Here we revisit the decline of Indigenous populations of North America by using the concept of perceived risk. We argue that the root cause behind Indigenous depopulation in North America was not the lack of immunological defenses against novel pathogens introduced to the New World from the Old World, a hypothesis known as “Virgin Soil.” Certainly many Indigenous people died of disease, but so did many Euro-American colonizers. The populations of colonizers rebounded, as most populations do, but Indigenous populations could not recover because of colonizer violence and the persistent marginalization perpetrated against them. We show that European settlers promoted and practiced an ideology of domination based on an exaggerated perception of risk against Indigenous communities. On the basis of colonial prejudices, they created a distorted perception of Native Americans that depicted them as dangerous savages, un-Christian, and untrustworthy. Native Americans were seen as capable of damaging the life and property of the colonists and as incapable of being assimilated by them. Colonists assessed the Indigenous groups as an unacceptable and intolerable risk that had to be eliminated, irrespective of the financial cost of waging war on them. This ideology of risk has continued to impact the lives and well-being of Indigenous people for more than five hundred years as demonstrated by the elevated deaths from COVID-19 for Native Americans and other persons of color. Structural inequalities derived from the ideology of risk are behind the deaths of Indigenous people even today.

Risk can be approached as the probability of occurrence of a hazardous event and its consequences (risk = probability of loss/gain * danger * exposure * vulnerability). Specialists in the social sciences know that risk involves a balance between profit and loss, and there is risk associated with every aspect of life (Douglas 1985; Douglas and Wildavsky 1982). Indeed, risk-aversion behaviors may bring high opportunity costs, such as the loss of income to individuals or groups, and may be irrational from the point of view of classical economic theory (Blaikie et al. 1994). High risk, high returns is at the core of modern financial and insurance markets, on which the modern economy relies. Nevertheless, the public approaches risk based on the negative consequences and threats to human life, on bodily injury, or on loss of welfare due to external dangers outside their control. Risk assessment by most laypeople tends to be based on perception, and it is easily manipulated by propagation of irrational fear. We argue that the fear of the “other” by American colonists created a colonial ideology that drove and justified policies of exclusion, violence, and marginalization toward Native Americans and other groups who did not comply with the racial and religious ideals of the colonists. As Thomas Jefferson said, “the two principles on which our Conduct towards the Indians should be founded, are justice and fear” (Conn 2004, 3). Although he referred to the need to create fear among Native Americans, in fact, this reflects an exaggerated perception of risk based on the fear that Europeans felt for Indigenous people.

Beginning with the first European explorers, Indigenous people were seen as exploitable resources like the minerals, animals, and plants Europeans also desired. As part of the process of exploitation, Europeans defined them not only as less than human but as dangerous and requiring control. Soon after Columbus returned with news of a New World, Spanish rulers began to wrestle with the question of whether the newly discovered Indigenous populations could rightfully be enslaved. Enslavement of Indians was banned in the early 1500s by the Spanish Crown, but with exceptions: “cannibals” could be enslaved, natives could be taken in “just wars,” and people who had been slaves in Indigenous societies but were taken by the Spanish could remain slaves with new Spanish masters (Reséndez 2016, 41–42). Almost anyone could be easily slotted into one of these categories. The “othering” of Indigenous people had begun.

Brutal treatment of Indigenous Americans began with the first two large expeditions through North America, led by Spaniards Hernando de Soto and Francisco Vázquez de Coronado. During de Soto's 1538–42 expedition through the American Southeast, his chroniclers reported that his men attacked and killed Indigenous people, pillaged their goods, took many captives to carry the goods they had stolen, and took young women as sexual partners. Coronado's vast expedition from 1540 to 1542 traveled from Mexico City through what is now the southwestern United States and eventually out to the Great Plains. Along this route, his men killed any Indigenous people who resisted demands for food and supplies, took many prisoners, and sexually molested Indigenous women.

Seventy years later, the English arrived and colonized eastern North America. They not only appropriated Native land and resources but also saw Natives as savages, largely beyond the redemption of civilization. For example, Pilgrims settling New England were tasked with converting the local Indians to Christianity, but Pilgrims saw themselves as the elect of God. Regardless of their attempts to conform to Christian teachings, Native Americans could never be full members of colonial communities (Thomas 1975). Throughout the seventeenth century, Pilgrim leaders allowed Natives to be attacked, bullied, and robbed by colonists, and when the Natives objected or fought back, they were brutally put down. As in other parts of North America, Anglo-American settlers defined themselves as the rightful owners of New World lands and enslaved, disinherited, killed, and misused Native peoples.

