American Indian and Western European Philosophy: A Historical, Cultural, and Environmental Crisis - Essay Example

American Indian and Western European Philosophy: A Historical, Cultural, and Environmental Crisis Lynn White, Jr., (in his paper The Historical Roots of Our 
Ecologic Crisis), Lewis W. Moncrief (in his paper The 
Cultural Basis for Our Environmental Crisis), and J. Baird Callicott (in his paper Traditional American Indian and Western European Attitudes 
Toward Nature: An Overview) seem to argue that there is a causal story to tell between a cultures adoption of 
a certain kind of Christian ethic and that cultures exploitation, misuse, and abuse of the natural 
environment. Here their arguments and these authors theses will be synthesized and evaluated. According to White, several solutions to ecologic problems tend to be “calls to action” which are “palliative” and “negative,” such as calls to ‘ban the bomb,’ et cetera—which is the Western European idea of solving ecological woes.1 From what we know of the history of Native Americans in America, much of what was learned in literature referring to Native American culture simply reinforces the thought patterns that whites had of Native peoples during that time period—including the habits they had while living in their environment. The major forces which characterize the stereotype of First Nations people include sorrow, defeat, and broken treaties along the way—which characterize several of the stories of various native peoples that were indigenous to America long before any white settlers arrived. As such, we will analyze how Native Americans were first perceived by the original settlers at Plymouth Rock, by the government with the Trail of Tears, and later on by politicians who bargained with and swindled the Lakhota Sioux. When the settlers arrived at Plymouth Rock, Native Americans were considered “savages,” as evidenced in the following sentence found in James Fenimore Cooper’s The Last of the Mohicans: The man had “…a look so dark and savage, that it might in itself excite fear.”2 This stereotype of the Native American painted as some sort of inhuman creature was only reinforced by the idea that they made them feel that there was a definite threat to their women (white women). “Notwithstanding the fearful and menacing array of savages on every side of her, no apprehension on her own account could prevent the noble-minded maiden from keeping her eyes fastened on the pale and anxious features of the trembling Alice.”3 While this was not an unmitigated fear, as some white settlers’ wives were caught and captured to be made part of the Indian tribes, this fear was largely propagated by white people—and widely-circulated as rumor that Indians were always on the prowl for some fair, blond-headed maven that they might take in search of satisfying their savage lust. Of course, that is not to say that there was not favoritism displayed even among tribes, as Cooper notes. “[T]here is but little love between a Delaware and a Mingo…”4 Nor, can it be said, was there the absence of nepotism either. “The Hurons love their friends the Delawares. . . . Why should they not? They are colored by the same sun, and their just men will hunt in the same grounds after death.”5 Surely, by the same token, Cooper—being a white narrator—tries to preface a racist statement by saying the equivalent of, “I’m not racist but…,” thus attempting to neutralize any shred of judgmental ideas coming after that statement as not being perceived racist. Cooper writes, “I am not a prejudiced man, nor one who vaunts himself on his natural privileges, though the worst enemy I have on earth, and he is an Iroquois, daren’t deny that I am genuine white.”6 In essence, he is saying, “Not that this really has anything to do with him being Iroquois, but this guy is the most annoying chap I’ve ever met on the planet. Oh, and did I mention he’s Iroquois?” Well, if was a fact that didn’t matter, why was the fact mentioned? The mere fact that Cooper mentions that the other person being Iroquois didn’t matter, mattered. If he had just simply said, “Well, there was this annoying guy.” But, since he mentioned that the person also happened to be of a certain race, that sort of tempers the statement, tinging it and tainting it in a most unusual fashion—in essence coloring the way one sees the sentence. Indubiously, one is led to believe that, perhaps, if one Iroquois person is an enemy, then, perhaps, naturally should many or all Iroquois be one’s enemy—by nature of whatever unpalatable elements the Iroquois people may possess. Although Cooper does not expressly say it, he is (yes) being racist. Although he tries to paint a dapper picture with his writer’s quill, he is has unremarkably sullied the way he will forever be remembered in history—simply writing a tawdry account of Indian-white relations