King Philip’s War Discussion
After viewing the Native American video and reading Rowlandson, what came to my realization is that there are two different perspectives on the same story. For instance, the readings view the story as a social issue relating to land disputes between the Natives and the non-Natives, with the parcels of land presumed to belong to the Natives. Arguably, the Native American video, unlike Rowlandson, takes a different perspective altogether, viewing the problem as a political issue relating to colonization where the Natives were mistreated, and thus leading to their revolt based on the fact that they had a belief that it is the mandate of the governing organ to protect their fundamental rights by ensuring that everyone is treated fairly. The political issue, as captured in the video, was amplified when a Native was murdered, thus interfering with the victim’s fundamental right to life. This kind of interference with human rights can be mapped to the inactions by the colonists, who viewed themselves as superior than others.
As a historian, what I think really happened was that there was a struggle for power in the sense that the Natives were fighting for the scarce available resource, which is land as a way of attaining power. This thinking is based on the explanation of the event as outlined in the reading Rowlandson. On the other hand, I also think that the murder of the Natives was as a result of them being subjected to forced labor along with other inhumane conditions in the face of colonialism.