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Reviews tagging 'Terminal illness'
Killers of the Flower Moon: The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI by David Grann
6 reviews
hanyaya's review against another edition
challenging
dark
informative
medium-paced
4.5
Content Warnings
Graphic: Racism, Racial slurs, Domestic abuse, Colonisation, Fire/Fire injury, Emotional abuse, Murder, Death, and Death of parent
Moderate: Toxic relationship, Gun violence, Alcoholism, Terminal illness, and Physical abuse
j0guelas's review
challenging
dark
emotional
informative
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
4.5
Patrick Wolfe was right when he said settler colonialism is a structure not an event.
I picked up the book straight after watching the movie and I can definitely say I enjoy the book more, which is not a slight to Martin Scorsese. My reading experience was greatly influenced by the movie as well - making comparison to how the story and its characters were portrayed.
David Grann is a true journalist. He wastes no time in telling the truth and laying bare how sinister white society can be in a style that is so beautiful.
While it’s true the shift to the FBI does not compare to Mollie Burkhart’s story, I was quite captured by Tom White. Though Mollie, like the film, no doubt is the beating heart of this story, White’s story was enrapturing. Following White’s story from his youth to his days as a cowboy lawman to when he becomes the FBI’s crowning jewel before slowly being lost to time was poetic.
And much like the film, I have a lot of complex feeling about this book that I struggle to articulate. Every time I come up with a thought about this book, I find myself countering it. Was I acutely aware that the person telling this story is a non-Osage person? Yes. But I was also acutely aware that I am not an Osage person. What layers of this truth is Grann missing? What am I missing?
I picked up the book straight after watching the movie and I can definitely say I enjoy the book more, which is not a slight to Martin Scorsese. My reading experience was greatly influenced by the movie as well - making comparison to how the story and its characters were portrayed.
David Grann is a true journalist. He wastes no time in telling the truth and laying bare how sinister white society can be in a style that is so beautiful.
While it’s true the shift to the FBI does not compare to Mollie Burkhart’s story, I was quite captured by Tom White. Though Mollie, like the film, no doubt is the beating heart of this story, White’s story was enrapturing. Following White’s story from his youth to his days as a cowboy lawman to when he becomes the FBI’s crowning jewel before slowly being lost to time was poetic.
And much like the film, I have a lot of complex feeling about this book that I struggle to articulate. Every time I come up with a thought about this book, I find myself countering it. Was I acutely aware that the person telling this story is a non-Osage person? Yes. But I was also acutely aware that I am not an Osage person. What layers of this truth is Grann missing? What am I missing?
Content Warnings
Graphic: Murder, Racism, Torture, Hate crime, Racial slurs, Suicide, Colonisation, Genocide, Violence, Gun violence, and Terminal illness
hanhantap's review
challenging
informative
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
5.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Racial slurs, Toxic relationship, Gun violence, Racism, Murder, Violence, Colonisation, Injury/Injury detail, Hate crime, and Torture
Moderate: Grief, Alcoholism, Alcohol, Terminal illness, and Addiction
stevia333k's review against another edition
dark
informative
reflective
sad
tense
slow-paced
4.0
Look this is a history book, not a fictional mystery novel, this whole review is spoilers because I used the book for studying, not entertainment.
most of my review discusses the 1st & 3rd chronicles because I did not understand what happened in the 2nd chronicle at all. The 2nd chronicle is the longest & it gives context about the limitations on David Grann's investigations, but again, it was too complicated which spoilerit's because there were multiple scalping businesses involved with a limited number of rubber stampers, which means from a dictatorship of the white bourgeois patriarchy perspective things were working as intended (such as with settler colonization) even if at the surface, it appeared to just be terrorist attacks. Basically take note in the 1st chronicle of what Laura Ingalls Wilder wrote in her memoirs about how her father & the adults in her community were operating with disregard to the laws of the "Indian country" they moved to. So this meant that the assumptions the investigation had at the beginning did not match the reality of what was happening, so it just read to me of violence & corpses instead of being able to keep track of what was up. Please consider these limitations.
---
So the book is very informative, in fact, I'm using it to get a gist on other "custodial" arrangements. I do need to say that I'm a white person studying anti-racism & therefore you'll need to listen to people of color when needed. I usually read history books to get a sense of the systemic. I don't like spending a lot of time on single crimes... I wanted to learn about the syndicate because I had learned before reading this book that native americans are wary about marrying settlers because of the risk of femicide, MMIWG2SMB/MMIP cases.
