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POV template — Americas

There is no need to reiterate David Stannard's position twice, in violation of WP:UNDUE. ... **1st paragraph : "Over the course of more than four centuries from the 1490s into the 1900s, Europeans and white Americans "engaged in an unbroken string of genocide campaigns against the native peoples of the Americas." – Stannard 1993, pp. 146–7. ... **4th paragraph : "Historian David Stannard writes that by the year 1769, the destruction of the American aboriginals population ..."

(Redacted) (Off-topic sentence moved to user's Talk page for more thorough continued discussion. - Xenophrenic)

Summary of the problem per User:Etsybetsy [1]: "You changed from a section mentioning disease as the foremost cause of loss of life in the Americas but also heavily describing the crimes of the colonialists into just describing that Europeans and "white" Americans perpetrated crimes against the natives? I also don't know why in the worlds you had to specify white in such a editorializing way." Per User:Stumink [2] "The diseases is important since Stannard described the entire death toll as genocide even though most source describe it otherwise." -- Tobby72 (talk) 07:42, 14 November 2016 (UTC)

Thank you, Tobby72, for the more detailed response. But this has all been discussed and resolved earlier. I'll quote each of the relevant parts of those previous discussions here for your review:
  • There is no need to reiterate David Stannard's position twice, in violation of WP:UNDUE... --Tobby72
I see those two sentences you have quoted, @Tobby72:, but you haven't explained an actual concern with that text. Like Kiernan, Rummel, and the other sources who deal extensively with the topic of genocide, Stannard is likely to be cited more than once. As noted above, those excerpts you partially quoted are not conveying the same thing. The sentence in the first paragraph is a general summary of the assertion/position advanced by the scholars who say the indigenous peoples of the Americas suffered genocide. The sentence in the fourth paragraph is a statement of scale attributable to Stannard (native population is down to a mere 1/3 of 1%, and "worst in history" holocaust). The content in the United States section is also different, being specifically Cherokee-related. Since there is no prohibition in this article against citing a reliable source more than once (see for example Kiernan, Rummel, et al., being cited a dozen times each), and the content items you've mentioned from Stannard are unique and not redundant, I'm having trouble identifying what your concern is. Please elaborate? Or perhaps propose a specific rewording you feel would address your concern? Xenophrenic (talk) 19:50, 26 October 2016 (UTC)
After this information was presented, there was no further elaboration or expression of concern from you, and no rewording proposals were made. If this is still a concern, could you please explain why so it can be addressed? Xenophrenic (talk) 17:40, 14 November 2016 (UTC)
  • You changed from a section mentioning disease as the foremost cause of loss of life in the Americas... --Etsybetsy
  • The diseases in important since Stannard described the entire death toll as genocide... --Stumink
Our sources don't say that the early decimation of native populations because of disease has anything to do with genocide (although it did make the later genocide easier because there were far fewer natives). Our article only mentions the few intentional acts to spread smallpox to illustrate the intent and mindset at the time, while making clear that we cannot know if they were effective or not. So I'll ask you again, where in our article does it convey that the 90% drop in populations due to disease during the first century has anything to do with genocide? Xenophrenic (talk) 21:19, 10 October 2016 (UTC)
After this information was presented, there was no further expression of concern from Etsybetsy about this, and no rewording proposals were made. If this is now a concern of yours, Tobby72, could you please explain why so it can be addressed? Xenophrenic (talk) 17:40, 14 November 2016 (UTC)
I've reviewed the Stannard sources (as well as the others), and I am not seeing where Stannard "described the entire death toll as genocide". Could the editor please indicate the specific sources here? Xenophrenic (talk) 18:44, 4 October 2016 (UTC)
I was referring to this "the destruction of the American aboriginals population down to just one-third of one percent of the total American population of 76 million was the most massive genocide in world history". Stumink (talk) 18:52, 4 October 2016 (UTC)
There is no mention of disease there, and that isn't a specific source - that's a sentence from our article. I was asking for a specific source. You've added a lead sentence to the 'Americas' section which states:
From the 1490s when Christopher Columbus landed in the Americas to the end of the 19th century, the indigenous population of the Western Hemisphere declined precipitously, mostly from diseases brought from Europe, from over 50 million to 1.8 million, a decline of 96%.
That says nothing about "genocide", and neither does the cited source for that sentence. (There are other problems with the sentence which can be addressed later, if it is to be used. I've removed it for now.) Please keep in mind that this article is about genocide. So that sentence is completely out of place (and a rather undue breach of our NPOV policies) as the lead to that section. I also find it curious that you would say in your edit summary that depopulation by disease is "important" only to Stannard "even though most source describe it otherwise", yet you would try to make a sentence about depopulation only by disease the lead for that section? Odd. If you'd like to expand on the disease role in depopulation in this article, we could certainly discuss that. Could you please explain why, and indicate your sources?
Stannard's position, as he explains in the prologue to his book which we cite: "It is true, in a plainly quantitative sense of body counting, that the barrage of disease unleashed by the Europeans among the so-called 'virgin soil' populations of the Americas caused more deaths than any other force of destruction." But he insists that should not be the focus of this discussion. "From almost the instant of first human contact between Europe and the Americas firestorms of microbial pestilence and purposeful genocide began laying waste the American natives. Although at times operating independently, for most of the long centuries of devastation that followed 1492, disease and genocide were interdependent forces acting dynamically--whipsawing their victims between plague and violence, each one feeding upon the other, and together driving countless numbers of entire ancient societies to the brink--and often over the brink--of total extermination. In the pages that lie ahead we will examine the causes and the consequences of both these grisly phenomena. But since the genocidal component has so often been neglected in recent scholarly analysis of the great American Indian holocaust, it is the central purpose of this book to..." Note that Stannard distinguishes between the catastrophic depopulation from disease (the topic of the afore-mentioned Population article), and the actual genocide perpetrated on natives (the topic in this article). If we're going to have content here about death from disease, it should be presented as it relates to the topic of this article. Don't you agree? Wikipedia policy does. Xenophrenic (talk) 20:49, 4 October 2016 (UTC)
After this information was presented, there was no further expression of concern from Stumink, and no rewording proposals were made. If this is now a new concern of yours, Tobby72, could you please explain why so it can be properly addressed? Xenophrenic (talk) 17:40, 14 November 2016 (UTC)
Are there any unresolved reasons why the NPOV tag shouldn't be removed? It can always be re-added if new concerns warrant it, of course. On a related matter, I've removed the addition of a misleading image with embedded text saying 95% of the native population of the Americas died from diseases. While that is likely true, this is an article about genocide, and we shouldn't mislead our readers into thinking the 95% population loss was due to genocidal action instead of disease, without solid reliable sources expressing exactly that. I'm looking forward to thoughts on the above issues. Regards, Xenophrenic (talk) 17:40, 14 November 2016 (UTC)
Repeating David Stannard as if he were the most prominent researcher in the field is POV. In calling a section of American Holocaust "Pestilence and genocide", he seems to be intentionally blurring the disease and genocide issue.
Xenophrenic's text:
Historian David Stannard writes that by the year 1769, the destruction of the American aboriginals population down to just one-third of one percent of the total American population of 76 million was the most massive genocide in world history, and "there was, at last, almost no one left to kill."
Most researchers attribute this decline in population to the introduction of new diseases, primarily smallpox and measles. As noted, we shouldn't mislead our readers into thinking the 95% population loss was due to genocidal action instead of disease.
Xenophrenic's text:
In the nineteenth century, the U. S. Army sent contaminated blankets to Native Americans, especially Plains groups, to control the Indian problem."
See Did the U.S. Army Distribute Smallpox Blankets to Indians? Fabrication and Falsification in Ward Churchill's Genocide Rhetoric.
Xenophrenic's text:
While specific responsibility for the 1836-40 smallpox epidemic remains in question, scholars have asserted that the Great Plains epidemic was "started among the tribes of the upper Missouri River by failure to quarantine steam boats on the river", and Captain Pratt of the St. Peter "was guilty of contributing to the deaths of thousands of innocent people. The law calls his offense criminal negligence. Yet in light of all the deaths, the almost complete annihilation of the Mandans, and the terrible suffering the region endured, the label criminal negligence is benign, hardly befitting an action that had such horrendous consequences."
While perhaps true, this is an article about genocide.
-- Tobby72 (talk) 11:07, 16 November 2016 (UTC)
To clarify, what you've listed above as "Xenophrenic's text" isn't. I've edited a lot of it, to be sure, but I didn't originally add much of it, and I don't claim ownership of it. With that clarified, let's look closer at Stannard's work. Rather than "intentionally blurring the disease and genocide issue", as you claim, he instead makes it very clear that they are separate. He makes it clear that while the great loss of life to disease is horrible, it's not actually genocide. He refers to the combined effect of genocide upon the natives plus the disease upon the natives as the "American Holocaust". The wording in the article attributed to Stannard, "was the most massive genocide in world history", needs to be changed to "was the most massive Holocaust in world history" per the sources. You are correct, therefore, that this article about Genocide doesn't need to be discussing the 95% population decline due to disease. As for your comment to "See [Brown's screed]", I have. What, specifically, am I looking for, and how does it apply to our article? (Please note that I am *very* familiar with that piece by Brown, and RockyMtnGuy referred unsuccessfully to it elsewhere on this Talk page already. But I'll bite...) And finally, you state: "While perhaps true, this is an article about genocide. Agreed; as is that specific content upon which you are commenting, as is made evident in the very next sentence after what you quoted. Regards, Xenophrenic (talk) 21:33, 16 November 2016 (UTC)

