WEBVTT - Part One: Ancient Genocide and the War on Carthage 0:00:01.560 --> 0:00:04.400 Hey everybody. Robert Evans here and for the last two years, 0:00:04.400 --> 0:00:07.840 Behind the Bastards listeners have funded the Portland Diaper Bank, 0:00:07.920 --> 0:00:12.320 which provides diapers for low income families. Uh. Last year 0:00:12.480 --> 0:00:15.560 y'all raised more than twenty one thousand dollars, which was 0:00:15.600 --> 0:00:18.520 able to purchase one point one million diapers for children 0:00:18.560 --> 0:00:22.439 and families in need in one um. And this year 0:00:22.440 --> 0:00:26.439 we're trying to get dollars raised for the Portland Diaper Bank, 0:00:27.240 --> 0:00:30.280 which is going to allow us to help even more kids. 0:00:30.760 --> 0:00:32.839 So UM, if you want to help, you can go 0:00:32.960 --> 0:00:36.400 to bTB fundraiser for pd X Diaper Bank at go 0:00:36.520 --> 0:00:38.920 fund me. Just type and go fund me b TB 0:00:39.080 --> 0:00:42.120 Fundraiser for PDX Diaper Bank. Again, that's go fund Me 0:00:42.240 --> 0:00:45.680 bTB Fundraiser for PDX Diaper Bank, or find the link 0:00:45.720 --> 0:00:50.120 in the show notes. Thank you all. Let's go. Let's 0:00:50.159 --> 0:00:55.480 start the podcast, So get off, let's move it. Robert, Sophie, 0:00:55.840 --> 0:01:01.720 Robert Sophie, Robert Sophie, evens Toma Robert. This is Behind 0:01:01.800 --> 0:01:09.120 the Bastards. It's a podcast. Hello Joe, I'm glad to 0:01:09.160 --> 0:01:12.560 be on the podcast. This is the podcast of Behind 0:01:12.600 --> 0:01:15.399 the Bastards where we talk about bad people, and today 0:01:15.400 --> 0:01:19.840 we're talking about the worst people broadly speaking, in the 0:01:19.880 --> 0:01:23.400 world in history, which are collectively all of the people 0:01:23.400 --> 0:01:29.240 who have participated in are directly enabled genocide. Um yea 0:01:29.720 --> 0:01:32.160 more to the point, Joe, we're talking. There was an 0:01:32.160 --> 0:01:35.399 episode of our sister podcast it could happen here. Maybe 0:01:35.400 --> 0:01:41.040 cousin podcast is more accurate. Um, maybe behind the Bastards 0:01:41.080 --> 0:01:43.320 is like the uncle. I don't know, I don't depending 0:01:43.360 --> 0:01:47.039 on what state you're from, that's all of those things. 0:01:47.040 --> 0:01:52.400 Behind the Bastards is the uncle by marriage could happen here. Yeah, 0:01:52.440 --> 0:01:54.800 that sounds right anyway. I made a comment about the 0:01:54.840 --> 0:01:57.560 fact that because we were talking about anarchism and stuff 0:01:57.600 --> 0:02:00.840 and and what kind of things the state makes possible 0:02:00.840 --> 0:02:02.360 in what kind of things are just human nature? And 0:02:02.360 --> 0:02:05.960 I made a comment that like, genocide is not something 0:02:06.000 --> 0:02:08.120 you need a state or like a nation for. It's 0:02:08.160 --> 0:02:10.520 just like a thing that people have always done, and 0:02:10.560 --> 0:02:12.919 that basically, as long as we have evidence of people 0:02:13.040 --> 0:02:17.080 organizing in any capacity, we have evidence of genocide. And 0:02:17.200 --> 0:02:19.560 um some folks got upset about that. There were some 0:02:19.600 --> 0:02:21.600 people who really questioned that, and because I had not 0:02:21.680 --> 0:02:24.520 actually provided any kind of evidence, it's understandable that people 0:02:24.520 --> 0:02:26.519 will be like, because it is. It is difficult, I 0:02:26.560 --> 0:02:28.799 think if you haven't thought about this, to imagine like 0:02:29.200 --> 0:02:34.200 prehistoric human beings engaging in organized genocide. Um, but they 0:02:34.280 --> 0:02:39.679 totally did. Yeah, I think it's something that I mean, 0:02:39.840 --> 0:02:43.760 of course, having an organized state certainly will make that easier. 