I mostly agree with your post. That said I would like to sound two notes of caution. I think given the frequent history of forced assimilation and persecution in many societies, in at least a few countries such rights can serve as useful safeguards against such things, although obviously in a lot of countries like the United States, this isn’t a realistic concern. Also, as somebody else noted, complicating the picture is the fact that often a lot of the people who receive such rights genuinely do seem to want them which could be because of foolish ethnic sentiments. But we should probably give at least a little wait to these desires, even if not as much weight as we give their other preferences, and this preference for self-governance might be an indication in some cases that there are important considerations that we are missing because of seeing like a state reasons, and these people might genuinely be better off in some way. Also in some societies, people care about the issue so much that interfering with such rights is going to lead to blood in the streets. Although obviously that’s not a concern in America.
I think a lot of this is right, but none of it is specific to the concept of indigeneity! Minorities of all stripes face forced assimilation and persecution—I think they all should have access to basic human rights, but don't see why that necessitates control of traditional, ancestral lands and the right to form their own systems of justice and education. Often, those systems end up respecting individual rights far less than the state's own do!
Yup, I agree that being indigenous people should not give rights in itself. I just think the specific rights they receive wood in a lot of instances be at least partially justified. I agree that minority ethnicities having their own systems of education and justice will often result in systems that are worse than the alternative. But this is somewhat countered by the fact that they are aware of cultural realities on the ground, which the larger state might be unaware of or at least bad at taking into account. I have a prior that if the Justice system is too out of sync with the cultural norms of the society, it will not be very effective and the society will start avoiding the normal justice system and develop its own grassroots alternatives.
Also, it’s notable that almost all multi ethnic societies in history where assimilation has not taken place effectively granted a lot of autonomy to different ethnicities and cultural groups. In my own India, for example, linguistic and ethnic considerations are an important part of how the boundaries of states were decided. In general people throughout history seem to have a very strong preference for being ruled by people in their own cultural group and given its universality throughout history. I am inclined to suspect that there are hidden costs to disregarding this preference, even apart from the fact that people try to bring a lot of pressure in support of these demands. Do be clear. I’m not arguing that cultural and ethnic minorities that have not been assimilated should always receive self-governance rights. I am just noting some considerations in favour of granting such rights. I agree with you that in a lot of cases, it’s not worth while to grant these rights, hence why I said I mostly agree with your post. My exact position is that in some cases it’s worthwhile to grant such rights or at least watered down versions of some of them. Although even then I dislike a lot of specific implementations. In a lot of other cases it is in fact not worthwhile to do so.
> if anything, made much worse off by their isolation from liberal, multicultural, mainstream American society.
My understanding is that lots of indigenous people and indigenous rights groups think they're better off by other metrics, ones they care about more. For instance, they might care about sovereignty, or not having mainstream American culture competing with traditional indigenous culture. For some people, it might even be about the literal geographical location - they've designated some sites as sacred to indigenous people, and want unfettered access to them. (This is why there was so much fracas over oil companies wanting to run a pipeline through the land.) And it seems like lots of indigenous people genuinely value these things over higher SAT scores, or the other benefits of mainstream American society. Isn't there a sense in which we should let them decide what they want? We let people smoke because we think it's OK for people to choose to trade health for pleasure. Why not let people trade education (or whatever) for, say, a sense of sovereignty?
Put simply: a lot of people want a lot of things. Sometimes those things conflict—oil companies want to build and southerners want cheap energy and natives want their land unperturbed. It's tough to see why indigeneity makes one concern more important than any other.
Further, when indigenous groups "desire" sovereignty / the preservation of their culture, this isn't necessarily so pure. Sovereignty actually means the power to coerce individuals in one way or another—if a tribe is going to use that power inappropriately, then the individual concerns are clearly more important than the concerns of the leaders!
Smoking is a good analogue here—yeah, you can smoke, but you can't do it in a school area! The kids will be harmed, and we don't want the kids to be harmed. Similarly, yeah, you can want your own education system—but the kids should learn math, and we don't want the kids not to learn math.
Btw I think the Irgun and Lehi are actually great examples of the stupidity of “indigenity” movements, attacking the British because they’re “colonialist”. Yes Jews including Ashkenazim are indigenous to Israel and the British are not and all of that sure. That doesn’t justify the anti British violence though. I’m a Zionist but of the Churchillian bent.
“For example, my mom and dad are both Jews from Eastern Europe—that means we’ve got a lot of Polish ancestry, and a lot of Russian, and plenty of Semitic. So are we indigenous to Israel? Or to Minsk? Does that entitle us to the land? Does it entitle us less than it would an uber-Mediterranean Mizrahi Jew or a purebred blonde Belarusian?”
Not exactly. Ashkenazi Jews have only about 10% Eastern Euro type ancestry. The rest is evenly split between Israelites and Italian converts. So a little Minsk, but mostly Jerusalem and Rome.
