Why did the Native Americans lose the war over their lands?

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Winston
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Why did the Native Americans lose the war over their lands?

Post by Winston »

1. Weren't the Native Americans in America as long as the Europeans were in Europe? If so, shouldn't they have an equal or similar population? In movies they are always depicted as having fewer numbers than the whites. Why?

2. I heard that in real life, the guns of the 19th century were very inaccurate and worked only short range. If that's so, then how could it win over the Indian arrow? Shouldn't the wars have been equal?

3. Did most of the Indian population die from the diseases brought about by the white man? If they didn't die off, would they have won and kept their lands in the end?

4. How come the result of the Indian wars wasn't the same as in Vietnam, where the forest battles made it difficult for the US to win?
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Post by momopi »

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Native_Ame ... plications

"...some historians estimate that up to 80% of some Native populations died due to European diseases after first contact."

"In 1618-1619, smallpox wiped out 90% of the Massachusetts Bay Native Americans"
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Guns, Germs, and Steel

Post by wuming »

Read the book "Guns, Germs and Steel" by Jared Diamond. As momopi pointed out, it was all due to the infectious diseases the Europeans brought over, and the lack of strong immune systems amongst the Natives, due to their minimal animal agriculture.

The Native Americans had minimal animal agriculture/domestication due to massive extinction from all-too-easy hunting when they first arrived in the Americas, as indigenous North American animals did not co-evolve with humans (unlike African/Asian animals) and didn't realize humans were a threat when they first appeared 12,000+ years ago.
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Re: Guns, Germs, and Steel

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wuming wrote:Read the book "Guns, Germs and Steel" by Jared Diamond. As momopi pointed out, it was all due to the infectious diseases the Europeans brought over, and the lack of strong immune systems amongst the Natives, due to their minimal animal agriculture.

The Native Americans had minimal animal agriculture/domestication due to massive extinction from all-too-easy hunting when they first arrived in the Americas, as indigenous North American animals did not co-evolve with humans (unlike African/Asian animals) and didn't realize humans were a threat when they first appeared 12,000+ years ago.
W: So if the majority of the Native American population was wiped out due to plagues and diseases, then wasn't that worse than the Black Death of Europe that killed off a third of its population?

So the plague was what cost Indians their land then, and not the armies of the US cavalry, as movies depict?
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Post by Winston »

A few years ago, I drove through the Southwest USA, hoping to experience some Indian culture and the mystique of Dances With Wolves.

What I got though, were reservations full of souvenir stands, greasy diners, obese Native Americans, etc. But at least I saw lots of nice national parks such as Monument Valley, Canyon de Chelly, etc. The Navajo lands were breathtaking.

So what happened to these Indians? I was told that the land the US government gave them is not fertile land, so they cannot grow crops. So they have to depend on tourists to visit them, and eat imported US food, which makes them fat and gives them diabetes, as they can't take white flour well. So why don't they just choose to eat more healthy?

And why doesn't the government just give them better land, so that they aren't limited to tourists and casinos?

Don't they have a voice in Congress?

I'm sure the majority of the American population sympathizes with the Native Americans, especially after movies like Dances with Wolves, and feels sorry for them and regrets what the government did in the past. So why haven't they helped them more?

Also, why are so many Native Americans alcoholics? Haven't they been given equal opportunity to create whatever life they want on their own land?

Any of you ever visit them too? Or been to a POW WOW? Or been to Navajo lands in northeastern Arizona?
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Post by ALIBABA »

natives killed off by diseases. now theres a great conspiracy theory. i'd say they just died from the white man's bullets. that disease argument just doesnt work because natives from south america came in contact with whites, but they werent completely killed off. in fact, many south american countries still have native majorities. so what does that mean? it appears that the british are more genocidal than the spanish. either momopi, wuming are really disinformed, or theyre rent-a-trolls. i got to wonder about momopi. most of his comments fall perfectly in line with the establishment. a little too perfect. so why does a guy come on a site like "happier abroad", and preach pro establishment thoughts? thought police?
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Post by Winston »

ALIBABA wrote:natives killed off by diseases. now theres a great conspiracy theory. i'd say they just died from the white man's bullets. that disease argument just doesnt work because natives from south america came in contact with whites, but they werent completely killed off. in fact, many south american countries still have native majorities. so what does that mean? it appears that the british are more genocidal than the spanish. either momopi, wuming are really disinformed, or theyre rent-a-trolls. i got to wonder about momopi. most of his comments fall perfectly in line with the establishment. a little too perfect. so why does a guy come on a site like "happier abroad", and preach pro establishment thoughts? thought police?
Then how did the white men win then, against millions of natives? You gotta remember that the guns of the Old West had short range and didn't shoot straight. They were nothing as accurate as you see in Western movies. How would guns that don't even shoot straight win out against bows and arrows and millions of natives, who would have teamed up to eliminate the white people from America? How could the native Americans be that easy to conquer?
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Post by Crazy Blaqe Bitch »

Go read the book "Lies my Teacher Told Me" It is...oh.. my I can't even explain it in detail, but you have to read this book. It's a must.
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Post by Jester »

Good comments by all on this thread.

No need for me to weigh in too much, everyone is making sense. I am once again pleased that I have found HA.

In answer to Winston's original question, I agree with AliBaba... Spanish/Indio interaction in Latin America was harsh and sometimes cruel, yet somehow not genocidal, somehow even fertile.

Were the Indians themselves different in the North and the South? For sure.

Were the White guys different North and South? Obviously.

Clearly we can say two things:

Lustful, greedy, lazy, slave-taking Catholic Spaniards are in some ways LESS harmful to natives than morally strict, strictly monogamous, non-slave-taking, hardworking Protestants. Like Gordon Gekko said decades ago... greed is good. ???!!! Or at least it can be, apparently.

