"The settlement story of the Americas is much more complicated than we've realized."
Humans and their stories tend to be complicated, often more so than realized. Which can be a A problem for the teller, the hearer, and the ones who want to manipulate and use the stories for political or personal advantage.
The best book about pre-Columbian America is "1491" by Charles Mann (and its follow up "1493" is interesting as well). Yeah, it's complicated because there were a lot of humans living here and you know how they are, those humans. There's been a lot left out of the stories because it doesn't neatly fit the academic/activist narrative. For just one example, the USA founding story. The pilgrims landed (ultimately) in a mass grave yard. (Mass graves necessitated by disease borne by French traders to local Indians.) They survived for a while by eating grave offerings. The local Indian tribe befriended them because the tribe was weakened by disease and needed the pilgrims' weapons to fight off the next tribe over. In addition, there were ancient and astonishing civilizations on our continent as well as South America, gone and almost forgotten/purposefully ignored because (basically) their spectacular successes, and failures, do not fit the narrative of simple native people, all from one spot, living peacefully as one with the land so beloved by academics and activist Indians. People don't realize that these assholes who chalk up every failure to colonialism are themselves practicing colonialism and telling lies which suppress the truth and deny humanity and autonomy to people of color.
I do enjoy Graham Hancock and have several of his books but would not necessarily buy into all his conclusions. He's not Ancient Aliens nuts, though, and knows a lot about a lot so he always has something interesting to say. Fortunately, he works in an area where "scholars" have pretty much beclowned themselves for generations.
The mounds in Cahokia Illinois are laid out much like the Aztec temple complexes and were probably used for the same type of human sacrifice. I remember how disappointed the scholars were when it turned out the Mayans were not the gentle people they were passing them off as.
Am I to assume from the illustration above that George Floyd was an Olmec?
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"The settlement story of the Americas is much more complicated than we've realized."
Humans and their stories tend to be complicated, often more so than realized. Which can be a A problem for the teller, the hearer, and the ones who want to manipulate and use the stories for political or personal advantage.
The best book about pre-Columbian America is "1491" by Charles Mann (and its follow up "1493" is interesting as well). Yeah, it's complicated because there were a lot of humans living here and you know how they are, those humans. There's been a lot left out of the stories because it doesn't neatly fit the academic/activist narrative. For just one example, the USA founding story. The pilgrims landed (ultimately) in a mass grave yard. (Mass graves necessitated by disease borne by French traders to local Indians.) They survived for a while by eating grave offerings. The local Indian tribe befriended them because the tribe was weakened by disease and needed the pilgrims' weapons to fight off the next tribe over. In addition, there were ancient and astonishing civilizations on our continent as well as South America, gone and almost forgotten/purposefully ignored because (basically) their spectacular successes, and failures, do not fit the narrative of simple native people, all from one spot, living peacefully as one with the land so beloved by academics and activist Indians. People don't realize that these assholes who chalk up every failure to colonialism are themselves practicing colonialism and telling lies which suppress the truth and deny humanity and autonomy to people of color.
I do enjoy Graham Hancock and have several of his books but would not necessarily buy into all his conclusions. He's not Ancient Aliens nuts, though, and knows a lot about a lot so he always has something interesting to say. Fortunately, he works in an area where "scholars" have pretty much beclowned themselves for generations.
The mounds in Cahokia Illinois are laid out much like the Aztec temple complexes and were probably used for the same type of human sacrifice. I remember how disappointed the scholars were when it turned out the Mayans were not the gentle people they were passing them off as.
Am I to assume from the illustration above that George Floyd was an Olmec?
All the Mayans on Cozumel are slightly taller than midgets.
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