If the British actually considered it a war crime then why did they do the same thing to other people in many places around the world? They are only morally outraged because they are on the receiving end.
Before European colonization, the indigenous peoples of the Americas had developed customs for dealing with captives. Depending on the region, captives could either be killed, tortured, kept alive and assimilated into the tribe, or enslaved. - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Captives_in_American_Indian_Wa...
Many of the indigenous peoples of the Pacific Northwest Coast, such as the Haida and Tlingit, were traditionally known as fierce warriors and slave-traders, raiding as far as California. Slavery was hereditary, the slaves being prisoners of war. Their targets often included members of the Coast Salish [indigenous] groups. - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavery_among_the_Indigenous_p...
A war crime is a violation of the laws of war that gives rise to individual criminal responsibility for actions by combatants in action, such as intentionally killing civilians or intentionally killing prisoners of war, torture, taking hostages, unnecessarily destroying civilian property, deception by perfidy, wartime sexual violence, pillaging - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_crime
So no, it was not. I thought we had laid to rest the myth of the Noble Savage, that knew neither greed nor cruelty until the evil European forced them upon him. But I suppose it would be too much to expect the Smithsonian to do what a nobody with an internet connection, 5 minutes of free time, and no training in history can do.
We've banned this account for using HN primarily for ideological battle. That's not allowed here, regardless of what you're battling for or against. We want curious conversation here, and people hammering each other with pre-existing talking points and pre-hardened positions—which is what ideological battle is—goes completely against that spirit.
I didn't ban you because of your point about whatever your point was. I banned you because you've been using HN primarily for ideological battle and that's not allowed here.
The reason I replied to your GP comment is that (a) I had to reply somewhere, and (b) it was the most recent place to do so.
Sorry, I phrased my question poorly. What I meant was, does the linked article also count as discouraged ideological battle (even if, on its own, it doesn't merit a ban)?
I guess that's a borderline call. The topic is ideologically fraught; on the other hand, it looks like there's interesting history there, which it would be possible (though perhaps not easy) to discuss while holding a state of curiosity.
If this thread had gotten a lot of attention, standard mod practice would probably have been to (1) let the article stand, but (2) change the title to something a bit more neutral.
I agree with you, but also reject that premise that there was such thing as a "war crime" then. There was no Geneva Convention (or TIL Hague convention) at that time, and society was completely different. This is just another part of the idiotic pattern of judging past actions by today's morals (which is most ironic because the kind of people pushing this would have been at the front of the line on enforcing whatever the orthodoxy of their day was).
As the article points out, the use of poison in warfare was against the morals (and accepted rules of combat) of the time and the specific poisoning described in the article was denounced at the time as well.
> someone coming from a different culture, a culture that is less refined than one's own culture, and so the migrant would make everything in one's homeland worse
Why should one have to think a different culture and people are inferior, to want to preserve one's own culture and people? If it was environmentalists worried about native wolves being slowly displaced by an invasive breed of dingo, would you call them wolf-supremacists? Certainly nobody accused Kashmir of supremacy when they worried about immigration [1].
Or are human groups so unique, the first of their kind in the entire animal kingdom, that they actually benefit from a competing group moving into their territory?
Apologies. The original title contained "to be", which did not fit in the 80 character limit. In any case, UK's population is already larger than the European parts of France, which is what most people think of, so while the shortened title is not technically true, it is not misleading.
This is what the western owners of the narratives want everybody to believe. In reality, the west is much more repressive toward citizens that disagree with the narrative and manifest it publicly. The European Commission, which in practices rules over the EU, is a completely unelected body. Still, Europeans think they live in a free country. Just like the Americas think they live in the greatest country on the planet. Yet, many run away from it as soon as the remote work allows them to. Again, just like Putin said, the West is an empire of lies.
"Illegal" refers to a person's presence in the country, not any specific action. If you would prefer to call them "trespassers", be my guest. But "undocumented" is deceptive - it implies they're allowed to stay, and they're just lacking documentation, like losing a passport. When in fact even fully documenting their presence and identity (such as during deportation procedures) doesn't mean they have permission to stay in the country.
Passports and documentation are a relatively new concept. Before 1920 or so, you would just show up in the USA for a new life, and if your skin color was the right shade of white, no one would stop you (otherwise you might be interned or otherwise sent back). All immigrants were undocumented back then.
Today, you show up with a passport and a visa, which is easy to get if your skin color is the right shade of white. Somethings never really change.
> Today, you show up with a passport and a visa, which is easy to get if your skin color is the right shade of white
Only 18% of immigrants to the US were white in 2015 [1], and the preference towards immigration from white countries was abolished as far back as 1965 [2], so kindly go lie to somebody else.
I didn't lie. I said "a passport and visa is easy to get if your skin color is the right shade of white" which does not mean it is impossible to get otherwise.
Try getting an immigration visa as an Indian or a Chinese vs. being an Australian or from the UK, and tell me with a straight face that it is just as easy to get for the former as the latter. Now try that getting that visa as a white Mexican vs a non-white Mexican. American immigration policy is still implicitly racist, and the only reason immigration is skewed that way is because of demand for immigrating into the USA in the first place.
If your family has been in the USA for a few generations, your ancestors more than likely came here as undocumented. Its just now a certain segment of "got mine, scr*w you" America wants to call those same people as illegal immigrants.
Yes, that's what a racist, white supremacist country would do: 82% non-white immigration.
> Its just now a certain segment of "got mine, scrw you" America wants to call those same people as illegal immigrants.
It's called a "country", and is not unique to the US. If anything, the US is one of the most* open - that's how they went from 85% white in 1960, to 58% in 2020 [1]. You mentioned China - in that same period, they went from 94% Han-Chinese, to 91% Han-Chinese [2], and they have virtually zero immigration - 0.07% [4], India has 0.4% [5], while the US has 14.5% [6]. And unlike the US, China and India do not grant citizenship by virtue of being born there [7], which means the US undercounts immigration, compared to China and India.
So the country that has proportionally 36x more immigration than India, and 207x more than China, and almost entirely non-white immigration at that, is the one you're accusing of racist xenophobia?
As for difficulty of obtaining citizenship, you greatly overstate the role of race. Whites have an approval rate of 93%, and blacks 90% [3].
I couldn't help notice most of the games examined focus on piracy (Monkey Island), various military acts (Mass Effect, Final Fantasy, Elder Scrolls..), or exploration (most games to some degree)[1].
Before we accuse games of bias, shouldn't we compare with the proportion of real-life pirates, soldiers, or explorers, that were women?
[1] The King's Quest series doesn't fit neatly into these categories, but is distinguished by having been designed and written by Roberta Williams, a woman. Regardless, I'm sure the authors of this article wouldn't dispute that women had a marginalized role in the middle ages, where King's Quest takes place.
implies they did consider it morally wrong. Or do you mean only the society perpetrating the war crime should be the one to judge?