There is no doubt that diseases introduced from Europe played a role in the collapse of Indigenous population numbers throughout the New World. The Virgin Soil account (Crosby 1976), pushed by scholars for decades, however, puts all the blame on disease and ignores the myriad factors that prevented Indigenous population numbers from recovering after a pandemic struck. Indigenous people have capable and effective immune systems just like any other population (Jones 2015). But they were not fighting only disease. Europeans enslaved, overworked, and starved them. Their land was appropriated, and they were either forced into marginal desert or mountain regions or herded into mission settlements where disease was even more rampant. Perhaps most devastating was the loss of Indigenous medical knowledge and caregivers.

In California, Spanish agricultural and livestock practices quickly degraded the traditional resources that had long sustained Native peoples (Hull 2015). This left Native peoples few options other than to relocate to a mission or labor for a Spaniard on a nearby rancho. The result of these policies was the dispersal and collapse of Native communities, and with them went the social support and caregiving that had long sustained their members. Crowded conditions at missions contributed to the spread of disease, and harsh punishment by missionaries and associated military personnel led to poor health that rendered Natives susceptible to disease and death. Similarly, in Spanish colonial Florida, studies of human remains have shown that Natives forced into missions were overworked and underfed, had parasites, drank contaminated water, and generally suffered from poor health (Larsen 2015). When epidemic disease arrived, they were poorly prepared to fight it. Similar scenarios played out across the continent: As land and resources were appropriated by Europeans, Natives were forced into the bottom social strata of European settlements or retreated into remote and often barren lands where they struggled to survive. Such marginal social positions have ongoing health impacts, and recovering from epidemic disease was extraordinarily difficult for these dispossessed people.

The ideology of an exaggerated perception of risk from the “others” created during the colonial period has endured the passage of time. The country's “founders” continued and formalized its practice under the name of Manifest Destiny, beginning with President Washington's policy of purchasing Indian land by forceful means through the Indian Removal Act of President Jackson and through General Sherman's policy to destroy the buffalo—and the Indigenous way of life in the Great Plains. This policy was also applied to Mexicans from Texas to California after the Mexican–American War, since they were mixed-blood people (mestizo), in which European qualities had been diluted by miscegenation with Indian women. In addition, Mexicans practiced Spanish Catholicism and therefore were perceived as participants in fictitious popish plots against Protestantism.

Africans imported to the Americas beginning in the sixteenth century joined Native Americans and Hispanic Americans as a marginalized underclass. The effects of the recent COVID-19 pandemic on these minority groups mirror the devastation Native groups have suffered since Europeans arrived. During the unfolding of the COVID-19 pandemic, we have learned that the death rate is higher for Black American (2.8 times), Hispanic (2.8 times), and Native American (2.6 times) groups than it is for white, non-Hispanic people. This is a reflection of an ideology of risk toward others that has maintained historically constructed inequities in which Native American, Hispanic, and Black communities are poor, forced to live in more densely populated neighborhoods and in smaller houses shared with extended families, afforded less access to healthy diets, and forced to perform jobs with greater health risks and with limited or no access to medical insurance. This colonial ideology of risk created a disaster process that has been unfolding for the last five hundred years in the territories that currently form the United States of America.

