A history lesson with PumaClaw

The BBQ Pit
41

::sighs::

You know, PumaClaw reminds me of a teacher I had once for a class on Native American history after having him for another class. Suddenly, once we got to Native American history, he was completely and totally Native American, railing against the white man and telling us that we ought to be ashamed of our ancestors.

The man was somewhere between 1/4 and 1/8 Native American, with the remainder being white Euro-American. He grew up in Chicago. Which makes him juuust about as Native American as I am.

There were times I wanted to scream at him, “You are NOT the mouthpiece for every Native American Indian who has walked this earth! Quit being a racist jerk and blaming everyone for the sins that their fathers may or may not have committed.”

Sad thing is, I agreed with almost everything he said except this stuff. Thus, when I ended up working w/him on other projects…well, yeah, things were kinda tense, seeing as I still wanted to strangle him

This is what PumaClaw reminds me of. A racist who thinks that classifying others as all the same is okay so long as it’s not his group that’s being classified. Brill.

42

Yes, that’s exactly what I think…uh…just a lot less eloquently :smiley:

43

BTW, my father is a member of Knights of Columbus-it’s the Catholic version of the Free Masons, pretty much.

44

Yes, but to everyday human beings whose thought may have been shaped by thinkers of the past of their culture (whether they know it or not), Socrates is only important to folks in the West. Someone like Pumaclaw might not care what Socrates has said because he has no context to build his ideas into. Socrates is a great philosopher, we are influenced by him in tons of ways we are not conscious of in the West. In other cultures, Socrates impact will only be felt by those who read him. I agree Socrates is a great philosopher, I’m just saying that citing Socrates to Pumaclaw is understandably not nearly as effective as citing Socrates to an American.

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My point is that Socrates is just as influential as any other philosopher you could name, no matter what part of the world they came from. He hasn’t influenced everyone on the planet, not even everyone in the West, but to say that he isn’t a major philosopher is incorrect by any measure. To say otherwise would be the same a claiming that Mohammed wasn’t a major religious figure just because Muslims are a minority in the US.

And all of that aside, I’m pretty sure that PumaClaw is, in fact, an American, much as he might loathe to admit.

46

I am so fucking disgusted with racist people. I know how trite that sounds, but it’s completely true and I can barely stand it anymore.

Seriously, I read stuff like Puma Claw’s posts and I just want to throw my hands up in the air and scream “What the fuck!?” until I pass out.

I have a few rules of decency regarding racial issues that I try very hard to follow in my everyday life. Wanna hear?

1. No matter how oppressed your ancestors may have been, it does not give you carte blanche to be an ignorant asshole to everyone you meet.

Sorry, it just doesn’t. Your actions and words are yours alone, and none but you will be answerable for them. I am sorry your ancestors had troubles; I feel for your lingering pain, and would seek to learn what I can from you and your history, perhaps in the process mending old hurts and forging a new friendship. But you are not allowed to dismiss me or treat me poorly simply because you’re having a hard time.

2. If you refuse to treat others with decency and respect, you will be given no decency or respect in return, regardless of what you feel you are ‘owed’.

I understand that you are angry about the treatment of your ancestors. I understand you feel that as their descendant you are entitled to some apology or reparation for past wrongs. But the majority of the people you encounter day-to-day are not interested in your political agenda, and are just trying to get by in life as best they can. To treat them badly is inviting further poor treatment. Not because you are whatever race you are, but because you are being a complete asshole.

**3. All human beings, regardless of race, religion, gender, etc., are far more alike than different, and all are worthy of respect and kindness. **

To celebrate and learn about one’s history, religion, etc., is a good thing. It increases the knowledge and understanding of all of us. To show respect for other cultures who may have different ideas and practices is also a good thing; it shows compassion and empathy, and it, too, increases the knowledge and understanding of all of us. But to use this knowledge as a weapon, to divide and estrange your fellows humans, is undoubtedly a bad thing, and it will lead only to anger, and warfare, and lingering resentment.

All humans are members of one species, and each culture is a piece of the puzzle, another clue towards understanding what makes us human. No culture or race or religion or gender should be valued above any other, for all have their part, and without any one piece the whole is diminished.

I do not, and have never, and I hope never to understand beliefs regarding the superiority of any people over another. It is to me ridiculous, and divisive, and groundless.

But some people persist in their foolishness, and draw lines where in truth no lines exist. Why? I don’t understand, and it sickens me that there are still people so consumed by anger and hatred that they would not see the futility of their position.

