Compare and contrast attitudes towards Native Americans - Essay Example

Topic Compare and contrast attitudes towards Native Americans The battle between Native Americans and Custer and seventh cavalry at Little Bighom became legend in American history and led to the formation of Custer as a national hero. The conflict between Native Americans and other were basically over the matter of race. After the battle at Little Bighom ,Custer and his men became fighters in the mind of American people and Native Americans were counted as enemies. Even though the Native Americans won the battle of Little Bighom they could not win the right over their land. Native Americans were not given their rights as they deserve, and the white American wanted to have the dominion over the American continent. Even though white American treated American Indians in hostile manner, the latter considered the former as brothers.
The American Indian was always treated unfairly and was not rewarded for their efforts and they often survived liked invisible Americans. They were given small reservations and were cut off from the rest of the country. Many Americans who live out of the West have no idea that Native Americans did survive in America. Traditionally, Americans neglected Native Americans and did not give any rights or privilege to this community. Americans felt that even though Native Americans had noble qualities, in the end they are evil, treacherous and cruel. Native Americans were a minority and were treated with injustice by white Americans. Americans kept a distance from Native Americans as they were believed to be lazy, uncivilized and vengeful.
Native Americans had been neglected throughout the history of America, until the media started focusing on them. It was in 1960 that two books on American Indians throw some light upon their importance and culture. In 1960s Native Americans received more attention among white Americans and this led to greater awareness of American Indians and the troubles they faced in their daily life. The American Indians utilized the publicity they had among white Indians and the Americans started caring more for their needs and desire. Americans started feeling sympathetic towards Native Americans and started realizing their rights and needs. So the media started to focus on their problems, history and explained the pain they suffered at the hands of white Americans.
The plight of the Native Americans is poor because they are largely misunderstood by the White Americans. The problem is the both the parties does not attempt to understand each other. It was in late 20th century that the Americans started realizing that America is not only confined to Whites but to other communities like Blacks, Latinos, Asian- American and Native Americans. In the battle of Little Bighom, the Native Americans were portrayed to be savaging and hostile whereas the true is that white Americans were equally cruel some. Native Americans had performed protest to receive a memorial in their name at the battle at Little Bighom.After all the protest Native Americans did not get a memorial for the battle and had to fight more to achieve their goal. Read More