American Genocide

wrath
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At what point did the genocide in Nazi Germany start?
At what point did the genocide in Rwanda start?
At what point did the genocide in Bosnia start?
At what point did the genocide in China start? Has it even started yet?

We look at those with hindsight. We don’t have that yet with Trump, but we do have history to warn us.

it really seems as though old Hegel, in the guise of the World Spirit, were directing history from the grave and, with the greatest conscientiousness, causing everything to be re-enacted twice over, once as grand tragedy and the second time as rotten farce

Friedrich Engels, 3 December 1851

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The point is that the Trump administration is doing the kind of things that are, with hindsight, considered to be preparations for genocide when done by genocidal regimes. We cannot say that they are intent on genocide, but we cannot say that they are not, because they are doing what genocidal regimes have done in the build-up towards genocide.

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“But Obama…” is not an excuse here or anywhere else. Its 2020, Trump has been issuing his own policy and directives here. Go fuck yourself for even starting the conversation on those lines.

Concentration camps is part of how such things happen. As is pogroms, like what happened in India this week. He is already systematically killing people. Trump has already been piling bodies through INTENTIONAL neglect and withholding of basic services for those in detention.

Not every genocide follows the Nazi model, there were plenty before Hitler and plenty after him. But there are patterns of behavior which are common to them. Patterns you are just playing cheap denial

You want to know the signs of right wing genocidal actions/intentions:

  1. Use of reductive dehumanizing language for entire classes of people. “Mexicans are rapists”, “People from shithole countries”, “invaders” (a favorite of both Trump and neo-nazis)
  2. Use of goon squads to harass people based on race/ethnicity who have no accountability under the law. ICE doesn’t even follow its own laws, let alone abide by 4th and 8th amendment protocols. They even imprison US citizens “by accident”
  3. Promotion of conspiracy theories to demonize entire classes of people “The Jews will not replace us!”
  4. Trying to remove the citizenship of classes of legal immigrants
  5. Imprisonment of families, especially children in draconian conditions far in excess of necessity

"Because genocide is the systematic annihilation of the entirety of a population. "

How systematic was the Rwanda genocide? It was largely carried out by barely controlled mobs using little more than machetes and clubs for the most part.

Genocide denial is a big thing these days. People look for excuses to pretend genocidal actions never happened or were excused somehow.

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Its also the result of intentional withholding of necessary services and outright abuse. Like all concentration camps.

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I will level with you.

I tend to look at things in terms of probabilities. And I definitely assign a non-zero probability to the notion that there is an underground cabal of highly racist, genocidal even white power Nazis spread throughout government, military and police. That it is at least semi-organized, and may in fact be international in nature.

It may also be some kind of slightly new neo-fascist take on “genocide” that they envision, that is a little less regimented around as pure racial/religious divisions/eliminations as previous incarnations. The Germans and the Japanese were “allies” after all. Both were highly-racist fascist regimes, and only tolerated one another racially and culturally because they were more united in their extreme hatred and downright evil inclinations.

However, I do not assign the above scenario(s) a majority probability. Yes there’s tons of nasty racist fucks in the Trump admin up to and including Trump himself, but is he really thinking about wiping out all Latinx people? All Jews? All Muslims? All blacks? Think about it for a moment – it’s sort of ridiculous.

Which is why just starting to spread that idea around and normalize it, now, will mean that identifications of it when it is more clearly something that could happen or IS happening will sound much less credible. It will not make as much of the impact that it should. Bandying it about cavalierly now I believe is a poor long-strategy should a worst-case scenario unfold.

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Conflating the lessons of history with conspiracy theories is harmful disinformation. It’s a false equivalency that does real harm, and puts you in league with the people doing it.

Since you appear to not know what you’re talking about, I would encourage you to stop, and maybe edit your existing posts.

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I’ve asked you several times now to clarify if you believe that the Trump administration is currently gearing up for genocide against one or more populations in the United States, which is what has been getting tossed around. You still have not done that, all that has happened is you are apparently attacking me for even having the gall to question this narrative.

I have been aware of Alex Jones since the early 90s, and Infowars since the mid to late 90s. I know exactly what kind of narratives that venue and others like it toss around, and this looks very very similar to me. I have asked for any clarifications you could offer me, to indicate that this is categorically different and there is good reason to believe Trump is gearing up for genocide, and you nor anyone else have offered up one thing of credibility.

Pointing to all the racist nasty stuff his administration has done is not evidence of gearing up for genocide, and you will not encourage me to edit my posts to suggest that this is so.

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The thing is that Trump himself doesn’t have to make an explicit policy to kill people or expel them. He can just adjust the existing regulatory state to make bad actors (which there are many in ICE and adjacent agencies) do the rest of the work for him. The fact that ICE has been hiding numbers for who’ve died in their custody is enough of a red flag to say something bad is happening and it will get worse. Will it be the next Holocaust? No, but it still will systematically murder people, probably by the thousands at the end of Trump’s administration assuming he gets a second term (which then it could be more).

