Why do Liberals consider the Holodomor as a "Genocide" but not the 1990s Russian Federation famine; at the same time they consider the Uyghur Issues as a "Genocide" but not the European Minorities (Scots, Welsh, Irish, Bretton, Catalonians, Basques, Sami etc) as several genocides?
I don't think I need to elaborate any more here, except that I simply can't understand why the whole "genocide denial" thing always apply to Ukrainians and Uyghurs but never to 1990s Russians and or to Scots, Welsh, Irish, Bretton, Catalonians, Basques, Sami, Venetians, Occitanians, Galicians, Cornish and the like. And even about the Indigenous peoples of the Americas and of Africa and Oceania too. And also, if Liberals are too obsessed with Holodomor, why don't they talk about 1990s Russian Federation famine and about all the post-1990 famines all around the world on capitalist countries? Or even about historical capitalist famines like the Irish Potato Famine and all the famines on the British Raj? At this point liberals are even more genocide deniers than any tankie ever.
Personally, I'm half-Italian (half-Venetian) by blood, and there are literally very few content about the genocide / ethnic cleasing / cultural genocide Venetians have suffered over centuries under Austrian and Italian occupation... Brazilian Venetians have some things in common with pre-Italy Veneto than post-Italian Unification Veneto. Without mention it is also possible to talk about the genocide of Catalonians, Basques, Brettons, Occitanians, the Cornish, the Scots, the Welsh, the Irish, the Sami, and so over Europe, without mention all of the genocides that happened on the Americas against Natives as well.
Because genocides are not actual atrocities to be prevented, but political weapons to be used. Genocides only happen when our enemies do it (even if they're not real), and they never happen when we or our allies do it (even if they are real). That is the realpolitik of genocide. Same as everything else. And it doesn't help that the so called neutral arbiters of international politics like the UN and ICC have the US's thumb weighing heavily upon them.
I was going to write something similar.
Good post comrade
Because what they do and do not count as a genocide is above all else politically driven by their desire to make their side look good and their enemies look bad.
So, no offense to you, but I see "ask" threads like this on
a lot. Where someone on like the neoliberal sub will be like "why are leftists who stupid?" or someone on the Vaush sub is like "why are tankies muh bad?",the JP sub has a weekly "why do people who hate JP hate JP (is it cuz they're secretly pedophiles?"I find them really grating because we all know the person posting already has an answer to their question in their head they're just looking for like minded people to reaffirm their opinions by repeating them back to them.
And maybe you're not doing that, maybe you're actually looking for some kind of insight into how liberals think here. You're more likely to get that here than you are in any of the other site I mentioned. But I think you already kinda suspect when the answers will be. I'd like it if this site didn't get into the habit of having these reaffirmation posts where we basically just ask the community to give us answers to questions we already have, to me it just makes us come off really insecure about our beliefs.
Well, in this case, I am mostly asking so because of how much liberals and anti-communists talk about "muh Holodomor", "muh Communism/Socialism is a genocidal ideology" at the same time they just ignore all the genocides made by capitalism/neoliberalism.
I am mostly asking this because I am done of liberals instant banning me and or mass downvoting me on Lemmy and outside Lemmy for saying things like "the Holodomor was not intentional" and or "there were more far more famines and genocides under capitalism than under communism".
And I think the last paragraph already says everything btw, I can't take how much liberals can talk about "muh Uyghur genocide" and that's it, and if you disagree with them you're a "genocide denier" yet they will straight up deny all literal genocides of minorities on Europe and on the Americas... And that is fun how much they are for a "Uyghur Nation" yet they will call you "ethno-nationalist" if you support that all minorities from Europe (Catalonians, Basques, Galicians, Sami, Venetians, Scots, Welsh, Cornish, Northern Irish etc) have the right to have their own nations and to be members of the European Union and of the Schengen Space...
Yeah I get you, wasn't trying to call you out specifically. I just find this general style of post a bit tedious even if there are legit reasons to make them sometimes I just wanted to air my gripes about them.
Chomsky's distinction between worthy and unworthy victims. The former Soviet citizens who starved after the collapse of the union were unworthy victims while the Ukranians in the Holodomor were worthy victims
"Genocide" is a political/social category. There are people who want you to believe that civil rights are genocide, there are people who want you to believe what is happening in Gaza to the Palestinians isn't genocide.