Iryna Harpy, please participate in the discussion. You have removed the NPOV dispute tags — [3], [4], but I don't see you Iryna discussing this on the talk page. Per WP:TAGGING: "If the person placing the tag has explained their concerns on the talk page, then anyone who disagrees should join the discussion and explain why the tag seems inappropriate. ... the tag should be removed only when there is a consensus among the editors that the NPOV disputes have indeed been resolved or — according to the rules for this specific template — when the discussion has stopped for a significant length of time." -- Tobby72 (talk) 15:41, 20 November 2016 (UTC)

There is a distinct difference between reasonable 'discussion' and WP:BLUDGEON. To this end, you have been engaging in the latter: something you would know from experience I will not condone by indulging such behaviour, whether or not you believe it to be in good faith. --Iryna Harpy (talk) 04:04, 21 November 2016 (UTC)

Proposed rewording — Americas

I would like to hear the opinion of other Wikipedians.

  • Proposed text — Americas[5]:
Some scholars characterize the experience of Native Americans during the colonization of the Americas as genocide or genocidal whilst others dispute this characterization. The indigenous peoples of the Americas have experienced massacres, torture, terror, sexual abuse, systematic military occupations, removals of Indigenous peoples from their ancestral territories, forced removal of Native American children to military-like boarding schools, allotment, and a policy of termination.

Stafford Poole, argues that genocide does not describe the colonization experience: "There are other terms to describe what happened in the Western Hemisphere, but genocide is not one of them. It is a good propaganda term in an age where slogans and shouting have replaced reflection and learning, but to use it in this context is to cheapen both the word itself and the appalling experiences of the Jews and Armenians, to mention but two of the major victims of this century." Political scientist Guenter Lewy says the label of genocide is not applicable and views the "sad fate" of the Native Americans as "not a crime but a tragedy, involving an irreconcilable collision of cultures and values. [...] The new Americans, convinced of their cultural and racial superiority, were unwilling to grant the original inhabitants of the continent the vast preserve of land required by the Indians’ way of life." Noble David Cook, writing about the Black Legend and the conquest of the Americas wrote, "There were too few Spaniards to have killed the millions who were reported to have died in the first century after Old and New World contact." Cook acknowledged that "it is impossible to factor out and weigh precisely each of the causes that led to the collapse of Amerindian society. We might ask, Did the Spanish lance lead to the death of 2 percent of the Indians, the arquebus 5 percent, the dog 12? ... Almost all sources provide that sickness made conquest and foreign domination easier, not just for the Spanish but for all European states."

Historian David Stannard writes that over the course of more than four centuries from the 1490s into the 1900s, Europeans and white Americans "engaged in an unbroken string of genocide campaigns against the native peoples of the Americas." According to anthropologist Russell Thornton, for the American Indians "the arrival of the Europeans marked the beginning of a long holocaust, although it came not in ovens, as it did for the Jews. The fires that consumed North America Indians were the fevers brought on by newly encountered diseases, the flashes of settlers' and soldiers' guns, the ravages of "firewater," the flames of villages and fields burned by the scorched-earth policy of vengeful Euro-Americans." David Quammen likened colonial American practices toward Native Americans to those of Australia toward its aboriginal populations, calling both genocide. Some authors, including Holocaust scholar David Cesarani, have argued that United States government policies in furtherance of its so-called Manifest Destiny constituted genocide. Native American Studies professor Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz says, "Proponents of the default position emphasize attrition by disease despite other causes equally deadly, if not more so. In doing so they refuse to accept that the colonization of America was genocidal by plan, not simply the tragic fate of populations lacking immunity to disease. In the case of the Jewish Holocaust, no one denies that more Jews died of starvation, overwork, and disease under Nazi incarceration than died in gas ovens, yet the acts of creating and maintaining the conditions that led to those deaths clearly constitute genocide."

