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As a counterargument to the claim that Europe is less violent than the United States, especially over a historical period going back to the 18th century: Nazi G

As a counterargument to the claim that Europe is less violent than the United States, especially over a historical period going back to the 18th century: Nazi Germany murdered more people in a single named process than the total number of murders in the United States for the entire 20th century.

robotresearcher 6y ago
An estimated 12 million Africans were forcibly shipped to the US (and precursors) and they and their descendents enslaved for generations. Did you forget to count them? I’m not minimizing the evil of the Nazi murders. Just pointing out the US started out with a fundamental violence problem of incredible scale.
kcartlidge 6y ago
There is a case to be made that war is just legalised murder, but nevertheless in these comparisons the context does not normally include war. And would you really want to? The US is far from innocent with its use of nuclear weapons, fire-bombing Japan (Truman: "there were more people killed by fire-bombs in Tokyo than dropping the atomic bombs"), Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq, and so on. Note that I'm not saying you're wrong about Nazi Germany, just that, the whilst the death tolls may be either swift or cumulative, it remains the case that all countries are guilty on the war front. So to repeat: the context is criminality not war, where the distinction is the normally accepted delineation of the two.
- michtzik 6y ago
  I wasn't even including war! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Holocaust https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Holocaust > Between 1941 and 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered some six million Jews across German-occupied Europe, around two-thirds of Europe's Jewish population. Notice the use of the word "murdered" in the second sentence of the article, as well as throughout the rest. The context was violence, not criminality. But even if it were criminality, the Holocaust is widely considered a crime against humanity.
  - kcartlidge 6y ago
    > I wasn't even including war! Maybe you never intended to, but your comment reads: > Nazi Germany murdered more people in a single named process Reference to Nazi Germany does not, as you say, necessarily equate to war. However "a single named process" would to most readers be treated as narrowing it down to "a single named process" - World War Two. The most obvious simple reading of your comment would give the clear impression you meant the war. If that wasn't the intention, if the named process was the wider genocide, or simply the Third Reich, then fair enough. But I'm sure you can understand any misreading.
imtringued 6y ago
This is putting the US into a worse spotlight than you think. If it's possible for a mass murdering nation to become more peaceful than the US then that implies that the US completely failed at dealing with violence. Since you are starting off from a much lower base it should be much easier for your country to take care of the problem. Edit: As other countries pointed out the US did commit war crimes as well.

robotresearcher 6y ago

An estimated 12 million Africans were forcibly shipped to the US (and precursors) and they and their descendents enslaved for generations. Did you forget to count them? I’m not minimizing the evil of the Nazi murders. Just pointing out the US started out with a fundamental violence problem of incredible scale.

kcartlidge 6y ago

There is a case to be made that war is just legalised murder, but nevertheless in these comparisons the context does not normally include war. And would you really want to? The US is far from innocent with its use of nuclear weapons, fire-bombing Japan (Truman: "there were more people killed by fire-bombs in Tokyo than dropping the atomic bombs"), Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq, and so on. Note that I'm not saying you're wrong about Nazi Germany, just that, the whilst the death tolls may be either swift or cumulative, it remains the case that all countries are guilty on the war front. So to repeat: the context is criminality not war, where the distinction is the normally accepted delineation of the two.

michtzik 6y ago
I wasn't even including war! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Holocaust https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Holocaust > Between 1941 and 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered some six million Jews across German-occupied Europe, around two-thirds of Europe's Jewish population. Notice the use of the word "murdered" in the second sentence of the article, as well as throughout the rest. The context was violence, not criminality. But even if it were criminality, the Holocaust is widely considered a crime against humanity.
- kcartlidge 6y ago
  > I wasn't even including war! Maybe you never intended to, but your comment reads: > Nazi Germany murdered more people in a single named process Reference to Nazi Germany does not, as you say, necessarily equate to war. However "a single named process" would to most readers be treated as narrowing it down to "a single named process" - World War Two. The most obvious simple reading of your comment would give the clear impression you meant the war. If that wasn't the intention, if the named process was the wider genocide, or simply the Third Reich, then fair enough. But I'm sure you can understand any misreading.

imtringued 6y ago

This is putting the US into a worse spotlight than you think. If it's possible for a mass murdering nation to become more peaceful than the US then that implies that the US completely failed at dealing with violence. Since you are starting off from a much lower base it should be much easier for your country to take care of the problem. Edit: As other countries pointed out the US did commit war crimes as well.