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Alternative History as Cultural Revitalization

3/3/2013

27 Comments

 
The scholar of Indo-European myth Bruce Lincoln wrote an informative book in 1992 called Discourse and the Structure of Society in which he argued that myths “can be, and have been, employed as effective instruments not only for the replication of established social forms … but more broadly for the construction, deconstruction, and reconstruction of society itself.” For Lincoln, myth can serve as the vehicle whereby societies experiencing crisis can justify the practical changes needed to overcome crisis or to provide the sanction of history and the divine to maintain existing social hierarchies in the face of crisis.

In The Demon-Haunted World, Carl Sagan offered a similar thought, though in less academic language: “Whenever out ethnic or national prejudices are aroused, in times of scarcity, during challenges to national self-esteem or nerve, when we agonize about our diminished cosmic place and purpose, or when fanaticism is bubbling up around us—then habits of thought familiar from ages past reach for the controls. The candle flames gutters. It’s little pool of light trembles. Darkness gathers. The demons begin to stir.”

I bring this up because I am disturbed by the weird change that has taken place in Ancient Aliens and now America Unearthed. I have written several times about how Ancient Aliens seems to be advocating a neo-pagan religion, complete with a spiritual dimension akin to heaven where worshipers will be rewarded with eternal bliss. Now, America Unearthed host Scott Wolter is going in quest of the Holy Grail, which he believes is the secret set of descendants of Jesus and Mary Magdalene. In looking for a physical dimension to the Christian mysteries, this “holy bloodline myth” (which is not unique to Wolter, of course) seems of a piece with ancient astronaut theorists’ yearning desire to make material the immaterial, to make gods into men, to give religion a physical foundation. In turn, such a yearning seems closely related to the idea that in a world where science represents the commonly accepted language of truth, the spiritual must be cast in the guise (if not the methods) of science—the same impulse behind Intelligent Design. It does, however, seem to be a bit of a step down for religion and the old faith in the transcendent.

This has nothing to do with the search for archaeological evidence for or against one particular alternative claim but rather how a multitude of claims, for which there is at very best ambiguous evidence, are sown together into an alternative worldview, one that rivals the mainstream and seems to serve a purpose beyond mere archaeological inquiry.

This also has clear parallels with what anthropology calls “revitalization movements,” conscious efforts on the part of a culture under stress to restructure society. One of the best known examples is that of the Seneca prophet Handsome Lake, who in the years around 1800 preached a new religion in the guise of resurrecting traditional Iroquois (Haudenosaunee) values. His faith was particularly appealing because in a time when the Iroquois were under pressure from white Americans to adopt Euro-American culture and had lost their traditional lands to white settlers, Handsome Lake emphasized a strong, indigenous identity—but he did so by adopting and adapting the values of Christianity. He eventually descended into literal witch-hunting, accusing his followers right and left of being witches. A similar movement in those years among white Americans in search of a new national identity after the break from Britain gave rise to the lost white race theorists, culminating in Mormonism, with its recreated past of lost white mound builders who were the lost tribes of Israel come to America—a new, non-English but still “white” past. In both cases, the revivalist groups recreated the past to help negotiate the tricky politics and sociology of Euro-American settlement in lands once occupied by non-Euro-American people.

I’m certain that it is no coincidence that “alternative archaeology” tends to achieve its greatest success in periods of social upheaval. In America, it correlates well with the early Republic, Reconstruction, the Depression, the 1960s/70s, and the post-9/11 eras. (There are exceptions: American interest in Graham Hancock’s lost civilization claims of the 1990s was possibly one, though its presumed web of hidden communications networks and priesthood of secret dispensers of high-tech information did parallel the technological upheavals of the Web 1.0 era.)

It’s possible to become convinced by one particular archaeological “alternative” claim, like a particular Norse expedition to Minnesota, or a stray Englishman in Anasazi territory, without becoming part of the revitalization movement. (Indeed, any one claim by itself is a scientific question.) But those who string together dozens of such claims across time and space, almost indiscriminately and largely without care about the quality of evidence, do so because they reject mainstream “ways of knowing,” and are involved in a project designed (consciously or not) to replace an unsatisfying mainstream view with one that is more satisfying on an emotional level, or more useful in advocating particular cultural values that the advocate wishes society to adopt.

This isn’t just speculation on my part. On Friday I received an email from a highly deluded individual who, if taken at his word, believes he is the incarnation of a Hindu god (specifically Vishnu), who is also a space alien, and that religion is the only path to helping science prevent global warming from creating an imminent apocalypse that will end the Kali Yuga. He strung together every half-understood claim from Ancient Aliens and imagined that his message of renewal is failing because it’s all a conspiracy by the evil mainstream academics to suppress the truth for profit.

The questions, I guess, are these: What are the values these alternative proponents wish to normalize? And for what reason?

27 Comments
CFC
3/3/2013 06:59:11 am

Jason,
Great article! Thank You.
My observation is America Unearthed (Mr. Wolter, Committee Films & H2) Value: money and ratings
DO NOT VALUE: honesty in their programming, research integrity or educating the public and students with historically accurate information.
Truly frightening!!!

Reply
phillip
3/3/2013 10:30:08 am

CFC,
To add a little humor to your thoughts....
Based on Scotts "scripted" encounters with those who oppose his beliefs, I take this to be an attempt at adding "real life" adventure to this otherwise mundane subject matter. In so proving my theory that he really, really, likes Indiana Jones movies .

Reply
Christopher Randolph
3/3/2013 01:37:43 pm

Hi Jason -

I initially came to this blog because there wasn't much out there specifically dealing from a mainstream archeological perspective with the AU claims.

I've stayed because I've discovered the work you've done and continue to do connecting how the past is interpreted with what's going on in the present, and with people's preferred worldviews and myths.

