# Declaration of Independence calls Native Americans savages **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [December 17, 2019, 3:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/declaration-of-independence-calls-native-americans-savages/844988 "2019-12-17T15:25:47Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Bijou\_Drains](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bijou_drains/32/2814_2.png) [@Bijou\_Drains](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bijou_Drains)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2019, 3:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/declaration-of-independence-calls-native-americans-savages/844988/1 "2019-12-17T15:25:47Z")
By he, they mean King George III He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions. I guess they were not part of all men being equal. ---
**Author:** ![Chefguy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chefguy/32/138_2.png) [@Chefguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chefguy)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2019, 3:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/declaration-of-independence-calls-native-americans-savages/844988/2 "2019-12-17T15:38:27Z")
Native Americans and African slaves were considered to be less than human by many, if not most white colonists. In order to justify expansion and genocide, it was convenient to continue to promote the idea of merciless savages raping women and killing children. That sort of language would have been common at the time and largely accepted as fact. It was also carried over into the Constitution in the form of the 2nd Amendment, which was partly written the way it was in order to allow any group to form an armed militia for the purpose of murdering those who were in the way of expansion. ---
**Author:** ![Inigo\_Montoya](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/inigo_montoya/32/124_2.png) [@Inigo\_Montoya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inigo_Montoya)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2019, 3:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/declaration-of-independence-calls-native-americans-savages/844988/3 "2019-12-17T15:57:38Z")
Well, looks like the DoI fails the purity test. Time to torch it. ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2019, 4:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/declaration-of-independence-calls-native-americans-savages/844988/4 "2019-12-17T16:01:49Z")
Is anyone surprised that 250 years ago or so, people wrote, thought, said and did things that today we would find offensive or abhorrent? Even fifty years ago, the attitudes and language of some wouldn’t pass muster today. ---
**Author:** ![DrFidelius](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drfidelius/32/3447_2.png) [@DrFidelius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrFidelius)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2019, 4:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/declaration-of-independence-calls-native-americans-savages/844988/5 "2019-12-17T16:05:19Z")
Well, good thing it isn’t the basic of our laws or the structure if our government then. ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2019, 4:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/declaration-of-independence-calls-native-americans-savages/844988/6 "2019-12-17T16:22:41Z")
> [@Bijou\_Drains](#): > > I guess they were not part of all men being equal. As for that, don’t you remember that the other founding document that no one has read only counted some people at three-fifths for census purposes? The founding fathers (and they were all men) absolutely didn’t believe that all men were equal. Hell, there are still some people, even those serving in government today, who don’t think that. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2019, 4:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/declaration-of-independence-calls-native-americans-savages/844988/7 "2019-12-17T16:28:47Z")
Does the OP realize that when they said “all men are created equal” they didn’t really mean to include women? You know, people that couldn’t vote, couldn’t hold property, and were subservient to their husbands? Why didn’t you post this in the [Obvious things about a creative work you realize after the millionth time](https://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=525685) thread? ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2019, 4:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/declaration-of-independence-calls-native-americans-savages/844988/8 "2019-12-17T16:45:49Z")
It wasn’t just Indians. Germans (notably Hessians) were characterized as being pretty barbarous as well: > [@](#): > > He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation, and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & Perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation. ---
**Author:** ![Bijou\_Drains](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bijou_drains/32/2814_2.png) [@Bijou\_Drains](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bijou_Drains)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2019, 5:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/declaration-of-independence-calls-native-americans-savages/844988/9 "2019-12-17T17:06:17Z")
I tend to think of a creative work as a book, play , movie, TV show, etc. But I guess technically any written document is creative. ---
**Author:** ![hogarth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hogarth/32/1773_2.png) [@hogarth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hogarth)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2019, 6:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/declaration-of-independence-calls-native-americans-savages/844988/10 "2019-12-17T18:06:48Z")
I guess it’s a good thing that the “known rule of warfare” includes smallpox-infected blankets. ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2019, 6:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/declaration-of-independence-calls-native-americans-savages/844988/11 "2019-12-17T18:09:22Z")
I put a realization about a Japanese flag in that thread because there is creativity in visual works of art as well. ---
