RE: Christianity destroying cultures
November 18, 2013 at 5:28 pm
(This post was last modified: November 18, 2013 at 5:37 pm by Anomalocaris.)
(November 18, 2013 at 4:27 pm)freedomfromfallacy Wrote: The majority of the indigenous population of North America was entirely peaceful and pagan in their religious practices when Christianity made its way there.
We can discuss this in a separate thread, but I think you are totally mistaken about the peacefulness of North American indian populations.
You might be shocked by anthropological evidence of just how violent, in quantifiable terms, "peaceful" pre-agricultural or early agricultural societies really are compared to supposedly more violent modern world. Suffices it to say a typical person born in the 20th century had a far less chance of dying in violence, despite two world wars, many violent purges, many other civil wars, alledgedly dangerouse levels of violent crimes, than almost any pre-bronze age society for which anthropologists can apply any sort of reliable measurement.
(November 18, 2013 at 4:47 pm)freedomfromfallacy Wrote:(November 18, 2013 at 4:37 pm)thesummerqueen Wrote: Religiously, maybe, but they were sure warlike enough culturally, no matter what lipservice they paid to the Great Spirit.Agreed, though their religion gave little support to their war-like nature, whereas the Christian and Islam religions lend much support to killing for a god.
Yes, but that doesn't mean overall, beyond instance of sharp encounters, people of different religions who actually encounter christians and Muslims proslytizers really had a higher chance of dying violent deaths at the hands of these christains and muslims than people of primitive societies had of dying violent deaths as part of accepted normal social interactions in those societies.
Keep in mind the vast majority of the death toll inflicted by Europeans upon Indians (up to 95%) were through the unintended agent of diseases.