There are some documented incidences of germ warfare in the United Sates. In the 1700s, British militia like William Trent and Simeon Ecuyer gave Smallpox-exposed blankets to Native American emissaries as gifts at Fort Pitt, "to Convey the Smallpox to the Indians", in one of the most famously documented cases of germ warfare. While it is uncertain how successful such attempts were against the target population, historians have noted that, "history records numerous instances of the French, the Spanish, the English, and later on the American, using smallpox as an ignoble means to an end. For smallpox was more feared by the Indian than the bullet: he could be exterminated and subjugated more easily and quickly by the death-bringing virus than by the weapons of the white man."

Several works on the subject were released around the year 1992 to coincide with the 500th anniversary of Columbus' voyage. In 2003, Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez urged Latin Americans to not celebrate the Columbus Day holiday. Chavez blamed Columbus for spearheading "the biggest invasion and genocide ever seen in the history of humanity."


  • The current Xenophrenic's version — Americas:
Over the course of more than four centuries from the 1490s into the 1900s, Europeans and white Americans "engaged in an unbroken string of genocide campaigns against the native peoples of the Americas." The indigenous peoples of the Americas have experienced massacres, torture, terror, sexual abuse, systematic military occupations, removals of Indigenous peoples from their ancestral territories, forced removal of Native American children to military-like boarding schools, allotment, and a policy of termination.

From the earliest years of colonialism, conquistadores like Vasco Núñez de Balboa would brazenly advocate genocide against the native population. In the 1700s, British militia like William Trent and Simeon Ecuyer gave Smallpox-exposed blankets to Native American emissaries as gifts at Fort Pitt, "to Convey the Smallpox to the Indians", in one of the most famously documented cases of germ warfare. While it is uncertain how successful such attempts were against the target population, historians have noted that, "history records numerous instances of the French, the Spanish, the English, and later on the American, using smallpox as an ignoble means to an end. For smallpox was more feared by the Indian than the bullet: he could be exterminated and subjugated more easily and quickly by the death-bringing virus than by the weapons of the white man." The British High Commander Jeffery Amherst authorized the intentional use of disease as a biological weapon against indigenous populations during the Pontiac's Rebellion, saying, "You will Do well to try to Innoculate the Indians by means of Blanketts, as well as to try Every other method that can serve to Extirpate this Execreble Race", and instructing his subordinates, "I need only Add, I Wish to Hear of no prisoners should any of the villains be met with arms." When smallpox swept the northern plains of the US in 1837, Secretary of War Lewis Cass ordered that the Mandan (along with the Arikara, the Cree, and the Blackfeet) not be given smallpox vaccinations, which had been provided to other tribes in other areas.

Some historians disagree that genocide, defined as a crime of intent, should be used to describe the colonization experience. Stafford Poole, a research historian, wrote: "There are other terms to describe what happened in the Western Hemisphere, but genocide is not one of them. It is a good propaganda term in an age where slogans and shouting have replaced reflection and learning, but to use it in this context is to cheapen both the word itself and the appalling experiences of the Jews and Armenians, to mention but two of the major victims of this century." Political scientist Guenter Lewy says the label of genocide is not applicable and views the "sad fate" of the Native Americans as "not a crime but a tragedy, involving an irreconcilable collision of cultures and values. [...] The new Americans, convinced of their cultural and racial superiority, were unwilling to grant the original inhabitants of the continent the vast preserve of land required by the Indians’ way of life." Noble David Cook, writing about the Black Legend and the conquest of the Americas wrote, "There were too few Spaniards to have killed the millions who were reported to have died in the first century after Old and New World contact." Cook acknowledged that "it is impossible to factor out and weigh precisely each of the causes that led to the collapse of Amerindian society. We might ask, Did the Spanish lance lead to the death of 2 percent of the Indians, the arquebus 5 percent, the dog 12? ... Almost all sources provide that sickness made conquest and foreign domination easier, not just for the Spanish but for all European states." Native American Studies professor Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz says, "Proponents of the default position emphasize attrition by disease despite other causes equally deadly, if not more so. In doing so they refuse to accept that the colonization of America was genocidal by plan, not simply the tragic fate of populations lacking immunity to disease. In the case of the Jewish Holocaust, no one denies that more Jews died of starvation, overwork, and disease under Nazi incarceration than died in gas ovens, yet the acts of creating and maintaining the conditions that led to those deaths clearly constitute genocide."

Historian David Stannard writes that by the year 1769, the destruction of the American aboriginals population down to just one-third of one percent of the total American population of 76 million was the most massive genocide in world history, and "there was, at last, almost no one left to kill." According to anthropologist Russell Thornton, for the American Indians "the arrival of the Europeans marked the beginning of a long holocaust, although it came not in ovens, as it did for the Jews. The fires that consumed North America Indians were the fevers brought on by newly encountered diseases, the flashes of settlers' and soldiers' guns, the ravages of "firewater," the flames of villages and fields burned by the scorched-earth policy of vengeful Euro-Americans." David Quammen likened colonial American practices toward Native Americans to those of Australia toward its aboriginal populations, calling both genocide. Some authors, including Holocaust scholar David Cesarani, have argued that United States government policies in furtherance of its so-called Manifest Destiny constituted genocide.

Several works on the subject were released around the year 1992 to coincide with the 500th anniversary of Columbus' voyage. In 2003, Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez urged Latin Americans to not celebrate the Columbus Day holiday. Chavez blamed Columbus for spearheading "the biggest invasion and genocide ever seen in the history of humanity."


  • The last stable version — 1 October 2016 — Americas:
From the 1490s when Christopher Columbus landed in the Americas to the end of the 19th century, the indigenous population of the Western Hemisphere declined precipitously, mostly from diseases brought from Europe, from over 50 million to 1.8 million, a decline of 96%. In Brazil alone, the indigenous population declined from a pre-Columbian high of an estimated 3 million to some 300,000 (1997). Estimates of how many people were living in the Americas when Columbus arrived have varied tremendously; 20th century scholarly estimates ranged from 8.4 million to 112.5 million.

