Talk:Native American genocide in the United States

Feedback from New Page Review process

I left the following feedback for the creator/future reviewers while reviewing this article: Thanks a lot for creating this much-needed article, a surprise that it wasn't there earlier!

ChaotıċEnby(talk · contribs) 23:25, 27 January 2024 (UTC)

Did you know nomination

The following is an archived discussion of the DYK nomination of the article below. Please do not modify this page. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as this nomination's talk page, the article's talk page or Wikipedia talk:Did you know), unless there is consensus to re-open the discussion at this page. No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was: promoted by AirshipJungleman29 talk 20:00, 8 February 2024 (UTC)

(

• Comment or view
• Article history

)

• ... that British colonel Henry Bouquet's men giving smallpox-infected blankets to Delaware scouts during Pontiac's War is given as an example of Native American genocide in the United States? Source: (Calloway, p. 73)
  • ALT1: ... that because the Cherokee people were deliberately routed through cholera-stricken areas, their dislocation has been given as an example of the Native American genocide in the United States? Source: (Stannard, p. 124)
  • Reviewed:
  • Comment: The image to use would depend on the hook chosen. I think I actually prefer ALT1 because there was no war/rebellion involved...

Created by CarmenEsparzaAmoux (talk). Nominated by SashiRolls (talk) at 22:19, 1 February 2024 (UTC). Post-promotion hook changes for this nom will be logged at Template talk:Did you know nominations/Native American genocide in the United States; consider watching this nomination, if it is successful, until the hook appears on the Main Page.

• The article is new enough, long enough, and no copyright issues detected. The image is only tangentially related to both of the hooks and the article topic and for this reason it is not a good candidate to be featured at DYK. The hook facts can not be verified to the cited sources; at least not on those particular pages. Calloway doesn't use the word genocide at all on page 73 and seems to be linking the events to "germ warfare". That's not really the same thing. Likewise, Stannard also does not use the word genocide on page 124 although the chapter title does... Calloway links the events described to a death march but again that is not really the same thing as a genocide. Is there more obvious text somewhere else in these chapters that explicitly links these events to "genocide". If so, where? Unfortunately DYK review does not lend itself well to inference or original analysis of sources. There really needs to be a hook that can concretely reflect direct text.

Further, I am concerned with some of the use of "ongoing research" and "ongoing debate" type sentences within the lead and body of the article. The sources being cited for these statements in many cases date back to the 1990s and early 2000s. While these statements certainly may be an accurate representation of research and debate in 2024, I don't think we can use sources published in the 1990s or 2000s to verify those assertions. If you are going to make comments about current or ongoing research or current or ongoing debate then these statements need to be cited to something published post 2020 and ideally in 2023 or 2024 (such as a literature review in a journal or doctoral dissertation). Sources published from twenty to thirty-five years ago can't be used to verify statements about the year 2024. They can only tell us about the state of research and debate at the time of publication. Ultimately there needs to be better and more contemporary sources added to verify those claims, or the text needs to be modified. In general I would avoid making blanket claims about ongoing debate and research, because that is an unstable claim that can change with time and the older the source is the less reliable it becomes.4meter4 (talk) 22:22, 6 February 2024 (UTC)

• I've added a 2015 reference from the body to the lede (Oxford Encyclopedias). There are quite a few more recent books among the references, but that gives an overview. I agree with you that the photo isn't appropriate (it's not on the page). I'll remove it from the nomination. -- SashiRolls ^{🌿 · 🍥} 01:40, 7 February 2024 (UTC)

@SashiRolls I updated my review of the hooks above. I am a concerned that the word genocide isn't to be found on those pages. We really need a hook verified to a source with concrete language that uses the term genocide (and preferably "Native American genocide") in the text.4meter4 (talk) 01:54, 7 February 2024 (UTC)

I agree the source for the first hook does not use the word genocide. This is another reason why I prefer the second hook, it is incontestably sourced: when Stannard writes on that page "[...] more than 8000 Cherokee men, women, and children died as a result of their expulsion from their homeland. That is, about half of what then remained of the Cherokee nation was liquidated under Presidential directive, a death rate similar to that of other southeastern peoples who had undergone the same process--the Creeks and the Seminoles in particular." the words appear under two headers "American Holocaust" (book title on the even pages) and "Pestilence and Genocide" (chapter title on the odd pages). Four pages earlier he was quite explicit in the thesis statement of this part of the chapter (subheading III) which talks about the Trail of Tears: "The European habit of indiscriminately killing women and children when engaged in hostilities with the natives of the Americas was more than an atrocity. It was flatly and intentionally genocidal." (118-119) -- SashiRolls ^{🌿 · 🍥} 02:25, 7 February 2024 (UTC)

Yes, I am inclined to agree that viewing the chapter as a whole the meaning behind the Alt1 hook fact is strongly inferred if not directly stated within a concrete quote. But as I said earlier, I'm not sure that inferred context is enough to approve a DYK hook. Usually we require a hook fact to be explicitly stated within the text. I am going to place a note on the DYK talk page and ask others to comment to make sure this isn't an issue. I personally would be ok with Alt1, but I could see a promoter possibly raising a red flag. Best.4meter4 (talk) 02:41, 7 February 2024 (UTC)

• Based on the feedback at Wikipedia talk:Did you know#Template:Did you know nominations/Native American genocide in the United States I am going to approve hook alt1. @SashiRolls There are several other refs from google scholar listed there that could also be used to verify the hook as well if you care to add additional refs. The other issues raised appear to have been addressed. Good work.4meter4 (talk) 04:57, 7 February 2024 (UTC)

Topic needs to be broader

Hey @CarmenEsparzaAmoux:. I appreciate the article. But I think it should be changed to be broader than just genocide. (Which in my view the article already goes into. Meaning it wouldn't have to be substantially reworded.)

