Movie Boycott -Apology

[cristi at ix.netcom.com]

Henry, your story made me cry.  I so wish that the gentle people of
America didn't have to keep suffering this kind of pain.  I'm glad that
you are out there, teaching.  You're so needed.

I did want to take a moment to comment on this:

> working in a barrio school for the last 27 years. I don=92t hide the=20
> possibility/probabilty of human sacrifice. I try to help the kids understand=
> =20
> why it might have happened, and how it was regarded by the people in=20
> Mesoamerica, and how to relate it to the killing committed in modern times.=20
> But I don=92t dwell on killing aspects of cultures.

It's a good thing to discuss, if only because white historians and
conquistadors emphasized it so much.  However, I do want to keep
emphasizing:  every single culture that I can think of has sacrificed
human beings regularly at some time in its history.  In fact, it was
documented in the Bible as being practiced in Israel.  Of *course*
that bothers me, being a Jew, but hey--there it is.  Almost all
cultures have practiced cannibalism, if not all of them.  (Probably,
in fact, all of them).  I think that if children need to know about
middle American sacrifice, they need to know this as well!

My feeling is that the middle Americans practiced sacrifice longer
than (most) other cultures because #1 they were subjected to far
greater threats from their environment, and #2 they have had a far
rockier geological past than the rest of the planet's peoples.
Although we have no written, validated, white-man's histories of
what the American peoples have been through, I do believe their
own oral histories--and the geological evidence of the catastrophes
*abounds.*  I think they were locked into a position of a feeling of
total dependence on sacrifice for their very survival, and that it was--
rightfully so--inspired by these environmental threats.  (Drought,
vulcanism, earthquake, meteors, etc.).

I also think that the way they formed their religion around it--in a
way that minimized the suffering and ugliness of it and emphasized
the dignity and the rewards--helped perpetuate it.  Human sacrifice
in other cultures was far more brutal.

I *do* think that it really happened.  And I *do* believe that it was
*absolutely* nothing to be ashamed of. If I were an Azteca, I would
without a doubt have participated happily in those rituals...after all,
if it were to only way for my people to survive...

Just some thoughts.
Cristi