this post was submitted on 21 Aug 2023
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If you're looking for an American genocide, the Middle East is the wrong place to look. You want the Native Americans.
"Genocide" means something, and "stupid fucking idiotic war" isn't it.
It's not illegal to discuss the crimes of the US government in the US. It is illegal to discuss the crimes of the China government in China, by the way.
"It's not that bad because it wasn't an actual genocide. we already have genocide under our belt."
geez. how many war criminals were put to justice during that "stupid fucking idiotic war"?
discussing does fuck all when you have laws to prevent any justice being served for the crimes you commit abroad and sanction the people investigating it.
https://www.hrw.org/news/2002/08/03/us-hague-invasion-act-becomes-law
https://www.hrw.org/news/2020/12/14/us-sanctions-international-criminal-court
and Fuck CCP too. There aren't just tankies and yankies on the internet. We can be critical of both of you.
then why the hell is the ukraiine conflict called a genocide so often?
Genocide is a specific thing. It's not the same as "unjust war" or "lots of killing". It's the attempted elimination of a people; a culture, language, religion, etc.
Not every war is genocidal; and some genocides are not wars (because they're internal to a state — e.g. the China regime's ongoing genocide of the Uighurs is not a war).
Some of the conduct in the Ukraine invasion has been genocidal, e.g. abducting Ukrainian children to Russia to be raised as Russians, for the purpose of eliminating Ukrainian culture, language, and identity. This is the sort of thing that e.g. the United States and Canada sometimes did as part of genocidal conduct towards the Native American / First Nations populations.
Some of the rhetoric of the Putin regime has been genocidal; e.g. saying that Ukraine is not a real country and that Ukrainians are just bad Russians.
When the US and allies invaded Iraq, the goal wasn't to destroy the Iraqi people; it was to replace the Saddam government. The rationale for getting rid of Saddam was false, predicated on war crimes that Saddam wasn't actually committing — it was an unjust war.
But it wasn't genocidal. That doesn't make it good, or acceptable, or nice. It makes it not genocide; just as if you were to punch me in the nose, that would be a crime, but it would not be the specific crime of burglary.
Again: "Genocide" is a specific charge. It's not just a word for "really bad behavior" or "evil war".
And what has that discussion produced? Has the American murderers stopped killing people? They let you discuss, because nothing will come out of it. You have no influence to change policy.
I mean, you certainly don't have any control of the China government, which is still actively murdering and raping people in Xinjiang in an ongoing concerted effort to eradicate a whole ethnic group. Why do you bother denying the ongoing genocide?
Have I said anything good about the Chinese government or said that they are not doing evil? You are inventing fantasies in your head.
All I am saying is that whatever the Americans accuse China of, they themselves are guilty of the same (or worse).