[wat0n]

What makes you think we're discussing states here?

[Tainari88]

:lol: Really liberals do have the most absurd beliefs. This is what I mean by the narcissism of the liberal. The Iroquois were far more cruel than the Nazis and so were host of other primitive peoples. But because the Nazis figured so large in our history, so large in our consciousness, the Liberal has this emotional need for them to be the cruelist. Plenty of peoples had butchered Jews, Poles, Ukrainians, Romanians etc,but none of them needed to go to all the palava of building secret camps and gas chambers. When the Hutus wanted to genocide the Tutsi, they didn't fanny about for years on end like the Nazis did. They just got out their machetes and hacked them to death.

Gas chambers are not a particularly cruel way to kill people/ They're dead in a matter of minutes. If you want to be cruel what's wrong with crucifixion, its a tried and tested method and generally the suffering can be made to last for days. If the Germans had been a cruel people by historical standards, they would have crucified the Jews in public so as people could gloat over their suffering.

Now maybe you will say it was just the SS that were cruel. But again the SS compared to your Lakota, your Apache, your Commanche were a bunch of softies. Sure they had their hard core sadists, but you find those everywhere. A big part of the reason for gas chambers is because the straight forward killing traumatised so many of the Einsatzgruppen. Himmler I believe was physically sick. when he saw the executions and possibly Eichmann as well, Neither seemed to hav enjoyed the experience. Even Hitler wasn't a sadist. He may have watched some of the post July bomb plot executions, but theirs no evidence that I;ve seen that he used his position of power to watch people being tortured in general.

For some of the native American tribes, torturing prisoners of war was a proper communal event, lasting days, one that all the women and children could join in on.

Are you serious about this claim Rich?

Go and open a thread on those tribes you just said were unusually cruel. I lived among them for years. Go ahead. Let us see who got it wrong eh?

[wat0n]

@Tainari88 have you heard about the war between the Apache and the Comanches in the 18th century? It's been labeled a "war of extermination" because the Comanche nearly destroyed the Apache.

It's why it's a fallacy to just limit the analysis of cruelty to states. You don't need that to fight wars, although states are usually the most efficient way to do so in the long run (which is why states exist, anyway).

[Tainari88]

@Tainari88 have you heard about the war between the Apache and the Comanches in the 18th century? It's been labeled a "war of extermination" because the Comanche nearly destroyed the Apache.

It's why it's a fallacy to just limit the analysis of cruelty to states. You don't need that to fight wars, although states are usually the most efficient way to do so in the long run (which is why states exist, anyway).

You got flawed logic Wat0n. First off you have disagreement among different political philosophies on what the role of the state is in human societies. Libertarians believe one thing, socialists another, communiists another, capitalists another and everyone who has more complexity and differ on particular issues also differ.

Then you got the history of the Apache nation. That happens to be one of the tribes I visited and lived among for a while. There is a little town named Dulce, New Mexico. They are an Apache reservation in the Northern part of New Mexico.

Who are they and their history with the state of New Mexico and the Mexican government? And the fight between the Comanche and the Apache.

It is very interesting.

That should be a separate topic Wat0n. I studied the Apache in depth. I also did archaeology work for that group. There are different Apache groups. Jicarilla Apache, some live in the Southwestern USA and others live in Mexico. In Chihuahua and Sonora.

Again if you are truly interested in how the Apache wound up fighting with the Comanche who are mostly from the state of Texas we take up the topic and hopefully @Rich learns something about how bad the distorted history is regarding Native American groups in the USA.

In fact, the Apache were sent to a land that the US Government thought was a desert with absolutely no real monetary value. With very little worth. It turned out it has a lot of natural gas deposits, pure water deep under ground and good hunting and sheepherding land. They had to negotiate and the Apache sold the gas to the state of New Mexico and brought the profits back to the tribe. Every last man, woman and child was given equitable returns on that resource. From the newborn infant to the eldest elder all received the same. They also herded sheep, hunted, and built lives where they could live with dignity and in peace.

But how they got there is an interesting story eh?

I get tired of going over history that are founded on bullshit. I think Rich is one of those British people who never learned anything about Native Americans. Once you live with them, and talk with them, and know them? They are human beings first off. And they have the same complexities as all humans have. They make mistakes, they go through the whole gamut of emotions, they worry about the same things all humans worry about.

Nothing primitive about the way they think or feel or are.