For me what's slightly more troubling than a cable network called History (and its child networks) broadcasting this garbage is the fact that they correctly identify a large enough audience for these themes to be lucrative. Sure it's a cynical cash grab, but there are so many ways to attempt a cynical cash grab, and not all of them would work.

I've sounded a bit of a broken record on this issue the past few weeks, but obviously I identify the willingness of a broad swath of the American public to eat this up as the following:

- America is losing its place in the world and relatively powerless Americans have lost faith in the mainstream American mythos
- Many relatively powerless white people feel they are losing position not only in the world but within American society; their myths need to bolster race pride (Ancient Europeans in America or the "inability" of Arabs to pull off 9/11 seem in this general category)
- Science, education, educational institutions and professionals are generally degraded, and largely so by people who haven't ever had the advantage of experiencing academia first-hand. Even the scientific method and logic are thought of as irritants.
- Apocalyptic religious fervor is high, with many people actively looking forward to a violent endtime (witness the all too real buffoons on Doomsday Preppers)

This all manifests itself in disturbed group delusions.

This never ends well. We're in some degree of trouble here.

Reply
Jason Colavito link
3/3/2013 01:50:26 pm

What amazes me is that the same people who laugh at the pretentions of Afrocentrism and its most laughable claims about early African colonization of America don't think that the same scrutiny should apply to claims about European voyagers to pre-Columbian America. It certainly implies a certain degree of ethnocentrism.

Reply
Rocky R Rockbourne
3/3/2013 05:58:43 pm

Jason, from my experience, I think in most cases that would be confirmation bias combined with prejudicial bias against opposing conclusions/viewpoints. The ones that really confuse me are the ones that actually can think critically about every viewpoint except for their own. Maybe that's called "evidence for bicameralism"? Anyway, this post really rang some bells for me, nicely done.

Christopher Randolph
3/4/2013 03:26:04 pm

For a laugh imagine the meeting with H2 execs in which one pitches a show about how, week after week, sub-Saharan Africans beat Columbus to the Americas.

Do people think "Amerikkka Unearthed" hosted by Scott X, with the same level of proof and rigor, would be on H2 right now? If the answer is no maybe some folks' assessment of whether or not race has anything to do with this needs to be reexamined.

Thane
3/4/2013 12:52:55 pm

I think your points:

"- America is losing its place in the world and relatively powerless Americans have lost faith in the mainstream American mythos"

and

"Science, education, educational institutions and professionals are generally degraded, and largely so by people who haven't ever had the advantage of experiencing academia first-hand. Even the scientific method and logic are thought of as irritants."

are related. Acedemia and education have been denigrating American history and the views and values of pre-20th century America. When you constantly find nothing but fault with the past of your nation and the society of that nation, people will naturally search for something in which they can be proud and can use as a defense.

When you couple that with intellectual dishonesty and laziness, you will see a degradation of critical thinking skills.

Then add to that the need to make people who some see as outsiders to feel good about themselves and to do so you need to denigrate others... you engender a new form of racism wherein the people who are starting to feel disenfranchised go the extra mile to prove their worth.....as well as suppressing people from full potential due to the soft bigotry of low expectations.

As to belief in other spirituality.... there have been studies that show when involvement in organized mainstream religions fall off, there is an increase in other alternative belief systems. I can't find reference to the studies but from what I recall, they did make sense. Humans are very capable but we do seem to have a need to believe in something greater than ourselves.

It's all a vicious cycle feeding off itself.

Sadly, I agree that it is likely to get darker before the dawn.

Reply
Christopher Randolph
3/4/2013 03:15:17 pm

Well I think if we get past your and my buzzwords we both have a good idea as to where we each lean politically.

But that's good, it only serves to show how a lot of the interpretation of the past is merely reflective of views of the present.

Parts of academia have only been "denigrating" some American history in the past few decades only from the perspective of people whose ancestors used to be depicted as noble regardless of what they did. From the perspective of peoples who used to be disenfranchised (think the descendants of slaves, Native Americans and so forth), we've only recently been teaching history correctly.

And that that you stated right there is exactly what I mean when I say that some people in America feel besieged, feel they are losing social position, and this is some of the weirdness that squirts out as a reaction. We might be on two portions of the same page here; I see the reaction as less excused perhaps than you (?).

As far as established or alternative faiths - I don't want either mucking around in archeology. Middle Eastern archeology is a mess in places because mainstream Jewish, Christian and/or Muslim professionals (ones who are actually personally religious beyond ethnic identity) each have an ax to grind because claims of X,Y or Z in the past could affect things in the present. I don't want faith mixing in with (or supplanting) science regardless of whether those faiths have 100 or 100 million followers.

Fortunately I should add that there a good many scientists in each faith who are less literalist and indicate for the rest of us when their colleagues are being less than scientific.

So far as a I know, because of geography the one faith that has a long history of actively trying to foul the waters in North America are the Mormons. What I fear we're seeing are some Christians leaning toward some very weird Christian Identity-friendly ideas about light-skinned crusaders - literal ones in some cases - poking around the Midwest.

J.
3/9/2013 07:02:19 pm

To me, it seems the salient point in your observations is the need, conscious and unconscious, for a people to align themselves with a myth. Issues arise when the myth they understood proves to be an inadequate framework for understanding and addressing the problems they face in their own contemporary period. That's when cultural myths tend to go in for an overhaul -- they're revisited, revised, and often merged with other myths that seem to provide a missing voice to the conversation the myth-making people want to hear.

My concern is that we don't tend to be very good readers or interpreters of mythic narratives today. I think that's a modern phenomenon; mythic structure was built into oral traditions, and persisted in literature and art up into the early modernist movement, often with the implicit understanding that the audience would grasp the mythic elements and that would be enough for them to connect the fragmented dots.

James Joyce's Ulysses is a good example of that; it's not read much today, but it was in its day. But he's just the colossus of modern mythic literature; there are scores of other writers who went the same route. The point, though, is that Joyce (and others) wrote in an idiom that would be understood by people who didn't necessarily have PhD's in literature, and it was accepted that they would also get some of the mythic elements and could go from there.