during the French and Indian War with a tome of what would now pass as thinly-veiled racism. Of course, we still see these types of racism evident today with regard to Native peoples. “The most common stereotype of Native Americans depicts them as doomed, horse-mounted, buffalo-hunting nomads…”7 This is not helped by people trying to show what once was the stereotype versus how Native Americans are viewed today. “For example, students inevitably feel the need to express negative stereotypes of Indigenous peoples as they explain how they used to think (or how others think), and as they assure the class that they now know better.”8 Imitating a stereotype of the past does not do anything—the author is saying—in order to rid it from the present state of mind in historical thinking. Of course, relations might be bettered if these stereotypes were dropped altogether. Unfortunately, people try to “use” these stereotypes in order to strengthen the case for some good characteristics that they would like to reinforce within Native culture. “[One] strategy recognizes the power of the dominant cultures construction and use of the dualistic Indian stereotype—romantic versus savage—and seeks to identify with the more positive aspect of the stereotype.”9 Still, this does not necessarily justify using this type of stereotype. In fact, getting rid of various types of stereotypes—such as “the Tomahawk chop” in Atlanta “Braves” baseball—is seen as important to ensuring that Native peoples are no longer categorized as ruthless, war-obsessed savages. “Native American organizations see the elimination of [sports] mascots as part of a larger agenda of reducing societal stereotyping about Native Americans...”10 It was due to the diseases that the white man brought at Plymouth Rock that the Native Americans died in droves—and later on the First Nations would realize later on the true depth of the harsh feelings the whites had against them, in more ways than one. Moncrief’s argument is that native peoples have traditionally been forced to conform to Western European values and not the other way around. “It seems tenable to affirm that the role played by religion in man-to-man and man-to-environment relationships is one of establishing a very broad system of allowable beliefs and behavior and of articulating and invoking a system of social and spiritual rewards for those who conform and of negative sanctions for individuals or groups who approach or cross the pale of the religiously unacceptable.”11 Chief Nez Percé’s people were later faced with the anger of the whites in Washington when he pleaded with them not to make his people move off their land. They were later forced to trek across the plains of the United States in a move called The Trail of Tears. Callicott argues in his piece the following: “The Western tradition pictures nature as material, mechanical, and devoid of spirit…while the American Indian tradition pictures nature throughout as an extended family or society of living, ensouled beings.”12 The people in Washington were definitely proud and they weren’t about to let the Native Americans settle on their native lands in the east where they had been living. “The pale-faces are a proud and a hungry race,”13 as Fenimore Cooper describes in The Last Mohican. Cooper also makes an interesting observation that tends to be overlooked, which basically has a lot to do with the unchanging nature of (apparently) any people. “A Mingo is a Mingo, and God having made him so, neither the Mohawks nor any other tribe can alter him.”14 In a way, Cooper is saying that, “Whatever someone is, nothing can change that person.” This is not necessarily true and it is difficult to get someone to believe something is different about oneself unless one convinces the other party that something about that person really has changed. Cooper’s statement reinforces a stereotype that just because someone holds true to living out a stereotype, that they can’t change from that stereotype. White men could just not get over the fact that Native Americans (many times) had bronze or olive skin. Cooper demonstrates this with a tawdry mention of what used to commonly be known as “the red man,” or what is now known today as Native American. “There is reason in an Indian, though nature has made him with a red skin! … I am no scholar, and I care not who knows it; but judging from what I have seen, at deer chases and squirrel hunts, of the sparks below, I should think a rifle in the hands of their grandfathers was not so dangerous as a hickory bow and a good flint-head might be, if drawn with Indian judgment, and sent by an Indian eye.”15 Cooper openly demonstrates his idea that anything termed “Indian” goes with “Indian,” showing that he is grouping or lumping concepts together. For example, he is terming a rifle as a “white” object, while he is implying that