Native American Violence

Native American Violence
In the United States today, Native Americans, who are sometimes referred to as American Indians, are stereotyped and represented as violent beings. This comes from a vast repertoire of warring in past Native American history, portrayals of Native Americans in American pop culture, and statistics of Native American alcohol and drug usage. However, not all members of a race have the same beliefs or the same characteristics. Although Native Americans are often discriminated against for being violent, not all members of this race evoke this trait.
Nearly 12,000 years ago, Asian peoples crossed a land bridge from Asia into North America. They then dispersed throughout North America. As the Ice Age ended 10,000 years ago, people started settling down (Meyer et. al.). These new settlers were often hunters and gatherers, but many southwestern Native Americans were part of farming villages. Overall, Native Americans at this time were peaceful. However, throughout the last few hundred years of the Pre-Columbian era, violent clashes and fierce competition existed between native tribes, as southwestern farming villages were dissolved and warring over land occurred. According to American National Biography Online, after warring and disbanding of tribes, “All aspects of Native American culture displayed considerable regional and temporal variation” (Meyer et. al.). Basically, different Native American tribes became very diverse in their ways, ideologies, customs, etc. Some tribes had violent practices, while others did not. This is critical to understand when Native Americans are stereotyped. Not every tribe, much less every member of each tribe, was violent before the arrival of Europeans.
As Europeans ar...

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...e American descent. Typically, when people drink and use drugs, they lose judgment and self-control, thus becoming violent at some times. This is a supporting factor that some Native Americans can be more violent than members of another race under certain circumstances.
The history of Native American violence in the pre-Columbian era and after the arrival of the Europeans caused stereotypes that all Native Americans are violent to surface. These ideas are enhanced by the negative portrayals of Native Americans in pop culture in the past and even today, along with the relatively high rates of heavy drug and alcohol use among Native Americans. However, not all Native Americans possess these traits and backgrounds. It is therefore unfair to make the generalization that all Native Americans were and are violent in the past as well as in today’s American society.