Epidemic disease was the overwhelming cause of the population decline of the American natives. After first contact with Europeans and Africans, the death of 90 to 95 percent of the native population of the Americas was caused by Old World diseases such as smallpox and measles.

Historians disagree whether genocide, defined as a crime of intent, accurately describes the colonization experience. Stafford Poole, a research historian, wrote: "There are other terms to describe what happened in the Western Hemisphere, but genocide is not one of them. It is a good propaganda term in an age where slogans and shouting have replaced reflection and learning, but to use it in this context is to cheapen both the word itself and the appalling experiences of the Jews and Armenians, to mention but two of the major victims of this century." Political scientist Guenter Lewy rejects the label of genocide and views the depopulation of the Native Americans as "not a crime but a tragedy, involving an irreconcilable collision of cultures and values". Noble David Cook, writing about the Black Legend and the conquest of the Americas wrote, "There were too few Spaniards to have killed the millions who were reported to have died in the first century after Old and New World contact." Cook acknowledged that "it is impossible to factor out and weigh precisely each of the causes that led to the collapse of Amerindian society. We might ask, Did the Spanish lance lead to the death of 2 percent of the Indians, the arquebus 5 percent, the dog 12? ... Almost all sources provide that sickness made conquest and foreign domination easier, not just for the Spanish but for all European states."

By contrast, historian David Stannard argues that the destruction of the American aboriginals from 76 million down to just a quarter-million was a result of a combination of "invasions of European plague and violence" across two continents and four centuries, and was the most massive genocide in world history. According to anthropologist Russell Thornton, for the American Indians "the arrival of the Europeans marked the beginning of a long holocaust, although it came not in ovens, as it did for the Jews. The fires that consumed North America Indians were the fevers brought on by newly encountered diseases, the flashes of settlers' and soldiers' guns, the ravages of "firewater," the flames of villages and fields burned by the scorched-earth policy of vengeful Euro-Americans." David Quammen likened colonial American practices toward Native Americans to those of Australia toward its aboriginal populations, calling both genocide. Some authors, including Holocaust scholar David Cesarani, have argued that United States government policies in furtherance of its so-called Manifest Destiny constituted genocide.

British commander Jeffery Amherst authorized the intentional use of disease as a biological weapon against indigenous populations during the Siege of Fort Pitt. A month before Amherst's authorization, smallpox-exposed blankets were given as gifts to natives at Fort Pitt. This was one of the most famously documented cases of germ warfare in the Americas, and it is uncertain how successful the attempt was against the target population. For historians who describe this specific attempt at intentional infection as successful, see: According to testimonies by Gershom Hicks, a trader turned "white Indian" and captured by the British; and a captive to natives, John McCullough: the native tribe in question was already ravaged with smallpox.

