This video is in response to David Starkey’s comments made on BBC “Whites Have become Black”.
Following the riots in London, A English historian made racially inflammatory statements about black people. During a debate about the disturbances on BBC2’s Newsnight, English historian Dr Starkey argued that one of the central problems was the influence of a ‘violent, destructive and nihilistic’ black culture that had corrupted too many of Britain’s youngsters.
Warming to his theme, he said: ‘A substantial section of the chavs have become black. The whites have become black. Black and white, boy and girl, operate in this language together . . . which is wholly false, which is a Jamaican patois that’s been intruded in England, and this is why so many of us have this sense of literally a foreign country.’
Lies My Teacher Told Me:Native Americans
Native Americans
“Historically, American Indians have been the most lied-about subset of our population” (99).Did Europeans “civilize” the Americas? Actually, anthropologists tell us that “hunters and gatherers were relatively peaceful, compared to agriculturalists, and that modern societies were more warlike still. Thus violence increases with civilization” (101-2).
”..textbooks cannot resist contrasting “primitive” Americans with modern Europeans” (102).
”In what ways do we prefer the civilized Third Reich to the more primitive Arawak nation that Columbus encountered? If we refuse to label the Third Reich civilized, are we not using the term to imply a certain comity? If so, we must consider the Arawaks civilized, and we must also consider Columbus and his Spaniards primitive is not savage” (102).
”Europeans persuaded Natives to specialize in the fur and slave trades. Native Americans were better hunters and trappers than Europeans, and with the guns the Europeans sold them, they became better still. Other Native skills began to atrophy” (103).
”..because whites “demanded institutions reflective of their own with which to relate,” many Native groups strengthened their tribal governments… New confederations and nations developed.. The tribes also became more male- dominated, in imitation of Europeans.. [there was] an escalation of Indian warfare… [the slave trade helped] to deagriculturize Native Americans. To avoid being targets for capture, Indians abandoned their cornfields and their villages” (105-6).
”Europeans did not “civilize” or “settle” roaming Indians, but had the opposite impact” (107).
”..from the start in Virginia.. settlers fled to Indian villages rather than endure the rigors of life among the autocratic English. Indeed, many white and black newcomers chose to live an Indian lifestyle… some Natives chose to live among whites.. The migration was mostly the other way, however.. Europeans were always trying to stop the outflow. Hernando De Soto had to post guards to keep his men and women from defecting to Native societies… right up to the end of independent Indian nationahood in 1890, whites continued to defect, and whites who lived an Indian lifestyle, such as Daniel Boone, became cultural heroes in white society” (109).
”Not one American history textbook mentions the attraction of Native societies to European Americans and African Americans” (109).
”According to Benjamin Franklin, “All their government is by Counsel of the Sages. There is no Force; there are no Prisons, no officers to compel Obedience, or inflict Punishment.” Probably foremost, the lack of hierarchy in the Native socieites in the eastern United States attracted the admiration of European observers. Frontiersmen were taken with the extent to which Native Americans enjoyed freedom as individuals. Women were also accorded more status and power.. than in white societies of the time” (109-110).
Lt. Gov. Cadwallader Colden of New York in 1727 said, “Here we see the natural Origin of all Power and Authority among a free People” (110).
