Consider, alternatively, the symbols of the relatively young, settler-colonial United States. The bald eagle, symbolizing our American “freedom,” is often depicted as a formidable predator. This is a misunderstanding, biologically speaking. Bald eagles are mostly scavengers, similar to vultures, rarely hunting and not exceptionally aggressive. They are more likely to be seen picking at carrion than snatching prey from the air. Our “amber waves of grain” summon up the wheat monocultures that destroyed the prairies and drove the ethnic cleansing of the Indigenous peoples in the continent’s
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