My suggestion is that the scope of the article should be expanded into including other forms of atrocities against Native Americans. Historians, even Ostler, reject the claim that the United States uniformly committed genocide against Native Americans. They'll say that there was forced population transfers/ethnic cleansing with small-scale genocides of particular indigenous groups by state/local actors with national indifference.

Does that work with you? KlayCax (talk) 18:53, 5 February 2024 (UTC)

Hi Klay, what you're describing is a substantially different article from the one here. If you're interested in writing an article about all forms of atrocities historically committed against Native Americans, I would certainly encourage you to start working on that (sounds ambitious). This article is specifically limited to acts committed against American Indians in the U.S. which arguably fall under Lemkin's categories of genocide. There is pretty substantial debate as to what the scope of genocide in the U.S. was, which is why this academic debate is thoroughly addressed in the lead. Here are a couple of great reads if you want to learn a bit more about why an article about genocide specifically is useful here:

Emily Prey wrote for Foreign Policy: there has been no similar epiphany when it comes to the legacy of the genocide against Native Americans... Until this history, like the history of slavery, is properly excavated, reflected upon in the public political discourse, and internalized by the general public, Native American citizens will remain marginalized and oppressed.[1]

Ostler wrote for Oxford Ref: the issue of genocide in American Indian history is far too complex to yield a simple yes-or-no answer. The relevant history, after all, is a long one (more than five hundred years) involving hundreds of indigenous nations and several European and neo-European empires and imperial nation-states. While it would be absurd to reduce this history to any single category, genocide included, it would be reasonable to predict that genocide was a part of this history.[2] CarmenEsparzaAmoux (talk) 23:28, 5 February 2024 (UTC)

When it comes to the topic of genocide, even that topic is diverse and complex. You had literal structural genocide, both physical and cultural, where thousands were directly killed by forced marching them thousands of miles during the Removal period in the US (Indian Removal). Then you had genocide through assimilation in compulsory education at boarding schools and programs meant to "kill the Indian, save the man" (Cultural assimilation of Native Americans). Now, and I do include this, you have programs at private schools conducting inculturation (St. Joseph's Indian School), such as images of a Lakota Jesus and singing Christian hymns in Native tongue. Last time I checked Jesus was not Lakota, he was Hebrew. I think the title of these articles is just fine as they are. --ARoseWolf 16:07, 13 March 2024 (UTC)

Acts of genocide are still being committed in native communities. Children are still removed because of policy maker's that require their removal in order to fund the ICWA program. A sneaky effective way to continue to succeed in our demise which puts our very families at the forefront of their removal. No different than slavery however slaves were bred to have more children. Native American people still need to become extinct what better way than to allow them to create their own demise by paying them to do so. My name is Sabrina Richey mother of 8 youngest sister of chief Floyd Buckskin pit river tribe of northern ca. My son became the first to die due to his removal in 2008. 2021 he committed suicide. 2600:6C52:68F0:2D90:7D81:CE40:F5FB:4AD0 (talk) 01:18, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

I have reverted a recent intentional violation of WP:BOLDMOVE. -- SashiRolls ^{🌿 · 🍥} 04:21, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

Bold Move

Hi @SashiRolls:. What were your objections to these changes? KlayCax (talk) 04:18, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

Is this not a case similar to:

• Uyghur Genocide → Persecution of Uyghurs in China (Per RFC)
• Palestinian genocide → Palestinian genocide accusation
• Etc.

There was also other improvements in the edit that were also fully reverted. KlayCax (talk) 04:23, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

Look. You've been arguing about this issue for years. WP:1AM applies. -- SashiRolls ^{🌿 · 🍥} 04:25, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

The article should represent all significant perspectives. Most historians, political scientists, and sociologists don't characterize it as such.

And many other editors have agreed with me. KlayCax (talk) 04:30, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

If the article on the "Uyghur Genocide" has been changed to "Persecution of Uyghurs in China" per the reasoning: Support and oppose !votes here are roughly split, but I am giving the supporters more weight due to the stipulation #3 of WP:NCENPOV (as cited by Butterdiplomat below) which instructs as that "if there is no common name for the event and no generally accepted descriptive word, use a descriptive name that does not carry POV implications". It was demonstrated with evidence that although some independent reliable sources use the term genocide, many others describe the matter under discussion without ever using that word. As such, the use of genocide here isn't yet generally accepted, and the alternative of persecution, which I think all agree has fewer POV implications, is what the guideline instructs us to do. then the same applies here. This is obvious WP: RIGHTGREATWRONGS and WP:NPOV-pushing.

As the sources in the article note: this is by no means a consensus, and Wikipedia rules clearly dictate that all majority and significant minority opinions need to be represented (including in the title). KlayCax (talk) 04:33, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

This move needs to be discussed before moving the page. Please create a proper requested move discussion per WP:PCM. The one at the other article lacked input from editors who worked on this page.  oncamera  _{(talk page)} 05:42, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

Creating it now, will be online in 1-2 mins. KlayCax (talk) 05:45, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

Edit warring rather than seeking consensus via WP:BRD

As usual, you edit war rather than seeking consensus for your edits. WP:BRD Just because I do not choose to engage with you for the umpteenth time on the umpteenth page, does not mean that nobody else may choose to. Meanwhile, nobody has supported your edits yet. Perhaps they will eventually, but you should have waited to restore until someone else supported you. -- SashiRolls ^{🌿 · 🍥} 04:56, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

I responded above, @SashiRolls:. KlayCax (talk) 05:37, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

I'm simply confused on why you disagree with this edit.