在这里，我们使用感知风险的概念重新审视北美土著人口的下降。我们认为，北美土著人口减少背后的根本原因并不是缺乏针对从旧世界引入新世界的新型病原体的免疫防御，这一假设被称为“处女土”。当然，许多土著人死于疾病，但许多欧美殖民者也是如此。与大多数人口一样，殖民者的人口出现反弹，但由于殖民者的暴力和对他们的持续边缘化，土著人口无法恢复。我们表明，欧洲定居者基于对土著社区风险的夸大认知，促进并实践了一种统治意识形态。在殖民偏见的基础上，他们对美洲原住民产生了一种扭曲的看法，将他们描述为危险的野蛮人、非基督教徒和不值得信赖的人。美洲原住民被视为能够损害殖民者的生命和财产，并且无法被他们同化。殖民者将土著群体评估为必须消除的不可接受和不可容忍的风险，无论对他们发动战争的经济成本如何。500 多年来，这种风险意识继续影响着土著人民的生活和福祉，美国原住民和其他有色人种死于 COVID-19 的人数增加就证明了这一点。即使在今天，源自风险意识形态的结构性不平等也是原住民死亡的原因。并且不可靠。美洲原住民被视为能够损害殖民者的生命和财产，并且无法被他们同化。殖民者将土著群体评估为必须消除的不可接受和不可容忍的风险，无论对他们发动战争的经济成本如何。500 多年来，这种风险意识继续影响着土著人民的生活和福祉，美国原住民和其他有色人种死于 COVID-19 的人数增加就证明了这一点。即使在今天，源自风险意识形态的结构性不平等也是原住民死亡的原因。并且不可靠。美洲原住民被视为能够损害殖民者的生命和财产，并且无法被他们同化。殖民者将土著群体评估为必须消除的不可接受和不可容忍的风险，无论对他们发动战争的经济成本如何。500 多年来，这种风险意识继续影响着土著人民的生活和福祉，美国原住民和其他有色人种死于 COVID-19 的人数增加就证明了这一点。即使在今天，源自风险意识形态的结构性不平等也是原住民死亡的原因。殖民者将土著群体评估为必须消除的不可接受和不可容忍的风险，无论对他们发动战争的经济成本如何。500 多年来，这种风险意识继续影响着土著人民的生活和福祉，美国原住民和其他有色人种死于 COVID-19 的人数增加就证明了这一点。即使在今天，源自风险意识形态的结构性不平等也是原住民死亡的原因。殖民者将土著群体评估为必须消除的不可接受和不可容忍的风险，无论对他们发动战争的经济成本如何。500 多年来，这种风险意识继续影响着土著人民的生活和福祉，美国原住民和其他有色人种死于 COVID-19 的人数增加就证明了这一点。即使在今天，源自风险意识形态的结构性不平等也是原住民死亡的原因。

风险可以被视为危险事件发生的概率及其后果（风险=损失/收益的概率*危险*暴露*脆弱性）。社会科学专家知道风险涉及盈亏之间的平衡，并且存在与生活的各个方面相关的风险（Douglas  1985；Douglas and Wildavsky  1982）。事实上，风险规避行为可能会带来高昂的机会成本，例如个人或群体的收入损失，并且从经典经济理论的角度来看可能是不合理的（Blaikie et al.  1994）。高风险、高回报是现代经济所依赖的现代金融保险市场的核心。尽管如此，公众还是基于对人类生命的负面后果和威胁、身体伤害或由于他们无法控制的外部危险而丧失福利来处理风险。大多数外行人的风险评估往往基于感知，并且很容易被非理性恐惧的传播所操纵。我们认为，美国殖民者对“他者”的恐惧创造了一种殖民意识形态，这种意识形态推动并证明了针对美洲原住民和其他不符合殖民者种族和宗教理想的群体的排斥、暴力和边缘化政策。正如托马斯杰斐逊所说，“我们对印第安人的行为应该建立在两个原则之上，即正义和恐惧”（康恩 2004 年，3)。尽管他提到了在美洲原住民中制造恐惧的必要性，但事实上，这反映了基于欧洲人对原住民的恐惧而对风险的夸大认识。

从第一批欧洲探险家开始，土著人被视为可开采资源，如欧洲人也渴望的矿物、动物和植物。作为剥削过程的一部分，欧洲人不仅将他们定义为不及人类，而且将他们定义为危险且需要控制。哥伦布带着新世界的消息回来后不久，西班牙统治者开始思考新发现的土著居民是否可以合法地被奴役的问题。西班牙王室在 1500 年代初禁止奴役印第安人，但有例外：“食人族”可能被奴役，当地人可能被带入“正义战争”，以及曾在土著社会中成为奴隶但被西班牙人带走的人可能仍然是新西班牙主人的奴隶（Reséndez  2016, 41-42)。几乎任何人都可以轻松地归入这些类别之一。原住民的“他者化”已经开始。

对土著美国人的残酷对待始于前两次穿越北美的大型探险，由西班牙人 Hernando de Soto 和 Francisco Vázquez de Coronado 领导。在德索托 1538-42 年穿越美国东南部的远征期间，他的编年史家报告说，他的手下袭击并杀害了土著人，掠夺了他们的货物，俘虏了许多俘虏来携带他们偷来的货物，并将年轻女性作为性伴侣。从 1540 年到 1542 年，科罗纳多的远征队从墨西哥城出发，穿过现在的美国西南部，最终到达大平原。沿着这条路线，他的手下杀死了任何抵制食物和供应需求的土著人，俘虏了许多囚犯，并对土著妇女进行性骚扰。

