(Source: fac-ut-vivas, via zorascreation)

Jamestown, The Powhatan Confederacy, and the Myth of Pocahontas

adailyriot:

• In 1607, 32 Native Nations comprised the Powhatan Confederacy. It had over 15,000 people
• Many times when maps of the regions were created in 1607 and around then, Native villages would be wiped off of them and made to look sparse to support the idea of North America being a ‘void’.
• [photo] Wahunsenacawh holding council with members of Powhatan confederacy.
  • Pearls were used in Powhatan and other eastern nations/confederacy to denote status.
  • At the time, artists were sent to depict what the Americas and Native villages looked like. It was not uncommon to have been depicted not as is due to biases of the time.
• Jamestown Fort 1607-1611 
  • Was built in a triangle shape with best artillery on the corners
  • Their dead was buried inside the fort as not to show weakness to the Powhatans
  • John Smith arrived in 1607
• In the Powhatan Confederacy, alliances were made through marriage and through having children.
  • Women would go to villages to marry chiefs, have a child and go back to their tribes/villages after a year.
• Both Chief Powhatan and his daughter were missed named.
  • The English assumed the name of the tribe was the Chief’s name.
  • His daughter’s name is: Matsoaks’ats
  • When she met John Smith in 1607, she was between 8-11 years old.
• The Europeans had a bad habit of not having enough food with them when they traveled.
  • The food that was on the ground when the explores/invaders found upon their arrival that they took, was from a cemetery that had been left out for the spirits.
  • The Europeans/British would also raid villages for food while the (native) hunting parties were out.
• John Smith gave the Chief a hat/crown, which he understood meant that the Chief would be a “subject of the crown”. This did not translate to the Chief.
• At the time, the Native people on the east coast were about 6 feet tall (or taller) on average; while the Europeans were about 5 feet tall.
• Pocahontas was wed in her teens to a Native person
• Smith and settlers didn’t have food (again)
  •  Smith kidnaps and holds Pocahontas for ransom to gain food
    • when the Chief gave in, they decided to still hold her prisoner
    • She was forced to assimilate into European culture and Christianity
    • She was forced to marry her oppressor
  • The only known portrait of her was made in 1616
  • Matsoaka’ats (Pocahontas) was used as a walking, talking, advertisement for the Virginia Company
  • She was not allowed to leave England and she died there
  • At the time, and even now, England refuses to give her body back to her tribe because her grave/remains is a tourist attraction.

… 

newsandtrade:

angryfuckingliberal:

I will never not reblog

This is the funniest thing I’ve seen all day.

Caption: If First Nation people had been Republicans.

(Source: cartoonpolitics)

simplyrav:

mendmyheart:

doyayoda:

californiacornbread:

I’ve got some bad news for all the Native Americans/American Indians: We won. So shut the fuck up.

Lately, I’ve been hearing a lot of complaining from the peanut gallery about the “hipster headdress” phenomenon. Native Americans are insulted by it. Guess what? We can co-opt anything we want from Native American culture. We wanted the land you had. We fought several wars against you and took it. I’m sure you don’t like manifest destiny, but I’m noticing you’re dealing with it.

Do you know why you don’t get to complain? Federal subsidies. We pay you every single year to live on reservations and shut the fuck up. If you want to complain, quit taking the money. Quit subsidizing your casinos with federal tax revenue. Deal with your rampant alcoholism and poverty. (This especially goes to the Lakota Sioux, who refused to take the federal money awarded to them, and now have several billion dollars sitting in a federal account gaining interest. We’re not going to give you your land back. It’s ours now. So take the money and fund your schools. Did you know Native Americans have the lowest levels of literacy in the United States? Yup. It’s true. You’re even worse than blacks and hispanics.)

Your failure to adapt into a modern world has cemented your second-class citizenship in our country. The fact that a few hot white chicks are wearing headdresses is the least of your problems. If you really want to complain about the mockery being made of your culture, look inward. Take a long, hard look at all of your failures. There have been few societies on Earth handed so much, that have done so little with it. You don’t develop technology. You don’t develop your own education systems. You don’t invest in healthcare. You simply pump money into casinos in the blind hopes you’ll get more money back from ol’ pale face. Your economic disparity between the rich and the poor makes the rest of the United States look like a glowing utopia.

Your argument is cancelled. We’re not oppressing you anymore. You’re oppressing yourselves. Fuck off.

This has white privilege written ALL over it. How ignorant. 

 The words IGNORANT and ARROGANT are not enough to explain this whole shitty post.

This is the most ignorant crap I’ve read since a while. I just wanna know if this *** person can say this in people’s FACE instead of writing a stupid post online. 

You’re a shitty person. Just shitty. The “We’re better than you because we are” argument is not only shitty, it’s fucking ignorant. Your precious “pioneers” would have been nothing without the help of the Native Americans who taught their stupid asses how to farm in unfamiliar territory after they had been grave robbing and eating deceased Native Americans. You’re so fucking stupid, “failure to adapt”? How about failure to accept the fact that your ancestors are fucking thieves who believed they were entitled to everybody else’s shit because ‘god’ was on their side. The fucking king wrote that the diseases that decimated Native Americans were sent by god, thankful because thousands of people died.

Also, get off your ‘primitives are nothing without us’ soapbox. The Americas were fully populated with towns of people who coexisted and exercised democracy, a form of democracy which went on to influence the Constitution, yes your almighty Constitution, so please, SHUT YOUR IGNORANT ASS UP. 

(via bollyspired)