National Day of Mourning

November 22, 2018 1:45 PM

Thanksgiving: The National Day of Mourning. "A Native student on why the holiday is a painful reminder of a whitewashed past." [Via]
posted by homunculus (6 comments total)

“In 1637 the Pequot Massacre took place, when over 700 Native men, women and children were slaughtered in what's now known as Mystic, Connecticut. The following day, the governor declared a day of thanksgiving and held a feast to celebrate their victories in battle. Thirty-nine years later in Massachusetts, the colonists declared a "day of public celebration and thanksgiving" saying, "there now scarce remains a name or family of them [Natives] but are either slain, captivated or fled," right after the slaughtering of a tribe including the beheading of Wampanoag chief Metacom (which remained on display for 24 years after King Philip's war). It was not until 1863 that Abraham Lincoln officially declared it a national holiday, in the same year the Sioux were being removed from Minnesota, during which the bounty for a Sioux scalp was $25.“

This was really powerful, thanks for posting. Always more to learn, especially when it comes to the genocide and white supremacy this country is built on.
posted by stellaluna at 4:52 PM on November 22, 2018 [3 favorites]

Related thread: Will the real Thanksgiving please stand up?

Working link: Why I Hate Thanksgiving
posted by homunculus at 10:31 PM on November 22, 2018 [1 favorite]

Yikes, that thread from 2005 is awful. It makes the silence in this thread seem like a blessing, almost.

I celebrated Thanksgiving this year and have mixed feelings about it. For a long time, my celebrations haven't incorporated any of the traditional Thanksgiving mythology. It's an excuse to get together with friends or family and share a big meal - there is no awareness of history (false or not) in the holiday anymore. It's more of a fall harvest festival. I'm not saying that it makes Thanksgiving okay, because history is still how we got here, and lack of awareness isn't a virtue.

But, it's a big change from how Thanksgiving was presented/celebrated when I was in school, when we had to have "lessons" (always carefully incomplete) about the holiday. In the moment, when I'm crowded by friends and eating fall foods, it's hard to see what could be so wrong with it.

... but then the NFL game between the "Redskins" and the "Cowboys" comes on, and it's like a slap in the face.
posted by Kutsuwamushi at 6:37 AM on November 23, 2018 [4 favorites]

@lilnativeboy: my catholic Grandma basically disowned me bc of my article lol :P
posted by homunculus at 11:16 AM on November 24, 2018 [1 favorite]

Came here to say exactly what Kutsuwamushi said. It makes me concerned for what my kids are gonna learn in school, though -- and wonder if it's any different from when I was a kid.
posted by knownassociate at 6:55 AM on November 26, 2018

Retweeted by @lilnativeboy (I think it's a response to a response to the OP):

@frida_shallow: "Thread of what my ancestors were doing while colonizers were dying bc they didn't believe in taking showers"
posted by homunculus at 2:47 PM on November 27, 2018 [1 favorite]