Ollie Garchy said:
You hit the nail so hard on the head that you smashed it through the wood.
Since we are also talking about genocide as a general problem, what does your assertion tell us about the following people and cultures:
(1) Churchill: "I do not admit that a great wrong has been done to the Red Indians of America or the black people of Australia. I do not admit that a wrong has been done to these people by the fact that a stronger race, a higher-grade race, a more worldly wise race, has come in and taken their place". (1937)
As I said in my previous post, we all have a blind spot when it comes to crimes against humanity and genocides committed by our own countrymen. I have a hard time considering the subjugation of North American Indians as a genocide because I am Canadian and also because I live near various different Aboriginal reservations where today, there are many thousands of Mohawk and Algonquin living. While the culture as it once was is well and truly gone, the same thing could be argued about those who did the actual subjugation; the culture that existed in the early 1800's has also changed beyond recognition. It can be very successfully argued that the changes that have occurred to the North American Aboriginal population and culture are as much due to the needs and pressures of living in the modern world as they are to the actions of the white colonizers. I know that they are specious arguments, but that is how we in North America rationalize it. To counter that argument, I always use the same point: What about the Beothuk? After I explain who the Beothuk were, the argument is usually over.
Ollie Garchy said:
(2) F.D. Roosevelt: "With the exception of the English colonization of North America, Roosevelt viewed the European race for colonies as a manifestation of the forces of imperialism, militarism, and reaction. Roosevelt portrayed Spanish colonization on behalf of “His Most Catholic Majesty” as “a false glory,” bent solely on “exploitation” and producing only a hybrid race that was “part cavalier, part Indian, later on in part negro.” Similarly, Roosevelt portrayed French efforts prior to the establishment of English colonies in North America as little better, afraid of competition and focused on fishing, fur trapping, and trading with Indian tribes. Roosevelt observed that the French left few historical records and nothing that he could characterize as “sound and permanent colonization.” He noted that, in sharp contrast to Spanish and French imperialistic exploitation, the English came to North America as permanent colonizers whose efforts advanced the course of civilization." (various dates)
He was dead wrong about the French. I live in Québec, and I see signs of sound and permanent colonization every single day. It is no accident that I speak French fluently, as it is the principal language of eight million people here in this corner of North America. In Montreal and Quebec, the recordsstill exist, and buildings, architecture, language, culture, even our civil law are directly influenced by the French colonization; so in that regard, Roosevelt had absolutely no idea what he was talking about. The English simply won a war, and in doing so tool over a flourishing colony. Roosevelt simply never read about it.
As for the rest of his comments, it perfectly fits my other example. Roosevelt glossed over the actions of his own ancestors (the English) and justified their actions using an argument that I could blow huge holes through.
Ollie Garchy said:
[Holocaust Studies still aims at fighting this type of perspective. "Never again" is the dominant phrase. If, however, cultures justify their own genocidal "activities" using a subjective emphasis on the actions of "others", what does this mean for Holocaust Studies? Holocaust Studies, and the over-concentration on a single example, might be making the problem worse rather than better. Has Washington concentrated on their horrible treatment of Native-Americans or African-Americans? No. They build Holocaust memorials instead. Similarly, Turkish nationalists use the Holocaust to downplay, minimize or even deny the Armenian tragedy.]
The reason that the holocaust is used as an example is due to the fact that it was so well documented that it can be studied in the smallest degree, and from many different fields. You can easily study the mechanics and organization of large and small units, the economic costs and benefits of exterminating the Jews, the psychology of both the victims and those who carried out the murders, how mob psychology was used to turn ordinary Germans against the Jews, etc. etc. In every other example of a genocide, people were not stupid enough to leave such detailed documentation, and the perpetrators could never be questioned. If you take the example of the Armenian genocide, there is little if any valid archival evidence, all of the eye-witnesses are dead, all of the perpetrators are dead, and all of the memories of the victims and the perpetrators are second-hand. Hardly a good example to teach others about how to avoid another such occurance... But there is (unfortunately) another example that will be very useful for education, particularly in Africa, and that is the Rwandan genocide. As more and more evidence comes to light, we see the repetition of the same patterns that led to the genocides in Germany and Armenia. And it happened, what, ten years ago?
The trouble with normal is that it always gets worse.....
Dean.
Ollie Garchy said: