On Sat, 26 Apr 2008 10:45:14 +0200, andrel wrote:

>> OK, 600, I can't do math.
> indeed, see below.
>>  I'm counting from the time Columbus
>> "discovered" the new world trying to find a trade route to India.
> That'll be 516 then.
>> "Conquest" didn't really start until a bit later, though, you're right.
> indeed, so let us settle for approximately 500.

Alright, fine - I was working in round numbers - 1400's to 2000's = 600.  
I wasn't trying for a highly precise answer because the actual math 
doesn't change my point at all. ;-)

Jim

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Jim Henderson wrote:
> Heh, well, don't get me started on the casino BS.  I think that's a 
> travesty myself - a bastardization of the heritage that's just nothing 
> more than crass commercialism/consumerism.

I think it's because of jurisdiction stuff. The reservations really 
legally aren't 100% part of the state they're in, so they don't always 
need to follow the same state laws.

-- 
   Darren New / San Diego, CA, USA (PST)
     "That's pretty. Where's that?"
          "It's the Age of Channelwood."
     "We should go there on vacation some time."

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Darren New wrote:
> Jim Henderson wrote:
>> Heh, well, don't get me started on the casino BS.  I think that's a 
>> travesty myself - a bastardization of the heritage that's just nothing 
>> more than crass commercialism/consumerism.
> 
> I think it's because of jurisdiction stuff. The reservations really 
> legally aren't 100% part of the state they're in, so they don't always 
> need to follow the same state laws.
> 

They aren't actually part of the *country* they're in, which is why we 
have to have all kinds of treaties & such with them.

Of course, personally I think if they want to have their own separate 
nation, they ought to have green cards & visas as well.  You can't be 
both a separate nation, *and* citizens.

-- 
...Chambers
www.pacificwebguy.com

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Warp wrote:
>   You claim that a person's history consists of his ancestors' history
> besides his own life. I disagree. Why should it have any effect on your
> actions what your ancestors did or didn't do? Why should your own
> ancestors' actions have more effect on yours than the actions of someone
> else's ancestors?

Excellent question, Warp.  Personally, I think we should learn from 
*everyone's* ancestors, not just our own, so it still pays to pay 
attention to the past.

Should we make decisions based solely on what conditions were like in 
the past?  No, of course not.

Should we ignore past conditions when setting current policy?  Again, of 
course not.

That's all Jim is saying.  Don't let the past be the only guiding 
principle you have, but pay attention to it at least.

-- 
...Chambers
www.pacificwebguy.com

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On Sat, 26 Apr 2008 11:57:18 -0700, Chambers wrote:

> Excellent question, Warp.  Personally, I think we should learn from
> *everyone's* ancestors, not just our own, so it still pays to pay
> attention to the past.
> 
> Should we make decisions based solely on what conditions were like in
> the past?  No, of course not.
> 
> Should we ignore past conditions when setting current policy?  Again, of
> course not.
> 
> That's all Jim is saying.  Don't let the past be the only guiding
> principle you have, but pay attention to it at least.

Thanks - this is exactly what I was trying to say.  I wish I could've 
been as eloquent and succinct. :-)

Jim

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On Sat, 26 Apr 2008 11:01:44 -0700, Darren New wrote:

> Jim Henderson wrote:
>> Heh, well, don't get me started on the casino BS.  I think that's a
>> travesty myself - a bastardization of the heritage that's just nothing
>> more than crass commercialism/consumerism.
> 
> I think it's because of jurisdiction stuff. The reservations really
> legally aren't 100% part of the state they're in, so they don't always
> need to follow the same state laws.

Well, yes - but that's not the thing about it.  I grew up in Minnesota 
while the tribes there were getting their casinos established - as well 
as when there were "discussions" about allowing Native Americans rights 
for spear fishing.  We seemed really eager to have them start opening 
themed casinos, but not so eager on letting them practice their 
traditions as regards hunting.  I worked with a guy who was really 
involved in the spear fishing thing.  He was understandibly quite upset 
that his cultural heritage had been reduced to this: http://
www.mysticlake.com/ .

Because surely, that's what being a Native American is all about.

Jim

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Chambers wrote:
> They aren't actually part of the *country* they're in, which is why we 
> have to have all kinds of treaties & such with them.

Yet California seems to regulate them based on the votes of 
Californians. I don't think it's quite so simple, is all.

-- 
   Darren New / San Diego, CA, USA (PST)
     "That's pretty. Where's that?"
          "It's the Age of Channelwood."
     "We should go there on vacation some time."

