Wages of Empire

Spoils is an interesting term of art. As a plural noun (as opposed to a conjugated verb), its synonyms resonate – plunder, loot, swag, haul, pickings, booty, reward. The last, reward, is particularly revealing, as it shows a vested relationship hidden by the other terms – a payor and a payee, an employer and employee – as does another synonym: wages. On whose behalf am I seeking spoils? An admiral? A pirate ship captain? A king? Who is my wage-payor? And what’s my cut?

I’ve been mulling on this parcel of terms lately as indicative of the state of things in an important story about my ancestry. In many textbook stories about the Mayflower settlement at Plymouth, it’s related that in early excursions into their new environment, the colonists “found corn.” What is apparently often left out is that they found caches of dried corn buried in the ground. That is, they found stores of the harvested corn of the Wampanoag people who lived there. They found it and took it. They were obviously hungry, their stores exhausted after three months at sea, and they needed to figure out how to survive, short-term and longer-term. Even so, they found what belonged to others, and they took it for themselves. Spoils. Loot. Wages.

Not particularly surprising, really, given the whole state of things for these immigrants. They were coming to a land widely understood by Europeans to be theirs for the taking. England was relatively new to “New World” colonization – France and Portugal and, especially, Spain had been in it for longer. What all of these European cultures had in common before coming to the Americas, though, was an understanding of advancing “civilization” through empire – that is, of the expansion of culture across territory, generally through violence or the threat of it. This was, and remains, part of the Old World paradigm. Take control of what isn’t yours and use it for your own ends. Plant your flag.

It doesn’t take much study of the mapping of “civilization” to realize that part of what is meant by “civilization” is the conquering of other people and the expansion of territory. Disheartening, but there it is. Fundamental to my existence here in Illinois in the 21^st Century is a cultural mandate to take property and expand territory. Draw lines, hold turf, keep us in and others out. I am reminded that in his Ted Talk — https://www.ted.com/talks/aaron_huey — photojournalist Aaron Huey explains that the Lakota word for a person of European ancestry translates to “he who takes the best meat.” Thinking about suburban life in this context very much helps me to understand it. We are inheritors of this terrible, largely unspoken expectation – that we are the rightful possessors of whatever we can get. That other people’s land and labor somehow belong to us, if we can take it.

This month, as we consider together the theme of Memory, as the Sankofa bird asks us to “go back and get it,” as we share our plate with the UU Service Committee, our young people have studied some disparate cultures – Haitian, African-American, Honduran emigrant. The UUSC does its important work in many places throughout the world – but what most of them share is a history of being at the effect of European colonization. No matter what we may say, or even truly aspire to, historically and fundamentally, white folks don’t really believe in a level playing field. If we did, schools in the U.S., for example, would be consistently strong, regardless of location. We may complain bitterly about local property taxes, but we tolerate them, because they help keep our wealth local and largely white, and they preserve educational advantage for our own children. To name one of myriad examples of this cultural mindset. Or consider the legal understanding of corporations as persons. Or the planting of the American flag on the moon. Or the systematic destruction of unions. Or the endless series of voter suppression tactics. Illustrations are truly everywhere, once we are woke enough to look.

Still, it continues to surprise us when those most at the effect of these imperial cultural mandates complain, or resist, or even try to flee. This is how a Black Lives Matter protest or a Honduran caravan traveling through Mexico become news stories. This is how there is conflict around the rights of these people to self-actualize, to plea for asylum or for their right to life. Their truths should be self-evident – but our imperial paradigm blinds us to the righteousness of their causes. Even those of us who feel in our bones the call to justice on their behalf are too often stymied by barriers set in place – some by others long ago, some of our own making and choosing.

As we launch Guest At Your Table this Sunday, and begin to prepare our feasts of Thanksgiving for all that we have, as we enter the season of giving, let us remember – especially those of us of European ancestry, but, truly, all of us – to resist the imperial mandate, to loosen our hold on the wages of empire. Colonization is our common heritage, but it need not be our destiny. Consumption is not itself a good. Keeping this little box on our table can help us to become mindful of our complicity in systems of oppression, yes – and yes, this can be uncomfortable. But if we are mindful of the harms these systems bring to us, as well as to others, it may help us to remember what we have lost and bring us back into the wealth of keeping our wants few, and the abundant love of right relationship. May it be so. May we make it so.

 

© November 15, 2018