However, the very fact of these changing American demographics roused the alarm of danger in many of the elite. America was threatened by a murky and nefarious other, these people infiltrating our country who don’t look like us, talk like us, have the same culture of us, follow our religion and our tradition. They keep to themselves in small ethnic enclaves. They’re depurifying our country. Their existence is a direct threat to us. They’re a danger.
To the modern eye, these fears seem unfounded and ridiculous. However, during the Gilded Age a dark idea was capturing the hearts and minds of the elite- Social Darwinism. Based on a fundamental misapplication of the evolutionary theory of Charles Darwin, this idea stated that survival of
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The Supreme Court upheld these states’ rights to do so, and thus over 70,000 people around the country, from ethnic minorities to alcoholics, prostitutes and vagrants to sexual deviants to the “feebleminded” were sterilized, without their consent and oftentimes without their knowledge. Eugenics was celebrated in scientific journals and at the World Fair. Many of the people who had these sterilizations performed upon them were illiterates living in poverty, meaning that of the tens of thousands of people suffering as a result of this decree, only one major lawsuit ever came to light- Buck vs. Bell, and the courts quickly …show more content…
Such an obfuscation of the parts of our history that are uncomfortable, shameful, a betrayal towards all that we stand for, will serve no purpose but to ensure that we will not learn from them. It’s not patriotism to be born and raised on a false belief that one’s country is incapable of wrong, and to then, generation after generation after generation, carry out atrocity after atrocity after atrocity. If one’s national pride is based on falsehood, then it is not pride in America they have, but a sanitized and easy-to-like “America” starkly different from the sometimes stumbling, always striving nation that we are. It is through an acknowledgement of who we were, and who we thus have the potential to be again, that we can get better. Patriotism is a dream of the America we can someday bring about, and a willingness to work for a world where we can stand in unity for the principles of Liberty and Justice for all. Far more powerful than a hundred years of blindness to those who toiled in the shadows of our nation, is an appeal to our better angels, to a city on a hill, to a remembrance of our past, to an ever-persistent hope for our
To many of the English colonists, any land that was granted to them in a charter by the English Crown was theirs’, with no consideration for the natives that had already owned the land. This belittlement of Indians caused great problems for the English later on, for the natives did not care about what the Crown granted the colonists for it was not theirs’ to grant in the first place. The theory of European superiority over the Native Americans caused for any differences in the way the cultures interacted, as well as amazing social unrest between the two cultures.
...et the wrongs they’ve suffered, even if these tribulations were justified. But mostly forgetting history poses a serious threat to the future. Sometimes we do need to know where we’ve been in order to know where we’re going. However, remembering is also a sticky subject. Debates erupt about which history is correct, and which should be remembered. It’s also a matter of enthusiasm as much as anything else. Remembering the Civil War as many Northerners and Southerners remember the war, as a war that happened, had certain ramifications, and otherwise doesn’t affect contemporary life, is much easier to justify and deal with than a zealous attitude toward a "Lost Cause." It is just that great enthusiasm leads to reverence for ancestors that do not necessarily deserve it. Still, it is not as if any individual can decide for another which ancestors are worth revering.
Cronon raises the question of the belief or disbelief of the Indian’s rights to the land. The Europeans believed the way Indians used the land was unacceptable seeing as how the Indians wasted the natural resources the land had. However, Indians didn’t waste the natural resources and wealth of the land but instead used it differently, which the Europeans failed to see. The political and economical life of the Indians needed to be known to grasp the use of the land, “Personal good could be replaced, and their accumulation made little sense for ecological reasons of mobility,” (Cronon, 62).
The Indians thought of land very differently to the white man. The land was sacred, there was no ownership, and it was created by the great spirit. They could not sell their land to others, whereas the white people could fence off the land which belonged to them, and sell it freely to whoever they wanted. The Europeans didn't think that the Indians were using the land properly, so in their eyes, they were doing a good favour to the earth. To the Indians, the land was more valuable than the money that the white man had brought with him, even though it didn't belong to them.
James Loewen wrote the book ?Lies My Teacher Told ME? to help the students of the United States become aware of their true history. This book attempts to show how and why American history has been taught the way it has without regard for the truth. Mr. Loewen had compared twelve different history textbooks they are: The Great Republic, The American Way, Land of Promise, Rise of the American Nation, Challenge of Freedom, American Adventures, Discovering American History, The American Tradition, Life and Liberty, The United States ? A History of the Republic, Triumph of the American Nation and The American Pageant. Loewen has argued his cases for Heroification, Euorcentrism and the first settlers, and Racism in our history. He has done this knowing fully that most people do not want to know the harsh realities of our nations past. The United States has tried to maintain a positive image throughout history. Unfortunately, it has many skeletons in its closet that need to come out to heal this great nation on many levels. If the public at large new the real role of racism in our nations infancy and how men tried to pursue their way of thinking as opposed to what is good for the country they would be ashamed at what the United States has stood for in the past.
