Examples Of Industrial Mindset In Voices From White Earth

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It is said that Christopher Columbus discovered America; however, that is not how it actually worked out. In 1942, Columbus reached what the Europeans considered to be “The New World” and what is now known as present day Florida, the Bahamas to be exact. The Europeans came to a place that was new to them and there they discovered other people already inhabited there. To this new world, Columbus brought with him and industrial mindset that he would use to grow a colony in these new parts. In Voices From White Earth by Winona LaDuke, LaDuke defines an industrial mindset as several different things. First, she says that, “Industrial society believes that humans are entitled to full domination over nature. It believes that man - and it is usually …show more content…

An excerpt from his journal reads “ They would make fine servants… with fifty men we could subjugate them all and make them do whatever we want” (Zinn 1). This is an example of industrial thinking for one of two reasons. First, he showed a sense of entitlement by thinking that he could just come to a place that is not his own and have things go his way although this is not his territory. He wanted to use them [the Native Americans] to grow the area which shows an industrial mindset seeing as he was thinking of ways to expand right off the bat. Secondly, he thought that he would do what he wanted when he wanted or just make them do it without even asking, an example of this is, “I took some of the natives by force in order that they might learn and might give me information of whatever there is in these parts” (Zinn …show more content…

The majority of the article focuses on Massachusetts seeing as they were the first state to withhold slaves. “From fewer than 200 slaves in 1676, and 550 in 1708, the Massachusetts slave population jumped to about 2,000 in 1715. It reached its largest percentage of the total population between 1755 and 1764, when it stood at about 2.2 percent” (Douglas 2). As time went on more people felt the need to have slaves because first off, why pay someone to do work when you can have someone do the same work for free. Second off, why do the work for themselves and strain their own being when they again could have someone do the work for them and not have to feed them a dime. Yes, they have to feed them and provide them a shelter of some sort but that still was worth it. Slavery at the time to some people was a big thing, it was an industrial mindset that acted as tho they were better due to their skin color and in a way some aspects of slavery still stand today. By this I mean in a work environment, I will use my mom's job for example. She is 52 years old, never went to college and is in the sales department of a company called ADP. She has never had a hard time finding a job but since she did not go to college she has a harder time getting a high paying job. Now where she works she makes about 50,000 a year which is a