Why is it that the modern public revels in a demonstrably false portrait of primitive life?

Hollywood grinds out stories of wise and worthy native Americans, African tribesmen, Brazilian rainforest people and Australian despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary that they were rapacious and brutal civilizations?Why is it that the modern public revels in a demonstrably false portrait of primitive life?
Yes, the noble savage is always sage when viewed through the mists of time.





The deforestation, brutality, dysfunctional maladaptive cultures, and constant primitive warfare are forgotten, substituted by myths of environmental harmony.





The harmonious false image of primitive man was bought at the price of high infant mortality.





';A Peoples History of America';....??





reviewer Michael Kammen, a professor of American History at Cornell, wrote: ';I wish that I could pronounce Zinn's book a great success, but it is not. It is a synthesis of the radical and revisionist historiography of the past decade. . . Not only does the book read like a scissors and paste-pot job, but even less attractive, so much attention to historians, historiography and historical polemic leaves precious little space for the substance of history. . . . We do deserve a people's history; but not a singleminded, simpleminded history, too often of fools, knaves and Robin Hoods. We need a judicious people's history because the people are entitled to have their history whole; not just those parts that will anger or embarrass them. . . . If that is asking for the moon, then we will cheerfully settle for balanced history.';[10]





In a 2004 article in Dissent critiquing the 5th edition of A People's History of the United States, Georgetown University history professor Michael Kazin argued that Zinn's book is too focused on class conflict, and wrongly attributes sinister motives to the American political elite. He also characterized the book as an overly simplistic narrative of elite villains and oppressed people, with no attempt to understand historical actors in the context of the time in which they lived. Kazin writes, ';The ironic effect of such portraits of rulers is to rob 'the people' of cultural richness and variety, characteristics that might gain the respect and not just the sympathy of contemporary readers. For Zinn, ordinary Americans seem to live only to fight the rich and haughty and, inevitably, to be fooled by them.';[11] Kazin argues further that A People's History fails to explain why the American political-economic model continues to attract millions of minorities, women, workers, and immigrants, or why the socialist and radical political movements Zinn favors have failed to gain widespread support among the American public.





In 2003, Zinn was awarded the Prix des Amis du Monde Diplomatique for the French version of this book, Une histoire populaire des Etats-Unis.





What more do you need to know about this source?Why is it that the modern public revels in a demonstrably false portrait of primitive life?
The overwhelming consensus in popular culture holds that primitive peoples enjoy a quality - call it authenticity - that moderns lack, and that by rolling in their muck, some of this authenticity will stick to us.


An overpowering nostalgia afflicts the American post-Christian, for whom the American journey has neither goal nor purpose. Americans do not have close at hand the Saints Days of Italian villages incorporating heathen practice predating Rome, or the Elf-ridden forest of the German north celebrated in Romantic poetry. So he seeks authenticity in nature and in the romanticized dead customs of peoples who were ';subject to nature';. In their mortality, the post-Christian senses his own mortality, for without the Kingdom of God as a goal, American life offers only addictive diversions interrupted by ever-sharper episodes of anxiety.









I agree,although it's debatable that these peoples were more brutal and rapacious that modern societies.


It's when movies and books turned ancient peoples into some kind of 'fluffy bunnies' that I get really annoyed. Over the past 25 years 'celtic' studies have become popular-shelves groan with books titled 'celtic wisdom' and the like. Books bang on about the 'great Goddess' and 'being in tune with the earth', and 'druidic wisdom'. Novels like Marion Zimmer Bradley's MISTS OF AVALON speak of happy,matriarchal societies living in peace and harmony until the nasty patriarchal Romans brutally destroyed them.


What a load of cobblers! They celts weren't matriarchal, they didn't worship one great goddess, they were head hunters and warriors, they often put dedication burials in pits at the gates of the fort (read: human sacrifice), the druids in all probability did perform sacrifice (ie bog bodies)--and to me that makes them a whole lot more interesting than made up, muesli munching proto-hippies!
The ';wise Native American sage'; archetype is appealing to many industrialized nations (ie USA) in that it provides an alternative path to spirituality instead of traditional Judeo-Christian organized religion. Their way of life seems simpler and quaint even. And yes Hollywood romanticises history, but that doesn't mean ALL interpretations are false.





Rapacious and brutal are relative terms. What would you call the United States' slaughter of the Native American and the Trail of Tears? Noble acts of ';white man's burden?';





Some Native American tribes were violent, others quite peaceful. You can't make sweeping generalizations like that. We are talking about different cultures and standards. Some Amazonian tribes are cannibalistic and war mongering, others are peaceful.





Do you honestly believe all native peoples are 'noble savages?'


I thought we left Armchair Anthropology behind a century ago. Do you believe in eugenics as well?






rapcious and brutal compared to those who slaghtered them and stole everything from them?





Yes, there's a tendancy to romanticize the past.





But it's not true that ALL such groups were always rapacious and brutal.





And for rapacious and brutal, the colonizers of those people have it all over their victims.
Interesting question. I'm not sure how you're defining ';rapacious and brutal,'; since we're killing millions of people with our wars today. If there's one thing that studying anthropology should teach one, it is that all people are pretty much the same. Rapacious and brutal, wise and worthy, all wrapped up into one crazy package.
I agree with JW. Primitive means nothing more than having less. lol They live the basic life which can mean they have the chance to know themselves better. Many modern people live their lives chasing a perfect credit score, they know credit and not themselves.