US founded on genocide, slavery

[Lt. Fred]

As a non-american, and as someone who is rather critical of american policy.
America was founded on a dream of a better world.
A lot of mistakes were made by the people who followed that dream. A lot of those mistakes were costly and violent. A lot of people didnt know any better. They were ignorant.
The blue devils were not evil men, but they were ignorant and stupid men, and they slaughtered natives quite cheerfully. They believed a lot of nonsense that we now know is simply wrong, and they commited genocide based on those beliefs.

Just out of curiosity, D, where are you from?

I also don't understand the "blue devils" bit.

Slang for Yankee. Since that was the prime color of the army uniform back in the day. See also "Blue Coats", "Billy Yank", "Bluebacks"

In an outrageous example of hypocricy and projection, a term mostly used by the brown devils of the South.

[TheL]

As a non-american, and as someone who is rather critical of american policy.
America was founded on a dream of a better world.
A lot of mistakes were made by the people who followed that dream. A lot of those mistakes were costly and violent. A lot of people didnt know any better. They were ignorant.
The blue devils were not evil men, but they were ignorant and stupid men, and they slaughtered natives quite cheerfully. They believed a lot of nonsense that we now know is simply wrong, and they commited genocide based on those beliefs.

Just out of curiosity, D, where are you from?

I also don't understand the "blue devils" bit.

Slang for Yankee. Since that was the prime color of the army uniform back in the day. See also "Blue Coats", "Billy Yank", "Bluebacks"

In an outrageous example of hypocricy and projection, a term mostly used by the brown devils of the South.

I thought Confederate uniforms were gray?

[DasFuchs]

As a non-american, and as someone who is rather critical of american policy.
America was founded on a dream of a better world.
A lot of mistakes were made by the people who followed that dream. A lot of those mistakes were costly and violent. A lot of people didnt know any better. They were ignorant.
The blue devils were not evil men, but they were ignorant and stupid men, and they slaughtered natives quite cheerfully. They believed a lot of nonsense that we now know is simply wrong, and they commited genocide based on those beliefs.

Just out of curiosity, D, where are you from?

I also don't understand the "blue devils" bit.

Slang for Yankee. Since that was the prime color of the army uniform back in the day. See also "Blue Coats", "Billy Yank", "Bluebacks"

In an outrageous example of hypocricy and projection, a term mostly used by the brown devils of the South.

And indians in the west

I thought Confederate uniforms were gray?

Depends on what time period and state of the war. Southern uniforms ranged from proper grey of some units in the begining (along with federal blue, hence why Bull Run was so confusing) to whatever they could get their hands on from other states and pretty much the entire Southern army mid war on.

[rosenewock21]

I had this discussion with my class in AP US History.

The criteria for genocide as outlined by the UN is as quoted, so, picking it apart:

In the present Convention, genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part (it certainly wasn't unintentional. they might not have had the same reasons to kill them, but they singled out a single race to destroy. it wasn't an accident.), a national, ethnical, racial or religious group (which Native Americans are), as such:

(a) Killing members of the group; obvious check

(b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; obvious check

(c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; reservations, check

(d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; no check as far as I know

(e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group. forced assimilation schools, check and double check

You only need one to qualify. We have four out of five.

For D I give you this article from The Center for Bioethics & Human Dignity.

On Forced Sterilization

On November 6, 1976, the Government Accounting Office (GAO) released the results of its investigation into similar events at four of twelve IHS areas (Albuquerque, Aberdeen, Oklahoma City, and Phoenix). Records verified that the IHS performed 3,406 sterilizations between 1973 and 1976.[iv] “Tip of the iceberg” is indeed an appropriate metaphor. Per capita, this figure would be equivalent to sterilizing 452,000 non-Native American women.

Looks like we hit all five. Somehow "Oops, our bad" doesn't feel like it will cut it.

[Lt. Fred]

As a non-american, and as someone who is rather critical of american policy.
America was founded on a dream of a better world.
A lot of mistakes were made by the people who followed that dream. A lot of those mistakes were costly and violent. A lot of people didnt know any better. They were ignorant.
The blue devils were not evil men, but they were ignorant and stupid men, and they slaughtered natives quite cheerfully. They believed a lot of nonsense that we now know is simply wrong, and they commited genocide based on those beliefs.

Just out of curiosity, D, where are you from?

I also don't understand the "blue devils" bit.

Slang for Yankee. Since that was the prime color of the army uniform back in the day. See also "Blue Coats", "Billy Yank", "Bluebacks"

In an outrageous example of hypocricy and projection, a term mostly used by the brown devils of the South.

And indians in the west

This I didn't know.

[DasFuchs]

As a non-american, and as someone who is rather critical of american policy.
America was founded on a dream of a better world.
A lot of mistakes were made by the people who followed that dream. A lot of those mistakes were costly and violent. A lot of people didnt know any better. They were ignorant.
The blue devils were not evil men, but they were ignorant and stupid men, and they slaughtered natives quite cheerfully. They believed a lot of nonsense that we now know is simply wrong, and they commited genocide based on those beliefs.

Just out of curiosity, D, where are you from?

I also don't understand the "blue devils" bit.

Slang for Yankee. Since that was the prime color of the army uniform back in the day. See also "Blue Coats", "Billy Yank", "Bluebacks"

In an outrageous example of hypocricy and projection, a term mostly used by the brown devils of the South.

And indians in the west

This I didn't know.

I'm sure Mexicans used the term too. The standard US military uniform was a blue color from early  on till about 1900. Anyone we marched on probably referred to the US as blue "something" at one point or another

[Sylvana]

The US, Australia and my home country South Africa were all founded on genocide, racism and slavery. In reality it really just boils down to how things were done back then. Until, relatively recently slavery was legal and supported in pretty much the whole world. To my knowledge you can still find a country or two where slavery is legal, not to mention the illegal slave trade that happens today. Human history is covered in blood, no amount of being politically correct will change that. We must accept our origins and live the best we can.

I wouldn't be surprised if in 100 years our culture is mocked as backwards and evil for how we treat some group of people or each other. Similarly, if we ever manage to get space flight down, I can see us taking over some aliens planet through exactly the same means, genocide and slavery.

[Lt. Fred]

Well, we can stop lauding our pasts, because that's a lie. And we can move to remove the consequences of those crimes today. The US can fight racism in hiring and crime enforcement, Australia can fight poverty (and racism in crime enforcement) and South Africa can fight permanent hyper-unemployment in it's indigenous population. That would be the adult response.

It will, of course, never happen.