0:02:43.960 --> 0:02:47.760 It does help. Yes, I think it's something we're like. 0:02:48.040 --> 0:02:51.680 I'm a I'm a grad student in holocaust and genocide studies, um, 0:02:51.840 --> 0:02:56.919 and I I think it's something that people can get 0:02:56.919 --> 0:02:59.720 lodged in their head. Is when they see or hear 0:02:59.840 --> 0:03:02.840 the were genocide, they immediately think of like death camps 0:03:02.840 --> 0:03:06.440 and things like that, which of course wouldn't happen without 0:03:06.520 --> 0:03:10.080 a state structure, right, I mean you would imagine. So 0:03:10.560 --> 0:03:12.640 I think it might be best, honestly, like, given the 0:03:12.639 --> 0:03:14.200 fact that we are recording this the week of the 0:03:14.320 --> 0:03:16.400 Valdi shootings, it might be best to think about this 0:03:16.880 --> 0:03:20.399 the way it's reasonable to think about mass killings where um, 0:03:21.160 --> 0:03:24.440 there whether or not guns are available, there will absolutely 0:03:24.440 --> 0:03:27.160 be mass killings and a wide variety of societies. And 0:03:27.200 --> 0:03:29.280 the evidence for this is that many societies where guns 0:03:29.280 --> 0:03:32.320 are not available have mass killings. The easy availability of 0:03:32.360 --> 0:03:34.840 guns does mean those killings you're number one, more frequent. 0:03:34.960 --> 0:03:38.600 Number two tend to kill more people. Um, not always, 0:03:38.680 --> 0:03:41.600 but generally speaking. And it's the same thing with like genocide. 0:03:41.640 --> 0:03:44.760 Genocide prior to the state existed, but you can get 0:03:44.800 --> 0:03:47.000 a lot nastier with it when you have the apparatus 0:03:47.040 --> 0:03:50.360 of a centralized state. Of course. It's it's like, um, 0:03:50.400 --> 0:03:54.040 why World War One was so horrific. Um, you know, 0:03:54.160 --> 0:03:59.680 we we revolutionize the mechanisms of mass murder to to 0:04:00.120 --> 0:04:03.360 this human meat. It's it's not like the wars that 0:04:03.400 --> 0:04:06.960 happened before then. We're not as horrific in their day. 0:04:07.040 --> 0:04:10.960 We just we just continued to surpass our previous human 0:04:10.960 --> 0:04:14.360 records with their own violence. Yeah. Anyway, we're doing Genocide 0:04:14.360 --> 0:04:17.440 Week this week. Joe Joe Casabian, co host of The 0:04:17.480 --> 0:04:22.800 Lions Led by Donkeys podcast. Um, and you are also uh, 0:04:22.960 --> 0:04:28.279 like uh an academic on an academic capacity specialized in genocide. 0:04:28.279 --> 0:04:30.680 Like you've got a grad degree and ship, unlike me 0:04:30.720 --> 0:04:33.839 who just reads books about UM. So you have a 0:04:33.839 --> 0:04:37.040 degree of like formal knowledge here. Uh that is is 0:04:37.720 --> 0:04:40.240 beyond certainly like what I have in this area, which 0:04:40.279 --> 0:04:41.800 I think I hope will be hopeful because we'll be 0:04:41.800 --> 0:04:45.240 getting into this kind of meandered a bit in episode one. 0:04:45.240 --> 0:04:47.680 We will primarily be talking about kind of the prehistoric 0:04:47.760 --> 0:04:50.360 roots of genocide and then sort of the first what 0:04:50.360 --> 0:04:52.440 what what what? At least one scholar will argues like 0:04:52.440 --> 0:04:56.960 the first documented genocide UM in in history. And after 0:04:57.000 --> 0:04:59.360 that we're going to be talking more about what makes 0:04:59.360 --> 0:05:02.840 people cape of committing genocide, like what's actually going on 0:05:02.960 --> 0:05:06.159 that that pushes people to it? Because um, some of 0:05:06.160 --> 0:05:10.000 this is just based on my continual frustration of the 0:05:10.040 --> 0:05:13.560 description of like, you know, the perpetrators of the Holocaust 0:05:13.640 --> 0:05:15.920 is like being brainwashed or taken over by a mania. 