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Avatar: The Holocaust We Will Not See

monbiot.com

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Re: Avatar: The Holocaust We Will Not See

#41

Post by ryanwaggoner »

cssteerpike wrote: post #40
cynicalkane wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would you be OK with that if the Cebulons wiped out 90% of the human population? Because that's at least the scale of the genocide we're talking about.

Doesn't this misconstrue DanielBMarkham's argument, though? There's no attempt to justify the act of genocide, merely to point out that Monbiot's response to it ignores substantive differences between the relative merits of Western culture versus Native American culture, and what's more, does so willfully in service of a particular political agenda.

When discussing genocide, pointing out the merits of those who conducted the genocide vs. those who were slaughtered constitutes an implicit justification of the act.

Imagine if descriptions of Nazi concentration camps included lengthy treatises on how Jewish culture was backwards and savage, while German culture was refined and noble. Would you find this appropriate, or even relevant in any way?

Re: Avatar: The Holocaust We Will Not See

#42

Post by pyre »

baxident wrote: post #33
DanielBMarkham wrote: post #24

I made it about halfway this through before bailing. Yet another "western civilization is so bad" articles. Ho hum. The problem here is, as mattmaroon put it, if you buy into this logic we'd all still be chasing down antelopes on the savannah. At some point some civilizations, for whatever reason, start developing things like private property, the wheel, common law, reading, the printing press, etc. It's become fashi…

If Europeans had already developed the idea of private property, then why did we find it necessary to take the land of these ingenious populations?

He's ignoring the point that 'rule of law' didn't exist in the Americas. Maybe private property and rule of law existed in Europe and made for a better society there, but the conquistadors that came to the Americas acted like the rule of law was "whatever I want to do, I get to do." Ideas like private property don't excuse things like slavery and murder.

You can't say, "I claim this piece of land for my own. Oh, look! There are people living on it already. I guess I get to enslave, rape, torture them." This has more to do with brutal people being the first people to encounter the natives in the Americas, and deciding that since there was no European justice system or society to condemn/jail then that they could do whatever they felt like.

Re: Avatar: The Holocaust We Will Not See

#44

Post by pyre »

jcl wrote: post #39
yummyfajitas wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It would have almost no effect. Unless the Americas were completely isolated from Eurasia, everyone would have died anyway. The Americas were not conquered by force of arms, but by disease. A common pattern: send an expedition, which discovers cities, towns and gardens. Send another expedition years later: find nothing. I highly recommend the book 1491, which is a great historical account. There was absolutely nothin…

Why didn't it work symmetrically? Shouldn't the diseases going the other way have wiped out Europe? The only major disease I can recall coming from the Americas was syphilis.

Maybe there were more diseases in Europe? It's not like diseases never hit Europe from other places (e.g. The Black Plague).

Re: Avatar: The Holocaust We Will Not See

#45

Post by pyre »

_h4xr wrote: post #27
wendroid wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The third-world isn't some laggard full of overbreeding simpletons. It was created in the 18th & 19th century by well armed invaders helped at the end of the 19th C by drought & flood that killed 50m people in India & China and 50m in S. America. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Late_Victorian_Holocausts Indian & Chinese civilisation was crushed by armies & opium.

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 Singapore have? What happens is someone doesn't like me and decides to set me up for a crime I am no guilty of (e.g. deface some property and then claim that I did it)? The only problem that I have with harsh justice systems: What happens if you're an innocent person, but that system believes you to be guilty?

Re: Avatar: The Holocaust We Will Not See

#46

Post by Quarrelsome »

rainyday wrote: post #25
bokonist wrote: post #3

Question to HN readers who are sympathetic with this article: If you could wave a magic wand and "undo" all that was done, would you do so? So imagine all those who perished in the 1500's would be revived from the dead and restored to their ancestral lands, all those living in the Americas now would be sent back to England, Ireland, China, etc, with a one way ticket and $10K in cash to start a new life. Would you wav…

While there's no magic wand for the past, you can affect the future. We're in the midst of a great extinction event, combined with anthropogenic climate change, various unsustainable practices. A lot of life--human, nonhuman--is going to die, badly, and for a long time, if people waste their time on junk like Avatar instead of dealing with this mess.

.... and you're posting on hacker news when you could be "dealing with that mess".