Genocide was defined by the UN in like 1950-51. Before then nothing was really called genocide because the term didn't really exist. It had to be redefined by the UN in order for the term to be ratified because historically colonialist countries like France, GB, the US, realized that their history could be defined as genocidal. While it was being ratified, the US was decimating North Korea with bombs and caused over a million deaths, the "Korean War" was a genocide. But now most people don't know anything about it.
Because it is political, that means that what gets called a genocide is determined by struggle over time. The term (rightly) elicits an extremely negative reaction from most people, the definition has power both psychologically and legally. But it doesn't have an essential quality, it isn't beholden to undeniable natural laws (especially considering that even natural consequences are also deniable and therefore political.) So we fight to have legitimate genocides be recognized as such, while our enemies fight to use the term to slander the history of socialism and justify military action against countries attempting policies like land reform and nationalization of resources.
Yeah, you're right about that.
I don't have anything to criticize on your comment, you were very complete on that.
I would also add that terms like "Democracy", "Authoritarianism", "Totalitarianism", "Extremism", "Radicalism" and the like are also political/social categories. Like, Liberals want we all to believe that a political system where you can only participate by voting periodically and where you can barely choose your candidates because the candidate appointed by the Capital-Market almost always wins is "democracy" but a political system where you can actively participate of politics and even directly help your community without the risk of your community project be crackdown by a privatization and or prohibited by a parliament and or a supreme cort is "dictatorship". Same way Liberals legit want us to think that we must tolerate everyone under a Council/Proletariat/People's/Worker's Democracy, including racism, xenophobia, fascism, ableism, homophobia etc because it is all "opinions" and "freedom of speech" while liberals are fine with Liberal "Democracies" brutally suppress Leftists and Pro-Palestinian people because it is "the law". Same way liberals legit think that the mere fact of we socialists/communists make opposition to a political group like the right-wing and or new atheists (Reddit/RationalWiki-style Atheists - Neopositivists, Scientificists and the like) and or religious fundamentalists (like Christian Nationalists, Zionists etc) is "wanting to genocide everyone you disagree with" yet liberals/radlibs wanting the mass arrest/prison of Socialists/Communists/Leftists is "fine" because "it is law enforcement".
I would even say that the law and justice are political/social categories and are just like the terms previously mentioned here, I mean, treating about political/social themes, of course. Yet, that is fun how much Liberals think that ppl can't criticize "democracy" because "It is the will of majority" and they will just go like this: https://hexbear.net/post/1739941
Depending on how we perceive things, I agree, just about everything is, or can be made to be, political. I think probably one of the biggest exceptions here is democratic, of all things. We learn that Democracy is a political system, when really its a political process and has very little to do with the actual politics.
The part of democracy that, to me, seems the most political and urgent is the way it is defined. The ruling class defines it as a parliamentary democracy where, as you mentioned, the masses have very little direct political power and basically anything that isn't this specific form, is called authoritarianism, dictatorship or whatever. Socialists struggle to expand this definition or implement new forms of more direct democracy where political power stays with the people where it originates.
Because the things that they think are genocide are the things they're told to think are genocide.
Yup, Its their orthodoxy. Cognitive dissonance is fucking wierd.
TIL Uyghurs are White but Scots, Welsh, Irish, Bretton, Catalonians, Basque are not Lol
More in terms of who's committing the genocide. West commits one, it's a famine. Non west commits one it's an intentional genocide.
When the West commits a famine, it is untentional and "the fault of the ppl who starved" but when it is non-west it is an intentional famine... Just look at how the West treats the Holodomor compared to the Irish Potato Famine and the Bengali Famine.
It's pretty well-known that the Irish were Not White at one time in history, and I don't think the Welsh were either
I don't think most of them have even heard of half of these. I certainly hadn't
The argument is that the USSR deliberately attempted to exterminate ukrainians, while other famines (inc the 90s) were all just accidental or, at worst, due to non-state actors such as The Market.
Tangential to the point but in my experience, almost all libs would agree that the extermination of the indigenous populations of the americas were genocides (though many think this is not ongoing but stopped at some point). Many would also agree about the Irish because large numbers immigrated to the US during the potato famine, and we learned about it in school.
Most americans have never heard of eg basques or occitanians, but could likely be convinced that at minimum they were being culturally genocided if enough people told them about it.
political expedience
admitting to suppressing minorities in the national projects of the 19th century would mean rejecting those national creations, which many, even many victimized populations are unwilling to do.
The holodomor idea is embraced by liberals because for them it creates a historical precedence for Russia's malice toward poor little ukraine. It helps to create this myth that Russia always had it out for Ukraine, and that Putin is just trying to finish Stalin's work, so to speak.
