Hollywood's Indian

9 Pages 2351 Words

with no rules or orderly way of life. This of course was not true. The Native Americans had established forms of government and there were definite authority figures. Just because the system of ruling and government may not have been the same as the settlers they thought that it was wrong and primitive, however, the tribes were surviving and flourishing many years before the settlers arrived so therefore they must have been doing something right. There is no wrong or right form of government, but the Europeans saw the Native Americans form as wrong and tried to set their rules and ways of governing on them. This misinterpretation of the Native American government led to the belief that the Native Americans ran around wild and lawless without any sense of laws, and led to the expression, “acting like a bunch of wild Indians.”
When it comes to religion, America was suppose to be a place where one could have freedom to believe in whatever religion or belief that they choose. The settlers themselves came to this new land searching religious freedom and they valued spirituality very much. The Native Americans had their own beliefs and values and they were very spiritual people. The settlers did not understand these beliefs that the Native Americans had and so they rejected it and tried to make the Native Americans convert to their religions. The religion was foreign to the settlers, so therefore it was wrong and unrefined. Because the Native Americans did not believe in the same concept of god that the Europeans, there was a rumor about Native Americans that they worshiped the devil simply because they prayed to another god (Bataille, 55). The settlers did not even give the Native American religions a chance they set out on a mission to save the Native Americans by helping them find their God, they basically were taking away the Native Americans freedom to their own religious beliefs.
Aside from cultural differences, th...