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What Is Thanksgiving? The Truth Behind a Very Weird Holiday. [1]

['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.']

Date: 2023-11-22

Americans love lying. We love lying. We love liars. And we love the people that lie to us. We even bring our families and friends together every year to feast on lies, turkey, and mashed potatoes.

Thanksgiving is one of the greatest examples of our nation’s love affair with lying, and it serves as a fine example of how we proudly celebrate our collective falsehoods, pass our precious lies down from generation to generation, and gluttonously re-write our own sordid histories.

In the most basic sense, it is strange enough exercise for a nation built on Indigenous genocide to create a holiday centered on a fictionalized relationship of mutual goodwill and gratitude between colonizers and colonized. The mass slaughter and land theft of millions of people is not something normal people should want to crack a can of cranberries open over.

In America, though, we simply ask where the can opener is. We force our children to don the native equivalent of Blackface and retell the fairy tale of the “Pilgrims and Indians.” And without even questioning if this story is even remotely true, we ask our racist kin to pass the potatoes.

This year let’s do something different. Let’s serve up some truth about Thanksgiving. This holiday isn’t what you think it is.

The story of the Mayflower was in no way historically remarkable, let alone so spectacular that the entire nation should be forced to celebrate it with our families for centuries. The Indigenous were not thrilled to see another boatful of oppressors docked off their shores, and by 1620 they were definitely not eager to welcome a crew of settlers. There were no Pilgrims. The people aboard the Mayflower were actually called “Strangers” and “Separatists.” And the voyage was largely economic, not religious, and it absolutely wasn’t the first voyage of its kind.

In fact, over a century of Indigenous genocide and black enslavement scorched and salted the soil of the “New World” before the Mayflower set sail. Christopher Jones captained this particular voyage across the Atlantic in 1620, a full 128 years after Columbus found himself lost in “Indian” territory in 1492. The Mayflower reached the West 118 years after the first slave ship arrived in 1502. This boat full of diseased Europeans made landfall a full 22 years after the first colony in what is now the United States was established, and 12 years after the founding of Jamestown.

There was nothing new about a boat like the Mayflower coming to what would become America. And the passengers of the Mayflower did not come to Indigenous lands to seek religious freedom. They came to colonize and settle the west.

By the time the Mayflower set sail, competition for land, resources, and superiority in the “New

World” had become an incredibly lucrative industry. Amongst the entrepreneurial entities that profited off Indigenous land theft and genocide were “Companies” chartered by the royal crowns they served. These companies brought European colonizers and settlers to the Americas with the intent to settle specific lots of territory in the Colonies. The voyage of the Mayflower was chartered for just such a purpose by a blood soaked and gold thirsty company called the Merchant Adventurers of London. They were tasked with assisting in the settlement of Virginia, and the majority of their passengers were called “Strangers,” not Pilgrims.

The group of “Strangers” aboard the Mayflower were comprised of indentured servants, military personnel, assigned laborers, and governing authorities contracted to support the settlement of the Colony of Virginia. Among them was Myles Standish, for example, a military leader that would go on to

become a prominent figure in colonial politics. Also amongst the Strangers was a small group of passengers called the “Separatists.” This group of individuals were voyaging to the New World for religious reasons. That part is true.

These Christian passengers, though, only occupied a minority number of spaces on the voyage and not one of them called themselves a “Pilgrim.” That term would not come into common use until two centuries later. Neither the Strangers nor the Separatists would be allowed to leave the Mayflower upon their arrival to Plymouth Bay, Massachusetts.

The Mayflower reached Plymouth Bay in November of 1620. They did not, however, come ashore, immediately make friends with the “native inhabitants,” and join them as equals in a party to end all parties. The passengers and crew of the Mayflower arrived sick and starving. They were riddled with contagious diseases and were quarantined on their ship until late March.

In the meantime, select passengers had taken it upon themselves to forge for food outside of the ship and soon gained a reputation as thieves for stealing corn and grains from local Indigenous stores. By the time they were able to collectively disembark, half of the men and women on the Mayflower had died and their relationship with the locals was such that they positioned cannons on nearby hilltops in case the “Indians” attacked.

There was no warm welcome. There was no immediate celebration. There was little but death and disease when the colonizers on the Mayflower first arrived in the New World.

There is evidence to suggest, though, that by the first harvest after this crown and company shackled boat arrived, there was some sort of meal shared between indigenous leaders and the passengers of the Mayflower. For example, in a booklet entitled Mourt’s Relation, a passenger from the Mayflower wrote:

“Our harvest being gotten in, our governor sent four men on fowling, that so we might after a

special manner rejoice together after we had gathered the fruits of our labor. They four in one

day killed as much fowl as, with a little help beside, served the company almost a week. At which

time, amongst other recreations, we exercised our arms, many of the Indians coming amongst

us, and among the rest their greatest king Massasoit, with some ninety men, whom for three

days we entertained and feasted, and they went out and killed five deer, which we brought to

the plantation and bestowed on our governor, and upon the captain and others. And although it

be not always so plentiful as it was at this time with us, yet by the goodness of God, we are so far

from want that we often wish you partakers of our plenty.”

This event is most frequently cited by Americans as the first Thanksgiving dinner. This is another lie. In fact, Spanish colonizers had been celebrating Thanksgiving in the New World since the 1500s. Like English speaking European colonizers, they had also combined ceremonies of gratitude for safe voyages, encounters with indigenous communities, Christian prayers and fall harvests into this holiday.

Pork, beans, and biscuits were among the dishes prepared for these Thanksgiving celebrations. At the time of the Mayflower’s landing, waterfowl was the most commonly served poultry. By 1620, Thanksgiving feasts were common. They weren’t pioneering, historic or even centered around turkey and stuffing.

So, let’s take a step back and recap for a moment.

There was no Turkey. There were no Pilgrims. There was a Mayflower, but the crew and passengers didn’t make first contact with the indigenous peoples of the New World. They didn’t celebrate the first “Thanksgiving” in America. And they probably didn’t even eat turkey.

So, what are we really celebrating here?

We are rejoicing in a collective lie. On Thanksgiving, the nation celebrates the collective need to believe that our prosperity was built on merit and morality rather than genocide, slavery and white supremacy. And while there is nothing wrong with families coming together to eat and enjoy their time together, we as a nation are struggling against misinformation, deception and Big Lies that only get bigger and bigger as time passes. We are seeing active efforts to erase the histories of the victims of white supremacy. And we are one election away from saving or losing Democracy altogether.

The real reason we celebrate Thanksgiving is to forget. On Thanksgiving the nation collectively forgets that it was built on genocide, war crimes, and white supremacy. It daydreams of an origin story that never occurred. And it makes the mistake of ensuring that this nation and the nations it holds influence over continue to forgive these same horrors as they continue the exercise of nation-building.

Thanksgiving isn’t going anywhere. We as a nation, though, need to come to terms with the lies we tell ourselves and each other – especially those told in the name of patriotism. The story of Thanksgiving is just one of many. This year, let’s start discussing the meaning of Thanksgiving honestly. This year, let’s start celebrating the truth.

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