• Version #1 is the pre-edit changes.
• Version #2 is the post-edit changes.

As for the title: Beyond WP: BOLDMOVE, this article's title clearly violates WP:NCENPOV, as it is not a generally [(i.e. non-controversial)] accepted word in the literature. Michael F. Magliari, Jeffery Ostler, and Gary Clayton Anderson all state it is, and I know of nothing else in the literature that clearly contradicts their unified claims. I'll create a RFC if we must. But I was hoping to save the time of editors. KlayCax (talk) 05:45, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

Please self-revert to the last stable version while others determine what (if anything) of your addition should be added. (I do not mind if you remove the rebuttal I added of your The Spectator op-ed as long as you remove The Spectator op-ed itself.) Thank you. -- SashiRolls ^{🌿 · 🍥} 07:23, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

Could you do it for me (per my permission: I won't consider it edit warring). I'm not sure how to revert it without also removing the merge request. KlayCax (talk) 07:30, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

What specific objections do you have to the changes? I don't think it's controversial to state that this is a significantly contentious issue among mainstream historians. KlayCax (talk) 07:30, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

As for Jeff Fynn-Paul: I don't really care if he's included or not. Robert V. Remini's probably a better example. KlayCax (talk) 07:31, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

 Done. Feel free to propose specific changes below or take the time to introduce them one at a time over a longer period of time. The lede can wait for example, first see what people (note plural) agree to add to the body. -- SashiRolls ^{🌿 · 🍥} 07:56, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

Requested move 21 April 2024

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: RESULT: SELF-CLOSE. Discussion continues below. (non-admin closure) KlayCax (talk) 00:20, 23 April 2024 (UTC)

---

Native American genocide in the United States → Persecution of Native Americans – Indisputably fails WP:NCENPOV and WP:NPOVTITLE. Also violates WP: PRECEDENT in numerous ways.

Per WP:NCENPOV, "genocide" should not be stated in an article event's title unless there is at least a general scholarly agreement in the literature, which is a claim that both supporters/opponents of the label agree has "no consensus" or is a minority opinion. (See Michael F. Magliari's writeup for H-Net Network on American Indian Studies, Gary Clayton Anderson in Ethnic Cleansing and the Indian: The Crime That Should Haunt America, and lastly Jeffrey Ostler in Genocide and American Indian History, who states as his personal opinion that it was genocide, while also noting that "the concept of genocide has had only a modest impact [so far] on the writing of American Indian history" and states that the characterization (which he affirms) is a predominantly minority one. While there is an essentially unanimous agreement that the United States committed mass atrocities, including ethnic cleansing, massacres, and other horrific actions against its native populations, the term "genocide" is clearly not anywhere near a scholarly consensus.

The title also violates WP: PRECEDENT surrounding the use of "genocide" in article titles. For instance, the Uyghur genocide article has been renamed to Persecution of Uyghurs in China under the reasoning that: It was demonstrated with evidence that although some independent reliable sources use the term genocide, many others describe the matter under discussion without ever using that word. As such, the use of genocide here isn't yet generally accepted, and the alternative of persecution, which I think all agree has fewer POV implications, is what the guideline instructs us to do. Similar conclusions have been made for the War in Darfur (which WP:NCENPOV specifically cites), Allegations of genocide of Ukrainians in the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Palestinian genocide accusation, and in every other case where there is significant scholarly disagreement over the application of the term, comparable to this article. Furthermore, even in cases where genocide is agreed by scholars to have occurred, a topic that is covered by pages such as "Persecution of homosexuals in Nazi Germany", "persecution" is usually used in the title instead of "genocide", as the articles (including this one) generally include events that almost no one categorizes as genocide, at least in of itself.

What the United States did to Native Americans was utterly horrendous. However, this article's title is a clear case of WP: RIGHTGREATWRONGS, even if it was created with the best of intentions. KlayCax (talk) 05:52, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

• Support (RFC submitter) For the reasons listed above. KlayCax (talk) 06:11, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

• Oppose. Folks should probably look at the stable version of the page, rather than the version KlayCax has edit-warred to its current state (renaming the (partial list of) scholars who use the term "genocide" as revisionists and then copying wholesale large swathes of his POV into the lede). -- SashiRolls ^{🌿 · 🍥} 06:16, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

  Revisionism doesn't mean wrong. It means: "Going against the traditional understanding of an event". KlayCax (talk) 06:18, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

  And what POV? My belief is similar to Gary Clayton Anderson's. Not Robert V. Remini's or Jeff Fynn-Paul's. Every majority or significant minority view in the literature is expressed in the lead.

