Thanksgiving: a day of … giving thanks. Sounds good, right? A day created especially so that one may acknowledge the wonderful things one has received.
I’m all about appreciating the finer things in life and the blessings I have received: family, friends and being fairly healthy, to name a few. One might therefore assume that I really like Thanksgiving. That’s where the danger of assuming things comes into play, because if you assumed this, you’re wrong.
The concept of giving thanks is great, really. What I dislike is the rest of it. No, I’m not talking about vicious Black Friday shoppers (though they are frightening), or the turkey (which I don’t really like), nor even the fact that I always feel as though I’ve gained five pounds after the holiday (I may not like turkey, but pie…yum).
What I truly dislike about Thanksgiving is the consumerism and lack of appreciation surrounding the holiday. We’ve all heard the stories since kindergarten: the Pilgrims fled from persecution in England and settled in the “New World” where they befriended and had a feast with their new Native American buddies who had taught them everything they needed to know to survive in this “New World.”
Sound familiar? I remember participating in a “First Thanksgiving” play in my kindergarten class – I was in the Native American tribe, fortunately, so I got to wear a construction paper headband, complete with construction paper feather, on my head. Ah, historical accuracy.
The truth is that while the holiday that we celebrate is, in theory, in honor of that first Thanksgiving, there was really so much more involved. The first celebration has been accepted as having actually occurred, but the following anniversaries of that day were a horrifying perversion of what it had or could have been.
Once people back in England realized that life was indeed possible over in the New World, they hopped on the boats in swarms. Unfortunately, they did not achieve the same relationship that the first settlers did with local native peoples. What had been, for one year, a friendly celebration between two very different kinds of people became a Pilgrim celebration. They still gave thanks, but this time it was selfish; not the thanks for friendship and kindness of the Wampanoag Nation it had been before.
In fact, the Europeans had taken advantage of the Native Americans who lived where the Pilgrims hoped to settle. The Europeans would butcher the men of the tribes and set fire to the longhouses containing the women and children so that they were burned alive.
They had feasts where they would give thanks, but there were no Native Americans involved since most had either been displaced or murdered.
Thanksgiving should be remembered as both a time to give thanks and to remember the past for what it was, not just for its face value. A lot of blood, sweat and tears went into the formation of this country, so we should take care to remember and honor that fact.