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In article <481### [at] hotmailcom>, a_l### [at] hotmailcom 
says...
> Jim Henderson wrote:
> > On Thu, 24 Apr 2008 20:27:51 -0700, Patrick Elliott wrote:
> > 
> > Well, it's shrinking, but I don't know how rapdily, particularly here i
n 
> > the intermountain west.  But to solve the "problem" of past conquest 
> > today isn't an easy one to answer, because you can't make things like
 
> > they were in the 1400's - and I don't think current tribe members would
 
> > think that was a solution.
> > 
> > I think there's a fine line between acknowledging the past and exploiti
ng 
> > the sins of the past.  Is it appropriate to continue to pay reparations
 
> > to the Native Americans today for something that started 700 years ago?
  
> 700?
> > I honestly can't say I know the answer to that question.  My instinct i
s 
> > to say "you have the same opportunities today as everyone else here",
 
> That only applies if they want to live the same rat race as non native 
> americans (if that is the negation of native americans).
> If they want to live more or less like they did a millenium ago you 
> might argue that the non natives should not make that impossible.
Yeah. Most of them want to live like the ones directly across the street 
from where I grew up.. Three things they had in common:

1. They lived off government hand outs.
2. They never maintained anything they got from the government, figuring 
if they broke their car, windows, walls, doors, etc., the government 
could be called to fix it.
3. They, one year, got all pissed off about something, started working 
towards a war path, and only stopped when the local sheriff pointed out 
that the neighbors across the street from them where all armed, and they 
wouldn't have a tribe left to get pissed off at the government with, if 
they decided to cross the street and start hurting people.

There seem to be three types:

1. The ones that "will" live in the rat race, because they know damn 
well that sitting on their ass and doing jack shit isn't going to get 
them any place.

2. The ones that milk the government and every treaty they can dig up 
from some place to screw white people, while not doing jack shit for 
themselves, then blame both for why they don't have anything.

3. The ones that really do want to go back to "traditional ways", and 
basically refuse most help, won't be part of modern society, and think 
that being part of that society will destroy them, somehow "more" than 
what the first two groups have done.

Well, OK, there are obviously exceptions within the individual tribes, 
but this is generally what you end up seeing. They are destroying 
themselves, and we keep kissing their asses, on the stupid presumption 
that we "owe" the modern, gutless, ethicless, worthless, descendants 
what their ancestors **actually** deserved. Want to help them? Give all 
the land, money, etc. to the ones that are not assholes, then let the 
rest do something useful with their lives. But then, I may be biased, 
given the particular bunch of morons I lived across from.

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    if version = "Vista" {
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      call DRM_everything();
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    call functional_code();
  }
  else
    call crash_windows();
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Patrick Elliott wrote:
> In article <481### [at] hotmailcom>, a_l### [at] hotmailcom 
> says...
>> Jim Henderson wrote:
>>> On Thu, 24 Apr 2008 20:27:51 -0700, Patrick Elliott wrote:
>>>
>>> Well, it's shrinking, but I don't know how rapdily, particularly here in 
>>> the intermountain west.  But to solve the "problem" of past conquest 
>>> today isn't an easy one to answer, because you can't make things like 
>>> they were in the 1400's - and I don't think current tribe members would 
>>> think that was a solution.
>>>
>>> I think there's a fine line between acknowledging the past and exploiting 
>>> the sins of the past.  Is it appropriate to continue to pay reparations 
>>> to the Native Americans today for something that started 700 years ago?  
>> 700?
>>> I honestly can't say I know the answer to that question.  My instinct is 
>>> to say "you have the same opportunities today as everyone else here", 
>> That only applies if they want to live the same rat race as non native 
>> americans (if that is the negation of native americans).
>> If they want to live more or less like they did a millenium ago you 
>> might argue that the non natives should not make that impossible.
> Yeah. Most of them want to live like the ones directly across the street 
> from where I grew up.. Three things they had in common:
> 
> 1. They lived off government hand outs.
> 2. They never maintained anything they got from the government, figuring 
> if they broke their car, windows, walls, doors, etc., the government 
> could be called to fix it.
> 3. They, one year, got all pissed off about something, started working 
> towards a war path, and only stopped when the local sheriff pointed out 
> that the neighbors across the street from them where all armed, and they 
> wouldn't have a tribe left to get pissed off at the government with, if 
> they decided to cross the street and start hurting people.
> 
> There seem to be three types:
> 
> 1. The ones that "will" live in the rat race, because they know damn 
> well that sitting on their ass and doing jack shit isn't going to get 
> them any place.
> 
> 2. The ones that milk the government and every treaty they can dig up 
> from some place to screw white people, while not doing jack shit for 
> themselves, then blame both for why they don't have anything.
> 
> 3. The ones that really do want to go back to "traditional ways", and 
> basically refuse most help, won't be part of modern society, and think 
> that being part of that society will destroy them, somehow "more" than 
> what the first two groups have done.
> 
> Well, OK, there are obviously exceptions within the individual tribes, 
> but this is generally what you end up seeing. They are destroying 
> themselves, and we keep kissing their asses, on the stupid presumption 
> that we "owe" the modern, gutless, ethicless, worthless, descendants 
> what their ancestors **actually** deserved. Want to help them? Give all 
> the land, money, etc. to the ones that are not assholes, then let the 
> rest do something useful with their lives. But then, I may be biased, 
> given the particular bunch of morons I lived across from.
> 
Yes, you are. More in tone than in observation. One other way to look at 
it is that there is a confusion of inheritance of culture and 
inheritance of genes. While it is worthwhile to preserve the culture, 
not everybody that has the genes is part of that culture. Especially the 
ones that have nearly no culture at all, and that preserve what is left 
in ethanol.
Your three types are worldwide. There are several tribes trying to live 
a traditional way of life in this modern madness and there are those 
that do nothing and blame everything on others. My sister was a few 
years ago in Cameroon and she was supposed (and subtly forced) to pay 
for the food of everybody she met because she was from Europe and, well, 
you know, slavery and such.
One other thing: the three types are actually at least six, because it 
is all about a clash of two cultures and you forgot to take the culture 
that ends on top into consideration. The remaining ones are: 3b) winning 
group basically goes on undisturbed. 1b) Cultures get mixed and 2b) 
winning group takes most of the culture over from the defeated (I think 
I remember there were case where that happened but can't remember 
which). And there is also the situation that no group actually wins totally.