In fact, they find the lack of real solidarity among many people who are not raised with their value systems very strange. For them it is natural to know that you are on that land on borrowed time. We all are. The American modern WASP society has this idea of possession that they find strange. How can you own something that was here before humans, and who rules your very life. You depend on air to breathe, water to drink, food to eat, and resources to live. It comes from the land and the Earth. Therefore trying to dominate it is for crazy ass people. Sort of like a tiny ant wanting to be more powerful than a huge elephant.

Are they wrong?

[wat0n]

@Tainari88 the Apache-Comanche war happened before US independence, am I somehow supposed to believe they did not fight brutally at the time even though that was standard behavior? And by "fight brutally", I mean killing all adult males and taking women and children as slaves (if lucky, they were often killed too) that wouldn't manage to flee, which was pretty much expected and also done by Europeans to Native Americans.

I don't think this is about their culture, by the way, I'm sure 21st century Apache and Comanche views on what's acceptable in war are very different to what they were in the 18th century... Because we live in the 21st century.

[Unthinking Majority]

I already addressed the simplistic “everyone does it” argument.

And the British Empire (BE for short) had a clear and specific mindset and ideology: to bring civilization to the world.

It did so by buying and selling people into slavery, taking their lands, mass rape, putting people into concentration camps, and obliterating entire cultures, because these people were less civilized.

Yes we know how bad European empires were, including the British. They were also among the first countries in the world to ban slavery and guarantee human rights. The Nazis were worse than the British though. They wanted to wipe out the inferior races genetically by mass murdering them, not just their culture, and spread Aryan genetics across the globe.

[Unthinking Majority]

Cultures like the British Empire are very high on the list while the Roma or Palestinians would be very low.

The government in Gaza has specifically targeted the murder of civilians in Israel every few weeks for the last 20+ years.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lists_of_ ... _on_Israel

Per capita and per unit of power they're probably amongst the highest in the world.

[Unthinking Majority]

2024-1776=248

60 000 000/248 is more or less 242 000.

This is only slightly higher than the casualty count of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

The number of deaths directly caused by the US war effort is about 41 000 a year.

So, it is quite plausible that the indirect deaths from the US add up to the remaining 200 000 a year. This would include the sanctions on Iraq, the deaths of those suffering under US supported dictatorships, and other causes.

But I am fairly sure the British Empire killed way more than 60 million.

It's possible the British killed the most people. But we're talking about the cruelest regime, not the largest or deadliest.

[wat0n]

If we went by effectiveness in exterminating populations, Chile and Argentina would probably be ones of the most cruel regimes/nations/'peoples' ever.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Selk%27nam_genocide

I don't think either of us regimes/nations/'peoples' is particularly cruel, but this was definitely fucked up even for its time I'd say.

[Pants-of-dog]

Yes we know how bad European empires were, including the British. They were also among the first countries in the world to ban slavery and guarantee human rights.

Many other nations were already doing things like that.

The Five nations Confederacy, for example, provided the blueprint for the US constitution.

Just because you do not learn about how Canadian Indigenous groups had systems if governance that did similar things does not mean that they did not provide such things,

The Nazis were worse than the British though. They wanted to wipe out the inferior races genetically by mass murdering them, not just their culture, and spread Aryan genetics across the globe.

The British wanted to wipe out inferior cultures. They conducted mass murders. They set up systems of cultural genocide. They spread their ideology around the world.

The main difference between Nazis and the BE was that the former attacked white people while the BE attacked non-Europeans.

The government in Gaza has specifically targeted the murder of civilians in Israel every few weeks for the last 20+ years.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lists_of_ ... _on_Israel

Per capita and per unit of power they're probably amongst the highest in the world.

Compared to IDF attacks on Palestinians, this is very low.

[wat0n]

The main difference between Nazis and the BE was that the former attacked white people while the BE attacked non-Europeans.

Why is this relevant? Also, it's false - the BE fought the Boers using concentration camps and other scorched earth tactics when the latter decided to fight a guerrilla war.

[wat0n]

The government in Gaza has specifically targeted the murder of civilians in Israel every few weeks for the last 20+ years.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lists_of_ ... _on_Israel

Per capita and per unit of power they're probably amongst the highest in the world.

Nah, not really. Hamas' barbarism is disgusting and ought to be punished where it hurts them most (by toppling their government and rendering it unable to act as a military force, with the consequent loss of political power, which for them is much worse than being killed), but nothing we're seeing in Israel/Palestine or Russia/Ukraine (possibly the two wars that are followed with most interest in PoFo) is the most cruel thing happening right now, let alone ever.

