RE: My "Not To Be Pessimistic" post and Walter's "How Christianity Contrived to Bring Authoritarianism to America: A philosophical exploration on what made Americans give up their freedoms"
I found your comment to Maura genuinely fascinating! I agree; her insights were impressive. I'm new to the idea that the indigenous inhabitants of North America were intricately organized as nations, and it's pretty eye-opening. Is this one of the topics you write about and discuss on your Substack?
I hope to do something useful, I'm pretty new on here, so haven't really gone beyond just making comments yet, but now you mention it, I guess it could be. I've been holding back because I have not really solidified what to DO for a topic, but once I'm past my general introduction post, which is kind of a lot, I want to do with that (I have a bit of a "necessary" backstory, in which I'll explain what's going on in my nutty life at present), I -could- see doing some historocal deep dives as being something worth doing though, so it isn't out of the question. Thanks, appreciate you reading it.
Hmmm. There is no way to know how humans who ran into other human tribes behaved in the deep past. Maybe some fought, maybe some bred together instead. We do know that humans bred with Neanderthals, so there may have been more cooperation. After all Neanderthals were a whole other species, not just another tribe. Nature has far more cooperation than competition, in fact life on land started when lichen broke down rocks into soil. Lichen is two cooperating species.
Yes, we do have capacity for both compassion/cooperation or for lack there of. However, humans are built to belong, to work together.
Humans are also story telling creatures. The stories we tell ourselves lead to actions. They are powerful, especially when we believe them.
Why do we put so much focus on sin?
The Catholic church terrorized Europe for 2000 years with its doctrine of sin and authoritarian ways. It traumatized a whole population across the European continent and beyond. Protestants didn’t do better.
Traumatized brains don’t work well and tend to be hyper vigilant and trauma creates stronger neural pathways in the fear system. We don’t know how we could be if we weren’t so traumatized. The Church + colonialism spread this trauma around the world. We live in a great big trauma recycling system. That is how we arrived at this juncture.
There are tribal humans in the world that do not behave like us. It appears many Native American civilizations did not also. I don’t think it is just evolution. It is evolution plus trauma. Trauma that is not being healed. So many of us are in fight or flight and/or collapse states. Trump is definitely a traumatized person and so are his followers.
Personally I think Walter is on to something here! It is about time that the terror of Christianity is called out for what it created here. Our “Christian” nation was founded on a holocaust of Native people and the enslavement of Africans. Sure, some Christians also fought against these evils, but for the most part, Christians think they are chosen and superior, especially the more evangelical and the more devout dominionist Catholics. They deny their trauma and project all their self hatred shit onto to others and justify demonizing them because that is what their belief encourages them to do. It encourages them to hate being human, to hate themselves for not being perfect. It creates cognitive dissonance. They carry this sickness into every relationship. Evolution is not responsible for the mess, even if it plays a specific role in survival. However, we are not surviving, we are dying.
Imagine what the world would be like if we followed a culture more like some of the tribes we did our damndest to destroy.
Awesome comment, got me head goin' in a bazillion directions lol, this is not by way of argument btw, it's only attempting to add something of value....
To be fair, there is evidence suggesting that the US Constitution was actually influenced by Native American democracies, and bears more than a passing resemblance to the Constitution of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy that dates back to something like the 1600s, years before this nation was created. Even the symbology bears similarities, for example, their Great Law has a group of five arrows bound together signifying the unity and strength of the Five Nations, while the US has an eagle clutching thirteen arrows signifying the original thirteen colonies.
The way Congress operates also has similarities to their Grand Council, the US Congress is divided into two houses, while the Grand Council would divide into two sections of, "Younger Brothers" and "Elder Brothers", there are other similarities as well. In the 1730s and 40s the English relied on alliances with the Haudenosaunee Confederacy to keep the French from encroaching on the territory, colonists intermingled with them in an effort to build trust and strengthen the alliance.
Benjamin Franklin, while owning his printing company in the 1740s was immersed in the treaty councils because they sold papers in Europe, and were profitable. A guy named, Conrad Weiser, who was respected by the Haudenosaunee, and was even an honorary "Mohawk", acted as something of go-between, bringing Franklin the information, the point being, the "founding fathers" had ample opportunity to study these concepts, and were very likely influenced by them.
