The Real Savages

The Real Savages

When we take a moment and think about Hitler, and the millions of lives he took in what we've named the Holocaust, we tend say to ourselves "that could never happen here", the truth of the matter is, it already has. About 200 years ago, in one of our nations saddest moments, the very land your standing on was used in the world's worst case of human genocide on record. During the 19th and 20th centuries there was a push to eradicate American Indian culture for good, during this time, more than 11,750,000 Native Americans were murdered, more then 5x's the amount of people killed in the Holocaust. This extreme hate brought on by the English settlers was fueled by early propaganda that spread this idea Native Americans were savage beings not worthy to live. Every time a tribe would defend their land, support only seemed to grow for their eradication. Like Hitler, the English used similar process's to carry out their genocide such as Death Marches, biological warfare, and dehumanizing treatments.

The idea of Native American eradication was brought on by westward expansion of English settlers. As they traveled farther west they encountered several large groups of Native Americans, in attempts to protect their land, the native's attacked certain English colonies, which only lead to retaliation from the English. The image of the Native American savage comes mostly from they're deeply, ingrained Indian culture. For instance, their warfare practices; Many Indian tribes treated prisoners very harshly. This is because most Indian cultures valued bravery above all things, they had little sympathy for those who surrendered or were captured. Many prisoners were taken back to the villages and tortured. The most popular forms of torture were skinning alive, the severing of body parts, and boiling alive. The most disturbing however, were the trophies they made to symbolize their kills, often taking the form of fingers, toes, scalps, and heads. Afterwards, Indians often consumed the body or parts of it in ceremonial meals. These images of the Native Americans as being savages played a large roll in the push for they're eradication. Early propaganda that all Native Americans were savages gained much support from colonists, and from troops. As a result they justified their actions, calling it "self-defense", protecting themselves from the savages. This justification was all they needed to begin the eradication of the Native American culture.

Much like the holocaust, this genocide began because the English considered the Natives less than themselves; this was the same thing that happened in the holocaust, the Germans considered themselves better then the Jews. Many of the same techniques used against the Jews in the holocaust are also used against the Native Americans. For one, the English forced the Native Americans on death walks one of the most famous was the Trail of Tears, which consisted