Thanksgiving seems to be the same repertoire every year. Americans gorge on turkey and schoolchildren dress as little Native Americans and Pilgrims to reenact the famous feast that never happened.
It is one thing to enjoy the football, food and family that comes with the holiday, but it is a completely different topic to claim that Turkey Day originated from a benign relationship between the first settlers and indigenous peoples.
Nothing could be farther from the truth. Native populations were nearly wiped out from European diseases and their land was soon taken over by the white newcomers. Yet Thanksgiving celebrates the American ideals of cooperative teamwork and hospitality? I beg to differ.
The myth of the Pilgrims celebrating a joyful feast with their friendly Native American neighbors is an error in history fed to generation after generation of students across the nation. Sugarcoated in history textbooks, the Pilgrims are portrayed as peaceful and big-hearted foreigners who worked cooperatively with the congenial native population to bring about an abundant harvest. No, I am not saying we expose third graders to the rape, death and destruction brought about by passengers of the Mayflower. However the truth shouldn’t be hidden either.
The invented holiday of Thanksgiving and the history that it represents proves detrimental to the learning of students. Their perception of the consequences of European settlement in the Americas and the catastrophic impact it had on the natives is distorted.
It wasn’t until middle school that I became aware of the not-so-pretty picture of Thanksgiving, which was confusing because that meant the history I had learned in elementary school wasn’t true. But history is only history if it happened. Do you see the problem?
Thanksgiving is a made up holiday that humiliates and dishonors the countless Native Americans who died with the arrival of white folk.
This isn’t the first time white society has been glorified despite the great harm they have inflicted upon multitudes of people of color: slavery, Japanese internment camps, racial discrimination.he dark side of American history is often hidden behind a veil while it can impact the way that students view their nation’s past.
In a country that values their mashed potatoes and gravy, Native American policies haven’t been quite as pleasant. From the “Trail of Tears” to harsh exterminatory slogans such as “Exterminate or Banish!” indigenous populations have been subjugated to very un-Thanksgiving-like treatment. Although they have been occupying the North American continent for thousands of years before the white settlers arrived they have been treated like unwanted foreigners. The American education system needs to change the way history is taught to young students. It is not inappropriate, nor is it unnecessary. If you could lie and twist history, that wouldn’t be history. It would be folktales and bedtime stories.