The union of the colonies was even suggested to them by Canassatego, who was Chief of the Onondaga, *he* was attempting to impress upon the colonists the difficulties they had when dealing with each separate colony, and that forming a union would ameliorate the issue. Franklin tried something like this at that time, a union of the colonies federated under one legislature, with a president-general who would of course, be appointed by the Crown, which was very similar to what the Confederacy had. This plan unfortunately, was rejected by both colonies, and Crown at that time, and it would be another twenty years before the colonies would unite.
Naturally, they cherry picked these indigenous concepts, without really grasping their overall cultural concerns, consequently the US constitution stresses individual "freedoms" without really addressing what the indigenous cultures saw as the responsibilities of the collective, ie, managing land, water, animals and people, so yeah, if we were following their *original* intent, things would be way, way better.
It shouldn't really surprise anyone that *none* of this stuff is taught in US history classes, no, this is all stuff you have to dig up on your own, but imo, is kind of the thing that left the door open for what we're dealing with now. The takeover by basically, wealthy libertarians, the "I got mine, and screw everyone else" crowd, the concentration of wealth and power is *exactly* the thing the indigenous people saw as a *bad* thing. In some tribes, people who concentrated (hoarded) wealth were not "celebrated", as WE do, they were *shunned*, this is definitely where *we've* lost our way, it isn't something to be envied so much as *shamed*...
Awesome comment! It shows what is possible when we design a system first people and for the planet and all her creatures. I hope we can create something like this beyond the influences you mentioned and add in the responsibilities of the collective. I often wonder if it will only come after a collapse and too much loss.
I’m always pondering the root cause. Is power the reason that primitive MAN sought to overtake his neighbor’s possessions, family & property?
Is it genetically encoded in males for protection of family & survival purposes that has gone off the rails?
I’ve never understood the desire to use these skills outside of protecting family. Is the adrenaline rush of recognition within the clan enough to risk life & limb? Is elevated testosterone a factor or lack thereof that pushes past the norm of peacefully coexisting? (applies to male & female). Does it then make it a natural desire?
Is possession of this fragment of primal biology run amuck the reason?
I love this thought provoking comment. I would have to think about it a lot more to write a cogent response, although I am not trying to convince anyone to adopt my position. I agree with the points you made for the most part, however I think evolution must be recognized as a crucial role in where we find ourselves today.
Of corse, cooperation is a large part of the picture here, but so is competition, fierce competition at that, especially if resources are scarce.
I recall the old saying, "whiskey is for drinking and water is for fighting." This type of conflict arises through practically no fault of either party. To be sure, one party could exacerbate the conflict by taking more than their fair share. During famine or drought, everyone wants more!
The labor leader, Samuel Gompers, was once asked, "what is it your union want?" He responded with one word: more. This was not because union members are greedy, bad, etc., they are simply human, IMHO, because the quest for survival, for existence (evolution) molded them, all of us, to what we are way, through natural selection. Not wholly, as you point out, but substantially.
"Evolution is a gradual change in the inherited traits of a population over many generations, and natural selection is the mechanism that explains how this happens."
Thank you so much for a beautiful response! I look forward to more thoughtful discussions with you Maura.
This is all a T problem. Men are the makers of war, the hoarders, the takers of all they desire. The problem is not humans but the patriarchy and all that has come from that for 5000 years..... not human nature.... man power nature. This fact is displayed every moment for all to see but we are culturally blind to this over riding fact. The patriarchy has doomed us to the bloody cycle of violence until the day we cut it out from our collective story, by the roots. mho
Your essay provides a comprehensive view of human endowment from philosophical, historical and biological perspectives, and Kant's metaphor becomes a powerful tool here to think about human nature, the challenges we face and how to deal with them.
Humans are capable of both good and evil, which can be seen as a reflection of our evolutionary history rather than a simple moral or religious issue.
So it is more about what we expect to become. It is worth thinking about how to achieve our expectations and what needs to be done to achieve this.
Delightful! I am going to need to think about this. I feel like the computer in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. The one who, when asked a question, responded with, "tricky..." I feel a seed sprouting though, I'll sleep on it and get back to you. Thanks for the thoughtful post!
