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chiefswoneaglesloose OP t1_jcv0shh wrote

Reply to comment by [deleted] in The US government killed Lummi orphans for their land. White people continue to live on the murdered orphans land. This is the land that is beachfront in the middle of the reservation. by chiefswoneaglesloose

You’re the problem

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naazzttyy t1_jcvamut wrote

Genghis Khan’s mongol horde enabled him to rape and pillage so successfully that 16 million living men, or 0.5% of all males alive on Earth today, can trace their genealogy directly back to Khan.

OP, in your view, does this also qualify Mongolia as the problem?

Should those 16 million living descendants of rape victims be holding out for reparations?

My genealogy is Scotch-Irish, and far back blood relatives were subject to the rite of prima nocta.

Would compensation for this past historical behavior be laid at the feet of the Scottish monarchy, or should it be the responsibility of Great Britain, given that the Kingdom of Scotland merged with the Kingdom of England via the Union of Treaty, formally ratified by both parliaments in 1707 to form one joint Kingdom of Great Britain? Or, should recompense instead be borne by the United Kingdom, which governs both islands today?

Is the recent request from Greece for additional WWII reparations from Germany for Nazi atrocities valid, despite the terms set forth in the Treaty of Versailles, especially in light of Germany’s payment of $62 million dollars to Greece in 1960? Would the confiscation of property in Greece that is owned in 2023 by German citizens or companies, persons whom were not alive during the time of war or in the case of business entities not even formed under articles of incorporation until the turn of the century, over 60 years later, be valid? Were this to go forward, would it be justifiable, or a miscarriage of justice? What about the obvious and uncomfortable parallels to Nazi Party confiscation of Jewish-owned businesses and properties leading up to the rise of the Reich?

At what point do historical actions that were undertaken by people long dead cease to be attributed to the living? Is acknowledgment that such things were horrific, that these terrible events must be included in the history lessons taught to subsequent generations, not only to prevent history from repeating itself, but rather to better ourselves, insufficient? Who but the living can decide when the past may be let go, provided the lessons it teaches us are retained?

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Alarmed-Grape t1_jcy5u0s wrote

I think a major distinction when it comes to historical atrocities is whether people living now are still affected by the fallout from said atrocities. Indigenous people in the US are absolutely still negatively affected to this day in myriad ways. Are you, as a living person with Scottish ancestry, experiencing a negative impact to your life due to the historical practice of prima nocte?

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chiefswoneaglesloose OP t1_jcvb1kd wrote

You’re really that butt hurt over facts. Where in my essay does it say anything about reparations. I just want people to know about this

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naazzttyy t1_jcvbfa1 wrote

Nah, my man… I think you are just a bit obtuse and missed the point of my comment entirely.

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naazzttyy t1_jcvbvvh wrote

And your essay is entirely valid and brings to light horrible things the US government did.

But your counter to u/not-picky is part of the problem. By dismissing the first part of what he answered with, and only replying the the second part, you missed an opportunity to engage with someone who was clearly interested enough to read what you wrote and engage with you on it.

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not-picky t1_jcwq541 wrote

Well here's an alternate version of the story:

The islands up to Orcas were disputed by French and Americans at the time when French Catholic Missionaries committed atrocities and forced assimilation religious schools, later Americans took the land, and created the reservation system. There were many injustices, but that history is older than this story.

In the last century, Washington land wasn't super valuable outside of logging, and some people of the Lummi nation are struggling and sell the title of some costal land for money, thinking little of it. In the 90s tech makes it big and there's a population boom, suddenly costal development of nice homes are incredibly valuable, and developers are putting in homes in Sandy Point - a strip adjacent to Lummi nation.

The tribe now feels like its unfair, they ought to be paid a lot more of this now-very-valuable land. They claim the sale was not valid, the land is still Lummi. Although there are records of the sale on the American side, the Lummi story is that the sellers were orphans, part of the tribe by heritage but without written records. They weren't authorized to make such a sale, and so it should still belong to the tribe, the sellers were coerced because of medical debt. Now it's a he-said-she-said story, not that the land was sold but about the unverifiable nature of the tribal status of who sold it, and if that was a valid transaction. Because these homes are a strip alongside the reservation, the tribe then moves to cut water to the disputed land in retaliation. Without access to the outside utilities, the hope is to makes the land worthless to the developer and they can then buy it back to develop themselves and profit, but the developers sue and win the case after many years in the WA courts.

"As Leroy Deardorff, a Lummi natural resources officer, puts it: 'There are big bucks to be made out here.'"

Lummi nation passes around the tale of these orphans. In today's telling, they were murdered by white people! It's suspect that this particular tale doesn't appear to be told until the development dispute happened. Now salty chiefs wander reddit to tell the tale of evil white people stealing land, which is somewhat true in the long run, but the specifics of it change over time and 'white' just means anyone non-native. At this point Lummi nation identifies as 40% white, but those clinging most strongly to that heritage see anyone outside of reservation land as an oppressor and to blame for the theft of native lands and their modern problems. But mostly money.

You can read a 20-year-old telling of it here: https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1996/06/10/a-battle-of-rights-on-the-reservation/166b7f7e-e86f-4dcd-92e9-dc76b615757d/

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not-picky t1_jcwti55 wrote

And while I'm talking to myself on a dead thread. The politics of the Salish Coast people gets even more interesting. A faction of people with tribal heritage left their tribes, but now wish to be recognized as a new tribe: the Duwamish. With the modern reparations movements, they believe anyone living in modern Seattle ought to be paying them rent: https://www.realrentduwamish.org So you can kind of see what the focus of this group is.

However the Muckleshoot, Puyallup, and Tulalip tribes already claim this land as their ancestral home. Coincidentally they each run profitable casinos and get special access to fishing rights. If another tribe was recognized, what would they give up? They took out https://www.therealduwamish.org to try to smear the former group.

So it's nuts out there with inter-tribe politics, but the common thread is that money and business come with ownership of tribal heritage and land. It all feels a little disingenuous - it's cultural panhandling.

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chiefswoneaglesloose OP t1_jcvdm8o wrote

This person doesn’t understand why history is important to remember. That’s a problem.

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shooketh_not_stireth t1_jcveb1b wrote

Ok, why is history important to remember. What do you expect people to actually do with the information you've provided?

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goldensavage1 t1_jcvfna9 wrote

So the only response to the murders and thefts is to wait for a couple of generations to pass and ignore them. And that will make it ok? Also ignore this type of thing that is happening now because you are not personally affected, or would be affected if it was stopped?

“Don’t hurt my feelings! I don’t want to know about slavery because I didn’t do. And if my family did, it makes me feel bad so no one can know!”

Yes, I know you don’t give a damn about the Lummi, because a cave man took the kill of another cave man way back when. But we’re supposed to be the exceptional nation (don’t make me laugh). We’re the most civilized, modern, moral society in the world if you took a survey of fellow Americans. How does ignoring what we did helpful to anyone except the white majority? I’m white. I have white privilege. But I’m willing to fight for others. How this gets fixed is above my pay grade, but I do want it fixed.

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Tsujimoto3 t1_jcvj0gz wrote

The vast majority of historical scholars believe that Prima Nocta was a myth. The only reason it’s in popular culture is because they used the myth for a scene in Braveheart. Your ancestors didn’t suffer that any more than mine did. Go read a book instead of getting your misinformation from fantasy movies.

Edit: Look it up instead of downvoting, people. You’re wrong here.

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