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Avatar: The Holocaust We Will Not See

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Re: Avatar: The Holocaust We Will Not See

#161

Post by mcantelon »

cabalamat wrote: post #150
mcantelon wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where in the article is the claim that western civilization is all bad? The author seems to merely be pointing out that western society largely denies the magnitude of the human and environmental cost of its prosperity.

The article states that "Europe was massively enriched by the genocides in the Americas". On the whole, I think this is untrue. For European countries that had colonies, as often as not the colonies had a negative effect on their economies. If you look at European states today, ones that didn't have colonies (e.g. Sweden, Austria, Switzerland, Greece) are just as prosperous on the whole as ones that did (e.g. UK, Fra…

>The article states that "Europe was massively enriched by the genocides in the Americas"

Whether Europe was successful or not in profiting from the genocide, genocide did happen and I think the author is merely saying that the western world for the most part doesn't own up to this.

Regarding the profitability of colonialism, while I agree that it's debatable whether Europe itself was massively enriched by the colonies, Europeans profited. European immigrants to North America were able to create an empire by consolidating their power over the indigenous residents then leveraging North America's land and natural resources.

Re: Avatar: The Holocaust We Will Not See

#162

Post by borism »

seldo wrote: post #66
oconnor0 wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

True, and the article is a little simplistic on that front, but a modern communications network does not morally justifies the holocaust. Neither does making lots of money & whatever else the Unobtainium was going to do justify wholesale slaughter & genocide of the Na'vi.

But that's exactly what I said. It doesn't excuse the holocaust. But it also makes it hard to say that Germany in the 1940s was an evil regime that contributed nothing to the world. Both are true: they were evil bastards, and they gave us rocket science. The real world is tricky like that.

And I thought rocket science was invented by chinese (like pretty much everything else).

Re: Avatar: The Holocaust We Will Not See

#163

Post by ippisl »

seldo wrote: post #54
themilkmandan wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, all this black-or-white talk about genocide misses a lot of the subtleties. How about a nuanced analysis of the Jewish Holocaust? Nobody brings up enough the fact that Hitler built some damn good roads.

You're missing the point. It's not that genocide is sometimes good, it's that civilizations that commit genocide also do good things. The Germany that produced the Jewish holocaust also invented rocket science, which indirectly led us to the space program, satellites, and a big chunk of our modern communications network. Does this excuse genocide? No. Does it make it difficult to label German civilization as "all goo…

I would label those technological advances in a different dimensions than moral acts. And usually the meaning of bad and good regards morals , not other fields of human behaviour.

And since as a nation their positive moral acts was so little relative to their negative moral actions you can call them "bad".

Re: Avatar: The Holocaust We Will Not See

#164

Post by ippisl »

jacoblyles wrote: post #21
aaronblohowiak wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Meanwhile, poor countries send their top .1% to join the Western world's top 10%; a good deal for both sides" -- not for the rest of the population of poor countries.

What if the top .1% (however defined) of poor countries wouldn't have had the opportunity to exercise their talents at home? How many famous scientists would be subsistence farmers if the GDP of their country was lower? I would guess that India gains by having rich Indians living abroad. They increase the wealth of their families still living in India, they sometimes move back to India or start businesses there. If t…

What about doctors and nurses going to rich countries ?

Re: Avatar: The Holocaust We Will Not See

#165

Post by wendroid »

pyre wrote: post #45
_h4xr wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The third-world isn't some laggard full of overbreeding simpletons. Any concrete reason for that belief? It looks like the "overbreeding" is objectively true: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_birth_rate . As far as simpletons go, you tell me: is there any intelligence test you know of that routinely ranks people in Djibouti over people in Japan? If not, it sounds like your statement is unfounded. The…

> You can also consider Singapore (which is basically Victorian, and basically paradise on earth for law-abiding people). It's interesting that you need to preface that with 'law-abiding people.' What happens when you are accidentally on the other side of the law? Update: Maybe I should be more specific in what I mean. In Thailand you aren't a 'law-abiding citizen' if you criticize the king. What similar laws does Si…