Today that's not so much the case; people don't seem to read that sort of literature for fun anymore, and when we encounter mythic elements in a narrative, they're interpreted as literal and egotistically mapped onto their own experience as predictive rather than as a perspective for understanding.

To my mind, that kind of active misinterpretation is how you end up with doomsday cults, apocalyptic Christians predicting the end of the world, and acrobatically bizarre feats of confirmation bias in alternative history conspiracy theories.

If Wolter saw some of the temples and churches I grew up around -- and we're from the same part of the world -- he'd have to assume the Templars built them as well because some of them are aligned for significant astronomical alignments that occur with specific religious dates. He doesn't seem able to conceive that any people other than the Templars ever looked up and aligned their world on earth as it is in the heavens, or would be capable of doing so.

Reply
seahay
3/3/2013 11:38:04 pm

Can we get some actual TV ratings - how many people watch this twaddle as a % of the American viewing public - before we go full chicken little?

Why not just enjoy the crazy? It's always been there, in a small corner of everyday life. Most people live blissfully unaware of Wolter's or Tsoukalos' existence - let alone any arch conspiricies they espouse.

Why does a few charlatans in the backwaters of CableTV become an indictment of America?

Reply
Jason Colavito link
3/3/2013 11:49:15 pm

One TV show is not an indictment of America as a whole. One million people watch America Unearthed (= 0.3% of the population), but it is symptomatic of a larger cultural narrative we can find across many different facets of American life. Creationism, in its various forms, is widely believed, and claims like those of AU are used to defend the idea of a young earth and Noachian Flood. The ideas Scott Wolter promotes were also used in Dan Brown's Da Vinci Code (2003), read by tens of millions and believed by a sadly large number of people.

The raw numbers of viewers are only one factor; the fact that shows like this become opinion leaders by dint of being on TV and on a channel labeled as non-fiction history let the ideas percolate into the mainstream media and into the public consciousness. Repetition then leads to further belief.

But like everything in our fractured culture, such beliefs are confined to a sub-population, for now. But as we have seen with creationism, these sub-cultures with their narrow beliefs can grow to the point that they become major cultural players.

Reply
tubby
3/4/2013 02:30:07 am

I kind of wonder if creationism in general wasn't just something that's really been lurking just under the radar and probably would continue to fly by mostly unnoticed if YEC hadn't been brought to the forefront as part of the Evangelical narrative. Along, of course, with America as Jesus's chosen country and Europe as the home of the Anti-Christ pushed in popular literature and (oddly enough) 'documentaries' on the History Channel. The idea of Templars/Jesus's bloodline coming to the New World from Europe could be a facet of the America=god's kingdom story.

seahay
3/4/2013 11:09:49 pm

While ~1M viewers is more than I thought, I doubt it will last. The show(AU) is boring. At least with Ancient Aliens we get the drama of
Tsoukalos' hair.

It was worse in the 70's. Van Dannikan was big-time with books and movies, Hal Lindsey's nonsense. Carlos Castendeda's drug-addled BS. Jews for Jesus, Jim Jones/Peoples Temple. This crap was everywhere. It passed.

Now we have the internet and niche CableTV, and yet we are nowhere near the crazy of the '70s in my 54 yo opinion. You may see sub-culture growth. I'm seeing coagulation and eventual disinterest.

Rasslin' and Zombies and SpongeBob, however, rule the Cablez.

And this is good.



Jason Colavito link
3/4/2013 11:25:22 pm

I should clarify that the season average is 750,000 with 1 million for the most recent several episodes.

You're right that it was worse in the 1970s, and that was because there were fewer media outlets, so more people were exposed to alternative ideas. When NBC showed a TV version of Chariots of the Gods, about 1/3 of American TV viewers watched... because there were only three networks and PBS. Today, one couldn't get 1/3 of people to watch anything short of the Super Bowl.

Christopher Randolph
3/4/2013 02:41:48 am

I don't "enjoy the crazy" because the crazy is becoming a large enough segment of the population that it's becoming difficult to have reality-based discussions about serious issues.

Between the diffusionists, Creationists, Preppers, Truthers, Birthers, various cultists and the undifferentiated population who have given up on the idea of academics having any validity it's getting tough out there.

Far from a tiny segment of the population believes absolutely crazy things. There's a reason that TV sees money in webs of paranoid conspiracy.

Compounding the tragedy for me is that most people are actually ripped off on a daily basis by very mundane "conspiracies" - if you'd like to elevate general fraud and unfiarness to that level - involving their working and living conditions, prices and taxes and so forth. Most people could really use a 'Forensic Accountant!' This feeds feelings of powerlessness which I believe make people more receptive conspiracy theories.

I forgot in my little list above to note that tens of millions of Americans are on and off of powerful brain-chemistry-altering psychoactive drugs, many of them now from a young age. Some of the crazy as we've seen with devastating results is heavily armed. This is not good. That's just the prescription stuff, never mind the people crazed and made paranoid by illegal drugs.

Reply
Christopher Randolph
3/4/2013 06:22:01 am

I'll append this:

http://quizmasterchris.blogspot.com/2012/02/national-geographic-channel-gives.html

This is my assessment of the Nat Geo show Doomsday Preppers and the mentality that it uncritically exploits/promotes.

seahay
3/5/2013 12:47:06 am

Well, there's belief, and then there's BELIEF. To clarify, there is soft belief - what people will casually say they believe to be edgy or for the frisson of gnosticism, and hard BELIEF. The former, in my belief, vastly outweighs the latter.

Many people will thoughtlessly say when asked, "Sure, I believe in UFOs, Arizona Vikings, chemtrails, Illuminati, etc" - it's a no cost indulgence in woo. After all, "this ain't no court of Law". But they know they aren't serious believers.