  Guidelines are clear here. If there's not a consensus (and even a majority opinion on the matter): it violates WP:NCENPOV to have it in the title. KlayCax (talk) 06:31, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

That's an excellent example of your POV. You cite Magliari's review of Anderson but fail to mention anything from the following topic sentences from the review:

Unfortunately, Anderson’s own work with the Rome Statute does not provide a very encouraging model for others to follow. [...] Much more damaging to his project, however, is Anderson’s inability to resist tampering with his adopted framework [...] But is he correct? [...] Anderson errs badly by imposing “ethnic cleansing” onto the Rome Statute, which does not define or even mention the term. [...] Such abrupt dismissals do not permit any meaningful analysis or careful weighing of complex and often contradictory evidence. [...] The assertions fly thick and fast. [...] Anderson’s California chapter is replete with errors.[...] Anderson affords just one incorrect and misleading sentence to the infamous Humboldt Bay Massacre of February 26, 1860 [...] Not only does Anderson omit the other attacks that took place simultaneously with the assault on the Indian Island village, he consequently understates the actual death toll [...] etc. source

Surely just an oversight, like suggesting that an op-ed in The Spectator (second footnote in your version of the entry) is more significant than a Yale University Press book by Madley (not mentioned in the lede). -- SashiRolls ^{🌿 · 🍥} 06:48, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

1.) The article's about US-Indian relations as a whole. @SashiRolls:, I support including An American Genocide: The United States and the California Indian Catastrophe, 1846-1873 in the California section. It wasn't added into the lead because I don't believe he took a position on American-Indian relations outside of the narrow state he conducted his research on. If he did make a broad statement about the United States as a whole: then I'd definitely support you adding it.

2.) We could just leave it at Robert V. Remini.

Jeff Fynn-Paul and Guenter Lewy (Lewy infamously wouldn't even include the Armenian genocide into his definition of the term) are extreme minimalists who promote views that haven't been widely accepted since the 1960s, but I included them for the purposes of having an extreme minimalist position to the extreme maximalism of Ward Churchill and David E. Stannard. Most historians wouldn't take Fynn-Paul and Lewy very seriously. But I don't think a sentence or two really matters.

Wouldn't care if Lewy + Fynn-Paul are cut per WP: FRINGE and we just included Remini in terms of the lead for now.

3.) I'm aware of Magliari's personal opinion. I was pointing to this: Often waxing bitter and acrimonious, especially when it spills beyond the confines of the academy, the ongoing Native American genocide debate has generated a great deal of scholarship, an intense degree of heat, but no sign yet of an emerging consensus. Instead, the debate appears hopelessly deadlocked, and much of the discussion has become frustratingly circular..

Per WP:NCENPOV, WP:NPOVTITLE, and WP: PRECEDENT, I don't see how this doesn't end the debate over the article's title. No one opposes mentioning it in the lead or body. KlayCax (talk) 07:15, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

California is not a narrow state. Delaware is a narrow state. Cf. Pontiac's War in which "both sides seemed intoxicated with genocidal fanaticism" according to Dixon (2005).

No more gish gallop, k? -- SashiRolls ^{🌿 · 🍥} 07:34, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

Madley never commented on genocide outside of the narrow parameters of California. If he did, I wouldn't be opposed to adding it in the lead. Typo'ed. It's 2:41 AM here — so I'm tired. KlayCax (talk) 07:42, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

• Strong oppose. You can fill a library with scholarly literature about Native American genocide. Google scholar gets 91.8K hits [3]. Obviously, the terms are subject of much research, not just the few quotes cherry-picked in the move proposal. WP:IDONTLIKEIT is not an excuse for a move. Yuchitown (talk) 15:23, 21 April 2024 (UTC)Yuchitown

  • The number of "hits" has nothing to do with consensus. All it means is that lots of people have written about it. See below. Magliari, Ostler, Anderson, et al. all say it's a matter of active, mainstream historiographical debate.
  • There's:
  • Tens of thousands of hits for various versions of the title Holodomor. (Article's title is same name.)
  • Tens of thousands of hits for various versions of the title Uyghur genocide. (Which has been changed to Persecution of Uyghurs in China. Exactly the same as this one.)
  • 85,700 hits for the Palestinian genocide accusation and Allegations of genocide in the 2023 Israeli attack on Gaza.
  • 71,500 hits for Allegations of genocide of Ukrainians in the Russian invasion of Ukraine and Allegations of genocide in Donbas

  See my response to Netherzone below. WP:NCENPOV explicitly states that genocide should not be used in cases where there is active historiographical debate. (See Ostler, Magliari, and Anderson.) WP:NCENPOV thus kicks in here.

  The concept of genocide will still (and must) be addressed. KlayCax (talk) 19:39, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

• Oppose - Oh come on, there is a significant difference between persecution and genocide. People actually died, they weren't just mistreated or oppressed. I strongly oppose the move, and SashiRolls and Yuchitown present solid arguments above. There is no need to whitewash this matter (I am using whitewash per the dictionary definition as in to obsure, gloss over, or camouflage, not in any racial sense of the word). A wall of text sprayed with links to snippets of policy is wikilawyering. Netherzone (talk) 16:27, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

  It's not Wikilawyering. WP:NCENPOV was explicitly crafted for cases such as this.

  It states that genocide should only be used in article titles in cases where ...there is consensus, among scholars in the real world, on its applicability to the event.. There's a universal agreement in the literature that there's not a consensus in this instance. See Ostler (2015), Magliari (2016), Anderson (2016), and many other sources, all of which affirm that there's significant ongoing debate about its application, even among those who see it as applicable.

  Even among scholars who say that genocide did not occur, essentially all use terms such as ethnic cleansing, mass atrocities, and crimes against humanity, none of which can be categorized as "whitewashing" or downplaying the events.

