I am appalled by the treatment of the Arawak Indians, and all the indigenous people of the Americas for that matter, by Columbus and his men. It was savage and brutal. But I have found in my readings that the Indian women were much more liberated than their European counterparts during the colonial eras. In Zinn's book about the history of America he tells of women in the Arawak people in Haiti as being able to pick and choose their mates, and they were able to leave a relationship if they were unhappy. The women carried babies and birthed without difficulty according to Bartolome de las Casas who was a young priest who quickly became angered by the Spaniards treatment of natives as well and wrote at length in very descriptive narrative about the horrible cruelty of the Spaniards and Columbus himself.They could use herbs to induce an abortion and it was considered the woman's choice. The women and the men alike had no sense of shame over their naked bodies which the Spaniards found to be sinful. Las Casas writings are very descriptive about the women and how well they were treated by the native men (Zinn, 2003). It is a shame to me that we brought our religious and intolerant viewpoints over and forced them on what appears to be a happy and content people who held women in respect and treated them with love and kindness.
Zinn, H. (2003). A people's history of the united states. New York, NY. Harper Collins Publishing.
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