Hi Lux,
I found your comment to Maura genuinely fascinating! I agree; her insights were impressive. I'm new to the idea that the indigenous inhabitants of North America were intricately organized as nations, and it's pretty eye-opening. Is this one of the topics you write about and discuss on your Substack?
Best,
Jeff
I hope to do something useful, I'm pretty new on here, so haven't really gone beyond just making comments yet, but now you mention it, I guess it could be. I've been holding back because I have not really solidified what to DO for a topic, but once I'm past my general introduction post, which is kind of a lot, I want to do with that (I have a bit of a "necessary" backstory, in which I'll explain what's going on in my nutty life at present), I -could- see doing some historocal deep dives as being something worth doing though, so it isn't out of the question. Thanks, appreciate you reading it.
Hmmm. There is no way to know how humans who ran into other human tribes behaved in the deep past. Maybe some fought, maybe some bred together instead. We do know that humans bred with Neanderthals, so there may have been more cooperation. After all Neanderthals were a whole other species, not just another tribe. Nature has far more cooperation than competition, in fact life on land started when lichen broke down rocks into soil. Lichen is two cooperating species.
Yes, we do have capacity for both compassion/cooperation or for lack there of. However, humans are built to belong, to work together.
Humans are also story telling creatures. The stories we tell ourselves lead to actions. They are powerful, especially when we believe them.
Why do we put so much focus on sin?
The Catholic church terrorized Europe for 2000 years with its doctrine of sin and authoritarian ways. It traumatized a whole population across the European continent and beyond. Protestants didn’t do better.
Traumatized brains don’t work well and tend to be hyper vigilant and trauma creates stronger neural pathways in the fear system. We don’t know how we could be if we weren’t so traumatized. The Church + colonialism spread this trauma around the world. We live in a great big trauma recycling system. That is how we arrived at this juncture.
There are tribal humans in the world that do not behave like us. It appears many Native American civilizations did not also. I don’t think it is just evolution. It is evolution plus trauma. Trauma that is not being healed. So many of us are in fight or flight and/or collapse states. Trump is definitely a traumatized person and so are his followers.
Personally I think Walter is on to something here! It is about time that the terror of Christianity is called out for what it created here. Our “Christian” nation was founded on a holocaust of Native people and the enslavement of Africans. Sure, some Christians also fought against these evils, but for the most part, Christians think they are chosen and superior, especially the more evangelical and the more devout dominionist Catholics. They deny their trauma and project all their self hatred shit onto to others and justify demonizing them because that is what their belief encourages them to do. It encourages them to hate being human, to hate themselves for not being perfect. It creates cognitive dissonance. They carry this sickness into every relationship. Evolution is not responsible for the mess, even if it plays a specific role in survival. However, we are not surviving, we are dying.
Imagine what the world would be like if we followed a culture more like some of the tribes we did our damndest to destroy.
Great commentary! Thank you Maura! Jeff
Awesome comment, got me head goin' in a bazillion directions lol, this is not by way of argument btw, it's only attempting to add something of value....
To be fair, there is evidence suggesting that the US Constitution was actually influenced by Native American democracies, and bears more than a passing resemblance to the Constitution of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy that dates back to something like the 1600s, years before this nation was created. Even the symbology bears similarities, for example, their Great Law has a group of five arrows bound together signifying the unity and strength of the Five Nations, while the US has an eagle clutching thirteen arrows signifying the original thirteen colonies.
The way Congress operates also has similarities to their Grand Council, the US Congress is divided into two houses, while the Grand Council would divide into two sections of, "Younger Brothers" and "Elder Brothers", there are other similarities as well. In the 1730s and 40s the English relied on alliances with the Haudenosaunee Confederacy to keep the French from encroaching on the territory, colonists intermingled with them in an effort to build trust and strengthen the alliance.
Benjamin Franklin, while owning his printing company in the 1740s was immersed in the treaty councils because they sold papers in Europe, and were profitable. A guy named, Conrad Weiser, who was respected by the Haudenosaunee, and was even an honorary "Mohawk", acted as something of go-between, bringing Franklin the information, the point being, the "founding fathers" had ample opportunity to study these concepts, and were very likely influenced by them.