We have to acknowledge the difference in order understand the size and problem(or non-problem) of the true BELIEVERS.

As for hucksters, flim-flam men, and other assorted charlatans, they have always been with us. Though the internet has elevated their access to suckers, I won't conclude that there is proportionally more suckers now than in the past.

I agree that many suffer from innumeracy.

Byron DeLear
3/4/2013 02:26:40 pm

So, we have a case where storytelling is trumping any inherent evolutionary instinct for empirical probity. That makes sense—couple hundred thousand years of stories versus a few centuries of science (at best)?

Sure it’s called the ‘History Channel’, and yes, we have an expectation of what that means. But it *is* show biz (as we’ve all found out)—the ‘mega-male counterpart to Lifetime’. Nice.

Jason you’re doing good work, I've enjoyed your reviews and look forward to reading more.

I appreciate the critique here—the AU three-way between Chris Randolph, the Kean fellow and ‘T’, well, I was sad that ended.

The Randolph, Kean, and 'T' back-and-forth really made me think about the territorialism of flame wars, how they evolve, and the similarities to turf battles we see in academic circles, or at a place called Wikipedia. Having skin in the game definitely drives participation. Knowledge, attribution, are territories of the mind, and people are very protective and defensive about them.
It’s a survival instinct, selfish genes and all, right?
We are territorial about history—and when story tellers weave fiction with fact on the History channel, people get freaked out about it. I think it’s great to see the real time dialectic—couple days after the AU Templar episode and we get the whole thing broken down right after Jason’s hilarious unicorn post.

But I think the show’s relative success isn’t as troubling as some have suggested—viz. we’re in ‘heaps of trouble,’ quiet ‘racism’ running rampant, ‘whites’ or ‘Americans’ losing their ‘power’, ‘country’, etc.

When you peer down at the AA and AU phenomenon from 50,000 feet, the show’s style and approach seem to rely on a deeper penetration into our cranium; past the cerebral cortex, as Sagan calls “the seat of civilization”, and into more basic triggers, albeit still uniquely human formations.

The unbelievable leaps that work in the minds of many only emphasize the fact that we are storytellers and story listeners way before we are scientists—think about the many tens of thousands of years of language development and the evolution of our minds toward wielding narrative in a communally constructive (or destructive) fashion. We are oral and aural receivers with an emphasized tessitura for the reception of emotional narrative right in the center of our consciousness—facts be damned (sadly).

As Drew Westen has explained, we are emotional brains warping, manipulating, bending the space-time of empirical reality to reach emotionally satisfying conclusions. And consequential state of ‘being right’ provides a doggy biscuit in the form of a brain-chemical reward.

A Forbes piece concludes the primacy of story in a review of Harvard U Press’s “On the origin of stories: evolution, cognition, and fiction” by Brian Boyd...

“Boyd argues that “humans are hyper-intelligent and hyper-social animals.” By lining up key elements of intelligence, cooperation, pattern-seeking, alliance-making, and the understanding that other beings have beliefs and knowledge of their own, stories make us stronger and more effective as a species.”

Comparatively, science has only been around for a few centuries, and, for the average person, it has only recently occupied significant territory within our collective mainstream consciousness.

Will the History Channel's shows that violate basic principles of verification and peer review have legs? Not into the academy they won't. But the bottom line---at least History Channel's bottom line---is that people don't want to see the archaeologist's rocks, they want to be engaged emotionally and entertained.

As we test the boundaries of culture-churning-narrative infused with varying ratios of fact and fiction, the easily compartmentalized nature of the recent past (stories in one bucket, science in another) will be confused and confounded by new syncretic developments in the arts and media. Synchomysticism and Who Wants to Marry a Millionaire come to mind. It’s a blurry line.

One thing is for sure, we love our stories, and are increasingly, immediately, inside our stories. Maybe that’s one reason why the buckets are getting all mixed up.

Thank you all for the entertainment. It's good reading!

Reply
Christopher Randolph
3/4/2013 02:54:49 pm

Byron -

Well, you're welcome for my portion I suppose.

Point well taken about the relative newness of science, although in fairness science has been around more likely at least a few thousand rather than hundred years. Eratosthenes, for example, appears to have been a much sharper scientific thinker than Wolter:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eratosthenes

... and in his day the pyramids were about as old as Eratosthenes himself is to us now! I'm not willing to sell humanity short on early scientific prowess, but then I'm never going to be invited to be a talking head on Ancient Aliens.

Carl Sagan did an incredible job of laying out just how advanced we were as a species in Cosmos (well worth the 15 hours or so if you get the DVD set!) A few years ago my wife went on a little trip and left me home, so I cooked a lot of caveman food and watched the Cosmos series as a marathon. Not a bad way to spend a weekend.

In print Sagan also warned us that forces of darkness are always there to snuff out that scientific light if given the chance. What fills the void gets ugly.

I agree that something more primal is kicking in here, unfortunately as stated repeatedly I think it's tribal, and the only form of tribal identity most native-born Americans have at this point is the vague sense of being a "race", of being American and possibly of being a member of a religious group.

On the race thing I point out that owing to this country's history, people within the sphere of "whiteness" tend to be European mutts (I have ancestors that I know of from 6 different European countries as the maps currently look). African-Americans have a general sense of "blackness" regardless of their mixed origins.

For historic reasons these broad categories have been reinforced through time. (i.e Americans would no longer describe a neighborhood as "Slovak" - itself rather a larger unit than a tribal group - but rather "white.")

While deep parts of the brain might want to identify with a tribal group, the identities these days on this side of the Atlantic are 100x larger than the old tribal groups and are harder to define.

White Europeans, especially Christians, doing heroic things on this continent makes for a broadly comforting myth for many.

Reply
Byron DeLear
3/4/2013 11:33:59 pm

Thanks for the reply Christopher... I'm aware of the ancient history of science, but the context of my point about science being around for a couple of centuries (as juxtaposed to "storytelling") has to do with the widespread acceptance of its principles and method within a large segment of a population, like a History Channel audience for example --- not the brilliance and enlightenment of a few individuals, like Erastothenes, etc.