a bow, arrow, and flint are “Indian” objects. It is this sort of grouping which is demeaning to Native peoples. Later on, when the Lakhota Sioux were trying to live out their time on reservations in the Black Hills, the Sioux people were moved from there because there was found to be gold and oil in the Black Hills. But this was not before the U.S. government had fought the Battle at Wounded Knee, which was a historical and savage massacre of the Lakhota Sioux, who would not sign anymore treaties at one point—since previous ones had been violated, indeed the last straw. There were definitely several stereotypes perpetuated of Native Americans after the settlers first arrived in Plymouth Rock. Not only did the white settlers invade a land that was already that of the First Nations peoples, but they also took innocent lives of Native Americans needlessly, and did not respect nature. As was demonstrated by White, Moncrief, and Callicott, Native Americans’ ideas of taking care of the environment definitely contrasted with that of the Western European model. First, it began with the sorrow—where the Native Americans were unnecessarily decimated due to the fact that the whites brought illness, sickness, death, and disease; secondly, it continued with the defeat of the Native peoples of the Chief and his tribe, who valiantly carried on through the Trail of Tears to their new destination; and, thirdly, it ended with the battle that still lives on in its notoriety as one of the bloodiest massacres of innocent Native American people committed by a government in peacetime. Stereotypes are probably not going to go away anytime soon. However, in order to ensure that they do, several things must be accomplished. For one, it might behoove others to make sure that the way they speak does not inherently do harm to Native peoples. Secondly, the way one treats nature is invariably the way that Nature is going to take care of us. There are more ways, indeed, but that is for another time. To be sure, the stereotypes that have continued to be perpetuated in our society will not go away by themselves, but neither are they helped much by literature classes which proffer the work of James Fenimore Cooper and copy such as that of The Last of the Mohicans as world, and not insular (at-times racist), literature. And—although many people might claim that Christianity was the best thing to happen to Native American culture—it could be argued that Western European thinking seriously caused the American environment to be downtrodden. Indeed, having witnessed the assault of the Christian ethic on native peoples—demean the idea of the environment that is so highly esteemed in native culture. Native American customs have traditionally favored the environment over many other elements. In addition, Western European Christianity did not do much in terms of supporting the environment, but rather led to a rash of people being converted to their religion based upon the hubris of those doing the converting. They felt puffed-up, self-absorbed in their own interest in proffering the religion that took several lives in the name of a Savior. Certainly, the Christian ethic was not well-received when it was realized that part of that ethic was to downplay the contributions of Native Americans and First Nations peoples in terms of having traditionally defended the environment. In that regard, all these authors—White, Moncrief, and Callicott—have valid points. However, none of them quite appreciates the struggle that these native peoples had to endure in terms of discrimination for their beliefs that Nature had an enduring power that man could not harness. It is hoped that in the future, people who have more traditionally Western European thought regarding the environment will stop to reflect to realize that their way of living is not the only way, and that racist attitudes should never prevail. BIBLIOGRAPHY Callicott, J. Baird. “Traditional American Indian and Western European Attitudes Towards Nature: An Overview.” Environmental Ethics 4: 293-311. 1982. Print. Crawford, Suzanne J., et al. American Indian Religious Traditions: An Encyclopedia, Vol. I. US: ABC-CLIO, 2005. Print. Cooper, James Fenimore. The Last of the Mohicans, A Narrative of 1757. US: W.A. Townsend, 1859. Pp. 36, 47, 249, 365, 373, 386. Print. Healey, Joseph F., et al. Race, Ethnicity, and Gender: Selected Readings. US: Pine Forge Press, 2007. Print. Martin, Joel W. The Land Looks After Us: A History of Native American Religion. UK: Oxford, 2001. Print. Moncrief, Lewis W. “The 
Cultural Basis for Our Environmental Crisis.” Science, 170 (3957): 508-512. 30 October 1970. Print. Timpson, Annis May. First Nations, First Thoughts. Canada: UBC Press, 2010. Print. White, Jr., Lynn. “The Historical Roots of Our Ecologic Crisis.” Science, 155 (1367): 1203-1207. 10 March 1967. Print. Read More