The union of the colonies was even suggested to them by Canassatego, who was Chief of the Onondaga, *he* was attempting to impress upon the colonists the difficulties they had when dealing with each separate colony, and that forming a union would ameliorate the issue. Franklin tried something like this at that time, a union of the colonies federated under one legislature, with a president-general who would of course, be appointed by the Crown, which was very similar to what the Confederacy had. This plan unfortunately, was rejected by both colonies, and Crown at that time, and it would be another twenty years before the colonies would unite.
Naturally, they cherry picked these indigenous concepts, without really grasping their overall cultural concerns, consequently the US constitution stresses individual "freedoms" without really addressing what the indigenous cultures saw as the responsibilities of the collective, ie, managing land, water, animals and people, so yeah, if we were following their *original* intent, things would be way, way better.
It shouldn't really surprise anyone that *none* of this stuff is taught in US history classes, no, this is all stuff you have to dig up on your own, but imo, is kind of the thing that left the door open for what we're dealing with now. The takeover by basically, wealthy libertarians, the "I got mine, and screw everyone else" crowd, the concentration of wealth and power is *exactly* the thing the indigenous people saw as a *bad* thing. In some tribes, people who concentrated (hoarded) wealth were not "celebrated", as WE do, they were *shunned*, this is definitely where *we've* lost our way, it isn't something to be envied so much as *shamed*...
Awesome comment! It shows what is possible when we design a system first people and for the planet and all her creatures. I hope we can create something like this beyond the influences you mentioned and add in the responsibilities of the collective. I often wonder if it will only come after a collapse and too much loss.
I’m always pondering the root cause. Is power the reason that primitive MAN sought to overtake his neighbor’s possessions, family & property?
Is it genetically encoded in males for protection of family & survival purposes that has gone off the rails?
I’ve never understood the desire to use these skills outside of protecting family. Is the adrenaline rush of recognition within the clan enough to risk life & limb? Is elevated testosterone a factor or lack thereof that pushes past the norm of peacefully coexisting? (applies to male & female). Does it then make it a natural desire?
Is possession of this fragment of primal biology run amuck the reason?
Hard to redirect if we can’t identify a cause.
Not man bashing, just pondering possibilities
Interesting possibilities. I like the way you think! 🧡🙏
Hi Maura,
I love this thought provoking comment. I would have to think about it a lot more to write a cogent response, although I am not trying to convince anyone to adopt my position. I agree with the points you made for the most part, however I think evolution must be recognized as a crucial role in where we find ourselves today.
Of corse, cooperation is a large part of the picture here, but so is competition, fierce competition at that, especially if resources are scarce.
I recall the old saying, "whiskey is for drinking and water is for fighting." This type of conflict arises through practically no fault of either party. To be sure, one party could exacerbate the conflict by taking more than their fair share. During famine or drought, everyone wants more!
The labor leader, Samuel Gompers, was once asked, "what is it your union want?" He responded with one word: more. This was not because union members are greedy, bad, etc., they are simply human, IMHO, because the quest for survival, for existence (evolution) molded them, all of us, to what we are way, through natural selection. Not wholly, as you point out, but substantially.
"Evolution is a gradual change in the inherited traits of a population over many generations, and natural selection is the mechanism that explains how this happens."
Thank you so much for a beautiful response! I look forward to more thoughtful discussions with you Maura.
Best,
Jeff
My pleasure Walter! I look forward to it!
This is all a T problem. Men are the makers of war, the hoarders, the takers of all they desire. The problem is not humans but the patriarchy and all that has come from that for 5000 years..... not human nature.... man power nature. This fact is displayed every moment for all to see but we are culturally blind to this over riding fact. The patriarchy has doomed us to the bloody cycle of violence until the day we cut it out from our collective story, by the roots. mho
Your essay provides a comprehensive view of human endowment from philosophical, historical and biological perspectives, and Kant's metaphor becomes a powerful tool here to think about human nature, the challenges we face and how to deal with them.
Humans are capable of both good and evil, which can be seen as a reflection of our evolutionary history rather than a simple moral or religious issue.
So it is more about what we expect to become. It is worth thinking about how to achieve our expectations and what needs to be done to achieve this.
Delightful! I am going to need to think about this. I feel like the computer in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. The one who, when asked a question, responded with, "tricky..." I feel a seed sprouting though, I'll sleep on it and get back to you. Thanks for the thoughtful post!