PSA, American Thanksgiving was never about the pilgrims

deerstalkerdeathfrisbee:

Abe Lincoln issued the ‘Thanksgiving Proclamation’ during the Civil War to BOOST MORALE and encourage everyone in the Union to reflect on the good in the world. And he did it because AN OLD LADY SENT HIM A LETTER. According to abrahamlincolnonline.org 74-year-old magazine editor Sarah Josepha Hale (which, how badass do you have to be to be a magazine writer and a WOMAN in the 1800s???) wrote a letter to Lincoln petitioning him to make Thanksgiving a national holiday in response to the harvest festival’s increasing popularity in the Northeast. She’d been writing letters to presidents for years and been ignored every time. Old Abe, though, was like ‘OMG, SURE’ and almost immediately issued the Thanksgiving Proclamation, basically telling America that while things looked grim, there was still good in the world. According to USA Today, FDR is the president who made Thanksgiving Day the third day of November in the USA (in an attempt to lengthen the Christmas shopping season and boost the economy because, oh, right, THE GREAT DEPRESSION WAS A THING).

So essentially THANKSGIVING WAS NEVER ABOUT THE PILGRIMS. It was about making the best of things in hard times, and overcoming national crisis. It was a holiday meant for everyone, to give everyone a feeling of stability and security, and to send a positive message about better times being ahead.

Tldr; stop saying Thanksgiving is bad because the pilgrims were bad. Yeah, the Puritans/Pilgrims sucked in a lot of ways, but Thanksgiving was invented by two presidents and a grandma in the midst of national crises as a beacon of hope for the struggling HUNDREDS OF YEARS AFTER THE PILGRIMS. 

So enjoy your turkey and remember good times are ahead, Abe Lincoln said so.