I hope one day Puma Claw and others like him learn this.

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I would agree, except no one cited Socrates. PumaClaw himself brought him up when he complained that people were asking too many questions and stated that even Socrates got so tired of asking questions that he drank hemlock.

So, basically, PumaClaw’s fundamental ignorance of history is what brought the whole thing about.

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I doubt it. He’s gone. Off to greener pastures to preach to the converted methinks. Where racist inconsiderate morons wont keep bringing up “facts” that ruin his arguments.

49

Pythagras wrote,

Well, I won’t argue with you on that one. I can think of a number of interesting mathematical inventions from non-European cultures (Arabic algebra, Mayan calendars, etc.) but I don’t know whether you’d count them as attempts to understand the world through quantification per se, and in some cases I don’t know whether the cultures could be considered Western. On the other hand, I can’t really fathom PumaClaw as being somehow less influenced by the Western scientific revolution than somebody else. As Miller pointed out, Puma is an American, and it’s a lot more than a passport. Don’t kids on reservations get taught math and science in pretty much the same way as the kids in Des Moines or Fresno or whatever?

I guess I see fanatic as sort of a pejorative which wouldn’t be fair to apply to the Mayflower party. I also wouldn’t really tie them in to the Puritans, really. Here is a site which backs me up although I can’t vouch for it completely: http://www.sail1620.org/history/pilgrims_not_puritans.html Looking back, though, PumaClaw didn’t really specify who he was talking about; I assumed he meant the Mayflower party without any real justification; he could have meant Puritans (or Cortes, for all I know).

Seriously? I think skin color is about the most inconsequential thing about somebody. It affects how much sunscreen you buy and not a whole lot else. Obviously a matter of opinion.

You make a good point. However, I wasn’t really confronting the point PumaClaw was trying to make - that the Cherokee were not a military threat to the USA - which is demonstrably true. I was just slapping down the typical inflammatory exaggeration he used to express it.

Do you really mean that? If so, it seems like a pretty harsh indictment of Asian and American Indian educational programs.

I really don’t get this. Maybe I’ve got my history of philosophy all mixed up. Let me summarize and anyone can correct me if I’m wrong.

  1. Socrates was a major, if not the major, influence on Aristotle and Plato
  2. Aristotle and Plato are the two most important early Western philosophers
  3. Modern science is founded on the epistemology and methods of critical thinking which grew out of Western philosophy; indeed, in their infancy, philosophy were considered one and the same
  4. Inventions only made possible by modern science have had significant impacts on the lives of every single human being on earth

If that’s true, how could Socrates not be a major philosopher worldwide? I know it’s hard even for experts to assess the impact of a philosopher on another philosopher, or on an amorphous thing like science, and I’m no expert, but that’s the way I’ve always felt.

I guess we have very different guesses about the intellectual environment PumaClaw grew up in. Didn’t he learn about Euclid and Platonic solids in geometry class? Didn’t the doctors who gave him his vaccinations take the Hippocratic oath? Can you even teach the fundamentals of politics and ethics without Plato and Aristotle?

Now that I think about, you might have a case. The most important legacies of Socrates seem to be critical thinking and analytical reasoning, skills which PumaClaw obviously lacks. It’s not because of his ethnicity though.

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I meant to say, “in their infancy, philosophy and science were considered one and the same”.

51

ratty’s rules of decency: oh, hey, that was beautifully expressed. Reading that made my day.

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Hey, can we get these rules added to the FAQ?:smiley:

53

Here’s what Puma said to me:

“Instead of playing Socrates here, why don’t you read my lengthy post and think about it instead of glancing over it and taking 30 seconds to pen out this inane response here? Even Socrates got so sick of his “define this,” “define that,” “define the other” that he wound up ingesting hemlock. I hope you’ll get over your fascination with that moron before you make a complete fool of yourself.”

He brought up Socrates. He also brought up the fact that the KKK was a good place to find a definition:

“Heck ask the KKK what their definition of white is”

I realize he said it in jest, but still. What sort of defense is that anyway? The KKK said it so it has to be true? We all know that the KKK is the official fighter for truth, justice, and accuracy:rolleyes:

54

Jesus Christ on an out of control unicycle, what are jac (just jac) and Puma’s problems? They’re both Billy Jack crossed with the Black Knight from Monty Python and laced with Martin Short’s Nathan P. Thurm.

