Should the name âVikingsâ in Minnesota Vikings be changed to a name that does not glorify genocide

And yet you fancy yourself a pirate.... A member of a group not known for
their pro-social goals or
methods.

Do you even think before you post, matey?

Mike Thompson
Windom
Probably a descendent of a Viking

Original email:

-----------------
From: CJ Sparrow <email obscured>
Date: Thu, 29 May 2014 17:59:15 -0500 (CDT)
To: mn-politics@forums.e-democracy.org
Subject: [Minnesota] Should the name âVikingsâ in Minnesota Vikings be
changed to a name
that does not glorify genocide

This discussion came out of a United States Issues Forum, entitled
âWashington Football team
creating foundation to aid Native Americans.â This forum was mostly about
whether the
Washington team should change its name and mascot. It was suggested on
that forum that the
name âVikingsâ should be changed because the Vikings had allegedly been
involved in
genocide against Native Americans as well as other groups, where there
deeds are documented and
which include raiding villages as well as monasteries, and other homesteads
where they would kill
noncombatants including men women and children including the elderly the
clergy and anyone else
they could find. They also took captives as slaves where ever they went.
If these allegations are
correct is it appropriate to have the name âVikingsâ and the Viking
mascot for an NFL team
based in Minnesota? Despite the previously alleged activities of the
Vikings and later post
Columbus colonialists, leading to the decimation of the N
ative American population, Minnesota is still home to many Native
Americans as well as other races
and nationalities that have had the misfortune to have been âvisitedâ
by this âmerry bandâ
of marauders. I hope that contributors to this forum will stick to the
issue of the Minnesota Vikings
name change. That previously mentioned forum is still open for those that
want to comment on the
Washington Redskins naming and mascot issues. I would like to began by
asking for comments on
the veracity of the allegations mentioned above and below and if true do
they rise to the level of â
genocideâ?

If the allegations mentioned below are correct than the Vikings began
raiding the North American
continent 500 years before Columbus and that they did indeed engage in
unprovoked Violent attacks
on the Native American people and as indicated below they are alleged to
have taken women and
children as captives, possibly as slaves and to have then forced their
religion and language on them
while impregnating the females, according to DNA evidence. That would
make the Vikings, not
Columbus, the initiators of the genocidal activities against the Native
Americans and if true we
should no more honor the name "Vikings,"than we should honor the name
âNazi.â If these
allegations are true then we should ban the name âVikings,â from the
NFL and certainly
prohibit its use from any Minnesota team. It would become then like the
name "Nazi," a name to be
despised by all those that believe in human rights, as are the names of
others whose actions led to
genocide.

>From the Wikipedia article on âGenocideâ:
âWhile a precise definition varies among genocide scholars, a legal
definition is found in the
1948 United Nations Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the
Crime of Genocide
(CPPCG). Article 2 of this convention defines genocide as "any of the
following acts committed with
intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or
religious group, as such: killing
members of the group; causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of
the group; deliberately
inflicting on the group conditions of life, calculated to bring about its
physical destruction in whole or
in part; imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;
[and] forcibly transferring
children of the group to another group."[4]â
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genocide

>From the Wikipedia article on âNorse colonization of the Americas:â

Thorvald's voyage (1004 AD)[edit]
In 1004, Leif's brother Thorvald Eiriksson sailed with a crew of 30 men to
Newfoundland and spent
the following winter at Leif's camp. In the spring, Thorvald attacked nine
of the local people who
were sleeping under three skin-covered canoes. The ninth victim escaped and
soon came back to
the Norse camp with a force. Thorvald was killed by an arrow that succeeded
in passing through the
barricade. Although brief hostilities ensued, the Norse explorers stayed
another winter and left the
following spring.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norse_colonization_of_the_Americas

>From the Wikipedia article on âPre Columbian trans oceanic contactâ:
Arctic and Native American peoples
There is substantial evidence forÂ InuitÂ and other American Arctic peoples
arriving in Europe
before Columbus's voyage. Contact between indigenous Americans and
theÂ NorseÂ ofÂ
GreenlandÂ as early as the 11th century is well attested. In 1009, Norse
explorerÂ Thorfinn
Karlsefnicaptured two boys fromÂ MarklandÂ (Labrador) and took them to
Greenland, where they
were taught to speak Norse and baptized. TheNorse sagasÂ report that
Thorfinn sailed toÂ
NorwayÂ and thenÂ Icelandshortly after; though it is not explicitly stated,
it is likely that he took his
two captives with him. If so, they may have been the earliest Americans to
come to Europe. It is
possible that the Norse took other indigenous peoples to Europe as slaves
over the following
centuries, because they are known to have taken Scottish and Irish
slaves.[92][93]
In 2010Â DeCODE geneticsÂ and SigrÃÃ°ur Sunna EbenesersdÃ³ttir, revealed
the results of a
genetic study of the Icelandic population, showing that over 350 living
Icelanders carried
mitochondrial DNA found only in 'Native American' and East Asian
populations, and all had a line of
descent from a single woman, whose foreign DNA entered the Icelandic
population not later than
1700, and almost certainly around 1000. This DNA is distinct from Inuit
DNA, and combining the
historical and genetic information available, the only realistic hypothesis
is that this ancestral woman
was a 'Native American' presumably abducted from theÂ VÃnlandÂ area of
North America around
1000 by visiting Norsemen.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pre-Columbian_trans-oceanic_contact
CJ Sparrow
Powderhorn Park, Minneapolis
About/contact CJ Sparrow:
http://forums.e-democracy.org/p/6L1zgvAaB146XPhtcSxXQz

View full topic:
http://forums.e-democracy.org/r/topic/22DB0kjFjwlRotsqOBvx2Y

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To Michael Thompson:

Bob ”Again” Carney had this to say about pirates, and specifically, Captain
Jack Sparrow in his ebook, “Demand Transit Revolution,” with a quote from The
City of God by Saint Augustine.