The 1st chronicle explains how the media coverage of the Osage described them as wastefully wealthy & also explains how this was a continuation of the settler colonization that sent the Osage & other nations onto smaller & smaller reservations. Among other examples, it cites "little house on the prarie" where the dad explains to the daughter that the moved onto "indian" territory with the intent to not only disregard the laws of the "indian" nations because they wanted to be among the first in line for USA federal homestead rations basically. This is in addition to describing various femicides against the Osage nation.
Also mind you, while this book doesn't quote it, I have read a political-economy book called "red meat nation" & the first part of a biography called "black elk: the life of an american visionary" by joe jackson, and basically the gist of a tactic of USA's colonization was to basically destroy the land & foodstuff access of the first nations, run them into reservations/concentration camps, and then in order to play up how the first nations were "unproductive" with their land (which then plays into the sort of liberalism/capitalism that's behind "eminent domain") would then give as promised rations (the promises were usually broken, but the rations USA did give) would include things like raw meat or bad meat, and the starving captives would eat eagerly. This starvation was then played up in USA's media as being some sort of confirmation of the "degeneration" trope, used to uphold white supremacy. Like the starvation was so bad that it was famine. Even among the buffalo, Joe Jackson's book shared that the pecking order among buffalo used to reduce conflict & death was being rejected ending with the predictable death, which if we've seen anything from "late victorian holocausts" by mike davis & "night" by elie wiesel this is in line with that. I think if we're going to look for other examples within non-settler colonization, then look at how the media plays into Orientalism when it comes to other places with oil.
So yeah, the media about the Osage nation's oil boom was basically propaganda seeking to encourage settler colonization through taking away the oil rights of the Osage people by any means necessary. Usually this has been done via the private sector through contracts, because the public domain of say eminent domain & signing away mineral rights (like we see with various examples of environmental racism) would require governments that look more racial capitalist patriarchal like USA's as opposed to say something like the Haudonsaunee Kayanereko:wa where they've have a more consultative government.
The 2nd chronicle because the subject matter lends itself to diagrams as opposed to spoken word. I couldn't keep up with that portion. The word format might be good for conveying the generational trauma that's been inflicted onto the Osage & other nations, as well as showing the limits of the FBI investigations. But again it felt like trying to explain what happened on a battlefield without a map to diagram with. Also admittedly, I don't like watching cop procedurals because of how systemically bastardly they are. My struggle with reading comprehension with this chronicle is why this book is only 4 out of 5 stars.
The 3rd chronicle ends up explaining how settlers would work in packs in order to secure custodial rights of Osage people's mineral rights & then kill said Osage people. They worked in packs like small businesses, and some of the "corruption" of white-coat doctors recording opium poisoning as alcohol poisoning & black-coat undertakers burying the bodies quickly, was functionally notaries for these scalping businesses. The money was so large that the killer settlers could just split the money many ways.
I guess basically, when you're looking at how accomplices of mass incarceration & colonialism work, recognize that the white-coats, the blue-coats, and the black-coats are all complicit agents. "Follow the money" means in more sociological mapping: There are other complicit areas, but basically recognize that the fungibility of cash & the consolidation of various currencies into 1 standard, mean not only is cash an assilimation method of racial capitalist patriarchy, but its interchangeability will show relationships which develop into abuse. The same cash can be used to buy baby formula & ammo for a massacure. The custodial policy is literally how they were able to make the capital part fall back into white supremacist control, as well as say capitalism's ableism, etc. Another similar technique for this sort of thing is inflation & the bourgeoisie collectively raising prices in order to keep their positionality/rank if not just increase profits.
most of my review discusses the 1st & 3rd chronicles because I did not understand what happened in the 2nd chronicle at all. The 2nd chronicle is the longest & it gives context about the limitations on David Grann's investigations, but again, it was too complicated which spoiler
---
So the book is very informative, in fact, I'm using it to get a gist on other "custodial" arrangements. I do need to say that I'm a white person studying anti-racism & therefore you'll need to listen to people of color when needed. I usually read history books to get a sense of the systemic. I don't like spending a lot of time on single crimes... I wanted to learn about the syndicate because I had learned before reading this book that native americans are wary about marrying settlers because of the risk of femicide, MMIWG2SMB/MMIP cases.
The 1st chronicle explains how the media coverage of the Osage described them as wastefully wealthy & also explains how this was a continuation of the settler colonization that sent the Osage & other nations onto smaller & smaller reservations. Among other examples, it cites "little house on the prarie" where the dad explains to the daughter that the moved onto "indian" territory with the intent to not only disregard the laws of the "indian" nations because they wanted to be among the first in line for USA federal homestead rations basically. This is in addition to describing various femicides against the Osage nation.