Disneyland with the Death Penalty

We sent William Gibson to Singapore to see whether that clean dystopia represents our techno future.

http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/1.04/gibson.html

Re: Avatar: The Holocaust We Will Not See

#166

Post by blinks »

Tichy wrote: post #152
potatolicious wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "if the European invaders where not evil, ruthless and completely without moral compunction, how were they capable of doing the killing?" That's precisely why it matters who was "evil" and who wasn't. This kind of "pure evil" doesn't really exist, and by assuming it does you are glossing over the real causes of the native genocide. It's far too easy to ask "why did the Europeans murder the natives?" and answer with…

"This kind of "pure evil" doesn't really exist" I'll argue that it exists - not everybody who torments a baby has an excuse for it. Of course it is useful to try to figure out what made them do it, there might be a kind of excuse in terms of an explanation of what made them do it (bad childhood whatever). Or why - um, presumably they wanted the land? I think what happened in America is that some people had the better…

> I'll argue that it exists - not everybody who torments a baby has an excuse for it.

[citation needed] -- It's practically a tautology that people take actions for reasons, even if they don't consciously know what those reasons are.

Re: Avatar: The Holocaust We Will Not See

#167

Post by blinks »

tfh wrote: post #87
IsaacSchlueter wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let's say there are two murderers, Frank and Bob. Frank murders Bob. Is Bob therefor less bad than Frank? What if Bob had murdered 1000 children, and Frank wasn't a murderer until he murdered Bob? Does being a victim cleanse your sins?

Being a victim does not cleanse your sins. I'm sure that the Natives Americans were not perfect human beings. No one is. Being killed does not make the Natives good but the Europeans bad. I hope for you that you agree with that last sentence.

People aren't "good" or "bad." Actions are.

Re: Avatar: The Holocaust We Will Not See

#168

Post by blinks »

Tichy wrote: post #141
IsaacSchlueter wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Holy crap, I can't believe this. Let me say this for the record: The slaughter of Native Americans by the Conquistadors was a terrible thing. Awful. Tragic. An abomination. Also, and completely not taking anything away from the awful abominableness of that terrible tragedy, the Native Americans had lots of other problems with their culture, and were in many ways, quite savage. The Conquistadors had really good food,…

"My point is that you can't just say "they did this awful thing, therefor everything about their culture was horrible"." Nobody was even saying that. You seem to fabricate an enormous straw man.

Grep for "Being killed does not make the Natives good but the Europeans bad."

Re: Avatar: The Holocaust We Will Not See

#169

Post by jff »

armandososa wrote: post #128
Tichy wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So essentially you are calling for anarchy?

Anarchy is the only logical and natural state of being, every other attempt to bring order to chaos is unnatural. Imho.

I hope you enjoy not ever interacting with anybody else, because as soon as you start up relations with some other person you are creating some form of social order. Add a few more people and soon you'll be electing a mayor.

Re: Avatar: The Holocaust We Will Not See

#170

Post by turkishrevenge »

lolcraft wrote: post #124
turkishrevenge wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fine, I understand where you're coming from. Consider though that by very fact the conquistadors received funding from the crown, must in some way, shape, or form, have reflected prevailing attitudes at the time in Spain and within the Catholic church. After all, one of the goals of the expeditions was to "Christianize" the godless heathens, as well as "find" material wealth. So in this sense, yes, some of the attitu…

The problem is that you are actually understanding that conflict less, by painting 16th century Spain as how you'd like it to have been. For example, the Spanish crown formally accepted the natives, since the return of Columbus, as citizens of the crown subject to the same protections a native spaniard had back then. Very liberal for the century. It's just that the landlords (caciques) were much more seduced by the i…

Thank you for the historical context. I did not know that.
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