Several works on the subject were released around the year 1992 to coincide with the 500th anniversary of Columbus' voyage. In 2003, Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez urged Latin Americans to not celebrate the Columbus Day holiday. Chavez blamed Columbus for spearheading "the biggest invasion and genocide ever seen in the history of humanity."
  • Some observations on the above 3 blocks of text. (1) The second block is introduced as "The current Xenophrenic's version". It's not mine, and in fact, there are several changes I'd like to make to it (i.e., clarifying that Poole's comment was about Hispaniola, not "the Americas" in general; paraphrasing the first sentence to remove the quotes; etc.). It would be accurate to describe it as simply "The current version". (2) Your proposed text begins with "Some scholars characterize the experience of Native Americans during the colonization of the Americas as genocide or genocidal whilst others dispute this characterization", but I can't tell what source citation you would use for that. Your proposal has all of the citations stripped from it. (3) Your proposed text has this run-on sentence which makes no sense: While it is uncertain how successful such attempts were against the target population, For historians who describe this specific attempt at intentional infection as successful, see: historians have noted that, "history records numerous instances of the French, the Spanish, the English, and later on the American, using smallpox as an ignoble means to an end. (I think you got some of the reference formatting mixed up in there.) You've also added some of that text to the "current version" block of text, when it isn't really there in our article. (4) Your proposed version completely omits this very key content: The British High Commander Jeffery Amherst authorized the intentional use of disease as a biological weapon against indigenous populations during the Pontiac's Rebellion, saying, "You will Do well to try to Innoculate the Indians by means of Blanketts, as well as to try Every other method that can serve to Extirpate this Execreble Race", and instructing his subordinates, "I need only Add, I Wish to Hear of no prisoners should any of the villains be met with arms." When smallpox swept the northern plains of the US in 1837, Secretary of War Lewis Cass ordered that the Mandan (along with the Arikara, the Cree, and the Blackfeet) not be given smallpox vaccinations, which had been provided to other tribes in other areas. According to the reliable sources asserting that the Native Americans experienced genocide, rather than simple violence, the disposition of those in command (High Commanders Amherst & Gage, and Secretary of War Cass, etc.) towards the natives is key evidence. Why omit it? There are other issues as well, Xenophrenic (talk) 20:51, 16 November 2016 (UTC)
This assertion is also problematic:
While it is uncertain how successful such attempts were against the target population,[50] historians have noted that, "history records numerous instances of the French, the Spanish, the English, and later on the American, using smallpox as an ignoble means to an end. For smallpox was more feared by the Indian than the bullet: he could be exterminated and subjugated more easily and quickly by the death-bringing virus than by the weapons of the white man."[51]
The only documented case of smallpox blankets being given to Native Americans was by Captain Simon Eucyer of the British army in 1763 during Pontiac's War (the actual effectiveness is unknown).
Your proposed text says:
Archaeologist and anthropologist Ann F. Ramenofsky writes, "Variola Major can be transmitted through contaminated articles such as clothing or blankets. In the nineteenth century, the U. S. Army sent contaminated blankets to Native Americans, especially Plains groups, to control the Indian problem."[95] While specific responsibility for the 1836-40 smallpox epidemic remains in question, scholars have asserted that the Great Plains epidemic was "started among the tribes of the upper Missouri River by failure to quarantine steam boats on the river",[51] and Captain Pratt of the St. Peter "was guilty of contributing to the deaths of thousands of innocent people. The law calls his offense criminal negligence. Yet in light of all the deaths, the almost complete annihilation of the Mandans, and the terrible suffering the region endured, the label criminal negligence is benign, hardly befitting an action that had such horrendous consequences."[96] Leading genocide expert Dirk Moses attributes "the genocide of many Native American tribes" including the Mandans, to governmental assimilationist policies that coexisted with officially or unofficially sanctioned efforts "to eradicate, diminish, or forcibly evict the 'savages.'" (Red text added by Xenophrenic from the same source.)
That says nothing about "genocide" (see WP:UNDUE, also see Colorado Professor Faces Claims of Academic Fraud). -- Tobby72 (talk) 15:58, 17 November 2016 (UTC)
I haven't proposed any text. Did you mean the present text? Let's take a closer look at it, and your concerns.
The only documented case of smallpox blankets being given to Native Americans was by Captain Simon Eucyer...
Incorrect. Sources convey numerous accounts of the offensive use of disease, although the one you mention is perhaps the best documented. As noted in the Journal of American Folklore, Winter 1995, "New blanket stories continued to emerge in the 19th and 20th centuries as settlers pushed West, and versions still circulate today among whites, Native Americans, and Blacks." There are also accounts of smallpox delivered in sealed containers, in pox-tainted flags wrapped around gifts, etc. There are accounts of threats and extortion used, "Accept these conditions or I will unleash the pox from this jar...". What, exactly, did you find problematic with that content?
That says nothing about "genocide"...
Actually it does, as it was presented in the section describing the Genocidal mentality. It is further cited by other genocide experts referenced in that same section. And finally, you left out the very next sentence (I added it to the paragraph in read above) which directly addresses your concern.
...also see Colorado Professor Faces Claims of Academic Fraud...
I've seen that and am very familiar with it. What, exactly, was I supposed to see that applies here? I'm not seeing anything. Regards, Xenophrenic (talk) 22:27, 17 November 2016 (UTC)
Between 1994 and 2003, Ward Churchill published at least six different versions of this accusation against the U.S. Army. While the Mandans and other Indians of the Upper Plains did suffer horribly from a smallpox epidemic in 1837, Churchill presents no evidence whatsoever to indicate that the infection was anything but accidental, or that the U.S. Army was in any way involved. Fort Clark was a privately owned fur trading outpost, not a military base, and there were no U.S. troops in the vicinity. The closest U.S. military unit was an eight hundred mile march away at Fort Leavenworth.
— Did the U.S. Army Distribute Smallpox Blankets to Indians? Fabrication and Falsification in Ward Churchill's Genocide Rhetoric.
... we know of but a single instance of such warfare, and the documentary evidence is inconclusive. In 1763, a particularly serious uprising threatened the British garrisons west of the Allegheny mountains. ... On or around June 24, two traders at Fort Pitt did give blankets and a handkerchief from the fort’s quarantined hospital to two visiting Delaware Indians ... A second, even less substantiated instance of alleged biological warfare ... (Red text added by Xenophrenic from the same source.) ... concerns an incident that occurred on June 20, 1837. On that day, Churchill writes, the U.S. Army began to dispense"'trade blankets' to Mandans and other Indians gathered at Fort Clark on the Missouri River in present-day North Dakota." ... (Blue text added by Tobby72 from the same source.)
— Were American Indians the Victims of Genocide?. Guenter Lewy. -- Tobby72 (talk) 12:59, 18 November 2016 (UTC)
You've quoted something about a guy named Churchill (who I don't see cited in our article) and you've quoted something from an opinion-piece from a guy named Lewy about one of the intentional biological warfare instances he "knows of", which is already mentioned in our article, and cited to more reliable sources. So I'm afraid I still don't see what you are getting at. Instead of quoting snippets of text, and nothing more, could you at least give me a clue as to how it applies to the article content we are discussing? For starters, are you suggesting we add the Churchill and Lewy content? Regards, Xenophrenic (talk) 19:41, 18 November 2016 (UTC)
The First Paragraph. I suggest for starters: Some scholars characterize the experience of Native Americans during the colonization of the Americas as genocide or genocidal whilst others dispute this characterization.." instead of David Stannard's point of view: Over the course of more than four centuries from the 1490s into the 1900s, Europeans and white Americans "engaged in an unbroken string of genocide campaigns against the native peoples of the Americas." -- Tobby72 (talk) 15:41, 20 November 2016 (UTC)
(1) The lead sentence is not "David Stannard's point of view", as you assert. It is a factual overview description of events during the time period under discussion (1400s through 1900s) which is echoed by countless experts in the field and is an accurate reflection of the current scholarship on the subject matter. It is not presented as "opinion" or "point of view", and it is from a high quality academic, peer-reviewed publication. It is indeed presently cited to Stannard's work, and includes a partial quote (which I already noted above should be paraphrased), but if you are challenging the source as mere opinion, or as inaccurate, we should probably conduct that discussion at the Reliable Sources Noticeboard.
(2) Your proposed opening sentence appears unsourced (do you have a source citation I can review?). It also presents a false characterization of the subject, wrongly defining it as "the experience of Native Americans during the colonization of the Americas as genocide", when scholars instead have accurately asserted that "Native Americans have experienced genocide" over the centuries (which even Lewy, Poole and other apologists have conceded). I'd like to see the reliable source you are referencing when you mischaracterize the subject in that manner.
(3) Your proposed wording also sets up a false equivalency, implying that "some" say genocide happened while "some" say it didn't, which simply isn't an accurate characterization of the subject and state of scholarship on the matter. Your proposed wording is also redundant and uninformative. Our article lead already clearly informs our readers that, "...where accusations of genocide have circulated, partisans of various sides have fiercely disputed the details and interpretation of the event...". In addition, our article already goes on to say, "The debate continues over what legally constitutes genocide." In fact, there is a whole initial section of the article which already explains that there are competing definitions about what is or is not genocide. Your proposed sentence addition adds nothing new or informative, and the other sections of our article do not start with such a redundant, factually lacking equivocation. Should we likewise add a first sentence to begin the Holocaust section under Germany saying, "Some scholars characterize the experience of Jews in Nazi Germany as genocide or genocidal whilst others dispute this characterization"? That isn't a proper lead sentence. Xenophrenic (talk) 19:32, 21 November 2016 (UTC)

Proposed rewording — United States

  • Proposed text — United States[6]:
During the American Indian Wars, the American Army carried out a number of massacres and forced relocations of Indigenous peoples, acts that some scholars say constitute genocide. The Sand Creek Massacre, which caused outrage in its own time, has been called genocide. General John Chivington led a 700-man force of Colorado Territory militia in a massacre of 70–163 peaceful Cheyenne and Arapaho, about two-thirds of whom were women, children, and infants. Chivington and his men took scalps and other body parts as trophies, including human fetuses and male and female genitalia. United States Congress Joint Committee on the Conduct of the War, 1865 (testimonies and report)</ref> In defense of his actions Chivington stated,

Damn any man who sympathizes with Indians! ... I have come to kill Indians, and believe it is right and honorable to use any means under God's heaven to kill Indians. ... Kill and scalp all, big and little; nits make lice.

