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> The Europeans were psychotic bastards who murdered and tortured and enslaved people, and who had absolute masters and abject servants, and all kinds of psycho

> The Europeans were psychotic bastards who murdered and tortured and enslaved people, and who had absolute masters and abject servants, and all kinds of psychotic baggage. The native cultures were (and still are in many many places) not quite so messed up. The natives never fought amongst themselves for resources or territory? No victorious tribes ever enslaved or murdered their defeated foes? This whole idea of conflicts between ethnicity and tribes and nations, master-and-slave and hierarchical societies is just some weird European pathology that, like smallpox, was unknown in the Americas pre-1492?

carapace 4y ago
> The natives never fought amongst themselves for resources or territory? Of course they did, but they had forms and traditions that limited the (excuse me) savagery of their conflicts, for example "counting coup": > Among the Plains Indians of North America, counting coup is the warrior tradition of winning prestige against an enemy in battle. It is one of the traditional ways of showing bravery in the face of an enemy and involves intimidating him, and, it is hoped, persuading him to admit defeat, without having to kill him. These victories may then be remembered, recorded, and recounted as part of the community's oral, written, or pictorial histories. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Counting_coup https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Counting_coup > No victorious tribes ever enslaved or murdered their defeated foes? Generally, no. Even N.Am. "slavery" was very different from, say, Roman or later (Euro-)American slavery of Africans. IANAAnthropologist but it's pretty clear that Europe was a much more cruel and savage land than North America, at least (I don't know as much about Central and South American cultures.) > This whole idea of conflicts between ethnicity and tribes and nations, master-and-slave and hierarchical societies is just some weird European pathology that, like smallpox, was unknown in the Americas pre-1492? They had conflicts, and hierarchy, and even in some societies a kind of slavery, but nothing like the brutality, cruelty, and savagery of the Europeans. Again, I'm not an expert, but as I've looked into it, I've come to see that Europeans pretty much were "infected" with hardcore trauma and resulting psychological repression and etc.etc. Freudian, etc... plus bad religion. I mean, the Spanish Inquisition much?

carapace 4y ago

> The natives never fought amongst themselves for resources or territory? Of course they did, but they had forms and traditions that limited the (excuse me) savagery of their conflicts, for example "counting coup": > Among the Plains Indians of North America, counting coup is the warrior tradition of winning prestige against an enemy in battle. It is one of the traditional ways of showing bravery in the face of an enemy and involves intimidating him, and, it is hoped, persuading him to admit defeat, without having to kill him. These victories may then be remembered, recorded, and recounted as part of the community's oral, written, or pictorial histories. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Counting_coup https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Counting_coup > No victorious tribes ever enslaved or murdered their defeated foes? Generally, no. Even N.Am. "slavery" was very different from, say, Roman or later (Euro-)American slavery of Africans. IANAAnthropologist but it's pretty clear that Europe was a much more cruel and savage land than North America, at least (I don't know as much about Central and South American cultures.) > This whole idea of conflicts between ethnicity and tribes and nations, master-and-slave and hierarchical societies is just some weird European pathology that, like smallpox, was unknown in the Americas pre-1492? They had conflicts, and hierarchy, and even in some societies a kind of slavery, but nothing like the brutality, cruelty, and savagery of the Europeans. Again, I'm not an expert, but as I've looked into it, I've come to see that Europeans pretty much were "infected" with hardcore trauma and resulting psychological repression and etc.etc. Freudian, etc... plus bad religion. I mean, the Spanish Inquisition much?