Whether it was A Short Account of the Destruction of the Indies by Bartolome de Las Casas or Exterminate the Brutes: One man's Odyssey into the Heart of Darkness and the Origins of the European Genocide by Sven Lindquist, I felt like I was constantly surrounded by literature that compared human actions to those of animals.
I grew up in a small town in Eastern Oregon before moving to Portland to go to school; how different the two places are. In my hometown, my backyard was wonderful National Forests full of wildlife and beautiful scenery. I was spoiled to say the least. But growing up around so much wildlife I quickly learned how they acted, what their instincts were, I was able to predict their movements. This was something that was vital for our way of life because most people lived off of what the harvested and would be in a for long winter if they weren't able to kill something large enough to feed their family from. This animal instinct and natural way of life is something I see mirrored in the way the Spanish conquistadors acted as well as many others. The way a predator acts if threatened is usually to kill. Or if an animal finds something on it's territory, it will fight the challenging animal.
Much how the way of life was in these historic times, barbaric, the human actions were as well. To play off of what I discussed in last week's entry, we hadn't yet made the mistakes to learn from yet. We didn't see how destructive the way of life was, or how gluttonous some society's lived; something we are coming to realize yet again.
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