七十年后，英国人抵达并殖民了北美东部。他们不仅侵占土著土地和资源，还把土著人视为野蛮人，这在很大程度上超出了文明的救赎。例如，定居新英格兰的朝圣者的任务是使当地印第安人皈依基督教，但朝圣者将自己视为上帝的选民。无论他们试图遵守基督教教义，美洲原住民永远不可能成为殖民地社区的正式成员（Thomas  1975）。整个 17 世纪，朝圣者领袖允许土著人受到殖民者的攻击、欺凌和抢劫，当土著人反对或反击时，他们被残酷地镇压。与北美其他地区一样，英裔美国人定居者将自己定义为新世界土地的合法所有者，并奴役、剥夺继承权、杀害和滥用土著人民。

毫无疑问，从欧洲传入的疾病在整个新世界土著人口数量的崩溃中发挥了作用。然而，由学者们推动了数十年的 Virgin Soil 账户（Crosby  1976）将所有责任归咎于疾病，而忽略了在大流行发生后阻止土著人口数量恢复的无数因素。与其他人群一样，土著人拥有强大而有效的免疫系统（Jones  2015）。但他们不只是在与疾病作斗争。欧洲人奴役他们，过度劳累，让他们挨饿。他们的土地被占用，他们要么被迫进入边缘沙漠或山区，要么被赶到疾病更加猖獗的传教区。也许最具破坏性的是土著医学知识和护理人员的流失。

在加利福尼亚，西班牙的农业和畜牧业实践迅速退化了长期维持原住民生存的传统资源（赫尔 2015 年）。这使得原住民几乎没有其他选择，只能搬迁到附近牧场的西班牙人传教或劳作. 这些政策的结果是原住民社区的分散和崩溃，以及长期以来维持其成员的社会支持和照顾。传教士的拥挤条件导致疾病传播，传教士和相关军事人员的严厉惩罚导致健康状况不佳，使当地人容易感染疾病和死亡。同样，在西班牙殖民地佛罗里达州，对人类遗骸的研究表明，被迫执行任务的土著人过度劳累、食物不足、有寄生虫、饮用受污染的水，并且普遍健康状况不佳（Larsen  2015）。当流行病到来时，他们没有做好抗击它的准备。类似的情况在整个大陆上演：随着土地和资源被欧洲人侵占，土著人被迫进入欧洲定居点的底层社会阶层，或者撤退到他们努力生存的偏远且往往贫瘠的土地上。这种边缘化的社会地位会对健康产生持续的影响，对于这些被剥夺权利的人来说，从流行病中恢复是非常困难的。

殖民时期形成的对“他人”风险的夸大认识的意识形态经受住了时间的考验。该国的“创始人”继续并以昭昭天命的名义将其实践正式化，首先是华盛顿总统通过杰克逊总统的印第安人迁移法案和谢尔曼将军摧毁水牛和土著居民的政策，以强力手段购买印第安土地的政策。大平原的生活方式。美墨战争后，这一政策也适用于从德克萨斯到加利福尼亚的墨西哥人，因为他们是混血儿（混血儿），其中欧洲的品质因与印度女性的通婚而被稀释。此外，

从十六世纪开始进口到美洲的非洲人加入了美洲原住民和西班牙裔美国人的行列，成为边缘化的下层阶级。最近 COVID-19 大流行对这些少数群体的影响反映了自欧洲人到来以来土著群体所遭受的破坏。在 COVID-19 大流行期间，我们了解到美国黑人（2.8 倍）、西班牙裔（2.8 倍）和美洲原住民（2.6 倍）的死亡率高于白人、非西班牙裔人们。这反映了一种对他人的风险意识形态，这种意识形态一直维持着历史上构建的不平等，其中美洲原住民、西班牙裔和黑人社区很穷，被迫住在人口更密集的社区和与大家庭共享的小房子里，获得的机会更少健康饮食，并被迫从事健康风险更大、医疗保险有限或无法获得的工作。这种殖民风险意识形态造成了一个灾难过程，在过去五百年里一直在目前构成美利坚合众国的领土上展开。