[Pants-of-dog]

Why is this relevant?

Because people care more when white people are killed.

Also, it's false - the BE fought the Boers using concentration camps and other scorched earth tactics when the latter decided to fight a guerrilla war.

No, this does not disprove the claim that the BE targeted non-Europeans.

[wat0n]

Because people care more when white people are killed.

I would say it depends on what "people" you are talking about and the time period.

For instance, the Europeans of the late 19th century did care more when the Boers were being sent to concentration camps, even though Black Africans were sent to camps as well (and under even worse conditions).

OTOH, you can't deny that even Europeans were outraged at atrocities committed against non-Europeans, e.g. what Leopold II was doing in Congo. But I agree the outrage bar was higher when the victims weren't European, at least at that time.

No, this does not disprove the claim that the BE targeted non-Europeans.

Nobody said it didn't. I am saying your assumption that the BE did not target Europeans is false.

Likewise, the Nazis did target non-Europeans as well. The Maghrebi Jews who were sent to concentration camps were not European.

[Unthinking Majority]

Many other nations were already doing things like that.

The Iroquois Confederacy had slavery and some even owned African slaves:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iroquois#Slavery

The Five nations Confederacy, for example, provided the blueprint for the US constitution.

Cite? Indigenous people couldn't even read or write when Europeans met them. The blueprint for the US constitution came largely from British philosophers like John Locke, civil law in French and Roman societies, and the 700 years of British common law plus original American contributions.

The British wanted to wipe out inferior cultures. They conducted mass murders. They set up systems of cultural genocide. They spread their ideology around the world.

We're debating about who was most cruel. The British wanted to convert primitive cultures to Christianity and help them read and write so they weren't horrifically poor. It was a lot of misplaced and ignorant good intentions combined with some cruelty yes. African slavery was cruel, so were the West Africans who captured their neighbours and sold them into slavery and every other system of slavery in the world at the time.

Indigenous people scalped and raped war captives and took many into slavery, stole their goods and land etc. The Aztec Empire conquered fellow indigenous tribes through war and pillaging, and ripped the hearts out of captives while they were still alive as human sacrifice.

The main difference between Nazis and the BE was that the former attacked white people while the BE attacked non-Europeans.

The BE fought many other European nations many times. The cruelty done by the Nazi fascists in just 6 years and their future plans and ideology very cruel, especially in a European era of constitutions and human rights. Jews and Roma people also aren't white. You can't possibly argue that the Nazis weren't horrifically racist. They're probably the most racist government to exist in human history given that their raison d'etre was based around racism.

Compared to IDF attacks on Palestinians, this is very low.

Cite?

[Rich]

They're probably the most racist government to exist in human history given that their raison d'etre was based around racism.

You've been making a lot of great points, until you said this. Genocide is not the exception of human history and pre history, it is the norm. but its worse than that. Genocide was not just a fundamental aspect of pre modern human behaviour, genocide is what made us human. This needs to be repeated. It was only through racism and genocide that we became human. Racism can probable be best divided into six types.

1 Band racism. We see this in Chimpanzees. One band making warfare against another band.. What is crucial is that male chimps have been seen to rip off the genitals of a dead enemy chimp. The Chimp does not merely want to physically kill his enemy, but also to symbolically humiliate and annihilate him. Here we have the beginnings of racist consciousness. The beginnings of identity. Identity politics and even murderous identity politics were not invented by the modern left. They are millions of years old. In fact it is only through murderous and genocidal identity politics, combined with in group sexual competition and the rape and kidnapping of enemy females in warfare that we had the levels of differential reproduction to drive the evolution of the resource costly human brain over the last six to ten million years.

2 Tribal racism. The ability to form racist identities around multiple bands. Tribal racism was an incredibly brilliant technological advance. It meant the ability to immediately cooperate with someone you'd never met before, with whom you had no known familial relationship against a common enemy. This is something that Chimps never developed or if they did their ancestors lost this capability at some point. This was normally between groups that were genetically similar, but did their best to make themselves look different. We saw this in modern times with the explosion of the punk movement. Jonny Rotten admitted later that he actually liked some prog rock bands. Punks and Proggers, Mods and Rockers were not really biologically distinct races, but they looked like they were.

