The Good & Dark Side of Modernization

We tried to run, but they shot us like we were a buffalo. I know there are some good white people, but the soldiers must be mean to shoot children and women. Indian soldiers would not do that to white children.
- Louise Weasel Bear from Bury My Heart At Wounded Knee by Dee Brown
Chapter 19: Wounded Knee

Enforced change can cause people more harm than good. During the history course, the master theme has been modernization. To modernize means to make more civilized in order to fit into society. Examples of modernization have been the Enslavement of African Slaves, the killing of American Indians, and the Western Civilization in the Middle East.

The enslavement began when Africans from West Africa were caught in nets, roped, and taken aboard a slave ship from their homeland of Africa to the New World, which is America. In the eyes of the Europeans, African customs were seen as heathenistic and the people were seen as uncivilized. As you know, the barracks in the ship were clustered together. Most of the slaves who were sitting below were covered with urine and feces. The trip from Africa to the New World was defined as the Middle Passage. In a television show titled Reading Rainbow, an episode called "Follow The Drinking Gourd" was about the subject of African Slavery. Levar Burton described slavery as a "cruel and horrible journey." He mentions that for months, there was no fresh air or sunshine. Legs of men shackled by their ankles are seen in the dreary darkness that looms within the ship's belly. He also mentions that there was no room to move or breathe. A diagram showed every area in the ship's belly loaded with the bodies of human beings. Top to bottom. Left to right.

During the re-enactment of the Middle Passage, a man whose voice is almost to the point of exasperation, is heard. He says how dark it is in there, how hard it is to breathe. He mentions that some of the slaves are sick or dead. He misses his family and his village. Heavy with depression, he says that he does not know where he will be or where he will be going once the ship stops. Among his voice are the sounds of human misery; the sounds of coughing and shackles jangling against each other are heard within the background. There is also the sound of humming and singing. After landing on North American soil,slaves were then put on auction blocks and sold to the highest bidder. Because an entire family could not be bought, everyone was separated from each other. Husbands from their wives. Fathers from their children. Babies and children from their mothers. The cries of a baby snatched away from his mother can be heard during the Slave Auction re-enactment. A woman whose baby boy was snatched from her told about how men came to look at them, poking and prodding at them like meat. She said that she begged and pleaded for them to not take her baby. Her pleas fell on deaf ears. They paid her no attention. Her voice, deep with sadness, said her last words which were, "Be good child. Be good for your momma." Set with hopelessness, his face sunk with disbelief, a man being sold away looks on at the bidders getting their money.

Next is the genocide of the American Indians. Examples of this atrocity are the Trail of Tears, The Sand Creek Massacre and the Wounded Knee Massacre. The Trail of Tears is the forced relocation of the Cherokee Nation to Oklahoma, which is referred to as Indian Territory. The Cherokees, similar to African slaves, were forced out of their homes at bayonet point and loaded into stockades like herds of cattle. An article titled Surviving the "Trail of Tears" states that most of the Indians were suffering from hunger, disease, and exhaustion. An estimate read that 4,000 out of 15,000 died due to factors of bad weather, bad diet, starvation and malnutrition. Along the march followed various epidemics of cholera, smallpox, measles, whooping cough, pleurisy and dysentery. The death toll was approximately at 17.7%, with half of the dead being children. It is also noted that hundreds of those who were sick and dying were in wagons or lying on the frozen ground with a government-provided blanket to protect them from the January wind.

Another example is the Sand Creek Massacre, which took place in Fort Lyon,Colorado. On the dawn of 1864, a camp occupied by Chief Black Kettle and his band of Cheyenne and Arapaho Nations was attacked by a regiment of 600 soldiers. During this gruesome attack, the soldiers killed 200 men including women and children. Aside from the gunfire, physical mutilation became a common activity. Congressional Testimony stated that the scrotum from White Antelope was cut for a tobacco pouch in later use, along with the vaginal areas of dead women. This is noted in an article titled Washita: Genocide on the Great Plains by James Horsely. Richard B. Williams (Northern Cheyenne/Lakota) noted in a 1997 documentary titled The Great Tribes that the soldiers even cut out the private parts belonging to dead children. The soldiers then rode within the ranks into town wearing their "trophies" on themselves and placed them on display to amuse the crowd. An article about the massacre on www. Lastoftheindependents.com noted that within their trophies included 100 scalps and pubic hair from the women. Humanitarians in the East as well as the American Government were said to be horrified upon hearing about the actions done by the regiment.

