Alaska State Sen. Löki Tobin (D-Anchorage) sent a Thanksgiving message to her supporters that blasted the holiday for triggering historical trauma and perpetuating a “romanticized myth” about America.
“This upcoming federal holiday brings with it many complex feelings,” Tobin wrote in a Nov. 23 email. “It is also a day that perpetuates a romanticized myth that I know many educators spend a few precious classroom hours unpacking.”
Tobin’s email bemoans the fact that she did not learn the “accurate and true story of the ‘first Thanksgiving’ until she was in her 20s. She directed her supporters to utilized online resources that draw into question the friendly nature of the first Thanksgiving, while framing English settlers as “enslavers.”
Tobin’s email also includes a meme encouraging people to utilize the day to “clear their generational trauma.”
Despite her misgivings about Thanksgiving, Tobin does plan to enjoy the holiday in “radical rest” as she feasts on turkey with friends and family in order to “recharge, recenter and realign” in order to serve more “authentically” as a state senator.
Tobin’s criticisms of Thanksgiving are indicative of many left-leaning Americans who see Thanksgiving as rooted in oppression. This outlook, however, tends to marginalize or ignore the fact that many of the Pilgrims braved the harsh storms of the North Atlantic and perished well before the first Thanksgiving feast. Others struggled for bare survival, and endured harsh conditions while serving as indentured servants in hopes of achieving a better life.
These realities were the backdrop of the first Thanksgiving, which has always been inextricably tied to religion.
In 1789, President George Washington set aside Thanksgiving as “a day for public thanksgiving and prayer, to be observed by acknowledging with grateful hearts the many and signal favors of Almighty God.”
Then in 1863, amid the ravages and destruction of the Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln issued a proclamation inviting “fellow citizens in every part of the United States, …to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next, as a day of Thanksgiving.”
By 1941, Thanksgiving was declared to be a federal holiday to be celebrated on the fourth Thursday in November.
The significance of the holiday was famously articulated by President Theodore Roosevelt in 1906, when his Thanksgiving day proclamation affirmed that America has a “duty to set aside a special day of thanksgiving and praise to the Almighty because of the blessings we have received.”
Roosevelt noted that, “Never before in our history or in the history of any other nation has a people enjoyed more abounding material prosperity than is ours; a prosperity so great that it should arouse in us no spirit of reckless pride, and least of all a spirit of heedless disregard of our responsibilities; but rather a sober sense of our many blessings, and a resolute purpose, under Providence, not to forfeit them by any action of our own.”
He ended his message by warning Americans against the impulse to view material well-being as the true source of national greatness and happiness.
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“Upon our material well-being must be built a superstructure of individual and national life lived in accordance with the laws of the highest morality, or else our prosperity itself will in the long run turn out a curse instead of a blessing,” he said. “Accordingly, I hereby set apart Thursday, the twenty-ninth day of November, next, as a day of thanksgiving and supplication, on which the people shall meet in their homes or their churches, devoutly to acknowledge all that has been given them, and to pray that they may in addition receive the power to use these gifts aright.”
Writing for the National Review, Adam Carrington argued that Thanksgiving needn’t amount to “cherry-picking specific, praiseworthy events from our past.”
“Indeed, the history of America includes real instances of injustice on matters concerning race, gender, religion, and class,” he wrote. “Thus, gratitude — properly understood — is not rigidly attached to the status quo; it welcomes reform. Such reform, however, should be less focused with uprooting and upheaval and more oriented around amelioration and refinement — to purify our gold of its dross. For Americans, it has involved a better realization of our principles, not ridding ourselves of them.”
18 Comments
Oh good grief!!
Instead of thanks, and focusing on all that is good, learning from the past what can be improved or avoided, and making the future better, instead she and others like her want to suck the life out of everyone around them, devolving into a tar like sticky quick sand down into the dark morass of depression, depravity and hopelessness for things in the past that didn’t affect anyone today, to wallow in.
Ah yes genocide of an entire population effected absolutely no one, least of which native people.
Her name is Löki. Is that from a viking ancestory? Talk about history of violence and oppression…
Noki is,.. according to Norse mythology,… a male character,.. a cunning trickster, who had the ability to change “his” sex, and shape.. “HE” was associated with…, said to be… the companion of the great Gods of Odin, and Thor.. Lokin was also considered a god of fire…A character of great deceptions, and insurrection… According to the scripts,… The origins of the name is that of a male … But then,.. we are talking about deception .. aren’t we ???
Another “holiday” that we will get to learn the truth about when the time comes. Loki sure likes to create drama.
Eat the heart out of that turkey!!!
I really enjoy this holiday, it’s a great time for most normal folks. God Bless America.
What does one do to “Clear their generational trauma”? It’s a load of leftist gobbledygook. A well chosen word for a day when we are consuming turkey!
“America, America, God mend thine every flaw, til all success be Nobleness, thy liberty in law.” That verse puts it all together, recognizing that NO society is ever perfect. Leftists promote their own myths about the natural perfections of American native cultures, which were superstitious, brutal, oppressed women and practiced ritual cannibalism. They ignore the role that African blacks had in capturing and selling their own people into slavery. Or that FREE American blacks owned their own slaves. Or that blacks willingly fought in the Confederate armies. Or that Confederate officers had freed their own slaves, taught them Sunday school lessons, or that a Confederate Congressman said that, “If I have to choose between slavery and independence, then slavery has got to go!” These are inconvenient FACTS that the Left, which has elevated selective history to an art form, chooses to ignore.
Extremely well-said and thank you for that. If today’s idiots had to go through what our ancestors did to be free and survive, they would never make it. They have waaaay too much time on their hands because they choose not to work. Idleness is the devil’s workshop, which is where they are. Rather than being productive individuals in society, they would rather whine like babies about what they don’t know and don’t have. Sad situation!!
Well stated. I am a direct descendant of a woman who survived the ” Starving Time” at Jamestown where archeologists have discovered evidence of cannibalism. Also, I am a descendant of a Cherokee on the Trail of Tears.
I guess I should have a lot of generational trauma to overcome. But, guess what? I thank God that I was born in the U.S.A. No matter how bad things get, it is still the best.
https://www.ligonier.org/learn/articles/what-is-thanksgiving-day
Ms Loki must’ve read the yearly recycled article from Smithsonian Magazine about Thanksgiving.
This person wouldn’t be happy about anything. For crying out loud, I don’t see anywhere that it says you must celebrate Thanksgiving. If you don’t like it than don’t participate. Get a life.
Yeah so many people are traumatized by the history of Thanksgiving…pass the gravey.
What a loser!
Which entire population Joel? Be specific now. Which entire human population was extirpated from the face of the earth? I must have missed that day in school. But I did attend the day we learned about the generous and paternalistic relationship the US government (US taxpayer) renders unto the indigenous populations regardless of their financial status. Dave you nailed it. No guilt here. Just thankful to live in the best nation on earth. Still.
poor Loopi,,,