This is because the AU discussion here has shifted toward weighing the impact this type of story-telling-fiction-history has on our larger culture and why the emotional appeal and sensationalistic aspects of AA and AU have been relatively successful within a specific segment of the population.

Because storytelling is so rooted in the evolution of human intelligence, and consequently "reaches" more peole, the strident aspects of bad science or fallacious logic many of these shows take don't negate their value to an audience, or render them as "nonstarters" --- but these shows are trolling academics and historians, they're merely continuing the tradition of one of the fundamental building blocks of human culture and intelligence: good old fashion storytelling yarns.

Byron DeLear
3/4/2013 02:41:02 pm

Upon re-reading my comment, I wanted to clarify my use of "storytelling" to mean fictional storytelling versus "science" to mean scientific method and verification of facts.

(plus I forgot to check the new comment box)

Reply
Thane
3/4/2013 05:14:53 pm

On the whole, I think we've become too race conscious that we see racism in a whole range of things where race plays no part.

It is entirely possible that people gravitate to alternative history simply because they want to feel as if they have secret knowledge and are, therefore, more clever than others.

It is also possible that people embrace alternative interpretation of events because they have an axe to grind for whatever reason.

As I mentioned in another thread, I have a friend of Estonian descent and to him, all the good, world changing inventions of the ancient and early medieval period were Estonian. It was, I believe, his national pride that had nothing to do with race or feeling marginalized (he being blond and blue-eyed white as wonder bread young man) in this society. I think it made him feel special.

I have been discovering some of my genealogy and I have ancestors that came to North America as indentured servants. I have a level of pride of my pioneer ancestors, much like I imagine those that engage in ancestor worship feel when they recall the great deeds of those that came before them. It's a blood tie. It's the "I am related to "Him" who did "That great thing" or "Her" who did "that other great thing" and if they can do it, then I can certainly face what life throws at me after all, I am of their blood." sort of thing. I suspect it's genetic and part of how we are wired and also partially a result of nurture. I loved reading of great people of history and legend while growing up. Sagas and ballads and tales, used to inspire contemporaries are still powerful centuries later.

We are all human and are prone to self protection both physically and emotionally. Often times, our actions have little to do wit "the other" but more to do with ourselves. It just bothers me that the assumption is that "well, obviously this has to be with fear of "the Other" in some form on unconscious racism." it's too easy an answer for complex human psychology. May that be true for some people.. sure, why not.. but it should be be assumed to be the only or the wide spread reason. We are all individuals.

Anyway, I digress.....

When Christopher states above in response to my post (sorry, I don't see a reply button and so created a new post)

"Parts of academia have only been "denigrating" some American history in the past few decades only from the perspective of people whose ancestors used to be depicted as noble regardless of what they did. From the perspective of peoples who used to be disenfranchised (think the descendants of slaves, Native Americans and so forth), we've only recently been teaching history correctly."

It made me think that perhaps some events are still too recent to be dispassionately assessed.

For example, the European incursion into North America resulting in displacement and/or integration of natives peoples. How is it different from the Saxon, Angle, Danish, etc. incursions and settlements in England that displaced the natives peoples? The Brythonic speaking peoples survived in Wales and a large number left the Isle to setting in Brittany. How was it different to the Arabic conquest of North Africa and the Moorish invasion and settlements in Spain. Alexander into Persia and into India? None of these migrations of people are spoke of today in racial terms but the net result was the displacement and disruption of native cultures.

Now, that's not to say that some racial element didn't develop. But part of that was a result of the French and English using allied tribes as proxies in their conflicts both at home, across the global and for control of this new territory. The ongoing Indian wars were not wars of race but the conflict on both sides lead to a dehumanization of your enemies. Contrary to a populist notion that the native American peoples lived in peace and harmony until the evil white man appeared is misinformed (not saying that anyone on these boards have claimed that things were peachy keen before the Europeans arrived) and in it's way, racist...using today's loosey-goosey (IMHO) meaning of the word.

My belabored point is that it seems we (current day Americans) are too eager to look for offense or motivation in racial terms where none may exist.

I know, it's an unpopular position.

And to something else Christopher said (somewhere..it's late, I'm not wearing my glasses and I can't find the post. Christopher, if it wasn't your comment, I apologize. It's not meant as anything more than an explanation of what I was referring since I was lazy and didn't explain myself in my first post).. When I refereed to the denigration of our past, I was thinking of early 20th century denigration of certain founders who were unfashionable for a variety or reasons but with little to do with fact and more with political/social leanings. Heck, some founders, like Alexander Hamilton was attacked very early on by the Jacksonians. But it became very fashionable in the early 20th century to

Reply
Thane
3/4/2013 05:20:22 pm

oh, my post got cut off.

Well it's late, I;m tired, and it's not really that important anyway. I won't try to recreate it.

Let me just say, though I don't post much, I do enjoy reading the posts of others and believe I learn more from each of you. What more can you ask for in a civil discussion about the topic at hand.

Jason, you've collected an interesting group of commentators and I look forward to more of your posts and the responses from "your public"

Reply
Christopher Randolph
3/4/2013 06:54:47 pm

Thane -

Not quite sure why these events would be discussed "dispassionately." That might be a bit easier to do if you weren't subject to what amounts to slavery less than 80 years ago:

http://www.slaverybyanothername.com/the-book/

Native Americans were subject to a genocidal program of extermination.

"How was it different to the Arabic conquest of North Africa and the Moorish invasion and settlements in Spain."

Seriously?