Hardworking, agricultural, civilized Indians survived BETTER than rugged, survivalist, warring tribes of "North America". Numbers grew more before the White Man, and afterwards as well. Civilization beats Thoreau-like survivalism. Agriculture is good, greed is good. f**k complacency. f**k Dancing With Wolves.
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Re: Why did the Native Americans lose the war over their lan

Post by OutWest »

Winston wrote:1. Weren't the Native Americans in America as long as the Europeans were in Europe? If so, shouldn't they have an equal or similar population? In movies they are always depicted as having fewer numbers than the whites. Why?

2. I heard that in real life, the guns of the 19th century were very inaccurate and worked only short range. If that's so, then how could it win over the Indian arrow? Shouldn't the wars have been equal?

3. Did most of the Indian population die from the diseases brought about by the white man? If they didn't die off, would they have won and kept their lands in the end?

4. How come the result of the Indian wars wasn't the same as in Vietnam, where the forest battles made it difficult for the US to win?
Think about it. The Indians were still a stone age culture vs Europeans with locomotives and technology. (By the end of the era in the 1800s.) In this case, American Indian tribes met these vastly stronger European tribes. My ancestors were Celtic tribes...or Scoti.
When the English won the war with Scotland in the early 1700s, my ancestors were deported to the new world during what was called "The Clearances" in Scotland. You leave your land, home and country at the point of the bayonet and get on the ship waiting in the harbor.
This was the English version of ethnic cleansing, but actually less cruel than today as if you could survive weeks at sea in a rotting scow of some sort, you just MIGHT survive in the New World you were deported to.

Outwest
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Post by NorthAmericanguy »

ALIBABA wrote:natives killed off by diseases. now theres a great conspiracy theory. i'd say they just died from the white man's bullets. that disease argument just doesnt work because natives from south america came in contact with whites, but they werent completely killed off. in fact, many south american countries still have native majorities. so what does that mean? it appears that the british are more genocidal than the spanish. either momopi, wuming are really disinformed, or theyre rent-a-trolls. i got to wonder about momopi. most of his comments fall perfectly in line with the establishment. a little too perfect. so why does a guy come on a site like "happier abroad", and preach pro establishment thoughts? thought police?
Ha! He called out Momopi!
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Re: Guns, Germs, and Steel

Post by NorthAmericanguy »

wuming wrote:Read the book "Guns, Germs and Steel" by Jared Diamond. As momopi pointed out, it was all due to the infectious diseases the Europeans brought over, and the lack of strong immune systems amongst the Natives, due to their minimal animal agriculture.
This book as well:
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Re: Why did the Native Americans lose the war over their lan

Post by NorthAmericanguy »

OutWest wrote:
Think about it. The Indians were still a stone age culture vs Europeans with locomotives and technology. (By the end of the era in the 1800s.) In this case, American Indian tribes met these vastly stronger European tribes.
These Europeans that you speak of would have all died if the Indians did not help them initially (i.e, food, shelter from cold) despite any forms of technology they had which was rudimentary at best.

As far as the Spanish, they were shown hospitality and not killed right away by the Aztecs because they thought the Spanish men riding on beast they never seen (horses) were the returning "bearded white man" (Quetzalcoatl) that was said to have help establish the Mayan civilization.


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Post by NorthAmericanguy »

Winston wrote:A few years ago, I drove through the Southwest USA, hoping to experience some Indian culture and the mystique of Dances With Wolves.

What I got though, were reservations full of souvenir stands, greasy diners, obese Native Americans, etc.
But at least I saw lots of nice national parks such as Monument Valley, Canyon de Chelly, etc. The Navajo lands were breathtaking.

So what happened to these Indians? I was told that the land the US government gave them is not fertile land, so they cannot grow crops. So they have to depend on tourists to visit them, and eat imported US food, which makes them fat and gives them diabetes, as they can't take white flour well. So why don't they just choose to eat more healthy?

And why doesn't the government just give them better land, so that they aren't limited to tourists and casinos?

Don't they have a voice in Congress?

I'm sure the majority of the American population sympathizes with the Native Americans, especially after movies like Dances with Wolves, and feels sorry for them and regrets what the government did in the past. So why haven't they helped them more?


Also, why are so many Native Americans alcoholics?
Haven't they been given equal opportunity to create whatever life they want on their own land?

Any of you ever visit them too? Or been to a POW WOW? Or been to Navajo lands in northeastern Arizona?

I know men who could give you a 10 hour lecture from your few good questions alone. I'm only going to answer 3 of them.

1. Most Americans don't give a ****t about Natiave Americans, or even worse, they don't even know who they are. Americans are only concerned about their own families, their jobs, and their house; they could give two ***s that the land they're living on use to inhabited by somebody else.


2. Sad to say but whatever is left of Native American culture has turned into a form of a way for people to make money from it. So for example, you get these people who have some distant relative who was NA, and all of the sudden, he/she feels as though they are the expert on the culture and goes off selling NA pottery and art as if it's authentic when they are just bastardizing the culture and lining their pockets.

3. Alcohol was used as a tool along with guns and disease to conquer the Native Americans. It's no different than all the drugs that were dumped into the streets of Los Angles in the 80s to destabilize the communities.
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Re: Why did the Native Americans lose the war over their lan

Post by NorthAmericanguy »

Winston wrote: Weren't the Native Americans in America as long as the Europeans were in Europe?
From my knowledge, no. Why? Because up to date, there have been no bones of Neanderthal or ancient prehistoric men found in America through excavation.

In other words, there is solid evidence that Europeans developed and mated with Neanderthals in and around Western Asia and the caucasus mountain region, but America was only recently inhabited after the last ice age.
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