0:05:15.960 --> 0:05:18.160 That's generally not what happens. But we're getting ahead of 0:05:18.200 --> 0:05:21.560 ourselves here. Yeah, yeah, oh, I love that argument. It's 0:05:21.600 --> 0:05:24.000 it's it's one of my favorites. We we will be 0:05:24.080 --> 0:05:26.400 chatting about that in part too, But right now, I 0:05:26.400 --> 0:05:30.240 want to talk about probably the earliest evidence that exists 0:05:30.240 --> 0:05:32.960 in history of an act of genocide UM. It was 0:05:33.040 --> 0:05:36.279 discovered on the banks of Kenya's Lake Turkana in two 0:05:36.279 --> 0:05:39.760 thousand twelve. It is a mass grave, one which dates 0:05:39.800 --> 0:05:42.800 back roughly ten thousand years to about eight thousand BC. 0:05:43.680 --> 0:05:46.159 It is filled with women, children, and men, both young 0:05:46.200 --> 0:05:49.160 and old. Some of them had school shattered by blunt weapons. 0:05:49.440 --> 0:05:52.560 Others had been repeatedly pierced by some form of projectile. 0:05:53.040 --> 0:05:56.279 One woman was a pregnant woman who appeared to have 0:05:56.360 --> 0:06:00.680 her hands bound and have been beaten before her execution. Um. 0:06:00.720 --> 0:06:03.240 It looks very much like mass graves you would find 0:06:03.440 --> 0:06:06.480 from basically every act of genocide ever committed sense right, 0:06:06.560 --> 0:06:09.880 including people with their hands bound who were executed. UM, 0:06:09.920 --> 0:06:12.600 particularly like women and children who were executed with their 0:06:12.640 --> 0:06:16.520 hands bound. Uh. Marta Mirazon Lar of the University of 0:06:16.560 --> 0:06:20.520 Cambridge notes that the injuries discovered quote shocked for their mercilessness, 0:06:20.560 --> 0:06:22.720 but that quote what we see at the prehistoric side 0:06:22.720 --> 0:06:24.880 of Nataruk is no different from the fight's wars and 0:06:24.920 --> 0:06:28.479 conquests that shaped so much of our history. And again, 0:06:28.520 --> 0:06:30.440 what's interesting to me kind of in the context of 0:06:30.839 --> 0:06:33.960 where this line of thoughts started for for us and 0:06:34.000 --> 0:06:37.200 the comments I added another podcast, is that this is 0:06:37.440 --> 0:06:40.440 this occurs pre the development of anything we would recognize 0:06:40.440 --> 0:06:42.720 as a state really anywhere in the world. This is 0:06:42.760 --> 0:06:46.280 like eight thousand eight BC is roughly when this is 0:06:46.320 --> 0:06:49.839 thought to have when the killings that these graves were 0:06:50.320 --> 0:06:53.599 resulted or resulted from we're thought to have occurred depending 0:06:53.640 --> 0:06:56.280 on you know, there's some wiggle room as to win 0:06:56.400 --> 0:06:58.560 the first state arose, right, none of these like thea 0:06:58.960 --> 0:07:05.200 exact but broadly speaking somewhere around in Mesopotamia in Egypt, 0:07:05.240 --> 0:07:08.440 like in that kind of ballpark is when we get 0:07:08.440 --> 0:07:11.280 our first like city and you know how much you 0:07:11.880 --> 0:07:14.040 how much you kind of draw line to the first 0:07:14.040 --> 0:07:16.120 city and like whether you con consider that like a 0:07:16.160 --> 0:07:18.520 proper state is also a little bit because none of this, 0:07:18.800 --> 0:07:20.320 like they didn't just pick a day to be like, 0:07:20.360 --> 0:07:23.520 well now we have states, now human beings existing states, right, 0:07:23.880 --> 0:07:26.680 people started like living. You know, this all occurred kind 0:07:26.680 --> 0:07:31.600 of gradually. Um, So precision isn't possible. But these were 0:07:31.640 --> 0:07:35.640 definitely whatever happened in that mass graven lake Turkana was 0:07:35.680 --> 0:07:39.240 not organized by anything we would recognize as like a 0:07:39.280 --> 0:07:42.880 mass political entity that calls itself a nation, right like 0:07:42.920 --> 0:07:46.520 that that was not a factor in this. Um. People 0:07:46.520 --> 0:07:49.120 weren't doing that yet. Um. The people's of that part 0:07:49.120 --> 0:07:52.160 of Kenya and roughly eight thousand BC were hunter gatherers, 0:07:52.680 --> 0:07:55.040 or to be more specific, they were