Native American essay
Historically, relationships between European colonists and their descendants, on the one hand, and the native population of America, on the other, were extremely complex. Moreover, from the beginning of European colonization of America, Native Americans have become vulnerable to oppression and physical extinction because colonists wanted their lands and the pursuit of maximum profits moved settler westward wreaking havoc, diseases and destruction of the traditional lifestyle of Native Americans. Ironically, throughout the history of the development of relations between white Americans and Native Americans, the biased attitude to Native Americans emerged and white Americans had grown accustomed to view them as a threat but, in actuality, Native Americans were rather victims of white Americans, who oppressed Native Americans and forced them from their land causing numerous deaths and destruction of the traditional lifestyle of Native Americans.
At this point, it is possible to refer to the film Soldier Blue (1970) which reveals the controversy of policies conducted by the whites as well as threats, which Native Americans exposed white Americans to.
In fact, the film reveals the fact that the major problem of the failure of white Americans and Native Americans to build up normal, positive relations was not the irresistible desire of white Americans to occupy lands of Native Americans to rip off maximum profits at costs of Native Americans, but the main cause of conflicts between Native Americans and white Americans was the enormous gap between their cultures and the lack of effective communication between them. The main character of the film Cresta Lee seems to be the only person, who understands Native Americans and knows how to behave to build up friendly relations with them. At the same time, she is fully aware that Native Americans are different from white Americans and what is natural for Native Americans may be extremely cruel for white Americans. For instance, when she almost forces Honus to fight the chief of Kiowa horsemen, he is aware that this may be the only way for them to survive. As Honus wins and wounds the chief severely, he is unable to kill him but chief’s people kill their leader in place. Honus is shocked with such cruelty but Native Americans take it for granted. In fact, this episode may be key to understanding the difference between Native Americans and white Americans and why white Americans perceived Native Americans as a threat. Obviously, white Americans were appalled by the cruelty of some of the rites practiced by Native Americans. For instance, if they witnessed executions exercised by Native Americans, they could believe that Native Americans represent a threat to them too. However, the problem was that white Americans did not understand motives and reasons of actions of Native Americans, who just lived their life with respect to their traditions and cultural norms and they saw nothing wrong in their behavior. In contrast, white Americans failed to understand Native Americans and perceived them as a threat. Moreover, white Americans did not fully understand Native Americans and their belief that Native Americans represented a threat for them was, to a significant extent erroneous. The film clearly shows that if only white Americans could understand Native Americans just as well as Cresta Lee did it, they would have never viewed them as a threat and they would have never fought or oppressed them. However, the lack of understanding of Native Americans, their traditions and lifestyle, became the main cause of conflicts between them and white Americans. The latter preferred to expel Native Americans instead of integrating them into their communities or preserving equal relations between Native American and white communities. To oppress and eliminate the threat was apparently better solution for white Americans of that time, then negotiating and developing cultural ties with Native Americans, whom they treated as absolutely inferior. As a result, the policy of oppression of Native Americans became the core of the US policy in relation to the native population of American until the 20th century, when their rights have been finally recognized and the revisionist policies have started and the film Soldier Blue is the sample of revisionist western which attempts to revise the conventional view on Native Americans and relationships between Native Americans and white Americans.
Stereotyped, biased view of white Americans on Native Americans as a threat to their safety was the major driver of the oppressive policies conducted by white Americans throughout the 19th century, when such oppression became disastrous for the native population of America, which was relocated and those Native Americans, who survived the relocation, were settled in reservations. In this regard, the biased view on Native Americans can be clearly traced throughout the film Soldier Blue, where one of the main characters, Honus, personifies prejudices and biases against Native Americans. He views them as villains, although he does not even know him. In this regard, Cresta is quite different because she does know Native Americans and she does not have fear or repulsion in regard to Indians. On the contrary, throughout the film she manifests her respect to them and attempts to defend them from the unfair massacre that the US troop is about to launch.
White Americans perceived Native Americans as absolutely inferior and from the beginning of the colonist-Indian interaction, white settlers attempted to exploit Native Americans teaching them European technologies .
At this point, it is possible to refer to judgments the US military officers including Cresta’s fiancé make of Native Americans. They treat them as mere brutes, who are not worth of their attention but they believe that Native Americans have to be exterminated because they bear some threat to them, which they cannot even adequately explain. Such supremacist attitude to Native American explains their oppressive policies in relation to Native Americans. White Americans did not view Native Americans worth much negotiations, it was much easier for white Americans, who had much better developed technology, military, and economy, to relocate Native Americans from their land or simply eliminate them physically, than negotiate with them. This is why, to prevent the rising tension, the US Congress implemented the Indian Removal Act of 1830. Formally, the main reason for the introduction of the act was the decrease of the tension between white settler and Native Americans on the frontier. However, the major reason was the elimination of what white Americans and the US officials perceived to be the Indian threat. White Americans were just afraid of attacks form the part of Native Americans and the relocation of Native Americans became the preventive measure to secure white Americans, although this measure cost lives of a large part of the native population of America living on the territory of the US.
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