America is a façade hidden behind its notorious past, with an even more troubling present. The land of the free, home of the brave, and one nation claimed to be united under the presence of an omnipotent power, but is it really? America profits off of the so-called dream that is sold to the hopeful and broken. This nation has been riddled with violence, persecution, hatred, and a false sense of togetherness. Racism was not the beginning, it was the ending result of a power struggle between those who wanted control and those who had it. The systematic enslavement and dehumanization of blacks resulted in the concept of a racial caste division, creating the idea of us vs. them (Wacquant, 2002). The Jim Crow laws, prisons, and the creation of ghettos
5. Perry, Elisabeth Israels, and Karen Manners Smith. The Gilded Age and Progressive Era: a student companion. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006. Print.
Expansive growth was the moniker which expressly defined the Gilded Age. Industry in all sectors, witnessed massive growth leading to the creation of an American economy. Due to the rapidly changing nature of industrialization important men of both the public and private sectors attempted to institute their own controls over it. However this transforming landscape integrated both economic and political changes, but also cultural and social interactions. In turn, those who controlled the flow of business would also steadily impact the American social scene by extension. Alan Trachtenberg, professor of American studies at Yale and author of The Incorporation of America, argues that the system of incorporation unhinged the idea of national identity that all American’s had previously shared. As a result incorporation became the catalyst for the great debate about what it meant to actually be American, and who was capable of labeling themselves as such. Throughout his work Trachtenberg consistently tackles the ideas of cultural identity and how those ideas struggled against one another to be the supreme definition of Americanism. This work not only brings to life the issue of identity but it attempts to synthesize various scholarly works into a cohesive work on the Gilded Age and demonstrates that concepts developed during the incorporation of the time period have formed the basis for the American cultural, economic, and political superstructure. The Incorporation of America sets a high standard for itself one in which it doesn’t necessarily meet; however the work is still expansive and masterful at describing the arguments of the Gilded Age.
From the period between the 1870’s through the 1890’s, it became an era known as the Gilded Age. The term was characterized by a famous American Literature author named Mark Twain. The writer tried to point out that the term means that while on the outside society may seem perfect and in order, underneath there is poverty, crime, corruption, and many other issues between American society’s rich and poor. This era’s gild is thicker than the cheaper material it’s covering. This can be shown through the countless numbers of achievements and advances America has made during the period of reconstruction and expansion, industrialization, and foreign affairs.
Political democracy during the Gilded Age was inefficient and insignificant. With a revolving door of Presidents whether it be due to assassination, impeachment or constant corruption, neither Republicans nor Democrats could sustain a dominate hold in congress which limited the push for controversial issues to be resolved. With little government intervention in business and seemingly corrupt politicians accepting bribes, the people were becoming increasingly frustrated with both business and the government about how little was being done to help and protect
As a man who lived on both sides of the economic spectrum of his time, Andrew Carnegie saw himself as a man of change and philanthropy. He believed himself to be the one to diminish the theory of Social Darwinism and help other lower class workers go from “rags to riches.” Carnegie recognized the fairness and legitimacy of America’s rising system of social classes, however he wanted to do his part to help those who were struggling because of his past as a lower class man. While Carnegie had good intentions, his actions were not made out to be as helpful as he had planned.
In 1492 Columbus and his men landed in a completely different part of the world than they expected; the Americas. They came to be a part of the emerging western empire, and the riches that came along with it. In the decades that followed that first landing in the Americas; Spanish explorers came in search for the great wonders that this land was claimed to have. These Spanish Explorers had no respect for the native peoples who have inhabited this land for centuries. Certain tribes were unable to revolt against the Conquistadores, however, some fought back and won. Over the next hundred years the Spanish continued their injustice towards the Natives because they believed their Christian duty allowed them to conquer this land and bring its people, no mater the cost, to their God.
In the mid-to-late 1800s there were many social ideas being tossed around. A lot of them were justifications made by people in wealthy positions in what they could do with their extreme wealth while the majority lived in poverty. Darwinism was on the premise that only the fittest should survive. Others were a reaction to needed change. The theory known as the Gospel of Wealth does not give money directly to the poor but gives them the resources to become educated if they work for it. The Second Declaration of Independence worked to give workers some free time and decent wages. The Social Gospel worked to give better housing and unite laborers. Social Darwinism was the least American theory during the Gilded Age and gave an excuse to those with
The theory of Social Darwinism avows that biologically superior humans endure, while genetically inferior individuals die out. Author Frank Norris, a proponent of Social Darwinism, asserted that one should remain within his inborn social class. In his view, if one acts contrary to his inherited societal state, then Social Darwinism will level him back to his innate societal class. Frank Norris expressed this theory in his novel McTeague. Through his conceptualization of Social Darwinism, Frank Norris illustrated the downfall of Trina and McTeague, Maria and Zerkow, and the prosperity of Old Grannis and Miss Baker.
A prime example of Social Darwinism in “The Time Machine”, is when an English scientist named the Time Traveller, travels 800,000 years into the future. Here he meets a small communist society called the Eloi. Pampered by the advancement of technology the Eloi became weak and empty-headed. The advancement of technology had altered the Eloi’s environment where they no longer needed intellect or strength to survive.