A Legacy Of Bigotry

Back in 2002 I was working as a full time musician in Naples, Florida. I had a 5 piece band called the “Bungalow Band”.  While leading the band, I was blessed to work with some great musicians. At one point I had hired a piano player named Dan to be a part of the group. Dan was a fine player and I really liked Dan. I had planned on using Dan throughout the 2002 -2003 season. That was until another keyboardist named Greg became available. I believed Greg would offer more to the group. Because Greg sang it would give the band an added dimension.  I made a professional decision to go with Greg. I was faced with the task of telling Dan that after a certain date that I would not need him anymore. Being the professional he was, Dan took the news with grace and dignity and he responded by giving me a philosophical line that stuck with me. He said, “Don’t worry Chris, 70 years from now it’s not going to matter.” The comment immediately shifted the mood and I knew by it that Dan understood it was just business.

After the call I stopped to think about his comment. Seventy years from now it WON’T matter!! Wow!! What perspective! What insight! What presence of mind! From that time If I have parroted this line once, I have parroted it 1000 times. It has been a great tool to help me not take things TOO seriously. But as time goes on and wisdom grows (hopefully), beliefs can be called into question.  

About a week ago I looked on my bookshelf and saw a book that I had bought my wife as a gift a few years ago. It is by Nathaniel Philbrick and is titled “Mayflower.”  I bought it for her when she was knee-deep researching her family’s genealogy. I don’t know what possessed me to pick it up. Maybe my love for history, the book’s pretty cover, or just a God inspired idea. Whatever it was, once I picked it up I could not put it down.

Mayflower is one of the finest books that I have ever read. Not only is the story enthralling, it moves along at a fantastic pace and is incredibly well written. It documents the flight of the pilgrims from the old world to the new, and continues up through the 2^nd generation in the new world.

The book demonstrates how WITHOUT the Indians help the Pilgrims simply would not have survived. The good nature and the assistance given by the Indians to the new settlers was a benefit to future generations that is impossible to calculate.

One of the beautiful stories in the book is how the English diplomat Edward Winslow had built a wonderful relationship with the leader of the Pokonoket Indians named Massasoit. The respect they had for each other and the vastly different ways of life, laid the fertile ground on which America bloomed.

Massasoit - Leader of the Pokonets

As effective as this first generation Pilgrims and Puritans were in establishing peace with the existing inhabitants of the New World, their children were equally adept and undoing it all. The sons of the two allies were Josiah Winslow and Metacom (known by his English name Philip). Upon their first meeting their relationship was tenuous at best. By the 1660’s pure hatred coursed through their veins and by 1675 war engulfed all of New England.

As I read the about the way the war evolved, I couldn’t help but see Josiah Winslow as a sniffling little brat who somehow embraced the idea that he was BETTER than the Indians. This was not a learned trait from his father. It was a greed for power and privilege and by virtue of his father’s prestige, he was able to “get what he wanted” and that was fertile farm land of the Indians.

Josiah Winslow

Not lacking in an ego of his own was Phillip who had dis-affectionately been renamed “King Philip” who would not honor the agreements of his father and sold land that was not his to sell.

The actions of these 2 narrow minded men, threw the New World into major disorder and resulted in a 2 year long war called the King Philip war. It wiped out about 8% of the Puritan and Pilgrim male population and 60 to 80% of the Native American male population. It remains the deadliest war per capita ever fought on American soil. Women and children were not saved from the treachery. Both sides had innocent blood on their hands. Some Indian children were butchered and slaughtered and others sold into slavery.  White women and children were routinely scalped.

The bigotry which Winslow expressed toward the Indians gave license to other Puritans and Pilgrims to do the same. With it came an “US” vs “Them” mentality that sadly has been handed down generation by generation and is still with us 350 plus years later.

Now the “THEM” part of the equation has been different throughout history. It at times has been the JAPS, the BLACKS, The SPICS, The RUSSIANS, The CHINKS.  It is not limited to those outside of the white race. Ethnic or social groups are in the fray.  The OKIE’s, The REDNECKS, The DEMOCRATS, The REPUBLICANS, and those damn LIBERTARIANS. Oh and let’s not forget the GAYS. Dare they want to marry!!

So I have to change my point of view. In 70 years things WILL matter. Maybe not all things, like whether I get my laundry done tonight, but there are THINGS that really matter and will last beyond our lifetime; just asked the Pilgrims. 

members of the Westboro Baptist Church- Topeka Kansas