In 1865, Major Edward Wynkoop uttered these words about this depressing, derogatory and inhumane acts which took place: "Colonel Chivington, the most disgusting and horrible character. Dead bodies of females profaned in such a manner that the recital is sickening." Colonel John Chivington, also a Methodist Minister, was charged with planning the massacre and forced to resign from the army. According to the Professor of the University of New Mexico Dr. Paul A. Hutton, the Sand Creek Massacre is "one of the great blots in the history of the United States."

The last example of the American Indian Genocide is the Massacre at Wounded Knee, which spelled the end of the Indian Resistance. A blood relative of Dewey Bear named Mario Gonzales on www. Dickshovel.com stated in a written testimony for a Senate hearing on the 25th of September 1991 that the soldiers, including General Forsyth, were drinking heavily while celebrating the capture of Spotted Elk also known as Big Foot. Turning Hawk in a book titled Bury My Heart At Wounded Knee by Dee Brown, however, had a different outlook. In chapter 19 called Wounded Knee on pg.444, he points out the name of a deaf young man named Black Coyote. Black Coyote is described as a crazy man of bad influence and a nobody. Chasing Crane (played by Eddie Spears) quoted, "They tried to take a gun from a deaf man. He couldn't hear; they didn't care." This was in the HBO movie named after the book written by Dee Brown. In the movie, Black Coyote is shown refusing to give up his gun. Chasing Crane kept telling the soldiers to leave him alone and that he could not hear them. The gun held in Black Coyote's reach fires off. The soldiers, taking this as a sign of war, are shown firing back. Using their guns and Hotchkiss Cannons, they fired into the camps destroying tepees and and indiscriminately gunning down women and children.

The Great Tribes documentary states that the death toll was at 300 of the 350 original men, women and children. It also noted that 153 were also dead. Not only did the Wounded Knee Massacre signify the end of resistance and the nomadic way of life for Indians, it was also the symbolization of the broken sacred hoop. For 3 days, the Indians were left in the cold and bitter winter lying frozen in grotesque shapes. Their bodies were placed into wagons by a party of civilians and thrown into a trench which was previously dug; no ceremonial burial was conducted.

Last but not least, is the influence of Western Civilization in the Middle East. Ever since the attacks on the twin towers as well as the Pentagon on the 11th of September 2001, Middle Eastern terrorist groups such as Al Qaeda and the Taliban have plotted to destroy America. An American reporter interviewing the Taliban asks one of the them if they would kill the Americans if they installed Westernized fast food restaurants such as Pizza Hut, McDonald's, Burger King, etc. into their country. The Taliban guy responded back, saying that he and the rest of his followers would kill all Americans.

Modernization has its good sides; you get radios, color television sets, westernized clothing, and a lot of materials that Americans already have. But, there is also a dark side, which is you losing your way of living and dressing. African Americans lost their African customs during slavery and have to trace their roots to Africa. Native Americans lost their rights to speak their languages, due to the boarding schools they were forcefully placed in by the Bureau of Indian Affairs as children. Now as grown-ups, they have a hard time fitting in within their nations. They show no respect for their elders. Alcohol is used to numb the feelings of loneliness. They have flashbacks about the cruelty and abuse they suffered at the hands of the instructors in those confined buildings.

Although African Americans and Native Americans were given Europeanized materials, they lost their way of life and culture. Those very customs which they held strongly were stripped away from them the minute that the Europeans arrived to make changes.

http://www.semorpc.org/ttsurviv.htm

http://www.lastoftheindependents.com/sandcreek.htm

http://www.dickshovel.com