[blam]

I agree with what you have said, the argument is that these are not American Indians/Native Americans.
Chatters, in his book, says that there are not any skeletons in North America older than 6,000 years old that can be classified as American Indian/Native American. All the skeletons older than 6,000 years old are someone entirely different.

Now, I have discussed this with a FReeper Native American who basically said, "who-ever is found in the skeleton record, that's us." (I suppose he could be correct if he can accept that KM is his ancestor, huh?)

[WFTR]

I should have included more of the original quote from the post to which I was responding. In it, this gentleman had said:

We can't silently condone desecration of Indian graves and keep the bones of people's known kin on museum shelves and expect the general populace to see living Native Americans as fellow beings.

I think we agree on all points here. I'll throw them out and see where we fall.

In the case of Kennewick Man, the evidence doesn't support his being a cultural or genetic ancestor of the modern American Indian/Native American. Therefore, the modern American Indian/Native American cannot claim a right of refusal on the study or display of Kennewick Man.

In the case of more modern skeletons, we should respect the fact that modern tribes would feel some disrespect if we displayed the remains of their ancestors. For instance, the Anasazi are essentially the ancestors both genetically and culturally of the modern Pueblo and Navaho tribes and display of their remains may be seen as disrespectful to these people.

I would even lean somewhat towards the cultural "ancestry" being more important in most of these cases. I don't have any ancestors who sailed on the Mayflower, but I would have some problem with those people being dug up and displayed. On the other hand, someone excavating in the British Isles might find the bones of one of my direct ancient ancestors. However, because I have no cultural connection to the pagan Irish or English culture, I wouldn't have a problem with that display.

WFTR
Bill