IT TOOK JASON Colavito eight years to write The Mound Builder Myth, but the project seems tailor-made for 2020. It starts with multiple waves of a pandemic and ends with conspiracies, white supremacists, and a battle between science and superstition.
At the heart of the book lie the large earthen mounds that cover a vast portion of North America. The earliest of these, Colavito points out, “were standing in their solemn glory five centuries before the Egyptians raised their pyramids.” They were built by Native Americans, but in the 19th century, a legend took hold that a lost white race had constructed them. This manufactured myth didn’t just ignore indigenous American civilizations. It fed into the theft and ethnic cleansing of the indigenous people’s lands.
In this century-spanning work of U.S. intellectual history, Colavito describes how a determined few replaced the truth of who built the ancient earthen mounds in North America with a long-lasting “monumental deception” backed by many political leaders, including several U.S. presidents. The lie has now been exposed, but Colavito argues that the “constellation of ideas” that supported it persists today.
هذه القصة مأخوذة من طبعة August/September 2020 من Reason magazine.
ابدأ النسخة التجريبية المجانية من Magzter GOLD لمدة 7 أيام للوصول إلى آلاف القصص المتميزة المنسقة وأكثر من 9,000 مجلة وصحيفة.
بالفعل مشترك ? تسجيل الدخول
هذه القصة مأخوذة من طبعة August/September 2020 من Reason magazine.
ابدأ النسخة التجريبية المجانية من Magzter GOLD لمدة 7 أيام للوصول إلى آلاف القصص المتميزة المنسقة وأكثر من 9,000 مجلة وصحيفة.
بالفعل مشترك? تسجيل الدخول
Libertarianism From the Ground Up
ARGUMENTS FOR LIBERTARIANISM typically take two forms. Some libertarians base their creed on natural rights-the idea that each individual has an inborn right to self-ownership, or freedom from aggression, or whatever-and proceed to argue that only a libertarian political regime is compatible with those rights.
Lawlessness and Liberalism
THE UNITED STATES is notorious both for mass incarceration and for militarized police forces.
Politics Without Journalism
THE 2024 CAMPAIGN WAS A WATERSHED MOMENT FOR THE WAY WE PROCESS PUBLIC AFFAIRS.
EVERY BODY HATES PRICES
BUT THEY HELP US DECIDE BETWEEN BOURBON AND BACONATORS.
The Great American City Upon a Hill Is Always Under Construction
AMERICA'S UTOPIAN DREAMS LEAD TO URBAN EXPERIMENTATION.
Amanda Knox Tells Her Own Story
\"OUR CRIMINAL JUSTICE SYSTEM RELIES UPON OUR OWN IGNORANCE AND THE FACT THAT WE DON'T KNOW WHAT OUR RIGHTS ARE.\"
Trade Policy Amnesia
WHILE HE WAS interviewing for the job, President Joe Biden demonstrated an acute awareness of how tariffs work. It's worrisome that he seems to have forgotten that or, worse, chosen to ignore it-since he's been president.
Civil Liberties Lost Under COVID
WHEN JOE BIDEN was sworn in as president in January 2021, he had good reason to be optimistic about the trajectory of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Bye, Joe
AMERICA'S 46th president is headed out the door. After a single term marked by ambitious plans but modest follow-through, Joe Biden is wrapping up his time in office and somewhat reluctantly shuffling off into the sunset.
Q&A Mark Calabria
IF YOU HAVE a mortgage on your home, the odds are that it's backed by one of two congressionally chartered, government-sponsored enterprises (GSES), Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.