— - Col. John Milton Chivington, U.S. Army

A study by Gregory Michno concluded that of 21,586 tabulated casualties in a selected 672 battles and skirmishes, military personnel and settlers accounted for 6,596 (31%), while indigenous casualties totaled about 14,990 (69%) for the period 1850–90. Michno's study almost exclusively uses Army estimates. His follow-up book "Forgotten Battles and Skirmishes" covers over 300 additional fights not included in these statistics. According to the U.S. Bureau of the Census (1894), between 1789 and 1846, "The Indian wars under the government of the United States have been more than 40 in number. They have cost the lives of about 19,000 white men, women and children, including those killed in individual combats, and the lives of about 30,000 Indians. The actual number of killed and wounded Indians must be very much higher than the given... Fifty percent additional would be a safe estimate..." In the same 1894 report, the Census Bureau dismissed assertions that millions of Native Americans once inhabited what is now the United States, insisting instead that North America in 1492 was an almost empty continent, and "guesstimating" that aboriginal populations "could not have exceeded much over 500,000", whereas modern scholarship now estimates more than 10 million. Most of the population decline resulted from "smallpox, measles, and other Old World diseases that swept across the hemisphere far faster than the Europeans that brought them."

Chalk and Jonassohn argued that the deportation of the Cherokee tribe along the Trail of Tears would almost certainly be considered an act of genocide today. The Indian Removal Act of 1830 led to the exodus. About 17,000 Cherokees—along with approximately 2,000 Cherokee-owned black slaves—were removed from their homes. The number of people who died as a result of the Trail of Tears has been variously estimated. American doctor and missionary Elizur Butler, who made the journey with one party, estimated 4,000 deaths. Historians David Stannard and Barbara Mann have noted that the army deliberately routed the march of the Cherokee to pass through areas of known cholera epidemic, such as Vicksburg. Stannard estimates that during the forced removal from their homelands, following the Indian Removal Act signed into law by President Andrew Jackson in 1830, 8000 Cherokee died, about half the total population.

The U.S. colonization of California started in earnest in 1849, and resulted in a large number of state-subsidized massacres by colonists against Native Americans in the territory, causing several entire ethnic groups to be wiped out. In one such series of conflicts, the so-called Mendocino War and the subsequent Round Valley War, the entirety of the Yuki people was brought to the brink of extinction, from a previous population of some 3,500 people to fewer than 100. According to Russell Thornton, estimates of the pre-Columbian population of California was at least 310,000, and perhaps as much as 705,000. By 1849, due to Spanish and Mexican colonization and epidemics this number had decreased to 100,000. But from 1849 and up until 1890 the Indigenous population of California had fallen below 20,000, primarily because of the killings. In An American Genocide, The United States and the California Catastrophe, 1846-1873, Historian Benjamin Madley recorded the numbers of killings of California Indians between 1846 and 1873. He found evidence that during this period at least 9,400 to 16,000 California Indians were killed by non-Indians. Most of these killings occurred in more than 370 massacres (defined as the "intentional killing of five or more disarmed combatants or largely unarmed noncombatants, including women, children, and prisoners, whether in the context of a battle or otherwise"). 10,000 Indians were also kidnapped and sold as slaves.


  • The current Xenophrenic's version — United States:
During the American Indian Wars, the American Army carried out a number of massacres and forced relocations of Indigenous peoples, acts that some scholars say constitute genocide. The Sand Creek Massacre, which caused outrage in its own time, has been called genocide. General John Chivington led a 700-man force of Colorado Territory militia in a massacre of 70–163 peaceful Cheyenne and Arapaho, about two-thirds of whom were women, children, and infants. Chivington and his men took scalps and other body parts as trophies, including human fetuses and male and female genitalia. In defense of his actions Chivington stated,

Damn any man who sympathizes with Indians! ... I have come to kill Indians, and believe it is right and honorable to use any means under God's heaven to kill Indians. ... Kill and scalp all, big and little; nits make lice.

— - Col. John Milton Chivington, U.S. Army

A study by Gregory Michno concluded that of 21,586 tabulated casualties in a selected 672 battles and skirmishes, military personnel and settlers accounted for 6,596 (31%), while indigenous casualties totaled about 14,990 (69%) for the period 1850–90. Michno's study almost exclusively uses Army estimates. His follow-up book "Forgotten Battles and Skirmishes" covers over 300 additional fights not included in these statistics. According to the U.S. Bureau of the Census (1894), between 1789 and 1846, "The Indian wars under the government of the United States have been more than 40 in number. They have cost the lives of about 19,000 white men, women and children, including those killed in individual combats, and the lives of about 30,000 Indians. The actual number of killed and wounded Indians must be very much higher than the given... Fifty percent additional would be a safe estimate..." In the same 1894 report, the Census Bureau dismissed assertions that millions of Native Americans once inhabited what is now the United States, insisting instead that North America in 1492 was an almost empty continent, and "guesstimating" that aboriginal populations "could not have exceeded much over 500,000", whereas modern scholarship now estimates more than 10 million.

Chalk and Jonassohn argued that the deportation of the Cherokee tribe along the Trail of Tears would almost certainly be considered an act of genocide today. The Indian Removal Act of 1830 led to the exodus. About 17,000 Cherokees—along with approximately 2,000 Cherokee-owned black slaves—were removed from their homes. The number of people who died as a result of the Trail of Tears has been variously estimated. American doctor and missionary Elizur Butler, who made the journey with one party, estimated 4,000 deaths. Historians David Stannard and Barbara Mann have noted that the army deliberately routed the march of the Cherokee to pass through areas of known cholera epidemic, such as Vicksburg. Stannard estimates that during the forced removal from their homelands, following the Indian Removal Act signed into law by President Andrew Jackson in 1830, 8000 Cherokee died, about half the total population.

