[meteorite-list] Grondine, Native Americans and Campo de Cielo

From: Marco Langbroek <marco.langbroek_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Thu Apr 22 09:50:30 2004
Message-ID: <005801c1eeaf$e4298ba0$add586c2_at_latitude>

Dear all,

This is ridiculous, to say the least. Ed Grondine now suddenly accusses me
publicly on this list of racist undertones in my previous mail. Which is a
heavy accussation. And quite over the hill.

I am at a loss to understand Ed Grondine. Those who read my previous mail,
will note that I just pointed out not to be neglected incongruencies in
chronology and geography considering the topic which Ed raised. You can
check those taking any academic textbook on meso-American archaeology in
hand. Why that would be racist, I really don't know. It simply is science.

Then I proceeded poking some satyrical fun (actually, because I really
thought that Ed was joking - now it appears he was serious after all) the
subject which was not Native Americans, but the imagery on my profession and
ancient civilizations such as presented in Hollywood movies, and quite well
known to the public -and I happen to be fond of Indiana Jones, no matter how
wrongly these movies portray my profession, or ancient cultures of the Near
East and meso-America. I even have an Indiana Jones hat, which I sometimes
put on during excavations.

I have no doubt about the levels of civilization, architecture, trademanship
and craftmanship of Native Americans, be they today or in the past, as they
stand from current archaeological research. Why Ed suggests I am belittling
Native Americans in these things with my comment on his abuse of chronology,
is unclear to me - there is no suggestion to that effect in my previous
mail, they only exist - apparently- in the head of Ed Grondine.

Yes, although I am a professional archaeologist I am no expert on
meso-American culture (although I did get introductory training in that
field as part of my educational curriculum in archaeology). But you need not
be to acknowledge the things I pointed out in the first part of my previous
mail. You only have to have a proper appreciation of what goes and what
doesn't go in professional archaeology, of proper archaeological methodology
and conduct.

This is all I have to say on this. As a last word to Ed, I just want to say
that the accusation of 'racism' when a professional archaeologist deems a
hypothesis highly unlikely and highly unsubstantiated, is -allas- by no
means original. It is about as original as the accusation by a football-fan
that the referee was biased when his team has lost. The difference is, that
Ed's accusation is a bit more heavy than that (what he accusses me of, is a
criminal offence in my country, being a violation of article 1 in our
constitution), and thus quite a lot more inappropriate. I hope the list will
be spared this type af allegations in the future. The moment has come for me
now to simply ignore this all and pull out of the ongoing communications on
Mayans and Campo de Cielo. I have more serious things to do.

Sincerely

- Marco Langbroek
Received on Sun 28 Apr 2002 08:09:55 AM PDT