You might like to compare this:

http://irdialogue.org/articles/best-practices-non-profit-articles/al-andalus-a-case-study-in-inter-religious-tolerance-by-joshua-stanton/

with this:

"By the end of the 19th century, writes David E. Stannard, a historian at the University of Hawaii, native Americans had undergone the"worst human holocaust the world had ever witnessed, roaring across two continents non-stop for four centuries and consuming the lives of countless tens of millions of people." In the judgment of Lenore A. Stiffarm and Phil Lane, Jr.,"there can be no more monumental example of sustained genocide—certainly none involving a 'race' of people as broad and complex as this—anywhere in the annals of human history.""

http://hnn.us/articles/7302.html

This is the background against which Wolter's concept of there being nothing made by Native Americans worth finding so very offensive.

I've been through North Africa and there are still more people speaking Berber languages there than Arabic. To paraphrase Chris Rock, when was the last time you saw a whole family speaking Lenape at a Red Lobster?

"My belabored point is that it seems we (current day Americans) are too eager to look for offense or motivation in racial terms where none may exist."

Oh no no no. It's precisely the opposite. And I say this as a white person. We're very eager to dismiss assumptions which belittle some very valid concerns of groups of people still shellshocked as communities by events which just ended a blink of the eyes ago in historical perspective. I think you're doing so right now.

By the by I did a bit of work in Estonia over a decade ago. There's a fairly ugly history there regarding the country's 40% Russian minority, the same ethnic group who until recently lorded it over the ethnic Estonian population in the USSR years. Add into the mix the fact that Estonia was very pro-Nazi in the war (not merely "pro-German" as there was a whole ethnic Estonian SS division) and totally exterminated its Jewish population, add in the demonstrations and counterdemonstrations at the war monuments - the E's call them patriotic and the R's fascist - and you've got yet another little screwed up situation in an otherwise charming corner of the world.

Reply
Christopher Randolph
3/4/2013 07:16:33 pm

"The ongoing Indian wars were not wars of race but the conflict on both sides lead to a dehumanization of your enemies."

Probably the less said about this the better, There simply aren't any parallels between what Europeans did to the peoples of the Americas and vice versa. I don't know of any programs that Indians had to forcibly march whites a thousand miles away, I don't know of any Indian insistence that whites drop their languages and cultures. I don't know of any case in which Indians made white people retrieve X amount of gold or face death.

I certainly don't know of any Indian plan to sail to Europe and clear areas for Lebensraum.

"Contrary to a populist notion that the native American peoples lived in peace and harmony until the evil white man appeared is misinformed..."

Well, no one claimed that here as you pointed out. What I will say is that although it's abundantly clear that sometimes Indian groups didn't play nice with each other, they did manage not to bump off 15 million of themselves while wiping out the vast majority of their languages and cultures continent-wide. Might you see how the tiny portion of survivors might be less than jazzed about your perception that a focus on this is merely being a Negative Nelly?

Something VERY terrible happened to the native population of this continent, largely to make room for slave-intensive agriculture using people form yet another continent. Is this all really something that needs debate? Are the ethics of the ethnic cleansing of this continent and the slave trade still a gray area for people..?

Reply
CFC
3/5/2013 02:02:49 am

I predict America Unearthed (Wolter and Committee Films) will get more reckless and outrageous with their programming. As I read some of the comments on this blog and on other sites it’s clear they are alienating the freemasons, academics, geologists and archaeologist, historians, educators and serious amateur researchers.

Kudos to Scott Dawson with the help of his twin brother Ryan Dawson for speaking out about the behind the scenes, deceptive practices of this program!!! Let that story be a warning to anyone contacted by this group to film for the upcoming episodes.

I am very grateful to Jason for his reviews each week and for providing a forum for thoughtful and intelligent commentary.

Reply
EP
7/4/2014 04:07:13 pm

Funny thing is, if they were right, some of these groups would be the last people on earth you'd want to alientate...