actually fisher foragers, 0:07:55.120 --> 0:07:57.640 not really like hunting in a big deal, because again 0:07:57.640 --> 0:08:00.280 there's it was a wet area at this point. It's 0:08:00.360 --> 0:08:03.440 very dry today, but it was there were a lot 0:08:03.480 --> 0:08:06.440 of like lakes and rivers that no longer exist in 0:08:06.480 --> 0:08:09.800 the area UM Today. The individuals who lived there and 0:08:09.840 --> 0:08:12.240 who were found in that mass grave are known as 0:08:12.240 --> 0:08:15.200 the natar Uk people UM, and they're believed to have 0:08:15.320 --> 0:08:17.960 roamed and made connections as far afield as the Nile 0:08:18.080 --> 0:08:21.520 Valley and the Maghreb Uh. It's worth noting that in 0:08:21.560 --> 0:08:23.960 the period they were killed, the Sahara was green. It 0:08:24.040 --> 0:08:26.200 was not yet a desert. For an example, like how 0:08:26.320 --> 0:08:29.600 fucking old this is? Like you could you could grow 0:08:29.680 --> 0:08:34.440 things in the Sahara UM. So yeah. Um. This also 0:08:34.480 --> 0:08:37.120 probably made travel simpler, which is why folks who were 0:08:37.160 --> 0:08:40.000 far away could make it to natar Uck Um. Now, 0:08:40.040 --> 0:08:42.400 we don't know who committed the massacre of these people, 0:08:42.840 --> 0:08:45.440 but as this right up from the Smithsonian magazine makes clear, 0:08:45.480 --> 0:08:48.840 it was done with great intention. The remains were submerged 0:08:48.840 --> 0:08:52.160 in a lagoon after they were killed, which helped preserve 0:08:52.200 --> 0:08:54.200 them and may suggest that the people who killed them 0:08:54.240 --> 0:08:56.600 wanted to hide what they had done. Um. You know, 0:08:56.679 --> 0:08:59.600 maybe there was some ritual thing there. We don't really know, um, 0:08:59.640 --> 0:09:01.800 but it don't looked like other graves that had been 0:09:01.840 --> 0:09:04.920 found in the area at the time. Hide from who, 0:09:05.360 --> 0:09:09.680 yeah exactly quote uh, it's not clear that anyone was 0:09:09.720 --> 0:09:11.679 spared at the not A Rock massacre. Of the twenty 0:09:11.720 --> 0:09:14.160 seven individuals found, eight were male and eight female, with 0:09:14.200 --> 0:09:17.040 five adults of unknown gender. The site also contained the 0:09:17.040 --> 0:09:19.720 partial remains of six children. Twelve of the skeletons were 0:09:19.720 --> 0:09:22.520 in a relatively complete state. Ten of those showed very 0:09:22.520 --> 0:09:25.400 clear evidence that they had met a violent end. Um. 0:09:25.559 --> 0:09:28.560 In the paper, the researchers described quote extreme blunt force, 0:09:28.600 --> 0:09:31.640 trauma to crania and cheekbones, broken hands, knees and ribs, 0:09:31.720 --> 0:09:34.480 arrow allegiance to the neck, and stone projectile tips lodged 0:09:34.480 --> 0:09:37.199 in the skull and thorax of two men. Four of them, 0:09:37.240 --> 0:09:39.360 including a late term pregnant women, appear to have had 0:09:39.360 --> 0:09:42.920 their hands bound. Um. It's noted by the archaeologists that 0:09:42.960 --> 0:09:45.440 the killers carried weapons that would not have been used 0:09:45.440 --> 0:09:48.559 for hunting and fishing, so that this was These were 0:09:48.559 --> 0:09:50.720 not people like using kind of the tools that they 0:09:50.760 --> 0:09:53.040 used for other stuff for violence. These were people who 0:09:53.080 --> 0:09:57.480 brought special things meant to kill human beings UM. Mirazon 0:09:57.600 --> 0:10:00.600 Lar notes that there were a number of like close 0:10:00.600 --> 0:10:04.040 proximity weapons like knives UM, and that this is kind 0:10:04.040 --> 0:10:06.960 of a hallmark of intergroup conflict, as was the brutality 0:10:06.960 --> 0:10:10.840 of the killings right um like it suggests a degree 0:10:10.880 --> 0:10:15.280 of like uh ferocity UM. The use of these weapons, 0:10:15.320 --> 0:10:18.760 Laar notes also suggests premeditation