  Genocide will still be heavily mentioned in the article. It just won't be in the title. It's the same reason that the articles on Palestinians, Uyghurs, and Ukrainians don't have the term "genocide" in the lead. KlayCax (talk) 19:30, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

• Strong oppose per Yuchitown and Netherzone. Carlstak (talk) 17:17, 21 April 2024 (UTC)
• Strong oppose per Yuchitown and Netherzone PersusjCP (talk) 19:58, 21 April 2024 (UTC)
• Strong oppose per Yuchitown and Netherzone as well  oncamera  _{(talk page)} 22:55, 21 April 2024 (UTC)
• Oppose. OP avers there's a universal agreement in the literature that there's not a consensus about genocide against indigenous peoples in the United States. As Yuchitown and Netherzone discuss, this is untrue. I add to their observations two quotations from academic sources—both published more recently than OP's citations of Anderson (2014) and Ostler (2015)—that straightforwardly identify the systemic violence against American Indians in U. S. history as genocidal:

• Sheneese Thompson and Franco Barchiesi, "Harriet Tubman and Andrew Jackson on the Twenty-dollar Bill: A Monstrous Intimacy", Open Cultural Studies 2 (De Gruyter, 2018): 417–429: an exemplary historical representative of the United States as a national experiment built on whiteness, slavery, and genocide and Indigenous genocide.
• Jacquelyn C.A. Meshelemiah and Raven E. Lynch, "Genocide", in Encyclopedia of Social Work, ed. Cynthia Franklin, via Oxford Research Encyclopedias (National Association of Social Workers Press and Oxford University Press, pub. online August 27, 2020): Acts of genocide committed against Indigenous populations have a long history in the United States

This is not something for Wikipedia to mince words about. The article title should remain "Native American genocide in the United States". As for OP's invocation of article titles that back away from straightforwardly identifying genocides, I consider multiple of those examples to be other cases of Wikipedia soft-pedaling settler, colonial, and imperial atrocities. One Wikipedia essay's disavowal of right[ing] great wrongs, so to speak, as a purpose does not make the obverse—downplaying great wrongs—Wikipedia's goal either. Hydrangeans (she/her | talk | edits) 02:49, 22 April 2024 (UTC)

You're misunderstanding the statement, @Hydrangeans:. The move request statement wasn't claiming that no one ever stated it. The claim was that there's no consensus among historians over the matter.

Anderson, Ostler, and Magliari all state that there's no present consensus among historians. Thus, under WP:NCENPOV, another title is needed. KlayCax (talk) 22:25, 22 April 2024 (UTC)

I'm aware of what the statement claims. That's why I specified that the sources I quoted are more recent than the sources your opening post provided. These more recent sources don't repeat the hedging of the earlier sources. One might hazard that partly thanks to Anderson's book, understanding the scale and systematic structure of anti-indigenous eliminationism as genocide has become consensus among scholars of the field of and to dispute that has become the less accepted position. Hydrangeans (she/her | talk | edits) 23:15, 22 April 2024 (UTC)

If you have a source that a consensus has emerged, I'll yield, @Hydrangeans:. To my knowledge Anderson's claims are debated as of 2023.

A lot of this is about definitions, however, as Ostler notes. KlayCax (talk) 23:29, 22 April 2024 (UTC)

• Oppose - Persecution - The one lone suggestion for why to use persecution, Persecution of Uyghurs in China, to describe the overall action doesn't apply. While it has had a lasting affect on Native American communities these articles describe actions that have already happened and their direct results. The Persecution of Uyghurs is ongoing in current real time. The two situations are not comparable. We have enough scholarship to maintain the status quo but if something better is presented I will certainly entertain it. In this instance persecution carries a vastly underwhelming POV and serves to diminish the events and actions that occurred to the point of almost being dismissive of its affects. It is the single worst description I have ever seen suggested and would set a very bad representation of scholarships position on the treatment of Native Americans by the United States to our readers. On a scale of meeting threshold to be considered, if the suggestion is that genocide does not meet the criteria then persecution isn't even on the scale. Calling it persecution would be OR as I have never seen the term even suggested in academia to describe the treatment of Native Americans. This would break with one of Wikipedia's fundamental tenets as a tertiary source. We follow, we do not lead in setting new trends and redefining subjects. --ARoseWolf 13:35, 22 April 2024 (UTC)

  Wikipedia uses "persecution" in many articles that are about undisputed cases of genocide. Look at the Persecution of homosexuals in Nazi Germany article. The Nazis are as textbook genocidal as it gets.

  I'm okay with alternative titles such as Atrocities against indigenous populations in the United States, United States atrocities against Native Americans, et al. Would any of those work? Or do you have an alternative suggestion? The fact of the matter is that this is a case in which WP:NCENPOV lays out explicit criteria. Ethnic cleansing and atrocities are consensus; genocide is a contentious viewpoint at best. Editors have repeatedly expressed articles where it's mentioned. Yet this is either a misunderstanding (my guess) or a strawman. No one here is arguing for any mention of genocide to be expunged from the article. Yet there's clearly a difference in how Wikipedia is treating other British settler colonies such as Australia, Canada, and New Zealand vs. the United States. (Look at the Australian history wars article v. this one.) My proposal would simply bring it in line with the other articles on historic British settler colonies. The status quo is unsustainable.