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      • Unexplained + Unexplored
      • Rob Riggle: Global Investigator
    • Book Reviews
    • Galleries >
      • Bad Archaeology
      • Ancient Civilizations >
        • Ancient Egypt
        • Ancient Greece
        • Ancient Near East
        • Ancient Americas
      • Supernatural History
      • Book Image Galleries
    • Videos
    • Collection: Ancient Alien Fraud >
      • Chariots of the Gods at 50
      • Secret History of Ancient Astronauts
      • Of Atlantis and Aliens
      • Aliens and Ancient Texts
      • Profiles in Ancient Astronautics >
        • Erich von Däniken
        • Robert Temple
        • Giorgio Tsoukalos
        • David Childress
      • Blunders in the Sky
      • The Case of the False Quotes
      • Alternative Authors' Quote Fraud
      • David Childress & the Aliens
      • Faking Ancient Art in Uzbekistan
      • Intimations of Persecution
      • Zecharia Sitchin's World
      • Jesus' Alien Ancestors?
      • Extraterrestrial Evolution?
    • Collection: Skeptic Magazine >
      • America Before Review
      • Native American Discovery of Europe
      • Interview: Scott Sigler
      • Golden Fleeced
      • Oh the Horror
      • Discovery of America
      • Supernatural Television
      • Review of Civilization One
      • Who Lost the Middle Ages
      • Charioteer of the Gods
    • Collection: Ancient History >
      • Prehistoric Nuclear War
      • The China Syndrome
      • Atlantis, Mu, and the Maya
      • Easter Island Exposed
      • Who Built the Sphinx?
      • Who Built the Great Pyramid?
      • Archaeological Cover Up?
    • Collection: The Lovecraft Legacy >
      • Pauwels, Bergier, and Lovecraft
      • Lovecraft in Bergier
      • Lovecraft and Scientology
    • Collection: UFOs >
      • Alien Abduction at the Outer Limits
      • Aliens and Anal Probes
      • Ultra-Terrestrials and UFOs
      • Rebels, Queers, and Aliens
    • Scholomance: The Devil's School
    • Prehistory of Chupacabra
    • The Templars, the Holy Grail, & Henry Sinclair
    • Magicians of the Gods Review
    • The Curse of the Pharaohs
    • The Antediluvian Pyramid Myth
    • Whitewashing American Prehistory
    • James Dean's Cursed Porsche
  • The Library
    • Ancient Mysteries >
      • Ancient Texts >
        • Mesopotamian Texts >
          • Atrahasis Epic
          • Epic of Gilgamesh
          • Kutha Creation Legend
          • Babylonian Creation Myth
          • Descent of Ishtar
          • Berossus
          • Comparison of Antediluvian Histories
        • Egyptian Texts >
          • The Shipwrecked Sailor
          • Dream Stela of Thutmose IV
          • The Papyrus of Ani
          • Classical Accounts of the Pyramids
          • Inventory Stela
          • Manetho
          • Eratosthenes' King List
          • The Story of Setna
          • Leon of Pella
          • Diodorus on Egyptian History
          • On Isis and Osiris
          • Famine Stela
          • Old Egyptian Chronicle
          • The Book of Sothis
          • Horapollo
          • Al-Maqrizi's King List
        • Teshub and the Dragon
        • Hermetica >
          • The Three Hermeses
          • Kore Kosmou
          • Corpus Hermeticum
          • The Asclepius
          • The Emerald Tablet
          • Hermetic Fragments
          • Prologue to the Kyranides
          • The Secret of Creation
          • Ancient Alphabets Explained
          • Prologue to Ibn Umayl's Silvery Water
          • Book of the 24 Philosophers
          • Aurora of the Philosophers
        • Hesiod's Theogony
        • Periplus of Hanno
        • Ctesias' Indica
        • Sanchuniathon
        • Sima Qian
        • Syncellus's Enoch Fragments
        • The Book of Enoch
        • Slavonic Enoch
        • Sepher Yetzirah
        • Tacitus' Germania
        • De Dea Syria
        • Aelian's Various Histories
        • Julius Africanus' Chronography
        • Eusebius' Chronicle
        • Chinese Accounts of Rome
        • Ancient Chinese Automaton
        • The Orphic Argonautica
        • Fragments of Panodorus
        • Annianus on the Watchers
        • The Watchers and Antediluvian Wisdom
      • Medieval Texts >
        • Medieval Legends of Ancient Egypt >
          • Medieval Pyramid Lore
          • John Malalas on Ancient Egypt
          • Fragments of Abenephius
          • Akhbar al-zaman
          • Ibrahim ibn Wasif Shah
          • Murtada ibn al-‘Afif
          • Al-Maqrizi on the Pyramids
          • Al-Suyuti on the Pyramids
        • The Hunt for Noah's Ark
        • Isidore of Seville
        • Book of Liang: Fusang
        • Agobard on Magonia
        • Book of Thousands
        • Voyage of Saint Brendan
        • Power of Art and of Nature
        • Travels of Sir John Mandeville
        • Yazidi Revelation and Black Book
        • Al-Biruni on the Great Flood
        • Voyage of the Zeno Brothers
        • The Kensington Runestone (Hoax)
        • Islamic Discovery of America
        • The Aztec Creation Myth
      • Lost Civilizations >
        • Atlantis >
          • Plato's Atlantis Dialogues >
            • Timaeus
            • Critias
          • Fragments on Atlantis
          • Panchaea: The Other Atlantis
          • Eumalos on Atlantis (Hoax)
          • Gómara on Atlantis
          • Sardinia and Atlantis
          • Santorini and Atlantis
          • The Mound Builders and Atlantis
          • Donnelly's Atlantis
          • Atlantis in Morocco
          • Atlantis and the Sea Peoples
          • W. Scott-Elliot >
            • The Story of Atlantis
            • The Lost Lemuria
          • The Lost Atlantis
          • Atlantis in Africa
          • How I Found Atlantis (Hoax)
          • Termier on Atlantis
          • The Critias and Minoan Crete
          • Rebuttal to Termier
          • Further Responses to Termier
          • Flinders Petrie on Atlantis
        • Lost Cities >
          • Miscellaneous Lost Cities
          • The Seven Cities
          • The Lost City of Paititi
          • Manuscript 512
          • The Idolatrous City of Iximaya (Hoax)
          • The 1885 Moberly Lost City Hoax
          • The Elephants of Paredon (Hoax)
        • OOPARTs
        • Oronteus Finaeus Antarctica Map
        • Caucasians in Panama
        • Jefferson's Excavation
        • Fictitious Discoveries in America
        • Against Diffusionism
        • Tunnels Under Peru
        • The Parahyba Inscription (Hoax)
        • Mound Builders
        • Gunung Padang
        • Tales of Enchanted Islands
        • The 1907 Ancient World Map Hoax
        • The 1909 Grand Canyon Hoax
        • The Interglacial Period
        • Solving Oak Island
      • Religious Conspiracies >
