Genocides of Indigenous Peoples: Evil or Necessary?

[Dannichu]

Willow: Thanksgiving isn't about blending of two cultures. It's about one culture wiping out another. And then they make animated specials about the part where - with the maize and the big, big belt buckles! They don't show you the next scene, where all the bison die and Squanto takes a musket ball in the stomach!

Buffy: Okay. Now, for some of that, you were channeling your mother?

Willow: Buffy, earlier you agreed with me about Thanksgiving. It's a sham. It's all about death.

Buffy: It is a sham, but it's a sham with yams. It's a yam-sham.

Willow: You're not gonna jokey-rhyme your way out of this one.

Buffy: Yes, he's been wronged, and I personally would be ready to apologize, but I...

Spike: I just can't take all this mamby-pamby boo-hooing about the bloody Indians!

Willow: Uh, the preferred term is-

Spike: You won. All right? You came in and you killed them and you took their land. That's what conquering nations do. It's what Caesar did, and he's not goin' around saying, "I came, I conquered, I felt really bad about it." The history of the world is not people making friends. You had better weapons, and you massacred them. End of story.

Buffy: Well, I think the Spaniards actually did a lot of - Not that I don't like Spaniards.

Spike: Listen to you. How're you gonna fight anyone with that attitude?

Willow: We don't wanna fight anyone.

Buffy: I just wanna have Thanksgiving.

Willow: Well, if we could talk to him...

Spike: You exterminated his race. What could you possibly say that would make him feel better?

...just sayin'.

 

[Saith]

I'm suddenly very sad that I was too young to understand Buffy when it was on tv.

 

[Abwayax]

Wouldn't that be redundant considering no one is against genocide. This topic is specifically about if the destruction of native groups was an unnecessary evil or an event that had to happen.

In what circumstances would it "have to happen"? For anyone who thinks genocide of any kind is "necessary for advancement" I ask, advancement of what? Natives were killed off, enslaved, or removed from their own land for imperialistic purposes. That might be advancing some empire, but then the question should be asked, is strengthening an empire more important than the lives of an entire people?

 

[Spellca]

In what circumstances would it "have to happen"? For anyone who thinks genocide of any kind is "necessary for advancement" I ask, advancement of what? Natives were killed off, enslaved, or removed from their own land for imperialistic purposes. That might be advancing some empire, but then the question should be asked, is strengthening an empire more important than the lives of an entire people?

That last part was the concept exactly. Those who advocated and carried out the destruction of the Native peoples didn't see people. They saw sub-human savages who either had to assimilate, move to somewhere that wasn't being used or be killed. It isn't imperialism in the terms we all know...imperialism involves conquering and controlling - the Native Americans were never conquered.

They hold no concept of land ownership. Therefore, they saw using the land almost like a lease or just borrowing the land. Political games of foreign policy and, later on, domestic policy created a situation where the government saw ownership of the lands and would do anything in their power to secure them.