Thursday, May 8, 2014

Reformation + Indians = American Freedom

Why did America become a land of liberty? During the time of colonization many areas of the world were targets of European imperialism.
Brazil, Argentina, South Africa, Australia, New Zealand, Mexico, Canada.. all had lots of Europeans invading their shores. Why didn't america become like one of them? ..another European style statist system? They could be loyal to the king, and rule & oppress the native peoples. That is what most of them did. 

Here is my theory: 
The admiration for the honor and culture of the Native North American people.

1. The Native American would not be enslaved.
2. The Native American believed in dignity and honor. Their word was sacred and was something to be proud of.
3. They were utilitarian in their view of of war. War to them was to take the other guy's stuff, to take over their turf, and to carry off their children and women. It was an expansive tactic of coalition nation building.
4. Even though the European settlers brutalized the Native Americans, they admired them. The concept of the noble savage has been prominent in North American culture to this day. They learned how to survive in the New World from their native neighbors. They saw how they faced adversity with courage. They were sanguine about death. They were independent and self reliant from any central government.
5. They fought bravely, even when outnumbered. Courage and freedom were highly esteemed. ..More so than life in slavery or domination from another.

The Europeans however, had different roots.

1. For a thousand years or more, kings and popes and lords and masters had ruled the Europeans. They were used to being nannied, cared for and submissive and subservient. Independent living and thinking was not in their dna.
2. When they made war it was for genocide. They sought to wipe out their enemies, or any race they thought inferior, not to assimilate them. Or, they felt a manifest destiny to manage and manipulate other people as pets or inferior beings. They enslaved those who would submit to their tyranny.
3. The europeans would willingly enslave them selves for material things. They would sell themselves as indentured servants for years to gain passage on a ship or to gain partial ownership of some business.
4. They lived lives of quiet desperation & degradation with no honor, yet they accepted this as their lot in life.
5. The religion of Christianity was used to placate. The concepts of freedom, liberty, honor and self respect was not common in European church circles. They preached submission to authority and honoring the king.

Then, a reformation began. Law was seen as above all. The written law superseded the edicts of men. This blend of reformation theology, combined with the noble savage sense of honor, freedom, and dignity came together to form a new creature: The American. It was the perfect storm. This guy would fight with ruthlessness like a European but die with dignity, honor, & self sacrifice like an Indian. He saw freedom and liberty as the foremost things. It flavored his religion and his outlook on Law and his fellow man.
Of course, this American went on to brutalize and break the spirit of the noble man he admired. He did not appreciate the lessons or the freedoms gained from his neighbors' philosophy of life. But the white man assimilated the ideology of the indian, even though he didn't know it. He tried to follow his euro creed of non assimilation and genocide. He pushed the red man into reservations to keep him dependent, subservient and broken. But the genie was out of the bottle. The spirit of the North American had taken over and blended with the European settlers.
Then more people came & were infected.. They got the idea that all men are created equal. ..They are endowed by their creator with unalienable rights. Not long after a great war was fought to free the black man from his years of servitude and oppression.
All during this time aggressive men and statists worked tirelessly to empower the state and strip the people of their liberties. Freedom, though tentative, was always preserved.
But now, as usual, we are at a crossroad. American liberties we took for granted are being chipped away by an ever growing & expanding state. No longer content with securing our rights, they make war at will, steal our property, and try to nanny and micro manage us like we are their third world conquests.
Wake up America! It is time to rise up and put these scoundrels in their place. It is time to remember our heritage, & honor the native american who has helped us cast off the chains of imperialism & servitude. No more euro nanny state! We came here for freedom, & we should not let anyone take it from us.

I am convinced that those societies (as the Indians) which live without government enjoy in their general mass an infinitely greater degree of happiness than those who live under European governments. Among the former, public opinion is in the place of law, and restrains morals as powerfully as laws ever did any where. Among the latter, under pretence of governing they have divided their nations into two classes, wolves and sheep. I do not exaggerate. This is a true picture of Europe. Cherish therefore the spirit of our people, and keep alive their attention. ~Thomas Jefferson

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