“Indians invented techno dance clubs and geodesic domes 20,000 years before there were white men. They loved nature and the soil and didn’t have violent bones in their bodies and greeted the settlers with gifts of butterfly collections and cuddly puppy dogs. But whites instead gave them each a petrie dish of bubos because they’re evil devil worshippers.”

This cite says you’re wrong.

“Of course it does. It was written by white people. Besides, I never said they met them with puppy dogs. I said they met them with Puppy Dogs. You haven’t proven anything.”

The most frustrating part is that I really don’t have a clue what we’re arguing about. I completely agree that the Indian cultures were shafted and that some of the settlers and explorers were evil and that the Trail of Tears and the wars through Wounded Knee are a cancer on American history. Evidently that’s just not enough- I have to admit that Malcolm X’s “white devil” rhetoric was the only good non-Indian authored quote in American history and that Indians are the greatest people ever to exist and that all white people should move back to Europe.

Sorry for the discombulated venting. I’m gonna go change into my Givenchy nightgown and lick toads now.

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Sucks don’t it? I have the sneaking suspicion that Puma is a college kid with a cause. Initially I tried to show Puma that he was being overly racist. NO luck. I then tried to be nice. Still no effect on the racist attitude.

Do you think ignorance can spread? Is the mere reading of the ignorance contageous? I’m going to wipe down my computer screen with disinfective-just in case…

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Yes, and he must contend with living in a western culture, however, he also has a second cultural basis to draw experience from that does not view things the same way. An interesting example of this occurs in 17th century missionary efforts. One of the things that drew some missionary interest in the Puritans was, naturally, that they werent succumbing to small pox like the Puritans. Indian tribes did not perceive the living “spirit world” as any different from the dead “physical world” as western culture has tended to, at least since the scientific revolution. Spirit and material were fused together, one and the same; there was only one world which needed to be explained. Spiritual and material concerns were unified, hence Indians saw the missionaries as attractive in this regard. Native Americans being very culturally adaptive based on the changing situation thought hey, these guys have clearly taimed this thing, lets see what they have to say about the world. How can we put this to use to fight small-pox which has decimated our lifestyle.

Agreed. Things differ from time to place. But I do not think it would be an unwarranted statement to make the qualified generalization that: For the most part, seventeenth century, white, New England society was dominated by religous fanatics.

I just think the whole idea of race and what not is often more of a decision to adopt a set of cultural values than being linked, necesarilly, to skin color. “Race” might make a difference to the individual choosing to be of a race. This is increasingly pronounced nowadays when there is not an active social-engineering project to keep races genetically seperate and there are more and more races coming to the United States. You see “white” guys thinking their black, black guys playing golf. Its all very confusing these days IMO. I think the physical characteristics of black and white (and others) may be becoming blurred yet the cultures still persist.

I’d imagine they were probably more of a perceived threat than anything else. Being of a different race, a different political body, in control of potentially valuable land. The borders then might also have been not well defined or indefensible since colonization was often sporadic, not one line moving across the west. Also, Cherokee numbers might have been dwindling. I wonder what the internal politics of the Cherokee were like during that period. I recall the folks who signed the removal treaties ended up being killed.

Perhaps, but the path youve drawn from Socrates to the advent of modern science is filled with so many caveats that its possible to conceive of it happening w/o Socrates. There were so many other factors, including the invention of the specifically western notion of truth during the Catholic era. Think about the social and intellectual impact moving from one culture where youve got the vicar of christ, unquestionable, reassuring you the difference from the truth and the lies. Keeping you on the path of righcheousnous. Then, reformation hits. Its natural to see how unified, communal science might develop, as sort of a successor to the unified catholic church. Intellectuals crapped their pants and had to find something they could see as true while the original fountainhead of truth, the church, had just broken apart and now you werent even sure which way was up anymore. Thats just my unresearched position though, and obviously there are more factors than that in play, including the philosophies of Socrates, Plato, Aristotle.

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Where th’ pumaclaw?

I mean, is he too embarassed to show his face in the pit?

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Embarrassed? Possibly not. I can’t see where anyone’s offered PumaClaw the gilt-edged personal invite to come on down here to the Pit. Anyone told him this is happening? Might be a poster who doesn’t come down this way that often.

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I guess so. But I don’t he could’ve not seen it for this long.

60

I thought he’d scarpered but he posted again so what do I know.