  I fail to see how the persecution of Uyghurs, Palestinians, Australian aboriginals, and others has nothing to do with this, as they have all been listed by many scholars as forms of cultural genocide. KlayCax (talk) 22:31, 22 April 2024 (UTC)

  Don’t want to fall for whataboutism but the Uyghur article should probably be renamed. I’m well-versed on the legal definition of genocide, and innumerable actions by the US and others fall under that definition. You are the only one advocating for this name change. Yuchitown (talk) 22:53, 22 April 2024 (UTC)

  1.) @Yuchitown:, the Uyghur Genocide article was recently renamed by admins, into the present title per WP:NCENPOV. It was actually changed by the Wikipedia administration to say that the claim is "disputed". (I think it's cultural genocide, btw)

  2.) This isn't a WP:whataboutism case. Since I'm not using it as an argument for changes here. (Instead, I'm referring WP: NCENPOV.) The current profoundly diverging treatment between Australia, Canada, the United States, and New Zealand when the literature treats all relatively synonymously, is incoherent. Would you not agree that most scholarly papers on settler colonalism treat the four nations similarly in their relative treatment of indigenous populations?

  Since my POV is coming up: I believe that several American actions (outside of California, which I think was; and, if you include military, the Sand Creek massacre) do fall under the term genocide, but most fit ethnic cleansing better. I don't see how it is whataboutism to state that many scholars, including political scientists, historians, anthropologists, and sociologists have widely differing genocide definitions.

  There's an unanimous agreement here that genocide should be mentioned in the context of the United States. KlayCax (talk) 23:40, 22 April 2024 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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Further reading

I'm not sure if we need to spend time on the virgin soil theory... but this reference may be worth adding, if someone has time and inclination. There are other sources that likewise seek to debunk the notion that disease alone—and not the situation of vulnerability to disease created by settler colonialism—brought about the decimation of various tribes (to differing degrees and at different times). The larger article Genocide of Indigenous peoples has more on this...

Edwards, Tai S.; Kelton, Paul (2020). "Germs, Genocides, and America's Indigenous Peoples". Journal of American History. 107 (1): 52–76. doi:10.1093/jahist/jaaa008. ISSN 0021-8723. -- SashiRolls ^{🌿 · 🍥} 22:04, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

Differing treatment of the U.S. compared to other British white settler colonies

Temporarily withdrew RFC — and perhaps this belongs on a Wikiproject talk pageasking why there's profoundly diverging, but it's also in relation to this article, so this works as well — but feel like this conversation is necessary.

Tagging @Hydrangeans:, @SashiRolls:, @Netherzone:, @Carlstak:, @PersusjCP:, @Oncamera:, and @ARoseWolf:.

I'm surprised that the proposed changes + renaming is controversial. Since the proposed article's revision (compare to Australian history wars and other articles surrounding British settler colonies)/title are nearly identical to FA, GA, and B-tier pages that exist.

It honestly feels weird as a social democrat to have to take this position: but it's abundantly clear that there's significant "downplaying" (in the case of Australia, Canada, and New Zealand, it's actually shocking to me the amount of whitewashing that has occurred) of the atrocities committed by European colonialism and warfare on their respective pages; yet, conversely, an effort to inflate the estimates and costs inflicted on indigenous populations by the United States beyond mainstream historiography.

This usually involves:

• Predominantly using the most conservative/right-wing scholars possible for Australia's, Canada's, New Zealand's, and the United Kingdom's treatment of indigenous populations, such as Keith Windschuttle to "debunk" or minimize claims.
• Predominantly using the most revisionist scholars possible for the United States (such as Ward Churchill, David Stannard, and Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz) to inflate claims as much as possible.

For instance, Australia's simply states:

The indigenous population declined for 150 years following European settlement, mainly due to infectious disease. British colonial authorities did not sign any treaties with Aboriginal groups. As settlement expanded, thousands of Indigenous people died in frontier conflicts while others were dispossessed of their traditional lands.

That's it. Events such as the Black War are left completely unmentioned — and debates on the talk page have consistently opposed any mention of massacres as WP: UNDUE or "disputed" and thus can't be mentioned. Presently, the article is classified as "featured". Articles about Aboriginal mistreatment predominantly have links to the "Australian history wars" and cite Windschuttle to sometimes claim or give the impression that "genocide" is a minority position.

The closest to anything approaching the current pages on the United States is this section on the Stolen Generations article. Yet it's taken as a debate. (I will note that a article was recently created a month ago for the Genocide of Indigenous Australians. Yet it seems uncertain on whether this will last, editors have already tried to delete or dramatically modify it, and it isn't incorporated into many articles at the moment. We'll see what happens. However, I thought it deserved mention for the sake of fairness.)

Similarly, Canada's states:

Although not without conflict, European Canadians' early interactions with First Nations and Inuit populations were relatively peaceful. First Nations and Métis peoples played a critical part in the development of European colonies in Canada, particularly for their role in assisting European coureurs des bois and voyageurs in their explorations of the continent during the North American fur trade. These early European interactions with First Nations would change from friendship and peace treaties to the dispossession of Indigenous lands through treaties. From the late 18th century, European Canadians forced Indigenous peoples to assimilate into a western Canadian society. These attempts reached a climax in the late 19th and early 20th centuries with forced integration through state-funded boarding schools, health-care segregation, and displacement. A period of redress began with the formation of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada by the Government of Canada in 2008. This included recognition of past colonial injustices and settlement agreements and betterment of racial discrimination issues, such as addressing the plight of missing and murdered Indigenous women.

Genocide is left completely unmentioned.

