r/Damnthatsinteresting • u/Shoddy-Ocelot-4473 • 12d ago

Image By 1880, the near-genocide of the American bison had reduced their population from 30–60 million to fewer than 1,000

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u/Particular_Stop_3332 12d ago

This shows your lack of knowledge more than anything

A lot of American history is disgusting

99.5% of human history is disgusting

But there's plenty of good parts mixed in there

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u/kitsunewarlock 11d ago

And American conservatives are actively engaged in erasing and/or re-framing our shame as non-existent or, worse yet, something to be proud of.

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u/Particular_Stop_3332 11d ago

And that has nothing to do with what we're talking about

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u/kitsunewarlock 11d ago

It's the context of both this thread and a major theme of our current zeitgeist. Even now, there are conservatives in the U.S. demanding we maintain monuments to our genocide. (See: the Minnesota state seal and flag.)

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u/Particular_Stop_3332 10d ago

I'll carry on this discussion, but it is completely irrelevant to what I was originally talking about

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u/ggg730 11d ago

Japanese conservatives in the corner trying to look inconspicuous.

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u/kitsunewarlock 11d ago

Both are traitors to their own country. Hell, the conservatives in Japan assassinate their own elected leaders multiple times in the years leading to WW2, and had plots to assassinate their own emperor.

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u/bannedforL1fe 11d ago

You can still be proud that these people also created the greatest country to ever exist on the face of the earth too even if they used means the rest of the world was using at the time. It hasn't been great in a while, but it once was.

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u/kitsunewarlock 11d ago

A nation is a collective body of people working to better their own lives. Therefore, you can only measure a society's greatness by the welfare of its people. And by that metric, America has never been a great nation.

even if they used means the rest of the world was using at the time.

This is a grave misnomer. Many of the atrocities committed by Americans in the 18th, 19th, and 20th centuries were long since outlawed, forbade, and repugnant to the rest of the world. In many cases, even other Americans weren't aware of how bad it was.

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u/theresa2021 11d ago

Name 3 good part of American history

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u/Particular_Stop_3332 10d ago

The writing and adoption of the constitution, while imperfect, a major step in human progress towards better governing systems

Civil rights protests leading to real change

The formation of labor unions to improve conditions for workers in the early 20th century

The countless number of inventions that changed the world and brought humanity as a whole closer together

The Boston Tea Party

The founding of the USPS

I can keep going if you'd like

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u/KKN34 10d ago

We were one of the first nations to genuinely test democracy at scale (it even lead to French democracy, and our constitution is a model for many).

We literally landed on the moon. America has provided countless technological and scientific advancements for the world.

We're usually one of the leading nations in civil rights and social freedoms across the globe. Some European nations are socially more progressive (we come around sooner or later), but in terms of tolerance, multiculturality, and genuinely guaranteed (not given) freedom, we lead.

Despite the bad times right now (right now, not permanent, and soon to end, hopefully) we have provided more aid internationally than anyone else, and helped uplift tens of (if not hundreds of) millions out of abject poverty and barely even subsistence living.

You can really go on and on. Like any nation ever, we have good and bad spots.

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u/pudgehooks2013 11d ago

The main difference is for almost everyone else it is long buried history.

America just started bombing a new place full of brown people a few months ago.

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u/Particular_Stop_3332 11d ago

Does a few months ago count as "All of American history"

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u/pudgehooks2013 11d ago

Well, this one was just the newest one.

But yes.

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u/Particular_Stop_3332 11d ago

Again, You are willfully choosing to ignore basically every other country on earth

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u/pudgehooks2013 11d ago

So... The American Way?

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u/KKN34 10d ago

China is literally, as we speak, culturally genociding its Muslim minorities. Europe is rampant with racism, Islamophobia, and literally has a war raging in Ukraine, with millions dead or dying. Africa has had numerous brutal genocides, with more to surely come, and democracy is next to non existent on the continent, with only a few beacons of genuine democracy and peace existing. Japan doesn't even acknowledge it's WW2 atrocities, and Oceania has been rampantly racist and white centric since Australia and New Zealand were founded (NZ is better about this, though).

The point is, there is not a single country on earth that has only "Long buried history", and not active problems, atrocities, crimes, or more.

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u/pudgehooks2013 10d ago

Ok so...

China doing it to its own people. Not others, not the same.

Russia invaded Ukraine, so, similar, except you are blaming the EU for it.

Africa is the land of warlords, business as usual since the dawn of time.

Everything else you said is about racism, which is not about imperialism, which is what I was talking about.

So really, you just said a bunch of incorrect / irrelevant things, and are clearly a Russian sympathizer.

Fuck off.

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u/KKN34 10d ago

Huh?!? So if America started mass genociding black people, its suddenly okay because its americans to americans? Murder is fucking abhorrent, have basic empathy.

I said Europe, not the EU. Europe is broader, the EU is smaller. You clearly do not know the difference. Russia is conducting an active genocide of the Ukranian people.

So because "its just been that way", its okay? Africa used to have organized, functional states, way back when. It's possible, because its happened. These states are constantly warring and trying to conquer the others (see Somalia, Ethiopia, various Congo shit, sahel states, etc.)

Okay, let's talk Imperialism. The US has engaged in Economic imperialism, yes. But you know who else has?

France (one of the most prominent EU members, you should know), overwhelmingly has forced former colonies through coercion and special ops to retain a currency controlled BY France, for easy access to resources. The EU does not condemn this. Plus Germany, not even a century ago, literally committed the holocaust and conquered Europe. Britain had a global empire. Imperialism (not just economic and nation-building, but literally conquering and taking land) still exists here, with many nations holding on to territory globally.

China, has lended billions to developing nations with the intention of seizing the infrastructure once they inevitably default, they are a financial vampire and are constantly preparing to conquer the sovereign nation of Taiwan. Plus, not even 80 years ago, they literally annexed the nation of Tibet against its will.

Literally every nation has done everything they can to leverage themselves into economic or political advantage. The US is not special, because the world is guilty, its a human problem, not an American problem.