Before this thread gets closed again: Is this another case of US exceptionalism? Because grand Native American architecture is not questioned south of the Rio Grande.
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Yeah,some of the afrocentrists claim the moundbuilders.
Lots of crackpots all around.
that’s from “They came before Columbus”-- in the bibliography for Akala’s talk
Kinda shaped like pyramids of sorts.
white people also claim the headwaters of Donny Brook, near yon marble head.
so is the eiffel tower; steel having a steeper angle of repose than your average stony loam.
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@anon15383236 already gave you all the answer you deserve, but just to satisfy any lingering debate…
Because it’s a false equivalency clearly meant to be provocative and elicit an emotional reaction as opposed to a reasoned point of discussion. To wit: The population of North America at the time period this article refers to was racially mixed with approximately 83.8% European heritage 15.6% African, and approximately 1.4% Native N American (though that last number is very fudgy due to a number of factors, mainly racism), while Uganda in the time period you are referencing (now) the racial breakdown is 91% African of various tribal ancestry, 1% European descent and 8% “Other”. The clearly disingenuous falsehood in your logic is that, while the motivations of crime in Uganda may be ethnically motivated, they are not committed en masse by races alien to the region as they were by European-heritage white people against indigenous North American populations. Therefore, it is cogent to the topic to refer to these people as white, yet would be completely irrelevant to a discussion about Ugandan violence. Ya dig?
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I was thinking more of the white historians’ habit of claiming that African civilisations were not created by Africans.
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Most of that talk is based in mainstream history; in a few places, he mentions some less well-accepted theories (regarding Africa, not the Americas), but explicitly flags that he’s doing so as he does.
There is no claim made in that talk regarding American mound-builders.
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But don’t you see how important it is to always point out that both sides do it?
/s
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It may not be questioned by many people south of the Rio Grande, but it is still subject to the same woo as we find north of the border.
Some claim direct links between ancient Egypt and ancient Mesoamerica. Because different civilizations couldn’t possibly come up with pyramids independently, right? It’s all part of the “advanced antediluvian global civilization that They don’t want you to know about” conspiracy, or the ancient aliens conspiracy, and I’m sure someone has figured out how to merge the two grand conspiracies.
Some of this stuff has a pretty good veneer of plausibility, because why wouldn’t it if the people who peddle it (and in some cases actually believe it) spend a lifetime honing their arguments? And some of it lacks even a little veneer.
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Ugh. I know it’s just a meme and you’re not one of those people, but consider me duly provoked.
As with flat-earthers, it’s hard for me to believe that the “ancient aliens” folks aren’t just cooking up some wacky bullshit for fun & profit. The problem in both cases is that they sucker gullible folks, and their patently stupid conjectures and conspiracy theories take on a life of their own and acquire true believers. It’s fairly harmless when the numbers are small, but at some point they start to do real damage to the advancement of knowledge.
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Nowadays, yes, as our friend @TobinL shows, but just by fringe groups. The Smithsonian article refers to some mainstream opinions of the 19th century, not to what Erich von Däniken and similar contemporary crackpots may espouse. From the article:
Morgan, an anthropologist and social theorist, argued that Mesoamerican societies (such as the Maya and Aztec) exemplified the evolutionary category of “Middle Barbarism”—the highest stage of cultural and technological evolution to be achieved by any indigenous group in the Americas. By contrast, Morgan said that Native Americans located in the growing territories of the new United States were quintessential examples of “Stone Age” cultures—unprogressive and static communities incapable of technological or cultural advancement. These ideologies framed the archaeological research of the time.
So it seems to me that they were making a distinction between Mesoamerican and North American Natives.
Perhaps we should blame my former compatriots: while some Spaniards were witnesses of the Aztec splendor, other explorers, such as De Soto, spread the microbes that may have wrecked the most advanced North American Native civilizations.
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I realize we’re talking about different eras and different kinds of misconceptions (though in some cases they’re related).
I think I’m on this tangent because it depresses me that today’s fringe crackpots are surprisingly popular and gaining momentum. And to some extent they rely on the now-discredited thinking of the past, particularly those who build their conspiracy theories on allegedly “suppressed” evidence from the 19th/early 20th century.
The ancient-alien types are wackier and easier to see as harmless, but I still don’t see their schtick as harmless entertainment.
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That sort of thinking implies that there only two sides worth listening to. The truth does not lie somewhere in the middle between two dishonest narratives.
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thats some a level wankery, whatever your point.
keep throwing dirt, keep losing ground, dont let me stop you at all.
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