New Zealand's states:

The introduction of the potato and the musket transformed Māori agriculture and warfare. Potatoes provided a reliable food surplus, which enabled longer and more sustained military campaigns. The resulting intertribal Musket Wars encompassed over 600 battles between 1801 and 1840, killing 30,000–40,000 Māori. From the early 19th century, Christian missionaries began to settle New Zealand, eventually converting most of the Māori population. The Māori population declined to around 40% of its pre-contact level during the 19th century; introduced diseases were the major factor.

and:

The British Government appointed James Busby as British Resident to New Zealand in 1832. His duties, given to him by Governor Bourke in Sydney, were to protect settlers and traders "of good standing", prevent "outrages" against Māori, and apprehend escaped convicts. In 1835, following an announcement of impending French settlement by Charles de Thierry, the nebulous United Tribes of New Zealand sent a Declaration of Independence to King William IV of the United Kingdom asking for protection. Ongoing unrest, the proposed settlement of New Zealand by the New Zealand Company (which had already sent its first ship of surveyors to buy land from Māori) and the dubious legal standing of the Declaration of Independence prompted the Colonial Office to send Captain William Hobson to claim sovereignty for the United Kingdom and negotiate a treaty with the Māori. The Treaty of Waitangi was first signed in the Bay of Islands on 6 February 1840. In response to the New Zealand Company's attempts to establish an independent settlement in Wellington, Hobson declared British sovereignty over all of New Zealand on 21 May 1840, even though copies of the treaty were still circulating throughout the country for Māori to sign. With the signing of the treaty and declaration of sovereignty, the number of immigrants, particularly from the United Kingdom, began to increase.

Genocide is once again left completely unmentioned. A similar instance of double standards can be seen in the GA-article surrounding Indigenous peoples in Canada. In it, mention of "genocide" or historical Canadian atrocities against indigenous populations are not covered in the lead, minimized into a legalistic dispute surrounding the UN Genocide Convention, and portrayed in an ambiguous matter. In contrast, the American article on Native Americans in the United States treats the country much more negatively.

The only plausible way that I see to justify the status quo's is claiming that, in the aggregate, the United States committed worse actions against its indigenous populations than, say, Australia or Canada or New Zealand.

This is highly doubtful at best. Most scholars of settler colonial studies see the processes as relatively similar. What's the justification for the different treatment?

Repeatedly, again and again, indigenous mistreatment (including genocide claims/accusations):

• Are generally minimized, claimed to be a minority position, or ignored entirely for articles surrounding Australia, Canada, and New Zealand, often using historians who are among the most "minimalist" in the literature.
• The articles for the United States take it as a fait accompli and use the most "maximalist" sources that exist within the existing literature.

I don't believe that this differing treatment is defensible based on the literature. Discussion of all four's actions in the context of genocide should be mentioned. (And the agreement on this is unanimous.) Yet there's clearly a dispute on how broad the term genocide should be, intentions, and so on in all four countries, so I'm uncomfortable with the idea of putting this in Wikivoice. At the very least: substantial work needs to be done on the country articles of the four. Looking to get consensus here.

The status quo is unsustainable. KlayCax (talk) 23:11, 22 April 2024 (UTC)

A lot of words you wrote when "WP:Whataboutism" would suffice.  oncamera  _{(talk page)} 23:20, 22 April 2024 (UTC)

@Oncamera:, this isn't a WP:WHATABOUT case. I'm not using it as an argument for/against changes in the article. I'm asking why there's profoundly diverging treatment when the literature doesn't reflect this. KlayCax (talk) 23:25, 22 April 2024 (UTC)

Massive walls of text persuade no one. Very few people will read it all. I certainly didn't. This is starting to feel like editorial performance art. Carlstak (talk) 23:35, 22 April 2024 (UTC)

Editorial disagreements are normal. It's part of building Wikipedia. KlayCax (talk) 00:15, 23 April 2024 (UTC)

Eh, walls of text are inefficient and unproductive. Your requested edit change doesn't have a snowball's chance in hell anyway, as reflected in the removal of the tag from the article, so it's a wasted effort. Carlstak (talk) 01:28, 23 April 2024 (UTC)

There is a lot of WP:BIAS on this site, as you observed. No, it is not our job to WP:RIGHTWRONGS, but that doesn't mean not representing as accurately possible certain topics, in the event that they have been represented poorly or minimized in the past. I especially don't think it is right to continue to minimize the topic, just because, as you put it, other articles do too. PersusjCP (talk) 23:46, 22 April 2024 (UTC)

See below, @PersusjCP:. There's many genocides that I don't believe should be in Wikivoice due to WP:NCENPOV and WP:NPOVTITLE. There's also the question of widely differing genocide definitions.

There's presently not a current consensus insofar as it involves the U.S. If that changes, and a unified agreement does emerge, then I'd support it. That's just not the case right now. KlayCax (talk) 00:17, 23 April 2024 (UTC)

It being the case that in Wikipedia articles about non-U. S. contexts, genocides of indigenous peoples [a]re generally minimized, claimed to be a minority position, or ignored entirely for articles surrounding Australia, Canada, and New Zealand, often using historians who are among the most "minimalist" in the literature, I share your sense that it's actually shocking to me the amount of whitewashing that has occurred. From the way you describe it, I frankly wonder if intervention is necessary to address the editing community's failure to prevent these distortions. What I don't share is your conclusion that the solution to this problem of minimization in other articles is to change the name of this article. Hydrangeans (she/her | talk | edits) 23:41, 22 April 2024 (UTC)

There was definitely some miscommunication here. I wouldn't be opposed to to creating something. Would you be up for creating something with me, @Hydrangeans:? I'd support that.

