Ignoble savages

So I'm scanning my Facebook newsfeed this morning and see this link. Really? Are we still beating that drum? This drivel is intellectually dishonest and counterproductive.

By way of explanation for those unfamiliar with anarchist philosophy and its various schools, the idea behind this picture is that every last acre of land in this territory was rightfully owned by the Skraelings when filthy Europeans arrived. Europeans then proceeded to rape, pillage, and plunder their way across the continent. They slaughtered everything in sight and stole all the land for their own nefarious purposes. Communists masquerading as anarchists say all land deeds today are invalid because all land was stolen.

And these claims are pure bullshit. It's caucasian self-loathing and revisionist history at its finest.

To review actual history, Europeans arrived peacefully in this territory. They colonized areas and traded with the natives. At least in the northern sections. South of the Rio Grande was definitely a different story. But Plymouth Rock was not a war zone. Nor did it become one for quite some time.

Gradually, more and more Europeans arrived. The colonies expanded. It was not until 1634, 137 years after John Cabot "discovered" the region, that the first violence broke out. This was the Pequot War. And it was started when allies of the Narragansett tribe raided a local trading vessel. They killed the ship's owner and several of his crew, and made off with the cargo. The natives started a war over protecting their trade routes. A war of protectionism. That's far from an anarchic ideal.

If you scan westward you will find more of the same. Homesteaders did not rush out with guns blazing. They found open fields and homesteaded them. That's where we get the word "homestead". This is important because homesteading is universally accepted by anarchist thinkers as a legitimate way of claiming unused land. Most schools of thought consider it the only legitimate way. This is the part I love. The standard within the anarchist community is that a person must "mix their labor" with the land in order to own it. In other words, you only own as much lawn as you are willing to mow or as much field as you are willing to plow. But most plains tribes were nomadic. They didn't have big cities with outlying farms. They followed the buffalo and ate what nature provided. According to the view created by John Locke and held as the standard in the anarchist community, the skraelings did not "own" their hunting grounds. They never applied their labor to it. So homesteaders had every right, under anarchist philosophy, to settle the land as they did.

But the skraelings had never read John Locke. They felt their hunting grounds belonged to them. They took offense at the settlers occupying their lands. And violence ensued. Yes, it was the noble savage that began a policy of ethnic cleansing by attempting to remove white settlers.

Frankly, it's disgracefully hypocritical for anarchists to use the skraelings as a role model. The skraelings did not recognize the Lockean view of property rights which is considered gospel by anarchists. Rather, they used deadly force against peaceful families who were simply exercising their right to make a life for themselves. In addition, anarchists vehemently oppose tighter control of the US/Mexico border by saying the right to move about is an inalienable human right. But they then ignore the skraeling use of violence to prevent "illegal immigration". Step back 200 years and you will see that Europeans heading west were treated the same by the skraelings as modern mexicans are treated when they cross the Rio Grande. So how can any intellectually honest anarchist hold skraelings in any regard?

If you support the idea of Lockean property rights, you cannot begin to claim all land is stolen. It's pure fantasy. And if you support the right of people to move about as they wish without artificial borders, you cannot hold the skraelings as a role model. They didn't invent ethnic cleansing. But they sure as hell practiced it.

There is still more hypocrisy in the claim that restitution must be made to the skraelings. Anarchy is a philosophy of individualism. You can only punish people for wrongs they themselves have committed. You can't punish a person by taking their land or money away from them because you think their great-great-great grandfather did something wrong. And you can't give restitution to people for wrongs that were not inflicted on them. The whole idea is bat-shit insane. It's a complete contradiction of anarchist ideals. Especially since it treats everybody as members of collectives instead of as individuals. Chief Ownsa Casino does not deserve money because Chief Sitting Bull was kicked out of his house. There is no connection between the two other than some vague cultural similarities.

Anarchists need to drop skraelings as a role model. The natives simply don't fit the bill. Nothing about their culture represents the anarchist ideal. Skraelings fought wars with each other, they treated women like property, they slaughtered wildlife far in excess of what they needed, they basically did everything anarchists claim to despise govts for doing.