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I spoke up several times against equalling the current admin with the historical Nazis, and I won’t reiterate my argument here (which I, without revisiting them, would still believe to be not wrong).

I want everyone to be very cautious about this. Please be careful with historical analogies, and don’t equalise.
It’s bad enough. We don’t need that.

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I’m not your rhetorical slave, and I don’t have to address the point only in your terms. In addition, others have answered your question above. I’d be reiterating what has already been said. Your logic is flawed, your definitions are flawed, and your argument in unconvincing.

If you consider the writings of Heather Cox Richardson on the same level as Alex Jones, then you really have no clue. I only took you off Ignore long enough to counter your harmful misinformation. I will continue to provide that counterpoint until you stop or the thread dies.

The “Never” in Never Again means never.

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Maybe we should let it all happen again, because the pattern doesn’t line up perfectly? What should we do when confronted with a very similar pattern of behavior, not just to the rise of fascism in Germany but to many other similar political/historical occurrences?

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I for one think we should begin by not resorting to completely unsubstantiated hyperbolizing about how the Trump administration is gearing up for genocide, because they have done racist things, with zero actual evidence provided. The way to combat genocide is NOT by making absolutely false equivalencies. Fake news is not acceptable when you think it can be wielded in any context so long as it supports your cause. It hurts the anti-Trump cause.

And what exactly are people “letting happen,” huh? Are you suggesting that anything less than accusing Trump of gearing up for genocide is the same as being supportive of Trump? Really? Is that what you are suggesting? Am I a secret Trump supporter, maybe? It is difficult to follow your argument, and your willingness to go 100% on the offense without even bothering to clarify the thinking behind your point or accusations you are making speaks, I think, volumes.

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We did. In Cambodia, in Rwanda, in Yugoslavia (at the same damn time, they even joke about it in a movie about the Bosnian war), in Syria, in Sudan… :woman_shrugging:

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Holocaust survivors think this is the run-up to fascism. Along with historians, there can hardly be a better group to make that call. What special enlightenment do you have to gainsay them?

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Even one death under such conditions - intentional or not - is unacceptable. I am, frankly, appalled at your dismissive attitude.

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The UN definition of genocide includes things like forcibly taking children away from their parents. That was a big part of what America did to the Natives, you may recall. And people like Benjamin Ferencz have named it as an example of Trump committing a crime against humanity, in case you want the opinion of someone who is an expert on them.

Denying that this is genocide isn’t keeping things in perspective. It’s lying to yourself about what the word means.

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Raising awareness for systemic racist policies and increasingly fascist power-grabs is still not the same thing as saying Trump is gearing up for genocide.

How am I dismissing it? Because I won’t say one or even a hundred or even a thousand deaths is the same thing as genocide? By this definition, the USA is committing genocide already, for instance against the black population who is jailed at much higher rates than whites, and prisons are neglectful places. Those are all horrible, awful things, but I have not seen too many people saying the USA is currently engaged in genocide against black people.

Well, apparently I and the dictionary have a different definition?

Merriam Webster: “the deliberate and systematic destruction of a racial, political, or cultural group”

There is no question this is the correct way of referring to what America did to the first nations people. It describes the Holocaust. Stalin. Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge. Rwanda was not as directly state-controlled, but probably counts. The American slavery of blacks I think could be included, although “destruction” in terms of the definition of genocide is commonly understood to mean killing, in any single context I’ve ever heard the word used before – and when you grow up as an Ashkenazi Jew, trust me, you get an education on genocide, and what that means to a people it was recently committed on.

I do not accept the Trump administration, I am a massive critic of the Trump administration, I have done what I can to work against the Trump administration. The idea that me not acquiescing to what I perceive to be a highly exaggerated claim that they are literally gearing up to commit genocide on some… unnamed population, is the same as me supporting Trump, the administration’s racist policies, their fascist power grabs? That is simply an exceptionally weak argument, and no amount of “piling on” which frankly, I think is just cybernetic virtue signaling at this point, will make me think it is reasonable. Period. I’m totally fine with us disagreeing about this, and it seems quite obvious that we will. So be it.

Here, btw, is the UN definition of genocide. I have asked multiple times, what is the group people think the Trump administration is gearing up to commit genocide on. The entire definition is that there is a specifically targeted group, and policies and actions are oriented around eliminating the number of people in that population by killing, or preventing reproduction. Not one person has offered a view on this, which I find telling.

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First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a socialist.

Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a trade unionist.

Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Jew.

Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.

Martin Niemöller

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You’re the only one to call these “racist policies.” It’s much, much more than that, as detailed above.

Bloomberg’s Stop & Frisk was a racist policy. Rounding up brown people and putting them in internment camps, neglecting their care in every way, overpopulating them, and ignoring court orders to stop separating children from their families goes way, way beyond “racist policies.”

BTW, survivors of American internment camps for Japanese Americans also see the Trump Administrations actions as well beyond Step One for genocide. Read and inform yourself.

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LOL I’m the only person to label the Trump administration’s racist policies as racist policies? Like, what, the only person in America? OK, we’re in strange territory at this point, and maybe you’re just trolling me and I’m not getting it. Good day.

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