**Author:** ![thorny\_locust](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thorny_locust/32/431_2.png) [@thorny\_locust](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thorny_locust)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2019, 6:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/declaration-of-independence-calls-native-americans-savages/844988/12 "2019-12-17T18:38:34Z")
Much of the history of the USA can be seen as a protracted argument over what, precisely, “all men are created equal” means. We’ve gained on it some; but we’re still having that argument. Stick something like that in your founding documents and it keeps popping up again to whack you in the head. Give the founders some credit for putting it in there; but don’t assume that they’d really thought it through. There’s lots of evidence that they hadn’t. ---
**Author:** ![Broomstick](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/broomstick/32/246_2.png) [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2019, 6:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/declaration-of-independence-calls-native-americans-savages/844988/13 "2019-12-17T18:40:05Z")
> [@Bijou\_Drains](#): > > I tend to think of a creative work as a book, play , movie, TV show, etc. But I guess technically any written document is creative. A document that creates (or helps create) an independent nation or a new government most certainly is creative, even if not in a sense one normally thinks of creative works. ---
**Author:** ![SpoilerVirgin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/4491bb/32.png) [@SpoilerVirgin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SpoilerVirgin)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2019, 6:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/declaration-of-independence-calls-native-americans-savages/844988/14 "2019-12-17T18:49:25Z")
There was joke in Weekend Update last night on SNL. Someone had said that Trump was the greatest president of all time, and SNL pointed out that this meant that he was better than George Washington. The audience laughed at the idea that Trump was better than Washington, until Michael Che reminded them that Washington owned slaves, so Trump really is better than Washington. I’m a great admirer of the founding fathers, and believe that they had some very enlightened ideas, but there’s no getting around the fact that almost all of them were fine with owning people and believed in the superiority of white people of European ancestry. ---
**Author:** ![Bijou\_Drains](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bijou_drains/32/2814_2.png) [@Bijou\_Drains](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bijou_Drains)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2019, 7:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/declaration-of-independence-calls-native-americans-savages/844988/15 "2019-12-17T19:36:04Z")
> [@hogarth](#): > > I guess it’s a good thing that the “known rule of warfare” includes smallpox-infected blankets. Some guy named Cecil commented on that story: [Did whites ever give Native Americans blankets infected with smallpox? - The Straight Dope](https://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/1088/did-whites-ever-give-native-americans-blankets-infected-with-smallpox/) ---
**Author:** ![ftg](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ftg/32/2801_2.png) [@ftg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ftg)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2019, 10:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/declaration-of-independence-calls-native-americans-savages/844988/16 "2019-12-17T22:24:09Z")
> [@Bijou\_Drains](#): > > He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions. Narrowly speaking, they are referring only to the frontier combat natives that were stirred to war on the colonials by the Brits. During the Revolution, there were tribes on either side. Maybe the colonials viewed their native allies as savages. Maybe they didn’t. The above doesn’t clarify this on its own. Cf. the German troops. I don’t see how one could consider that comment to apply to all Germans. (After all, there were a bunch of German settlers among the colonials who fought for independence.) It’s standard propaganda to make negative comments about those that are doing bad stuff to you. And the _DoI_ was full of propaganda. ---
**Author:** ![Chefguy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chefguy/32/138_2.png) [@Chefguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chefguy)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2019, 10:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/declaration-of-independence-calls-native-americans-savages/844988/17 "2019-12-17T22:34:35Z")
> [@Bijou\_Drains](#): > > Some guy named Cecil commented on that story: > > [Did whites ever give Native Americans blankets infected with smallpox? - The Straight Dope](https://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/1088/did-whites-ever-give-native-americans-blankets-infected-with-smallpox/) I read about that very topic in a book not long ago. It also quoted those letters. There doesn’t seem to be any documented proof that it ever happened, which of course doesn’t mean that it didn’t, just that nobody wrote it down. ---
**Author:** ![KneadToKnow](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kneadtoknow/32/3999_2.png) [@KneadToKnow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KneadToKnow)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2019, 10:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/declaration-of-independence-calls-native-americans-savages/844988/18 "2019-12-17T22:37:50Z")
> [@Dewey\_Finn](#): > > Is anyone surprised that 250 years ago or so, people wrote, thought, said and did things that today we would find offensive or abhorrent? Even fifty years ago, the attitudes and language of some wouldn’t pass muster today. Just this morning, someone on the radio was deriding _Friends_ because 25 years ago they made fat jokes. ---
**Author:** ![Two\_Many\_Cats](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/8dc957/32.png) [@Two\_Many\_Cats](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Two_Many_Cats)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2019, 11:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/declaration-of-independence-calls-native-americans-savages/844988/19 "2019-12-17T23:58:33Z")
You know, people two hundred years from now are going to be aghast that we killed animals for meat. They’ll be okay with us killing foreigners though. ---
**Author:** ![Broomstick](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/broomstick/32/246_2.png) [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2019, 12:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/declaration-of-independence-calls-native-americans-savages/844988/20 "2019-12-18T00:27:11Z")
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