Re: Avatar: The Holocaust We Will Not See

#47

Post by tybris »

baxident wrote: post #33
DanielBMarkham wrote: post #24

I made it about halfway this through before bailing. Yet another "western civilization is so bad" articles. Ho hum. The problem here is, as mattmaroon put it, if you buy into this logic we'd all still be chasing down antelopes on the savannah. At some point some civilizations, for whatever reason, start developing things like private property, the wheel, common law, reading, the printing press, etc. It's become fashi…

If Europeans had already developed the idea of private property, then why did we find it necessary to take the land of these ingenious populations?

because they didn't...

Re: Avatar: The Holocaust We Will Not See

#48

Post by Prolorn »

jcl wrote: post #39
yummyfajitas wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It would have almost no effect. Unless the Americas were completely isolated from Eurasia, everyone would have died anyway. The Americas were not conquered by force of arms, but by disease. A common pattern: send an expedition, which discovers cities, towns and gardens. Send another expedition years later: find nothing. I highly recommend the book 1491, which is a great historical account. There was absolutely nothin…

Why didn't it work symmetrically? Shouldn't the diseases going the other way have wiped out Europe? The only major disease I can recall coming from the Americas was syphilis.

In simple terms, the Old World had a larger human population pool, with a longer history of settlement, and more domesticated animals (i.e. vectors for disease).

Or in simplest terms, Old World germs were way nastier. (Contrast: African settlement.)

Re: Avatar: The Holocaust We Will Not See

#49

Post by DanielBMarkham »

ryanwaggoner wrote: post #41
cssteerpike wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Doesn't this misconstrue DanielBMarkham's argument, though? There's no attempt to justify the act of genocide, merely to point out that Monbiot's response to it ignores substantive differences between the relative merits of Western culture versus Native American culture, and what's more, does so willfully in service of a particular political agenda.

When discussing genocide, pointing out the merits of those who conducted the genocide vs. those who were slaughtered constitutes an implicit justification of the act. Imagine if descriptions of Nazi concentration camps included lengthy treatises on how Jewish culture was backwards and savage, while German culture was refined and noble. Would you find this appropriate, or even relevant in any way?

I think you guys have fallen off in the weeds somewhere.

The point wasn't that somehow Europeans were "right" in the way they treated the natives, any more than the natives were "right". My thesis is, given any two sufficiently distant cultures, any interaction between them, no matter how principled, will be traumatic to the lesser culture.

That doesn't mean I approve of the side-effects of interaction, or that I'm a believer in social darwinism, or that we should kill a million people in order to make drugs to extend the lives of the billions of other humans. These are all extreme positions that I do NOT take. I'm simply pointing out the patterns from the past, which I fully expect to continue in the future. My personal opinions have no bearing on this anymore than whether or not I like the beach has anything to do with the migratory patterns of sea turtles. It's an observation, not a value judgement.

Even when I say I would send my kids to the schools and such, what I'm saying is that we must do what we have to in order to survive as a species. Not that I approve or somehow would be complicit in it. I'm saying that the personal attitude of survival and not moaning over things lost is what makes us able to move forward no matter what position we are in.

The more interesting question would be if the aliens arrived with all sorts of goodies, much like the Europeans did. What if we could eliminate death? Eliminate suffering? Live more fuller lives? But what if the interaction was bound to kill 90% of the population no matter how well it was handled?

I'm not in charge of making decisions like that and I quite plainly refuse to do so, even in a rhetorical sense. I'm much happier describing my personal reaction to such an event than trying to figure out what's best for an entire species over the long run. That's way above my pay grade.

But it's not a matter of me good, them bad. It's more like "some cultures are better than others, and when two cultures get significantly far apart mixing them becomes extremely traumatic to the lesser one"

You want an answer to the Fermi Paradox? I think it's right here.

Re: Avatar: The Holocaust We Will Not See

#50

Post by StrawberryFrog »

baxident wrote: post #33
DanielBMarkham wrote: post #24

I made it about halfway this through before bailing. Yet another "western civilization is so bad" articles. Ho hum. The problem here is, as mattmaroon put it, if you buy into this logic we'd all still be chasing down antelopes on the savannah. At some point some civilizations, for whatever reason, start developing things like private property, the wheel, common law, reading, the printing press, etc. It's become fashi…

If Europeans had already developed the idea of private property, then why did we find it necessary to take the land of these ingenious populations?

Because the Europeans conveniently decided that ingenious populations didn't own anything: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terra_nullius

Ok, so that's more "how" than "why". The "why" was because they wanted it.

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