Happy Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving has long been a holiday dedicated to expressing our gratitude for the good things which have happened in our lives during the preceding year. Lately, however, we have been inundated in the media by a three-pronged attack on Thanksgiving. First, they tell us that the Pilgrims really didn't celebrate Thanksgiving. Then, we're subjected to a guilt trip regarding the treatment of Native Americans. Finally, the animal rights' extremists want us to give up eating turkey.

Of course, the real isue is that they don't want us to give thanks because there is only one being to whom thanks could logically be given: the Creator of Everything, He Who Bestows All Blessings, the Being Formerly Known As God (before liberals tried to make "God" a dirty word.)

Let's address these "issues" briefly:

One - It doesn't matter whether or not Governor Bradford and the other Mayflower travelers celebrated Thanksgiving. You see, for them, the reality of Divine Providence's daily involvement in their lives, making their very survival possible, was something impossible to question. As far as the Pilgrims were concerned, every day was Thanksgiving Day. Whatever minor blessing or gift they were bestowed, they thanked God for it. The real question is not whether the Pilgrims picked one day to be thankful. It is why would we be thankful on only one day.

Two - I firmly believe that the Native Americans got a raw deal. That is beyond dispute. Europeans came into the Americas, exploited both the Natives lack of technology and their differing attitudes about ownership of the land and took over. However, from a historical perspective, this was not a race issue. It was not white versus non-white. Literally dozens, if not hundreds, of ethnic groups have been exterminated in Europe over the centuries. The same has happened worldwide for millenia. Does that make it right? Of course not. On the other hand, blaming racism for a phenomenon which was business as usual for white and non-white alike at the time is a complete warping of history. In fact, the Indians themselves had been known to engage in ethnic cleansing throughout the New World long prior to the arrival of the Europeans.

I believe we should do what can be done to help them become equal (financially, politically and so forth) partners in our society, keeping in mind that the dominant Anglo-American culture should be protected and nurtured. We must not, however, under any circumstances allow our misplaced sense of guilt to prompt us to turn the current order of things upside down. People who live in homes they purchased must be considered the rightful owners. What happened centuries ago has nothing to do with who owns the land now. The courts have no right to even hear these silly cases about giving land back to the Native Americans, much less to rule in their favor.

The vast majority of Americans - black, white, brown or otherwise - are descended from those who arrived here long after the Indians became the victims of European discovery and expansion into the Western Hemisphere. Those who do hail from those early days are centuries removed from their ancestors. Punishing any of us for the acts of those whose names we don't even remember is cruel, inhuman and senseless. Trying to mete out justice centuries after the fact is misguided and irrational. There is a reason that all legal systems establish statutes of limitations. This is a perfect example.

As for the turkey thing, what can I say? Conversation with people so ungrounded in reality is all but impossible. People are people. Animals are animals. People have rights. Animals don't. People need to treat animals with kindness and dignity and to avoid cruelty not because animals are our equals, but because we scar our own spirits when we are cruel and capricious. On the other hand, we need to eat and they are there for our benefit, as well as each others. I can hear the PETA people now howling with indignation at my words: "Exploiter! You can't see that animals are our brothers, our equals!" Really? Hundreds of species of animals eat meat and would, in fact, go extinct if they did not do so. If animals were, in fact, our equals, we would have exactly the same right to eat meat as they do. If they are not our equals, then there is no moral reason for us not to eat meat. Either way, I'm having white meat cut from a roasted bird raised for just that purpose.

Hey, maybe they ARE our equals. The bird's already stuffed and I'm about to be. (Yes, I mock the animal rights extremists, because their fairy tales are laughable.)

What this long-winded diatribe comes down to is: "Give thanks, help your fellow man where you can and enjoy the feast God has provided us."

I, for one, am thankful for my wonderful wife and four beautiful children (the fourth won't be gracing our home with joyful noises until just before Christmas, but he or she is a child, a living human being with all the rights we all possess, nonetheless), my parents and in-laws and all the blessings with which the Living and Loving God, the Creator of All, has gifted us. I am thankful for all the good people of our Town, who are quickly becoming an extended Family. I am thankful that we will be taking our Town forward on a new, positive, joyful path and for all of you who made that possible. There's so much for which to be thankful, it's impossible to list everything.

Happy Thanksgiving!