Apologies for the perceived stubbornness. My reasoning is simple: I'm an old school neutrality guy. Even in cases that I view as morally repulsive/evil. There's many articles in which I personally think the term is accurate but I oppose mention in the title due to a lack of consensus in the literature. (The Uyghur Genocide/California genocide being two examples.) Think many editors were misunderstanding what I was advocating for. I'm not proposing a dramatic change in article content. I'm proposing a title renaming. Although I think a discussion of genocide definitions (and ethnic cleansing) and the affirmation of a universal consensus that it had utterly horrendous consequences.

My present guessestimate of literature among mainstream historians is like: 5-10% traditionalist (predominantly just warfare before international law), 60-65% ethnic cleansing, and 25-30% genocide. Perhaps it's changed as Yushi suggests, but the Magliari, Anderson, and Ostler metareviews of the literature back it up, as recently as 2023. Many scholars of genocide think that using it for non-physical cases is far too broad: despite an unanimous consensus that the United States took actions that catastrophic impacts on indigenous populations. Would you be up for collaborating with me and submitting an intervention? I'd be up for it. I definitely noticed whitewashing/double standards on articles surrounding the topic.

Presently, anytime that mass atrocities, ethnic cleansings, and massacres occur on other British settler colony-related articles (with flowery language towards all of them outside of the United States: which has predominantly had the opposite trend), the claims are often promptly removed as "disputed" or debated. We can't have a situation in which the U.S. quotes the most maximalist scholars imaginable and Australia, Canada, and New Zealand's pages sugarcoat everything. KlayCax (talk) 00:05, 23 April 2024 (UTC)

For the record, Ostler believes genocide occurred. I wish you would stop presenting his views as if it supports this idea you have that genocide doesn't belong in the title of articles that discuss...genocide. He doesn't say every encounter was genocide, even encounters where Native Americans died, but he unequivocally believes and presents the view point that there was genocide committed by the US against Native Americans.

I don't generally edit or discuss articles about Australia, Canada or New Zealand but if you see inaccuracies or concerns I would definitely suggest going to those article talk pages and discussing or if they have related Wikiproject's that might be the appropriate place. This article talk page is for discussion about the Native Americans in the United States article and you really should be discussing those articles where the perspectives of those that contributed to the articles in question may join or even a broader community discussion about you concerns. I will say that it is not uncommon to see content on one article differ on depth and perspective than another article on a similar subject. Think of every article as an island. There may be bridges to other islands but the islands do not have to be the same even though they hold the same number of people, buildings and towns. Consensus may swing wildly depending on who is involved in the discussion so that articles may seemingly contradict one another. So be careful not to assume what is consensus for articles about Native Americans can be used for consensus on articles about Indigenous peoples in any other part of the world. That has to be formed on an article-by-article basis.

Good luck with your endeavor. --ARoseWolf 11:43, 23 April 2024 (UTC)

Encyclopedia Britannica defines genocide as this: "Any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such: (a) Killing members of the group; (b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; (c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; (d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; (e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group." This definition of genocide in Britannica comes from a Genocide Convention held in Paris, France in 1948. And here is a google scholar search list of sources about Native American genocide published between 2020 and 2023 https://scholar.google.com/scholar?as_ylo=2020&q=Native+American+genocide&hl=en&as_sdt=0,11 and another scholarly source list published between 2015 and 2022 https://alliance-uoregon.primo.exlibrisgroup.com/discovery/search?query=any,contains,genocide,AND&query=issn,contains,(01616463),AND&tab=Rollup&search_scope=Everything&sortby=rank&vid=01ALLIANCE_UO:UO&lang=en&mode=advanced&offset=0 Hoodoowoman (talk) 16:00, 25 April 2024 (UTC)

In this source, Native Americans scholars, students, and nations are applying the Genocide Conventions definition of genocide in the land back movement by arguing that the taking of land from Indigenous peoples of North America counts as genocide: "The Genocide Convention can be used to protect against forms of cultural extermination, including the taking of Indigenous lands." Hoodoowoman (talk) 17:37, 25 April 2024 (UTC)

In this source from the University of Nevada published in 2021 they explain the actions of genocide committed against Native Americans using Raphael Lemkin's, the one who coined the word genocide and its definition as this: "A genocide campaign does not just mean violent deaths or mass murder, it is more complex than that. According to Raphael Lemkin, who devised and coined the word “genocide”, genocide is “a coordinated plan of different actions aiming at the destruction of essential foundations of the life of national groups, with the aim of annihilating the groups themselves… The objectives of such a plan would be disintegration of the political and social institutions, of culture, language, national feelings, religion, and the economic existence of national groups, and the destruction of the personal security, liberty, health, dignity, and even the lives of the individuals belonging to such groups.” The objective of the genocidal agent is not necessarily to kill as many people as possible belonging to a certain human group, but to destroy the “national pattern” of a nation (what has been called “culture” or more correctly “collective identity”) in order to impose on this group the national pattern of the agent: Genocide is cultural assimilation. In Lemkin’s own words: “Genocide is directed against the national group as an entity, and the actions involved are directed against individuals, not in their individual capacity, but as members of the national group.”" (This is my last edit about this topic) Hoodoowoman (talk) 19:36, 25 April 2024 (UTC)