RE: If Aztecs were not conquered?
January 13, 2016 at 5:11 pm
(This post was last modified: January 13, 2016 at 5:14 pm by Regina.)
There is real archaeological evidence to prove that mesoacmericans did human sacrifice. However, I believe the Spanish were blowing it out of proportion and exaggerating it. History is written by the winners, they needed a "save the savages" complex to justify their cultural cleansing of Native peoples. It's exactly the same way as how in America, blacks were dehumanised during slavery. If you can remove the humanity from the people you are brutalising, you don't feel as much guilt over doing it.
Also, people equate "human sacrifice" with indigenous peoples as though they were the only race of people ever to do it. You can find evidence of human sacrifice in pretty much every region of the planet at some point in history. It seemed to just be a natural phase of early civilisation that most people went through. So yes, had the Aztecs been left uncontacted I think they'd eventually have dropped the practice.
Also, people equate "human sacrifice" with indigenous peoples as though they were the only race of people ever to do it. You can find evidence of human sacrifice in pretty much every region of the planet at some point in history. It seemed to just be a natural phase of early civilisation that most people went through. So yes, had the Aztecs been left uncontacted I think they'd eventually have dropped the practice.
"Adulthood is like looking both ways before you cross the road, and then getting hit by an airplane" - sarcasm_only
"Ironically like the nativist far-Right, which despises multiculturalism, but benefits from its ideas of difference to scapegoat the other and to promote its own white identity politics; these postmodernists, leftists, feminists and liberals also use multiculturalism, to side with the oppressor, by demanding respect and tolerance for oppression characterised as 'difference', no matter how intolerable." - Maryam Namazie
"Ironically like the nativist far-Right, which despises multiculturalism, but benefits from its ideas of difference to scapegoat the other and to promote its own white identity politics; these postmodernists, leftists, feminists and liberals also use multiculturalism, to side with the oppressor, by demanding respect and tolerance for oppression characterised as 'difference', no matter how intolerable." - Maryam Namazie
