Racism

10 Pages 2428 Words

provided the
British with extensive natural resources, resources that the
agrarian-unfriendly British isles could not supply for its growing
empire.
When Britons arrived in North America, the indigenous population posed
an economic dilemma to the colonists. The Native Americans were settled
on the land that the British colonists needed to expand their economic
capacity. To provide a justificatory framework for the expulsion of
Native Americans off their land, the English colonists created a
ideology that suited their current needs.
The attitude of Anglos toward the Native Americans began as one of
ambivalence and reliance. When the English first arrived in North
America, they needed the Indians to survive the unfamiliar land and
harsh weather. Once the English became acclimated to their surroundings
and realized that the Indians were living on valuable land, it was only
a matter of time before guns and shackles replaced treaties and
handshakes.
In the name of Christianity and capitalism, the English colonists
quickly turned their backs on the short lived missionary zeal that
characterized the early colonial period. Now, the “savage Indians” were
viewed as unable to save themselves and extermination would be a worthy
enterprise in the sight of the Lord. The idea that one possesses a
God-given right to mistreat others runs through much of Western culture
and became especially acute in North America after the emergence of
capitalism.
For example, in New England many settlers rejoiced at the extraordinary
death brought upon the Native American population by the introduction of
epidemic diseases. It was viewed as a way of “thinning out” the
population. In the world of the New Jerusalem, where a city was to be
build upon a hill, such trite concerns were of little consequence for
those with divine providence.
Duality, and its means of placing the truth and its allied freedoms in
the hands o...