Archaeologist and anthropologist Ann F. Ramenofsky writes, "Variola Major can be transmitted through contaminated articles such as clothing or blankets. In the nineteenth century, the U. S. Army sent contaminated blankets to Native Americans, especially Plains groups, to control the Indian problem." While specific responsibility for the 1836-40 smallpox epidemic remains in question, scholars have asserted that the Great Plains epidemic was "started among the tribes of the upper Missouri River by failure to quarantine steam boats on the river", and Captain Pratt of the St. Peter "was guilty of contributing to the deaths of thousands of innocent people. The law calls his offense criminal negligence. Yet in light of all the deaths, the almost complete annihilation of the Mandans, and the terrible suffering the region endured, the label criminal negligence is benign, hardly befitting an action that had such horrendous consequences." Leading genocide expert Dirk Moses attributes "the genocide of many Native American tribes" including the Mandans, to governmental assimilationist policies that coexisted with officially or unofficially sanctioned efforts "to eradicate, diminish, or forcibly evict the 'savages.'"

The U.S. colonization of California started in earnest in 1849, and resulted in a large number of state-subsidized massacres by colonists against Native Americans in the territory, causing several entire ethnic groups to be wiped out. In one such series of conflicts, the so-called Mendocino War and the subsequent Round Valley War, the entirety of the Yuki people was brought to the brink of extinction, from a previous population of some 3,500 people to fewer than 100. According to Russell Thornton, estimates of the pre-Columbian population of California was at least 310,000, and perhaps as much as 705,000. By 1849, due to Spanish and Mexican colonization and epidemics this number had decreased to 100,000. But from 1849 and up until 1890 the Indigenous population of California had fallen below 20,000, primarily because of the killings. In An American Genocide, The United States and the California Catastrophe, 1846-1873, Historian Benjamin Madley recorded the numbers of killings of California Indians between 1846 and 1873. He found evidence that during this period at least 9,400 to 16,000 California Indians were killed by non-Indians. Most of these killings occurred in more than 370 massacres (defined as the "intentional killing of five or more disarmed combatants or largely unarmed noncombatants, including women, children, and prisoners, whether in the context of a battle or otherwise"). 10,000 Indians were also kidnapped and sold as slaves.


  • The last stable version — 1 October 2016 — United States:
Statistics regarding the depopulation of the indigenous peoples of North America vary due to calculation methodology used. Statistics regarding the subset of deaths due specifically to armed conflict between Native Americans and Europeans are also sparse, as in many cases there were no records kept. A study by Gregory Michno concluded that of 21,586 tabulated casualties in a selected 672 battles and skirmishes, military personnel and settlers accounted for 6,596 (31%), while indigenous casualties totaled about 14,990 (69%) for the period 1850–90. Michno's study almost exclusively uses Army estimates. His follow-up book "Forgotten Battles and Skirmishes" covers over 300 additional fights not included in these statistics. According to the U.S. Bureau of the Census (1894), between 1789 and 1846, "The Indian wars under the government of the United States have been more than 40 in number. They have cost the lives of about 19,000 white men, women and children, including those killed in individual combats, and the lives of about 30,000 Indians. The actual number of killed and wounded Indians must be very much higher than the given... Fifty percent additional would be a safe estimate..."

Chalk and Jonassohn argued that the deportation of the Cherokee tribe along the Trail of Tears would almost certainly be considered an act of genocide today. The Indian Removal Act of 1830 led to the exodus. About 17,000 Cherokees—along with approximately 2,000 Cherokee-owned black slaves—were removed from their homes. The number of people who died as a result of the Trail of Tears has been variously estimated. American doctor and missionary Elizur Butler, who made the journey with one party, estimated 4,000 deaths.

Estimates of the native population of the United States before European colonization have varied widely due to the variety of calculation methods used. African History expert David Henige argues that modern scholarship arriving at higher population estimates, using both historical and scientific methods, "have grown fond of dazzling with pseudo-scientific number-crunching". While he does not advocate a low population estimate, he argues that the scarce and uncomprehensive nature of the evidence renders broad estimates to be somewhat suspect.

Credible evidence exists that epidemic disease was a major cause of the population decline of the American natives due to their lack of immunity to new diseases brought from Europe. Contemporaneous accounts of the effects of smallpox among the native population suggest an 80% to 95% mortality rate of the entire population affected. Governor William Bradford wrote, in 1633, about the second reported outbreak (e.g. 1617, 1633) in New England: "... for it pleased God to visit these Indians with a great sickness, and such a mortality that of a 1000. above 900. and a half of them died, and many of them did rot above ground for want of burial...."

-- Tobby72 (talk) 11:07, 16 November 2016 (UTC)

Should we add content about the Tuskegee syphilis experiment?

