Recognizing the Native American Genocide Is Not a Threat

Guess what headline I just saw on the news? “Erdogan threatens to recognise killings of Native Americans as genocide in response to Armenia resolution.” Um. Yes. Yes, that was a genocide. And?

https://twitter.com/thekohler/status/1207176781364633600?s=20

The fact that Turkey’s president would see recognizing the Native American genocide for what it was as some sort of threat shows just wrongheaded he is on his own approach to his nation’s genocide of the Armenians. Recognizing a genocide your nation committed as a genocide isn’t a threat. Suggesting it is points to some sort of underlying insecurity. We can recognize that our nations’ pasts are imperfect—or even riddled with acts of evil—without our countries or societies imploding.

Good gracious, the U.S. has so, so many of these dark blots throughout our history. It’s not just the Native American genocide. It’s also slavery, and then Jim Crow. There are other things too, such as our nation’s decision to deny entry to Jews desperately trying to flee Europe during the 1930s, or the rounding up and imprisoning of Japanese Americans during WWII.

The United States government does not deny that these things happened. Historians freely research and write about these atrocities. Ordinary Americans like myself can to criticize our history, and our country.

In Turkey, this is not the case.

In Turkey, public debate on the issue has been stifled. Article 301 of the penal code, on “insulting Turkishness”, has been used to prosecute prominent writers who highlight the mass killings of Armenians.

This leaves me genuinely curious whether Erdogan knows how different things are in the United States—does he know that historians in the U.S. currently write about efforts to eliminate Native American peoples and culture as genocide?

It is true, there are massive battles within the U.S. over what children learn about U.S. history in K-12 public schools. I am not suggesting that our nation is perfect in its approach to its past. Far from it. Conservatives in particular frequently try to downplay the atrocities in our nation’s past, as though they can wish them away by ignoring or denying them.

But we as ordinary people are allowed to criticize our government’s past actions without fear of reprisal—and so are historians. Writing about the Native American genocide as it was is not taboo. It is widespread. In the United States, we have the ability to look at our past—and our nation’s past mistakes—with open eyes and without fear of reprisal. Erdogan’s comments remind me of how rare—and precious—that is.

I am suddenly deeply grateful for our nation and our Bill of Rights.

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