3 Class racism. This has existed for perhaps 6000 years. The aristocratic / monarchist elite imagine themselves a race part. The differential rates of reproduction amount to an ongoing genocide of the poor by the elite, with the excess elites being downwarldy socially mobile. The son of the King is a prince. His grandson a duke, his great grandson a Marquis. His illegitimate heirs could descend the class hierarchy even faster,

4 Theocratic racism. Emerged perhaps two to two and half thousand tears ago. This upped the stakes, if you lost this battle, if the wrong God, or the wrong views about the right God emerged as victor, you're decendents might not be merely exterminated but could end up burning in hell for eternity.

5 World scale skin colour racism. Invented by the Muslims to justify their enslavement of darker skinned Africans to the south and lighter skinned Europeans to the North,

6 Victim Supremacist racism. Privilege is justified by your victim credentials. We see this in the battle over Palestine, who are the legitimate heirs to the Throne of Victim-hood, the Jews, the Palestinians or neither.

[ingliz]

@wat0n

Fair's fair.

From the 1600s, all sides took scalps. In the frontier wars against the French, British bounty policies originally intended only for Native Americans were extended to enemy colonists, and it didn't end there. Europeans continued to take scalps through the Revolutionary War - Henry Hamilton, the British lieutenant governor was known as the "hair-buyer general" - and the Indian Wars.

And they weren't too fussy. Women and children were fair game.

[wat0n]

@wat0n

Fair's fair.

From the 1600s, all sides took scalps. In the frontier wars against the French, British bounty policies originally intended only for Native Americans were extended to enemy colonists, and it didn't end there. Europeans continued to take scalps through the Revolutionary War - Henry Hamilton, the British lieutenant governor was known as the "hair-buyer general" - and the Indian Wars.

And they weren't too fussy. Women and children were fair game.

Indeed, although IIRC scalping was something the European colonists learned from Native Americans as it was a rite of passage for some of the Native American peoples. Europeans could be more brutal if they wanted e.g. as in the Tour de Nesle affair. There are also examples of outright extermination of Native Americans, not due to disease but as a deliberate act of war.

Another thing is that executions in Medieval Europe were comparable to a 21st century sports event. Not only people would gather to watch and cheer (if they didn't disagree with the execution) but you'd see some random guys selling food or booze for the show. I guess this was also the case when they executed Native Americans (even women and children) in the North American colonies, although since their numbers were relatively low (compared to Europe) attendance was smaller.

BTW, there were also some more limited instances of scalping as late as WWII. But I think that was done after the victim had already died at least most of the time.

[Rich]

Another factor that should be borne in mind is hunting,animal husbandry and butchery. This plays a powerful role in de-sensitising people to the use of violence. Modern supermarket meat consumption conceals or removes a lot of the grissly stuff.

But also take Britain in the 1950s by world standards an incredibly urbanised and politically moderate country. The levels of violence compared to today were just astronomical. Parents, relatives, teachers, police used violence on children without a second thought. Many husbands used violence on their wives. In the prisons warders used violence against prisoners as routine, the same for NCOs against privates.

[Pants-of-dog]

I would not say that Europeans or their white descendants abroad care about genocide and other atrocities. They might be shocked when imagining a particular act of cruelty, but when these acts are brought up here, for example, we get semantic discussions about the definition of the word or outright genocide denial.

@Unthinking Majority

The British also had slaves and were dealing in slavery when they began to abolish it. Nor does slave ownership among the Haudenosaunee contradict the fact that their culture had already created something analogous to a human rights system before colonialism. Nor is this contradicted by the racist assumption that oral.societies are too stupid to come up with accountable systems.of governance.

Nor am I judging them on their intentions, but on the actual facts of history. Would you ignore the fact that your family was torn apart if the perpetrators explained that they thought they were saving you from them?

Yes, other places also had slavery. The BE turned into a huge multinational industry with stocks and shares and limited liability and all the other accoutrements of capitalism. They were Starbucks when everyone else was a local family business.

The same with scalping. An act Earley done by a few Indigenous groups was turned into a huge multinational industry by the BE. If scalping and rape are bad, then the BE took this bad act and spread it far and wide to make money off it.

Also, there are Jews of every race. The vast majority of the Jewish victims of Nazism were Ashkenazi Jews from Eastern Europe. The Roma are also a multiracial set of communities. And yes, the Nazis were racist. So were the BE. Why else would they think they need to uplift all the other races to their level? By enslaving and killing them, oddly enough.