You mean the sources for the syphilis introduced to black communities? There seems to have been a lot written that it was fully intentional genocide? Etsybetsy (talk) 21:41, 20 September 2016 (UTC)
Not split into a section by me. Etsybetsy (talk) 05:24, 9 October 2016 (UTC)
I asked: How (again) is syphilis "the flip side" to colonists deliberately giving smallpox tainted blankets to Native Americans with the intent to infect them? Note the lack of the necessary INTENT in your irrelevant syphilis content addition.
Is this about the sources for the syphilis introduced to the black communities again? There is cited intent for that.
Again? Sorry, you lost me. It sounds to me that you are now introducing a wholly new topic. Black communities? I am looking forward to reviewing your reliable sources showing there was genocidal intent in your "syphilis introduced to the black communities again" content. Shall we create a new discussion section for that? And does this mean we've finally resolved the issue of your proposed insertion of syphilis origin theories into the content about genocidal acts toward Native Americans? Xenophrenic (talk) 03:16, 21 September 2016 (UTC)
Etsybetsy is referring to the infamous Tuskegee syphilis experiment in which the U.S. Public Health Service denied hundreds of black men in rural Alabama access to treatment in order to study the natural progression of untreated syphilis. It is truly similar to the Nazi treatment of minorities in Germany, but doesn't really count as genocide. A lot of federal bureaucrats should have gone to jail for it, but in this context it is a red herring.RockyMtnGuy (talk) 18:30, 24 September 2016 (UTC)
We are already aware that Etsybetsy is likely referring to the Tuskegee syphilis experiment, as was mentioned in this discussion several days ago. You appear to have now caught up to the rest of us. Of course it has nothing to do with the syphilis in Europe we've been discussing, so it may indeed have been a red herring on Etsy's part to distract from having to provide the requested reliable sources supporting his content addition proposals. But the idea may merit separate discussion, pending review of the reliable sources Etsybetsy produces. A quick check into the matter shows that Tuskegee's Truths: Rethinking the Tuskegee Syphilis Study edited by Susan M. Reverby notes several sources calling it genocidal, and so does Bad Blood by James H. Jones. On the other hand, The Search for the Legacy of the USPHS Syphilis Study at Tuskegee: Reflective Essays Based upon Findings from the Tuskegee Legacy Project edited by Ralph V. Katz and Rueben Warren, has some powerful articles examining the subject, including whether it can be classified as genocidal. I'm not yet familiar enough with where the scholarship stands on the matter to be comfortable introducing the content in our article. Which reliable sources are you paraphrasing, RockyMtnGuy? (And if you are only speaking from personal opinion again, please just exit the discussion.) Xenophrenic (talk) 01:42, 25 September 2016 (UTC)
However, Xenophrenic, you are clouding the issues by introducing large numbers of logical fallacies into the debate, creating semantic discord rather than producing facts, and trying to put the philosophic burden of proof on other people (a form of argument from ignorance) rather than providing proof of your own debating points. The point of Wikipedia is to create good articles, not trying to score debating points and promote your own POV through invalid and specious arguments.RockyMtnGuy (talk) 18:30, 24 September 2016 (UTC)
You misunderstand (yet again), RockyMtnGuy. I'm not debating. And I've not once offered a personal point of view in this matter. Would you care to substantiate your empty claims and mischaracterizations? No, of course you wouldn't. You can't. Red herring much? Xenophrenic (talk) 01:42, 25 September 2016 (UTC)
No, you are not debating, you are just pontificating and playing semantic games. You brought up the topic of the Tuskegee syphilis experiment, I didn't. I just identified what it was and cited it as an example of an incident that should NOT be considered genocide. The Jeffery Amherst, 1st Baron Amherst incident is similar in that it was NOT genocide, and even fewer people, i.e. nobody, was killed. How can it be genocide if nobody was killed? It basically is an urban myth and an example of historical revisionism by modern people imposing modern standards on people who didn't have the same standards or even the necessary technology. It should not be included in a Wikipedia article except as an example of urban myth and historical revisionism. (Personal attack removed) RockyMtnGuy (talk) 19:48, 25 September 2016 (UTC)
You brought up the topic of the Tuskegee syphilis experiment...
Incorrect. Etsybetsy brought it up, likely as a red herring, according to you.
I just identified what it was and cited it as an example of an incident that should NOT be considered genocide.
Yes, you did indeed. To which I responded: Which reliable sources are you paraphrasing, RockyMtnGuy? (And if you are only speaking from personal opinion again, please just exit the discussion.) Xenophrenic (talk) 01:42, 25 September 2016 (UTC)
As for your ramblings about Amherst, I'll respond in the Amherst section above. Regards, Xenophrenic (talk) 21:17, 25 September 2016 (UTC)

As a judge would say, this is all irrelevant and immaterial. These are all non-logical forms of argumentation. I only do logical argumentation. I have better things to do at this point in time, such as canning vegetables.RockyMtnGuy (talk) 16:42, 3 October 2016 (UTC)

Excellent. Please do so. One should stick with one's forte. Thank you for ceasing to be disruptive from this point on. --Iryna Harpy (talk) 23:06, 3 October 2016 (UTC)

Well Israel has committed genocide against the Mongols — Preceding unsigned comment added by 37.28.251.7 (talk) 22:05, 6 January 2017 (UTC)

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Undue addition

Hi, Whizz40. I've reverted your bold edit for reasons best explained at WP:BRD. While I'm certain you made the edit in good faith, your edit introduced undue POV which is against our WP:NPOV policy: which means representing fairly, proportionately, and, as far as possible, without editorial bias, all of the significant views that have been published by reliable sources on a topic. Here is the content you added:
Historian Michael McConnell writes that, "Ironically, British efforts to use pestilence as a weapon may not have been either necessary or particularly effective", noting that smallpox was already entering the territory by several means, and Native Americans were familiar with the disease and adept at isolating the infected. (cited to McConnell)
  • The content you added is redundant. While it conveys that the effectiveness of the efforts is debatable, that is already noted 4 sentences earlier. Undue repetition.
  • Most problematic, however, is that your 25+ year old source based his speculation on the Hicks and McCullough information, which has since been examined in more detail (see Wheelis, Mann, Fenn, et al.) - and found that it doesn't "ironically" alter the narrative after all. The tribe to which McCullough referred was actually several hundred miles away, and while they had some prior experience with smallpox, the tribes wiped out in the 1763-1764 epidemic did not. And Hicks' deposition, before his retelling of it with no mention of smallpox, actually supports the timing of the Fort Pitt incident as a probable epidemic source.
  • Your proposed addition also strays from the topic (Genocide), which is determined by actions with intent, and not by speculation on how effective or necessary those attempts against a race of people were.
McConnell is not the only source to use these apologetics ("the attempts probably weren't successful"; "the Indians deserved it because of their barbaric warfare tactics"; "they were already catching the pox from many other sources, so the Fort Pitt incidents didn't matter"; "the militia at Fort Pitt didn't know enough about disease to pull off a successful bio-attack"; etc.), but current scholarship has overwhelmingly relegated these speculations to the minority-theory category, with some traced back to actual white-washing attempts. Adding in that sentence "to balance previous sentences", as one of your edit summaries stated, indicates a serious misreading of what the preponderance of reliable sources on the matter say. I hope that better explains my concerns. Regards, Xenophrenic (talk) 10:55, 4 February 2017 (UTC)
Agreed that the content is WP:UNDUE at the very least. --Iryna Harpy (talk) 23:59, 4 February 2017 (UTC)

Some information was removed from this article

The Noakhali Genocide was described in an earlier revision of this article, but all mentions of it were removed in this revision by User:Ruslik0. Why was this section removed from the article? Jarble (talk) 22:52, 10 February 2017 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 27 January 2017

1963- present. West Papuan genocide. 500,000 Melanesians killed or missing during Indonesia's colonisation of West Papua 110.22.216.191 (talk) 07:35, 27 January 2017 (UTC)

Not done: There is not enough mainstream scholarly discussion of this being 'genocide'. It is referred to as 'human rights abuses', oppression, etc. Until such a time as it is treated as a serious 'genocide' subject, referring to it as such is a significant departure from the prevailing views. Wikipedia relies on reliable sources, not personal opinion or original research. Iryna Harpy (talk) 09:19, 27 January 2017 (UTC)
@Iryna Harpy: Nonetheless, there is another article in Wikipedia that describes the conflict as a genocide, citing this report. Jarble (talk) 17:05, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
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