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It's your ludicrous conflation of the OP's genuine concern for the material welfare of these people with "ethnic cleansing" that's abhorrent.

by uvdiv 16y ago

lwhi 16y ago
Okay, it's an extreme example .. but it definitely exists on the same side of the scale. -- Look at what happened to Australian Aboriginals - the settlers who separated kids from their families had the best of intentions - but they also had a sense of superiority which gave them an utter contempt for the culture of the children in question. There are some parallels between those settlers and the OP's statement: "There is nothing good or enviable about uncivilized lifestyles to preserve; any actions that maintain them in that lifestyle are ensuring they literally die young, mostly of preventable causes." EDIT: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stolen_Generation http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stolen_Generation
- Groxx 16y ago
  I've got to agree with the parent to yours, it's still a different scale. Ethnic cleansing seeks to destroy that which is different. Ethno-centric superiority complexes (like this, not necessarily all) seek to improve that which is different. They are capable of causing the similar outcomes, but I know of no examples (they didn't kill the children), and the motivations are almost total opposites. Both are essentially insulting to the other group though, absolutely, but in different ways.
  - lwhi 16y ago
    Maybe children weren't killed, but Australian Aboriginal society has been completely decimated - many of the stories involved are heartbreaking, and these people now have many many more problems that ever before. I'm sure that regimes that take part in ethnic cleansing believe that they're doing the right thing. A sense of superiority helps them to make their choices. Whether violence is used or not, in some ways, the effect is the same. EDIT: If you read about these people and the problems that they're facing, it's not difficult to see that they were pretty much undeniably better off before. It's nothing but a tragedy - and their ill-treatment even continues to this day.
    - Groxx 16y ago
      >many many more problems that ever before. That's committing the same error the OP made, but in reverse. Instead of viewing your lifestyle as superior, you clearly view theirs as superior, since adopting the new one has been a net loss. "many of the stories involved are heartbreaking" - I don't doubt that. But all change comes with cost, though that one was certainly far higher than it should have been. Citing past injustices in the pursuit of improving life doesn't mean the pursuit is incorrect. How about all the successes? Slavery was partially under the guise of improving lives (recently. Slavery has existed for far longer than we have records, usually the losing warring culture becoming slaves for the winning), but so was/is removing it. In some ways, at some times, the effect is the same. What about the others? Should the pursuit be abandoned entirely? The debate can be made more general: should we abandon everything that has ever caused suffering? Should only 100% successful lines be pursued? And, as no action is totally identical to a previous one: what's the measure used to tell if something is adequately different to be worth a shot? edit to match edit: OK, so their problem is current ill-treatment. That is wrong. But that's still not the only thing that happens with cultural assimilation, nor does it always happen, nor must it continue indefinitely. If it improves at any point in the future, would it have been worthwhile? If 100 years of suffering result in 1000 of improvement, was it right or wrong? Not "could it have been better", is it right or wrong to suffer to gain improvement, or to impose suffering to grant improvement? We're debating broad decisions, not issues with a single choice. There's always something wrong with a single choice, and those nuggets of wrongness don't decide whether the core choice was right or wrong as a whole.
      - lwhi 16y ago
        It really is immensely complicated - I have no solutions, but I do know that we have to learn from history. Good intentions almost always fail. People deserve respect. Superiority is often an illusion. Motivations are multifaceted. I know I'd be happier with a simple life, and - perhaps romantically - I imagine that these people might have a better life than we do. Realistically, that's just as likely as the opposite - because, for all the interesting things our lives have to offer, there are some deep-routed problems we face, that we're very far from solving. I think I said it in another post - but I'll reiterate before signing off .. I really hope this tribe is left alone. If a lot of contact is made, I'm sure no good will come from it. EDIT: Nice debating with you btw.

It's your ludicrous conflation of the OP's genuine concern for the material welfare of these people with "ethnic cleansing" that's abhorrent.

by uvdiv 16y ago

It's your ludicrous conflation of the OP's genuine concern for the material welfare of these people with "ethnic cleansing" that's abhorrent.

lwhi 16y ago

Okay, it's an extreme example .. but it definitely exists on the same side of the scale. -- Look at what happened to Australian Aboriginals - the settlers who separated kids from their families had the best of intentions - but they also had a sense of superiority which gave them an utter contempt for the culture of the children in question. There are some parallels between those settlers and the OP's statement: "There is nothing good or enviable about uncivilized lifestyles to preserve; any actions that maintain them in that lifestyle are ensuring they literally die young, mostly of preventable causes." EDIT: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stolen_Generation http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stolen_Generation

Groxx 16y ago
I've got to agree with the parent to yours, it's still a different scale. Ethnic cleansing seeks to destroy that which is different. Ethno-centric superiority complexes (like this, not necessarily all) seek to improve that which is different. They are capable of causing the similar outcomes, but I know of no examples (they didn't kill the children), and the motivations are almost total opposites. Both are essentially insulting to the other group though, absolutely, but in different ways.
- lwhi 16y ago
  Maybe children weren't killed, but Australian Aboriginal society has been completely decimated - many of the stories involved are heartbreaking, and these people now have many many more problems that ever before. I'm sure that regimes that take part in ethnic cleansing believe that they're doing the right thing. A sense of superiority helps them to make their choices. Whether violence is used or not, in some ways, the effect is the same. EDIT: If you read about these people and the problems that they're facing, it's not difficult to see that they were pretty much undeniably better off before. It's nothing but a tragedy - and their ill-treatment even continues to this day.
  - Groxx 16y ago
    >many many more problems that ever before. That's committing the same error the OP made, but in reverse. Instead of viewing your lifestyle as superior, you clearly view theirs as superior, since adopting the new one has been a net loss. "many of the stories involved are heartbreaking" - I don't doubt that. But all change comes with cost, though that one was certainly far higher than it should have been. Citing past injustices in the pursuit of improving life doesn't mean the pursuit is incorrect. How about all the successes? Slavery was partially under the guise of improving lives (recently. Slavery has existed for far longer than we have records, usually the losing warring culture becoming slaves for the winning), but so was/is removing it. In some ways, at some times, the effect is the same. What about the others? Should the pursuit be abandoned entirely? The debate can be made more general: should we abandon everything that has ever caused suffering? Should only 100% successful lines be pursued? And, as no action is totally identical to a previous one: what's the measure used to tell if something is adequately different to be worth a shot? edit to match edit: OK, so their problem is current ill-treatment. That is wrong. But that's still not the only thing that happens with cultural assimilation, nor does it always happen, nor must it continue indefinitely. If it improves at any point in the future, would it have been worthwhile? If 100 years of suffering result in 1000 of improvement, was it right or wrong? Not "could it have been better", is it right or wrong to suffer to gain improvement, or to impose suffering to grant improvement? We're debating broad decisions, not issues with a single choice. There's always something wrong with a single choice, and those nuggets of wrongness don't decide whether the core choice was right or wrong as a whole.
    - lwhi 16y ago
      It really is immensely complicated - I have no solutions, but I do know that we have to learn from history. Good intentions almost always fail. People deserve respect. Superiority is often an illusion. Motivations are multifaceted. I know I'd be happier with a simple life, and - perhaps romantically - I imagine that these people might have a better life than we do. Realistically, that's just as likely as the opposite - because, for all the interesting things our lives have to offer, there are some deep-routed problems we face, that we're very far from solving. I think I said it in another post - but I'll reiterate before signing off .. I really hope this tribe is left alone. If a lot of contact is made, I'm sure no good will come from it. EDIT: Nice debating with you btw.