        • Pantera, Father of Jesus?
        • Toledot Yeshu
        • Peter of les Vaux-de-Cernay on Cathars
        • Testimony of Jean de Châlons
        • Rosslyn Chapel and the 'Prentice's Pillar
        • The Many Wives of Jesus
        • Templar Infiltration of Labor
        • Louis Martin & the Holy Bloodline
        • The Life of St. Issa (Hoax)
        • On the Person of Jesus Christ
      • Giants in the Earth >
        • Fossil Origins of Myths >
          • Fossil Teeth and Bones of Elephants
          • Fossil Elephants
          • Fossil Bones of Teutobochus
          • Fossil Mammoths and Giants
          • Giants' Bones Dug Out of the Earth
          • Fossils and the Supernatural
          • Fossils, Myth, and Pseudo-History
          • Man During the Stone Age
          • Fossil Bones and Giants
          • American Elephant Myths
          • The Mammoth and the Flood
          • Fossils and Myth
          • Fossil Origin of the Cyclops
          • Mastodon, Mammoth, and Man
        • Fragments on Giants
        • Manichaean Book of Giants
        • Geoffrey on British Giants
        • Alfonso X's Hermetic History of Giants
        • Boccaccio and the Fossil 'Giant'
        • Book of Howth
        • Purchas His Pilgrimage
        • Edmond Temple's 1827 Giant Investigation
        • The Giants of Sardinia
        • Giants and the Sons of God
        • The Magnetism of Evil
        • Tertiary Giants
        • Smithsonian Giant Reports
        • Early American Giants
        • The Giant of Coahuila
        • Jewish Encyclopedia on Giants
        • Index of Giants
        • Newspaper Accounts of Giants
        • Lanier's A Book of Giants
      • Science and History >
        • Halley on Noah's Comet
        • The Newport Tower
        • Iron: The Stone from Heaven
        • Ararat and the Ark
        • Pyramid Facts and Fancies
        • Argonauts before Homer
        • The Deluge
        • Crown Prince Rudolf on the Pyramids
        • Old Mythology in New Apparel
        • Blavatsky on Dinosaurs
        • Teddy Roosevelt on Bigfoot
        • Devil Worship in France
        • Maspero's Review of Akhbar al-zaman
        • The Holy Grail as Lucifer's Crown Jewel
        • The Mutinous Sea
        • The Rock Wall of Rockwall
        • Fabulous Zoology
        • The Origins of Talos
        • Mexican Mythology
        • Chinese Pyramids
        • Maqrizi's Names of the Pharaohs
      • Extreme History >
        • Roman Empire Hoax
        • American Antiquities
        • American Cataclysms
        • England, the Remnant of Judah
        • Historical Chronology of the Mexicans
        • Maspero on the Predynastic Sphinx
        • Vestiges of the Mayas
        • Ragnarok: The Age of Fire and Gravel
        • Origins of the Egyptian People
        • The Secret Doctrine >
          • Volume 1: Cosmogenesis
          • Volume 2: Anthropogenesis
        • Phoenicians in America
        • The Electric Ark
        • Traces of European Influence
        • Prince Henry Sinclair
        • Pyramid Prophecies
        • Templars of Ancient Mexico
        • Chronology and the "Riddle of the Sphinx"
        • The Faith of Ancient Egypt
        • Spirit of the Hour in Archaeology
        • Book of the Damned
        • Great Pyramid As Noah's Ark
        • Richard Shaver's Proofs
    • Alien Encounters >
      • US Government Ancient Astronaut Files >
        • Fortean Society and Columbus
        • Inquiry into Shaver and Palmer
        • The Skyfort Document
        • Whirling Wheels
        • Denver Ancient Astronaut Lecture
        • Soviet Search for Lemuria
        • Visitors from Outer Space
        • Unidentified Flying Objects (Abstract)
        • "Flying Saucers"? They're a Myth
        • UFO Hypothesis Survival Questions
        • Air Force Academy UFO Textbook
        • The Condon Report on Ancient Astronauts
        • Atlantis Discovery Telegrams
        • Ancient Astronaut Society Telegram
        • Noah's Ark Cables
        • The Von Daniken Letter
        • CIA Psychic Probe of Ancient Mars
        • Scott Wolter Lawsuit
        • UFOs in Ancient China
        • CIA Report on Noah's Ark
        • CIA Noah's Ark Memos
        • Congressional Ancient Aliens Testimony
        • Ancient Astronaut and Nibiru Email
        • Congressional Ancient Mars Hearing
        • House UFO Hearing
      • Ancient Extraterrestrials >
        • Premodern UFO Sightings
        • The Moon Hoax
        • Inhabitants of Other Planets
        • Blavatsky on Ancient Astronauts
        • The Stanzas of Dzyan (Hoax)
        • Aerolites and Religion
        • What Is Theosophy?
        • Plane of Ether
        • The Adepts from Venus
      • A Message from Mars
      • Saucer Mystery Solved?
      • Orville Wright on UFOs
      • Interdimensional Flying Saucers
      • Flying Saucers Are Real
      • Report on UFOs
    • The Supernatural >
      • The Devils of Loudun
      • Sublime and Beautiful
      • Voltaire on Vampires
      • Demonology and Witchcraft
      • Thaumaturgia
      • Bulgarian Vampires
      • Religion and Evolution
      • Transylvanian Superstitions
      • Defining a Zombie
      • Dread of the Supernatural
      • Vampires
      • Werewolves and Vampires and Ghouls
      • Science and Fairy Stories
      • The Cursed Car
    • Classic Fiction >
      • Lucian's True History
      • Some Words with a Mummy
      • The Coming Race
      • King Solomon's Mines
      • An Inhabitant of Carcosa
      • The Xipéhuz
      • Lot No. 249
      • The Novel of the Black Seal
      • The Island of Doctor Moreau
      • Pharaoh's Curse
      • Edison's Conquest of Mars
      • The Lost Continent
      • Count Magnus
      • The Mysterious Stranger
      • The Wendigo
      • Sredni Vashtar
      • The Lost World
      • The Red One
      • H. P. Lovecraft >
        • Dagon
        • The Call of Cthulhu
        • History of the Necronomicon
        • At the Mountains of Madness
        • Lovecraft's Library in 1932
      • The Skeptical Poltergeist
      • The Corpse on the Grating
      • The Second Satellite
      • Queen of the Black Coast
      • A Martian Odyssey
    • Classic Genre Movies
    • Miscellaneous Documents >
      • The Balloon-Hoax
      • A Problem in Greek Ethics
      • The Migration of Symbols
      • The Gospel of Intensity
      • De Profundis
      • The Life and Death of Crown Prince Rudolf
      • The Bathtub Hoax
      • Crown Prince Rudolf's Letters
      • Position of Viking Women
      • Employment of Homosexuals
      • James Dean's Scrapbook
      • James Dean's Love Letters
      • The Amazing James Dean Hoax!
    • Free Classic Pseudohistory eBooks
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