his History of the Plymouth Plantation written at the time, describes John Mason's raid on the Pequot village:

Those that scaped the fire were slaine with the sword; some hewed to peeces, others rune throw with their rapiers, so as they were quickly dispatchte, and very few escaped. It was conceived they thus destroyed about 400 at this time. It was a fearful sight to see them thus frying in the fyer, and the streams of blood quenching the same, and horrible was the stincke and sente there of, but the victory seemed a sweete sacrifice, and they gave the prayers thereof to God, who had wrought so wonderfully for them, thus to inclose their enemise in their hands, and give them so speedy a victory over so proud and insulting an enimie.
As Dr. Cotton Mather, Puritan theologian, put it: "It was supposed that no less than 600 Pequot souls were brought down to hell that day."

The war continued. Indian tribes were used against one another, and never seemed able to join together in fighting the English. Jennings sums up:

The terror was very real among the Indians, but in time they came to meditate upon its foundations. They drew three lessons from the Pequot War: (1) that the Englishmen's most solemn pledge would be broken whenever obligation conflicted with advantage; (2) that the English way of war had no limit of scruple or mercy; and (3) that weapons of Indian making were almost useless against weapons of European manufacture. These lessons the Indians took to heart.
A footnote in Virgil Vogel's book This Land Was Ours (1972) says: "The official figure on the number of Pequots now in Connecticut is twenty-one persons."

Forty years after the Pequot War, Puritans and Indians fought again. This time it was the Wampanoags, occupying the south shore of Massachusetts Bay, who were in the way and also beginning to trade some of their land to people outside the Massachusetts Bay Colony. Their chief, Massasoit, was dead. His son Wamsutta had been killed by Englishmen, and Wamsuttas brother Metacom (later to be called King Philip by the English) became chief. The English found their excuse, a murder which they attributed to Metacom, and they began a war of conquest against the Wampanoags, a war to take their land. They were clearly the aggressors, but claimed they attacked for preventive purposes. As Roger Williams, more friendly to the Indians than most, put it: "All men of conscience or prudence ply to windward, to maintain their wars to be defensive."

Source

More about the Pequot War

Plus what FireArrow said, these people didn't just disappear.

[K-NiGhT]

Well, I'm "hardcore" conservative and I don't think America is perfect. I do think the Puritans and Pilgrims were good Christians though and didn't commit genocide. But since I can't convince and of you and you can't convince me, let's not argue

you are really good at ignoring hard facts and truths

[Ruto]

I suppose you can blame the English for sending their savages to colonize North America, if you want to distance yourself from this.

Here's some more horrible things the English did in Jamestown, from the same source:

Spoiler

Jamestown itself was set up inside the territory of an Indian confederacy, led by the chief, Powhatan. Powhatan watched the English settle on his people's land, but did not attack, maintaining a posture of coolness. When the English were going through their "starving time" in the winter of 1610, some of them ran off to join the Indians, where they would at least be fed. When the summer came, the governor of the colony sent a messenger to ask Powhatan to return the runaways, whereupon Powhatan, according to the English account, replied with "noe other than prowde and disdaynefull Answers." Some soldiers were therefore sent out "to take Revenge." They fell upon an Indian settlement, killed fifteen or sixteen Indians, burned the houses, cut down the corn growing around the village, took the queen of the tribe and her children into boats, then ended up throwing the children overboard "and shoteinge owit their Braynes in the water." The queen was later taken off and stabbed to death.

[close]

[Maelstrom]

Thought of the moment: What would happen if the amount of active users on the forums someday just shot up into the thousands?

Leave.

[Sebastian]

you are really good at ignoring hard facts and truths

Well.....I don't know 100% sure but I will research it when I have time.

[BlackDragonSlayer]

Manifest Destiny, AKA, let's kill all these Native American's because THIS IS THE LAND OF THE FREE. I hate how our education system highlights the genesis of America as some revolutionary amazing thing - it was a genocide.

To be fair, this is kind-of how world history in general is taught. If your actions had even a somewhat positive outcome, then you paved the way for the future, not murdered thousands of people!

[mikey]

Thought of the moment: What would happen if the amount of active users on the forums someday just shot up into the thousands?

ugh like League of Legends forums or GameFAQs
new threads would be created every minute
I wouldn't bother coming here
new sheets would be made all the time though