and planning. She goes on 0:10:18.800 --> 0:10:21.400 to suggest that given the resources employed, the people of 0:10:21.440 --> 0:10:24.800 Natarup were likely massacred for their own resources. Right. This 0:10:24.880 --> 0:10:26.920 was not like a simple thing for people in this 0:10:26.960 --> 0:10:29.560 period to get together the kind of equipment they used 0:10:29.559 --> 0:10:33.040 for this. UM, Yeah, I was gonna I was gonna 0:10:33.080 --> 0:10:37.080 say that tracks. Um. What's unique is even in situations 0:10:37.120 --> 0:10:39.560 where and we'll we'll talk about this more. I'm sure 0:10:39.600 --> 0:10:42.880 when we get the perpetrators and there and their motivations 0:10:43.000 --> 0:10:48.559 is um, even mass atrocity crimes or mass murders UM 0:10:49.320 --> 0:10:54.280 are are done. Is normally like women and children are taken, 0:10:54.480 --> 0:10:58.079 especially during this time period for very obvious reasons. I 0:10:58.120 --> 0:11:01.679 won't go into UM. And the men are killed because 0:11:01.760 --> 0:11:04.720 with the men is the identity of of of the area. 0:11:04.760 --> 0:11:07.000 But the reason why you're killing them is to take 0:11:07.040 --> 0:11:10.440 their ship. Yes, so that all that all makes perfect 0:11:10.440 --> 0:11:13.800 sense to me in my very very broken mind. Yeah. Yeah, 0:11:13.920 --> 0:11:15.920 but but it does, like I think the thing that's 0:11:16.000 --> 0:11:18.679 like this is not this does not look purely like 0:11:18.880 --> 0:11:20.760 you have two groups who have like a like a 0:11:20.840 --> 0:11:23.920 conflict over over something like this is there's a lot 0:11:23.960 --> 0:11:26.760 of evidence of that kind of violence, and it does 0:11:26.760 --> 0:11:29.120 not look quite like this. Like there's a reason why 0:11:29.160 --> 0:11:31.560 this is noted as different. Again, the killing of like 0:11:31.600 --> 0:11:35.160 women and and and children, pregnant people, the fact that 0:11:35.200 --> 0:11:37.800 like they were kids, like people were bound and executed, 0:11:37.840 --> 0:11:41.320 that all looks um again, just like it's it's more 0:11:41.320 --> 0:11:44.040 complete than the kind of violence that is, I guess 0:11:44.040 --> 0:11:47.120 you'd say, more normal around people in between people in 0:11:47.120 --> 0:11:51.120 this period. Even if you measure that against you know, 0:11:51.200 --> 0:11:55.680 the definitions would come however, many thousands of years later. 0:11:57.240 --> 0:12:00.200 That that hits it to a t. Yeah, yeah, And 0:12:00.200 --> 0:12:02.520 that that's the point that like Mirizon Lar makes is 0:12:02.559 --> 0:12:05.600 that um, her exact quote is this shows that two 0:12:05.600 --> 0:12:08.840 of the conditions associated with warfare among settled societies, control 0:12:08.880 --> 0:12:12.400 of territory and resources, were probably the same for hunter gathers, 0:12:12.400 --> 0:12:14.959 and that we have underestimated their role in prehistory. Again, 0:12:15.040 --> 0:12:20.600 just the idea that like genocide uh goes back quite 0:12:20.600 --> 0:12:22.000 a bit. And that also, I mean one of the 0:12:22.040 --> 0:12:25.160 things that it is worth noting too, because when we 0:12:25.200 --> 0:12:28.240 think about genocide in a modern context, it's always nearly 0:12:28.280 --> 0:12:31.720 always framed as motivated by racism um. And it's like, 0:12:31.760 --> 0:12:35.439 obviously racism has played a significant role in many genocides, um, 0:12:35.520 --> 0:12:38.560 but just as as significant a role as pure venal greed, 0:12:38.880 --> 0:12:40.680 which we'll be talking about more in Part two. But 0:12:40.800 --> 0:12:43.120 like people want ship and that's a big part of 0:12:43.160 --> 0:12:45.800 why they do a genocide, and it's that goes back 0:12:45.840 --> 0:12:50.360 further than states UM. Obviously. I think one of the 0:12:50.400 --> 0:12:53.640 things that's I kind of thought about