5 Discussion boards each at least 150 words and total is 750 words
HAPPY THANKSGIVING!
OK… just kidding….
Disturbing though, huh?
Are you beginning to understand just how much is left out of our histories?
From early childhood, we are taught about this brave group of individuals who
courageously set out to find a new life for themselves in the "New World." A life
where they could be free to worship and live as they chose...and when they got
here they had to labor and toil day and night in the midst of an inhospitable and
unfamiliar land. Luckily, however, the kindly natives befriended them and helped
them survive their first winter here in their new home. And when harvest time
came the following year, they all sat down together at the table of brotherhood
holding hands, enjoying the fruits of their labor and singing Kum Ba Yah....Does
this sound about right?
The Pilgrims... a small group of people we thought were seeking religious freedom
when they came to this country...we thought they were simply an example of
moral, upstanding, Christian leaders responsible for much of the foundational ten-
ants which lay at the core of this country... or were they? What have you learned
about this group of people now that you've read Loewen's chapter?
Some of the issues I find interesting about this group:
They were not seeking religious freedom when they came, they had
already found it...in the Netherlands.
They may have hijacked the Mayflower...and in today's language,
what do we usually call a group of people who hijack a ship or plane?
When they got here, they did not have to "tame" the wilder-
ness...where did they actually settle? In Squanto's old village. The
homes were already built, crops planted...
When they got here what did they do immediately? Begin looking for
gold....
And they looked in some of the most interesting places...like graves.
Because they began immediately looking for gold and not preparing
themselves for the months ahead they get themselves in a predica-
ment...and many resort to cannibalism....yes, cannibalism .
(Happy Thanksgiving!)
Many of us remember the Thanksgiving plays we participated in as children in el-
ementary school...where we made the construction paper hats with the big
buckles and buckles for our shoes, or the construction paper feather head-
dresses...or how we would trace the outline of our hand onto our drawing paper
with our crayons and magically it would morph itself into a turkey...we spend
much, much time and energy on this "creation" story....
Shouldn't we include some smallpox ravaged natives, complete with blistering
pustules, to represent the 90% of the entire Native American population (in the
North and South American continents) wiped out by disease? After all, this is part
of the Pilgrims' story isn't it?
Shouldn't we include the story of Metacom's War (named after the son of the
original Native American leader who helped the Pilgrims) and all of the ghastly
things done to Metacom? His being drawn and quartered by the Pilgrims, them
cutting off his hands and putting them on display in Boston, and removing his
head and taking it back to Plymouth to mount it atop a big, long stick in the mid-
dle of town square where it would remain on display for 25 years? I kid you
not….
Should we not include slavery? As the Puritans were one of the main North Ameri-
can contributors to the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade-an institution responsible for the
loss of 50 million people from Africa through enslavement and death?
Why do we spend so much time on this group of people in school? Perhaps even
more importantly, why do we spend so much time on this Disney-esque version of
the Pilgrims? What purpose, what lesson, do you believe studying the Pilgrims in
this way serves?
1. Please post an initial response to these questions of at least 150 words
2. Reply (2 or 3 sentences) to at least 3 other students' initial postings.
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