Thanksgiving Mourning?

[Gorefiend]

A few weeks ago I recieved an email. I thought just now that it might be worth sharing, at least in part.

Originally Posted by Mitchel Cohen?

This year once again Lakou NY calls on the community to make the correct logical choice on "Thanksgiving" day, the only one which honors our ancestors. We call on the community to join us as we travel to Plymouth, Massachusetts to stand with the United American Indians of the Northeast as they mark the 40th National Day of Mourning on the day most Americans celebrate Thanksgiving.

Most of us who celebrate and eat turkey on this day do so without realizing that the very 1st "official" Thanksgiving was proclaimed in 1637 by Massachusetts Governor Winthrop to thank his god after a group of whites returned home unscathed from a massacre of 700 Pequot men, women, elders, and children in Mystic, Connecticut.

The National Day of Mourning starts at noon with a Native American prayer ceremony. It is followed by a march around the town and a rally in front of Plymouth Rock where members of the UAINE tell the truth about the genocide perpetrated against their people and also their resistance which the day's mobilization represents. The day ends with a potluck dinner where everyone sits vand eats together. This year, the day is once again dedicated to Native American political prisoner Leonard Peltier, unjustly imprisoned by the US Government since 1977.

I had been maybe sorta peripherally aware that there were people who protested on Thanksgiving. I was never aware that it was even at this scale (and I doubt this is terribly large), or about the history, and while on the one hand I think that we can celebrate anyways (kinda taken from my thoughts on Halloween: even if it IS a pagan holiday or whatever, as far as I'm concerned now its for kids to have sugar highs on, and that's fine enough that we should all forget its roots*) but on the other hand, at least to me, pagan holidays are far less offensive than genocide. I guess I'm stuck on the fence, and thereby pushing it to the back of my head.

All that said, what do you guys think?

[Funka Genocide]

I don't celebrate thanksgiving, haven't for years. I mean if someone offers me some turkey and stuffing I'll eat it, but I don't really know anyone who gets all crazy about pilgrims and the myth of the first thanksgiving.

American history with regard to the original inhabitants of America is complete bullshit and thanksgiving is just another way of enforcing that bullshit.

I'm not one for protesting because it hardly ever gets anything done, but I wouldn't be aversed to the changing of the name to something like "Native American History Appreciation Day" or something equally politically correct but at least partially plausible.

It would suck if they took away the federal holiday parts though.

[stefan]

wait, people celebrate thanksgiving as anything other than an excuse to eat a shitload of rich food and not feel bad?

[Fifthfiend]

I don't think much anybody gives a fuck anymore about the ridiculous pilgrims and myths and shit and it has pretty much turned entirely into "Get together with some people and have a big-ass dinner, The Holiday" and as a result is pretty much the best of all holidays.

I dunno maybe somewhere they hate history kids still have to do the retarded construction-paper pilgrim hats and shit but you can't save everybody.

[krogothwolf]

Don't forget the most important part for most Americans now, The Football and Black Friday!

[Tev]

Originally Posted by Fifthfiend

.....and as a result is pretty much the best of all holidays.

It's slowly being eaten by Christmas. Halloween and Easter are the only holiday stalwart defenders we have left to hem in that seasonal juggernaut.

[stefan]

Originally Posted by Tev

It's slowly being eaten by Christmas. Halloween and Easter are the only holiday stalwart defenders we have left to hem in that seasonal juggernaut.

Im calling it now, sometime in the next 100 years christmas and thanksgiving will meld into a month-long festival involving bi-weekly feasts and giftgiving

[Funka Genocide]

Originally Posted by stefan

Im calling it now, sometime in the next 100 years christmas and thanksgiving will meld into a month-long festival involving bi-

I stopped reading there and filled in my own ending. It was the most outrageous holiday ever conceived.

[Bob The Mercenary]

It's one of the only times of the year where I can see my grandma in actual good spirits, seeing as the rest of the year she spends fighting cancer and going to dialysis. It's a time where my family can, for one damn second, put down their gripes and grudges against each other, sit down and laugh it off, while eating some of the best food this side of the Atlantic (stuffed artichokes mmmmm....).

Frankly, I couldn't give less of a fuck about the actual meaning.

I'm not one for protesting because it hardly ever gets anything done, but I wouldn't be aversed to the changing of the name to something like "Native American History Appreciation Day" or something equally politically correct but at least partially plausible.

I would be very very aversed to that.

[bluestarultor]

Pretty much all history is BS. History is meant to give people an identity, and nobody wants to identify as an asshole, so they just fill it up with outright lies and heroism when they can and spin it when they can't. America is probably more guilty of this than other countries, but I dare you to find anything in a primary school textbook that doesn't make it sound like life as told by Disney when it comes to the home team.

I mean, I'm totally willing to be proven wrong, but I'm not talking about "this guy was bad, but he was replaced by this totally awesome dude who farted rainbows, had a lovely singing voice, and they all lived happily ever after." I have yet to see anything really truly reflect badly on a national hero before higher education.