“War of the Worlds”:

First Contact, Science Fiction &The Colonization of the Americas

America’s been fascinated with science fiction for decades. Lots of reasons have been hypothesized for this, some sensible, some silly, proffering everything from technological development, to socio-economics, to geo-politics, to subconscious Freudian yearnings & Jungian archetypes (those are the silly ones), & I’ve no doubt there’re grains of truth in many of them; however, I’d like to offer another reason for the perennial popularity of aliens, robots, extraterrestrial invasion & space travel. Like to hear it, hear it is: our country’s founding is basically a classic “First Contact” story as they say in the sci-fi biz.

Think about it: You & your civilization are minding your own affairs, when suddenly, without warning, strange beings from an unknown elsewhere arrive on strange ships with hostile intent. Their weapons seem irresistible; they defy efforts at compromise & appeasement, mostly, seemingly wanting nothing beyond destroying your people, taking your land, resources, expanding their empire & taking over your world. & they sure are ugly. Sound familiar? If you’re of Native American heritage as is yours sincerely-if you’re not, it’s all right, no one’s perfect-it does.

That’s essentially what happened to this hemisphere’s indigenous people during European conquest; due to their sophisticated weapons, metal armor,  horses & great sailing ships, nasty germs-smallpox infected blankets anyone?- worse attitudes, European colonists in the New World behaved like any fictional Martian army; typically desiring to destroy, subjugate Native peoples, posses their lands, their goods.

In most situations there was little effort to understand, cooperate, coexist with indigenous populations. More often, Amerindians were decimated through warfare, disease, & dispossessed. Many died outright (Native populations declined between 30% to 90% according some estimates); others survived physically but with a loss of their native religions & languages, dress, culture-the “person” was spared, but the “Indian” killed, to paraphrase the Carlisle Indian School’s sinister slogan.

It’s perhaps this history, & a collective guilt about it which drives at least some of our fascination with space invaders. We’re aware of our history, & are perhaps fearful a similar fate will befall us; a belief the type of civilization most capable of inflicting such devastation would be an ultra-sophisticated extraterrestrial one. There may be a sense, fear such destruction would be a Karmic correction, a sense we deserve to have a more powerful foe, ultimately “other”, inflict on “us” what our “ancestors” inflicted on our nation’s First Nations.

So many of us have a fascination with fictional scenarios where exactly that occurs; the fact the perpetrators are nearly as alien to modern Earthlings as Europeans were to American Indians heightens the drama. Or horror.  Keeps TV & Film costumers, make-up artists, set designers in full employ too.

That’s my hypothesis; it’s admittedly untested…though it’s something to ponder while watching the next time you’re watching “Star Wars” or “X-Files” DVDs……