Also mind you, while this book doesn't quote it, I have read a political-economy book called "red meat nation" & the first part of a biography called "black elk: the life of an american visionary" by joe jackson, and basically the gist of a tactic of USA's colonization was to basically destroy the land & foodstuff access of the first nations, run them into reservations/concentration camps, and then in order to play up how the first nations were "unproductive" with their land (which then plays into the sort of liberalism/capitalism that's behind "eminent domain") would then give as promised rations (the promises were usually broken, but the rations USA did give) would include things like raw meat or bad meat, and the starving captives would eat eagerly. This starvation was then played up in USA's media as being some sort of confirmation of the "degeneration" trope, used to uphold white supremacy. Like the starvation was so bad that it was famine. Even among the buffalo, Joe Jackson's book shared that the pecking order among buffalo used to reduce conflict & death was being rejected ending with the predictable death, which if we've seen anything from "late victorian holocausts" by mike davis & "night" by elie wiesel this is in line with that. I think if we're going to look for other examples within non-settler colonization, then look at how the media plays into Orientalism when it comes to other places with oil.
So yeah, the media about the Osage nation's oil boom was basically propaganda seeking to encourage settler colonization through taking away the oil rights of the Osage people by any means necessary. Usually this has been done via the private sector through contracts, because the public domain of say eminent domain & signing away mineral rights (like we see with various examples of environmental racism) would require governments that look more racial capitalist patriarchal like USA's as opposed to say something like the Haudonsaunee Kayanereko:wa where they've have a more consultative government.
The 2nd chronicle because the subject matter lends itself to diagrams as opposed to spoken word. I couldn't keep up with that portion. The word format might be good for conveying the generational trauma that's been inflicted onto the Osage & other nations, as well as showing the limits of the FBI investigations. But again it felt like trying to explain what happened on a battlefield without a map to diagram with. Also admittedly, I don't like watching cop procedurals because of how systemically bastardly they are. My struggle with reading comprehension with this chronicle is why this book is only 4 out of 5 stars.
The 3rd chronicle ends up explaining how settlers would work in packs in order to secure custodial rights of Osage people's mineral rights & then kill said Osage people. They worked in packs like small businesses, and some of the "corruption" of white-coat doctors recording opium poisoning as alcohol poisoning & black-coat undertakers burying the bodies quickly, was functionally notaries for these scalping businesses. The money was so large that the killer settlers could just split the money many ways.
I guess basically, when you're looking at how accomplices of mass incarceration & colonialism work, recognize that the white-coats, the blue-coats, and the black-coats are all complicit agents. "Follow the money" means in more sociological mapping: There are other complicit areas, but basically recognize that the fungibility of cash & the consolidation of various currencies into 1 standard, mean not only is cash an assilimation method of racial capitalist patriarchy, but its interchangeability will show relationships which develop into abuse. The same cash can be used to buy baby formula & ammo for a massacure. The custodial policy is literally how they were able to make the capital part fall back into white supremacist control, as well as say capitalism's ableism, etc. Another similar technique for this sort of thing is inflation & the bourgeoisie collectively raising prices in order to keep their positionality/rank if not just increase profits.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Car accident, Colonisation, Death, Death of parent, Fire/Fire injury, Physical abuse, Sexism, Sexual violence, Trafficking, War, Xenophobia, Drug abuse, Gore, Gun violence, Medical trauma, Toxic relationship, Violence, Hate crime, Injury/Injury detail, Kidnapping, Medical content, Racism, Ableism, Alcohol, Domestic abuse, Grief, Blood, Murder, Police brutality, Addiction, Forced institutionalization, Genocide, Terminal illness, and Torture
emoryscott's review
challenging
dark
emotional
informative
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
fast-paced
5.0
Incredible, heart-breaking story of the greedy murders of the Osage people perpetrated by white settlers. I couldn’t put this book down. I’m sad, angry, and frustrated at the horrors that this country continues to cover up. Every American should read this and reckon with the trauma we inflicted on so many.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Colonisation, Death of parent, Gun violence, Stalking, Violence, Alcohol, Hate crime, Toxic relationship, Alcoholism, Kidnapping, Racial slurs, Terminal illness, Vomit, Blood, Rape, Car accident, Child death, Chronic illness, Classism, Genocide, Murder, Domestic abuse, Death, Torture, Police brutality, and Racism
junefish's review against another edition
challenging
dark
informative
mysterious
slow-paced
3.25
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death
Moderate: Gun violence, Violence, Addiction, Alcoholism, and Racial slurs
Minor: Terminal illness
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