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At Least You Have Read ONE Source

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Posted by Mike Pearson on November 4, 2002 18:59:16 UTC

Reading one source is not the same as thinking, Mr. Boldface. You can find a source to say
almost anything. In our time, it is considered
acceptable by many just to quote from any book
as long as the idea fits a widely-propagated conventional belief. But "widely-propagated" is exactly what Earth-centered astronomy was in Copernicus' time. The difference here is that
information is freely available but largely ignored, which would make different, truer, even more human-emancipating sense of the subject of European expansion.

I have posted many comments about the subject on this forum, drawn from many sources. Ruquist
engaged in a very unsatisfying conversation, in the sense that he did not address the points I
brought up.

A few points now:
1) I objected to your acting as a wire for the
idea of Manifest Destiny and implying it was
the standard attitude. Alexis de Tocqueville, upon visiting our country in the early 1800s, commented that in America, people married whomever they wanted, with a great deal of marriage between so-called Indians and so-called Europeans. There is a huge amount of slop in the Manifest Destiny thesis.
Yes, it was one school of thought and newspapers
played it up a lot.
2) Most of Europe is a melting pot for ethnicity throughout history. Invasions from all sides
have made some parts of Europe a greater victim
of "Manifest Destiny" than were the gene pools of
North America. But do we speak of Europeans the way we speak of Genghis Khan, or the Aryans, or the Huns, or the Moors, or the Turks, or the Romans (many of whom arrived from North Africa after the Sahara dried out), or the Vikings
(okay, they were already European)?
3) I am in agreement with addressing grievances
of descendants of 'Native Americans' fairly. If you are really intersted in the justice of some matter in question, I can discuss some matters specifically in public policy, though I cannot pretend to "rule" on them as I am not a judge or jury.
4) Many Americans were actually displaced in
recent times from their European homes. When they displaced 'Native Americans' they were
doing what had been done to themselves by population pressures that push toward the West and the Atlantic Ocian all the way to Asia and Africa.
5) President Grant looked part Indian to me; how about to you? And he was our fire-water addicted President of the United States when blonde Custer was dying in the dust.

There's lots more.
What say you?

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