Pop Culture and Native Americans

I have never been able to figure out why I love history so much. Oh, sure, it is easy to understand part of it. I love stories. I like reading things in linear fashion. I like things that develop naturally and make sense. And perhaps, just a little, I like to identify with a winner. It is a well known adage that history is written by the winners.
That statement is only partially correct, however. Yes, the winners might direct the writing but the losers have a voice too. Otherwise there would be no accounting people such as Josephus or the reverance given even now to the Greeks. The great Greek culture that produced minds like Plato, Socrates, Aristotle, Aristophanes, and so many others was destroyed utterly by the time of the Romans yet even today much of our university system is founded on their ideas. Winners may write the history but the losers influence it.
It is in that influence that part of what I love is found. Even though I know he will lose it is fascinating to read the exploits of Geronomio. Somehow, in hte back of my mind, I hope this time he will escape Crook and live free in his beloved mountains. That is how his story should have ended rather than a broken old man trying to teach Sunday school when he did not understand the religion he was trying to teach.
And that is one thing I hope to write a book on before I die. The story of how we in the United States look at the people we call Native Americans. For many years they were reviled, hated, and feared...or else looked upon as noble, doomed people. They were never something we identified with.
Why did that change? Was it the positive portrayals that snuck into mass media, things like Tonto and Scalphunter? Or was it a collective guilty conscience that we could indulge ourselves in without having to make real changes? That, of course, is different than the socially prevalent guilty conscience over what happened to the black people who were enslaved for so long. We are unable or unwilling to take action there. Nor am I convinced we should do things such as reparations. But the fact there is a possibility to retroactively remedy a social ill prevents many people from looking at the situation.
Native Americans, however, are a different story. They seem to be experiencing great success with their casinos. We do not bother to look closer. We only think of them as Indian when something happens like the kid shooting up the school. Suddenly ugly words like "reservation", undereducated, poverty stricken come to light. Then we sweep it under the rug and go back to talking about things such as steroids in baseball.
So go on, citizens of the United States. Spend your money in the casinos, at the fireworks stands, and on the things like Dream Catchers. Argue over names of sports teams like the Braves, Redskins, and so forth. But when you do, maybe you should look at the things you do today and ask yourself if what you are saying and doing today will be part of the collective guilt complex a hundred years from now.