‘Pirates have been a long standing (sometimes swaying slightly) presence in the
history of politics. While they are often thought of as wrongdoers, here’s an
interesting example of an early thought experiment considering the “right to
rule” of pirates and emperors -- from The City of God – Book IV, by Saint
Augustine, then Bishop of Hippo, writing in the early fifth century.

“4. How like kingdoms without justice are to robberies.”
“Justice being taken away, then, what are kingdoms but great robberies? For
what are robberies themselves, but little kingdoms? The band itself is made up
of men; it is ruled by the authority of a prince, it is knit together by the
pact of the confederacy; the booty is divided by the law agreed on. If, by the
admittance of abandoned men, this evil increases to such a degree that it holds
place, fixes abodes, takes possession of cities, and subdues peoples, it
assumes the more plainly the name of a kingdom, because the reality is now
manifestly conferred on it, not by the removal of covetousness, but by the
addition of impunity. Indeed, that was an apt and true reply which was given to
Alexander the Great by a pirate who had been seized. For when that king had
asked the man what he meant by keeping hostile possession of the sea, he
answered with bold pride, “What thou meanest by seizing the whole earth, but
because I do it with a petty ship, I am called a robber, whilst thou who dost
it with a great fleet art styled emperor.”

Regarding both economic Justice and the principle of nonviolence, I frankly
have to question whether Captain Jack is qualified as either a pirate or an
emperor, as Saint Augustine understood and used those terms in the above
passage. Captain Jack is both a strong proponent of economic justice, and of
nonviolence, although we disagree on some social issues’.

http://www.bobagain.com/Demand%20Transit%20Revolution%20--%20e-book%20--%208-18-2013%20edition.pdf

The section below is from an article from occupirate.blogspot.com, “CJ Sparrow
walks the plank”

When planning the action at US Bank headquarters Sparrow suggested making it a
pirate action... Sparrow and the others risking arrest insisted on the pirate
action because pirates were early practitioners of participatory democracy, and
many believed in economic democracy as well. Pirates were among the first to
adopt checks and balances similar to, but before the United States Government.
They also had one of the best medical plans with just compensation for
injuries, etc. Some of them were true communists, (not Bolsheviks), in that
they shared equally in the booty, which they seized from the wealthy or as CJ
Sparrow put it, "OK, so we taxed the rich, what about it". And they had ready
and just remedies if a bank or anyone else wanted to foreclose on their ships,
Some pirates also liberated slave ships allowing the former slaves to join
them, or not, as they chose for themselves, and unlike the US government at the
time, former slaves could vote.** See Pirate democracy and See especially:
Pirate code and distribution of justice

** Pirate exhibit at the Science Museum of Minnesota. (The exhibit is no longer
at the Science Museum of Minnesota but it is touring nationally so it is still
probably available someplace in the United States.

http://occupirate.blogspot.com/2013/07/draft-cj-sparrow-walks-plank-only-to.html

I don’t think we can rightly blame Captain Jack Sparrow for the alleged unjust
actions of other pirates even if those unjust actions are demonstrated by
evidence to be true. History, we know, is written by the victorious and most
pirates did not prevail in the end. Had they prevailed they could have written
their own history, and if they were successful enough they could have written
there own history using the much more prestiges title of King or even Emperor
giving their histories much more legitimacy. If pirates were sanctioned by
Kings or Emperors they operated under the color of law and were called, like
Thomas Paine, privateers but there activities were essentially the same as
pirates.

Sparrow name is based on the character played by Johnny Depp in the Pirates of
the Caribbean series. While I have not personally seen any of the movies in
this series I have been given the impression that, while he has many faults, he
has not committed any atrocities approaching those that the Vikings have
allegedly committed.
http://mnprogressiveproject.com/captain-jack-sparrow-wrong-for-minneapolis/

That being said, even if the Devil himself accused another of a crime, as long
as evidence was presented to back up that claim it is not logical to discount
the claim because of the alleged bad actions committed by the Devil. That is a
logical fallacy which has a formal name, probably in Latin, which means in
common usage, something like “changing the subject”.

Why do you want to change the subject? You said in your post you are "probably
the descendent of a Viking." Do you wish to deflect attention away from the
allegations being leveled at your ancestors? Maybe as in Rwanda and South
Africa it is time to ask for forgiveness through reconciliation.

Or maybe it would it help to convince you of my right to inquire into the
alleged atrocities of the Vikings if I were to change my name to someone who
presumably has not sinned and therefor has the moral right to “cast the first
stone.” Perhaps I should change my name to Michael Thompson.

Captain Jack Sparrow

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Should the name âVikingsâ in Minnesota Vikings be changed to a name that does not glorify genocide

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Should the name âVikingsâ in Minnesota Vikings be changed to a name that does not glorify genocide