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the aztecs had an empire, a civilization, with pyramids, systems of agriculture, public schools, museums full of massive detailed gold statues, and organised sp

the aztecs had an empire, a civilization, with pyramids, systems of agriculture, public schools, museums full of massive detailed gold statues, and organised sport. they invented basketball and chocolate. there were many kther advanced civilizations that we will only ever know the tiniest amount of, because they all died of smallpox. the only groups to survive were the nomads, cherokee, lakota, apache, etc. because they could avoid the spread of disease. the view that they were cavemen is part of the whole terra nullius argument, trying to cast them as essentially fauna.

Yetanfou 8y ago
You forgot the bit which told of how the Aztecs [1] became to be the power they were back in the day: by a combination of military conquest and, to a lesser extent, trade. Before the Aztecs became the power they were there were the Toltecs, another militaristic culture which lost steam and got overrun by Chichimec tribes. It was from those tribes that the Aztecs rose, seemingly out of a group of a few thousand Chichimecs which had been forced out to a group of islands after sacrificing a princess from a neighbouring tribe. They gradually rose in power after conquering a few cities on the mainland and forming alliances with other tribes. First under Montezuma I and later under his successor they 'evolved an ideology of themselves as a chosen people destined to conquer' according to [2]. This ideology served them well and lead them to become the dominant power in what is now Mexico until they came into contact with another group of people who saw themselves as conquerors, better known in their own language as conquistadores [3]. In other words, those Aztecs with their pyramids and systems of agriculture were just like those who came before them and those who came after them. All they lacked was the firepower of those who conquered them and immunity to - to them - exotic diseases, otherwise the world would look different from what it looks like today. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aztecs https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aztecs [2] https://warfarehistorynetwork.com/daily/military-history/the-rise-of-the-aztec-civilization/ https://warfarehistorynetwork.com/daily/military-history/the... [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conquistador https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conquistador
- dmix 8y ago
  I think he's saying we should have let the Aztecs continue sacrificing humans to their gods and viciously attacking the weaker tribes in the north and south of Tenochtitlan... because they were there first.
  - ZenPsycho 8y ago
    no, my point was that the justification for conquering them “they were living like neolithic people” is nonsense.

Yetanfou 8y ago

You forgot the bit which told of how the Aztecs [1] became to be the power they were back in the day: by a combination of military conquest and, to a lesser extent, trade. Before the Aztecs became the power they were there were the Toltecs, another militaristic culture which lost steam and got overrun by Chichimec tribes. It was from those tribes that the Aztecs rose, seemingly out of a group of a few thousand Chichimecs which had been forced out to a group of islands after sacrificing a princess from a neighbouring tribe. They gradually rose in power after conquering a few cities on the mainland and forming alliances with other tribes. First under Montezuma I and later under his successor they 'evolved an ideology of themselves as a chosen people destined to conquer' according to [2]. This ideology served them well and lead them to become the dominant power in what is now Mexico until they came into contact with another group of people who saw themselves as conquerors, better known in their own language as conquistadores [3]. In other words, those Aztecs with their pyramids and systems of agriculture were just like those who came before them and those who came after them. All they lacked was the firepower of those who conquered them and immunity to - to them - exotic diseases, otherwise the world would look different from what it looks like today. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aztecs https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aztecs [2] https://warfarehistorynetwork.com/daily/military-history/the-rise-of-the-aztec-civilization/ https://warfarehistorynetwork.com/daily/military-history/the... [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conquistador https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conquistador

dmix 8y ago
I think he's saying we should have let the Aztecs continue sacrificing humans to their gods and viciously attacking the weaker tribes in the north and south of Tenochtitlan... because they were there first.
- ZenPsycho 8y ago
  no, my point was that the justification for conquering them “they were living like neolithic people” is nonsense.