I mostly agree with your post. That said I would like to sound two notes of caution. I think given the frequent history of forced assimilation and persecution in many societies, in at least a few countries such rights can serve as useful safeguards against such things, although obviously in a lot of countries like the United States, this isn’t a realistic concern. Also, as somebody else noted, complicating the picture is the fact that often a lot of the people who receive such rights genuinely do seem to want them which could be because of foolish ethnic sentiments. But we should probably give at least a little wait to these desires, even if not as much weight as we give their other preferences, and this preference for self-governance might be an indication in some cases that there are important considerations that we are missing because of seeing like a state reasons, and these people might genuinely be better off in some way. Also in some societies, people care about the issue so much that interfering with such rights is going to lead to blood in the streets. Although obviously that’s not a concern in America.
I think a lot of this is right, but none of it is specific to the concept of indigeneity! Minorities of all stripes face forced assimilation and persecution—I think they all should have access to basic human rights, but don't see why that necessitates control of traditional, ancestral lands and the right to form their own systems of justice and education. Often, those systems end up respecting individual rights far less than the state's own do!
Yup, I agree that being indigenous people should not give rights in itself. I just think the specific rights they receive wood in a lot of instances be at least partially justified. I agree that minority ethnicities having their own systems of education and justice will often result in systems that are worse than the alternative. But this is somewhat countered by the fact that they are aware of cultural realities on the ground, which the larger state might be unaware of or at least bad at taking into account. I have a prior that if the Justice system is too out of sync with the cultural norms of the society, it will not be very effective and the society will start avoiding the normal justice system and develop its own grassroots alternatives.
Also, it’s notable that almost all multi ethnic societies in history where assimilation has not taken place effectively granted a lot of autonomy to different ethnicities and cultural groups. In my own India, for example, linguistic and ethnic considerations are an important part of how the boundaries of states were decided. In general people throughout history seem to have a very strong preference for being ruled by people in their own cultural group and given its universality throughout history. I am inclined to suspect that there are hidden costs to disregarding this preference, even apart from the fact that people try to bring a lot of pressure in support of these demands. Do be clear. I’m not arguing that cultural and ethnic minorities that have not been assimilated should always receive self-governance rights. I am just noting some considerations in favour of granting such rights. I agree with you that in a lot of cases, it’s not worth while to grant these rights, hence why I said I mostly agree with your post. My exact position is that in some cases it’s worthwhile to grant such rights or at least watered down versions of some of them. Although even then I dislike a lot of specific implementations. In a lot of other cases it is in fact not worthwhile to do so.
> if anything, made much worse off by their isolation from liberal, multicultural, mainstream American society.
My understanding is that lots of indigenous people and indigenous rights groups think they're better off by other metrics, ones they care about more. For instance, they might care about sovereignty, or not having mainstream American culture competing with traditional indigenous culture. For some people, it might even be about the literal geographical location - they've designated some sites as sacred to indigenous people, and want unfettered access to them. (This is why there was so much fracas over oil companies wanting to run a pipeline through the land.) And it seems like lots of indigenous people genuinely value these things over higher SAT scores, or the other benefits of mainstream American society. Isn't there a sense in which we should let them decide what they want? We let people smoke because we think it's OK for people to choose to trade health for pleasure. Why not let people trade education (or whatever) for, say, a sense of sovereignty?
Put simply: a lot of people want a lot of things. Sometimes those things conflict—oil companies want to build and southerners want cheap energy and natives want their land unperturbed. It's tough to see why indigeneity makes one concern more important than any other.
Further, when indigenous groups "desire" sovereignty / the preservation of their culture, this isn't necessarily so pure. Sovereignty actually means the power to coerce individuals in one way or another—if a tribe is going to use that power inappropriately, then the individual concerns are clearly more important than the concerns of the leaders!
Smoking is a good analogue here—yeah, you can smoke, but you can't do it in a school area! The kids will be harmed, and we don't want the kids to be harmed. Similarly, yeah, you can want your own education system—but the kids should learn math, and we don't want the kids not to learn math.
Btw I think the Irgun and Lehi are actually great examples of the stupidity of “indigenity” movements, attacking the British because they’re “colonialist”. Yes Jews including Ashkenazim are indigenous to Israel and the British are not and all of that sure. That doesn’t justify the anti British violence though. I’m a Zionist but of the Churchillian bent.
“For example, my mom and dad are both Jews from Eastern Europe—that means we’ve got a lot of Polish ancestry, and a lot of Russian, and plenty of Semitic. So are we indigenous to Israel? Or to Minsk? Does that entitle us to the land? Does it entitle us less than it would an uber-Mediterranean Mizrahi Jew or a purebred blonde Belarusian?”
Not exactly. Ashkenazi Jews have only about 10% Eastern Euro type ancestry. The rest is evenly split between Israelites and Italian converts. So a little Minsk, but mostly Jerusalem and Rome.
Even better, the Italians have cooler churches.
Jerusalem has a nice church too - the Holy Sepulchre.
Appreciate the kind words! (Also agree with what you say)
I think you mean 'What About the Good Ol’ US *of* A?', not "US and A"? Or do people say that too
Borat reference https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xrTbsefI7aA