This week we bring you Natives in the News.<\/p>\n
First stop, Peru, where archaeologists have discovered a mass grave in the Lima suburbs.\u00a0 The grave is shallow, the bodies twisted in odd directions, with no burial offerings.\u00a0 Researchers have concluded that the bodies must be the remains of an Inca tribe killed way back in 1536, in the first wave of Spanish conquest. \u00a0Many of the bodies show signs of violence; in one of the skulls, there is a curious little hole lined with metal fragments. \u00a0Only one thing can explain this wound:\u00a0 a musket ball. \u00a0This victim has achieved the dubious distinction of being the oldest identified shooting victim in the Americas.<\/p>\n
Skip forward two and a half centuries.\u00a0 This summer marks the 250th<\/sup> anniversary of a bloody six-day siege at Fort William Henry on Lake George.\u00a0 In the long valley between Albany and Montreal, the balance of global power was decided.\u00a0 The English and the Iroquois versus the French and the Algonquians, winner take all.\u00a0 The English would lose the battle and the fort, but would go on to win the war and the world.\u00a0 The French would pack their bags for Orleans and New Orleans.\u00a0 And the Algonquians?\u00a0 Their once-mighty nation is gone.\u00a0 After the war, the \u201cLast of the Mohicans\u201d were systematically destroyed by the British and the Iroquois.<\/p>\n The legacy continues today.\u00a0 Down at the other end of the British Empire in Australia, the native culture has collapsed.\u00a0 The Aborigines have neither hope nor opportunity.\u00a0 They spend their welfare money on gambling, alcohol and pornography, creating a life expectancy 17 years shorter than for the average Australian.\u00a0 This week Prime Minister John Howard announced a new policy that will restrict alcohol sales to natives, require welfare money to be spent only on critical items like food, and link the distribution of welfare to a school attendance requirement. \u00a0Supporters of the program say it is necessary to protect aboriginal youth. \u00a0Critics decry the program as paternalistic and patronizing.<\/p>\n What\u2019s it all mean?\u00a0 Who knows, but it\u2019s something to reflect on this summer, while drinking a mojito and shooting craps at the Mohegan Sun.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"This week we bring you Natives in the News. First stop, Peru, where archaeologists have discovered a mass grave in the Lima suburbs.\u00a0 The grave is shallow, the bodies twisted in odd directions, with no burial offerings.\u00a0 Researchers have concluded that the bodies must be the remains of an Inca…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[97,175,460,461,859,938,1116],"class_list":["post-223","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-2","tag-australia","tag-british","tag-french","tag-french-and-indian-war","tag-native-american","tag-peru","tag-shooting-victim"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/quicksilverhg.com\/thequicksliver\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/223","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/quicksilverhg.com\/thequicksliver\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/quicksilverhg.com\/thequicksliver\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quicksilverhg.com\/thequicksliver\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quicksilverhg.com\/thequicksliver\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=223"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/quicksilverhg.com\/thequicksliver\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/223\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/quicksilverhg.com\/thequicksliver\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=223"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quicksilverhg.com\/thequicksliver\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=223"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quicksilverhg.com\/thequicksliver\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=223"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}