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In article <481### [at] hotmailcom>, a_l### [at] hotmailcom 
says...
> Yes, you are. More in tone than in observation. One other way to look at
 
> it is that there is a confusion of inheritance of culture and 
> inheritance of genes. While it is worthwhile to preserve the culture, 
> not everybody that has the genes is part of that culture. Especially the
 
> ones that have nearly no culture at all, and that preserve what is left
 
> in ethanol.
Well, we where talking about one specific group of people and if they, 
by reason of "blood", not "culture", should get some sort of special 
treatments, not something more general, so.. Also, culture changes over 
time. You can preserve it by reenacting it, like people do in a "lot" of 
cases, while still living in the modern world, or you can stuff your 
head in the sand and render yourself extinct, by sticking to stuff that, 
maybe, didn't work quite as well as the rose colored glasses look, which 
some people get looking at their pasts, implies. Sometimes cultures die 
out from competition, not due to overt and intentional destruction from 
outside.

> Your three types are worldwide. There are several tribes trying to live
 
> a traditional way of life in this modern madness and there are those 
> that do nothing and blame everything on others. My sister was a few 
> years ago in Cameroon and she was supposed (and subtly forced) to pay 
> for the food of everybody she met because she was from Europe and, well,
 
> you know, slavery and such.
The problem imho, is that, rather than figure out what is good from now, 
a lot of them simply reject everything from now, for some imaginary 
ideal of the past, forgetting all the bad shit that used to happen when 
they *did* live in the simple, supposedly non-mad world. I might agree 
that the US often fails to look at the consequences of progress, and 
gives up on some stuff too easy. We also, sadly, tend to hang on to some 
of the stupidest and most useless crap from the past possible, at least 
among the conservatives, because admitting its crap would be 
**liberal**, so one must instead fight even harder to preserve it, even 
when it didn't make sense to 50% of the people when it *was* wide 
spread...

> One other thing: the three types are actually at least six, because it 
> is all about a clash of two cultures and you forgot to take the culture
 
> that ends on top into consideration. The remaining ones are: 3b) winning
 
> group basically goes on undisturbed. 1b) Cultures get mixed and 2b) 
> winning group takes most of the culture over from the defeated (I think
 
> I remember there were case where that happened but can't remember 
> which). And there is also the situation that no group actually wins total
ly.
> 
True enough. And really, there is no such thing as 3b. Something always 
transfers. The most common tactic is to borrow the idea, claim you came 
up with it, then vigorously deny it existed "before" you borrowed it. 
The Catholic church is an expert on that, given that, if what many 
scholars now consider to be true is, nothing from the NT itself to their 
rituals, holidays, saints, or **anything** is original. Its all been 
borrowed from whom ever was the biggest threat to them at the time. lol


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void main () {

    if version = "Vista" {
      call slow_by_half();
      call DRM_everything();
    }
    call functional_code();
  }
  else
    call crash_windows();
}

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