reading about this 0:12:53.679 --> 0:12:56.880 case is the mass graves recently uncovered parts of Ukraine, 0:12:56.880 --> 0:12:59.679 like Buka, and the fact that the killing of civilians 0:12:59.679 --> 0:13:01.640 who's hands were bound like that was one of the 0:13:01.679 --> 0:13:03.920 things that I thought of those pictures I saw of 0:13:04.040 --> 0:13:06.480 like corpses on the road with their hands bound, and 0:13:06.520 --> 0:13:08.480 then ten thousand years ago you have dead people with 0:13:08.520 --> 0:13:11.559 their hands bound in a mass grave outside of lake 0:13:11.600 --> 0:13:15.439 in Kenya. UM. These archaeologists saying it was probably because 0:13:15.440 --> 0:13:19.240 they wanted resources, and the Russian soldiers in buccus stealing 0:13:19.280 --> 0:13:22.160 every luxury item that that isn't nailed down, you know, 0:13:22.320 --> 0:13:26.839 like this is uh what people do. Yeah, specifically it's 0:13:26.920 --> 0:13:32.280 what I mean, especially in Kenya, it's extra state forces 0:13:32.400 --> 0:13:36.640 or I guess paramilitary forces, tribal military forces. Yeah, I 0:13:36.679 --> 0:13:39.800 mean it's still happening. And with the Boko Haramas, I 0:13:39.800 --> 0:13:44.640 think it's yeah, yeah, yeah, um, yeah, people are pretty consistent. 0:13:45.000 --> 0:13:51.240 You gotta give us that, um, unfortunately painfully depressingly consistent. Yeah. Yeah. 0:13:51.280 --> 0:13:53.520 And obviously I think there's some people who might have 0:13:53.559 --> 0:13:57.560 some objections here. Um, because nobody doubts that ancient folks 0:13:57.880 --> 0:14:03.000 murdered each other in war. Um, that's pretty pretty widely accepted. 0:14:03.040 --> 0:14:06.080 But we consider genocide to be kind of going beyond that. 0:14:06.360 --> 0:14:08.679 You know, every king or warlord who like killed a 0:14:08.720 --> 0:14:14.280 shipload of people isn't necessarily considered like a committer of genocide. 0:14:14.320 --> 0:14:16.000 I think there's even a lot of debate about like 0:14:16.040 --> 0:14:18.280 whether or not you would consider like Genghis Khan like 0:14:18.440 --> 0:14:20.440 is a lot like it's the sacking of a city 0:14:20.480 --> 0:14:22.880 for the purposes he did the same as like the 0:14:22.920 --> 0:14:26.520 extermination of a of a race, and that's a that's 0:14:26.520 --> 0:14:28.040 a debatable point. So I think if we're gonna have 0:14:28.080 --> 0:14:31.600 a productive point productive talk about like genocide in an 0:14:31.640 --> 0:14:33.840 ancient context, we're gonna need to leap forward a bit 0:14:33.880 --> 0:14:37.440 to something that you, uh, spoilered a little bit. Spoiler 0:14:37.480 --> 0:14:41.400 is the wrong term for this, um, the definition of genocide. 0:14:42.600 --> 0:14:48.840 Spoiler alerts spoiler exactly. Yeah, that's yeah, that's He's the 0:14:49.000 --> 0:14:51.880 He's the single man with whom that word has its 0:14:51.960 --> 0:14:56.800 like linguistic origins. Um Limpcoln was a Holocaust survivor Um 0:14:57.160 --> 0:15:01.200 and he was an extremely delicated, dead cated, an intelligent man, 0:15:01.240 --> 0:15:04.720 and his crusade too to start what became like not 0:15:04.840 --> 0:15:07.400 just the concept of genocide as like a legal term, 0:15:07.440 --> 0:15:11.640 but the the Genocide Convention actually started way before the 0:15:11.680 --> 0:15:14.480 Holocaust got going in nineteen thirty three, which is like 0:15:14.520 --> 0:15:18.080 the year the Nazis took power. So Lincoln, like I 0:15:18.240 --> 0:15:20.520 was aware of what was coming, you know, like he was, 0:15:21.120 --> 0:15:24.680 I mean he he had actually started his research about 0:15:24.720 --> 0:15:27.040 two decades before then. He was in law school, I 0:15:27.080 --> 0:15:31.480 believe the same in Poland, Um, when the the trial 0:15:31.840 --> 0:15:36.360 of Sagamantelerian was going on in Berlin. Yeah, to Leirian 0:15:36.480 --> 0:15:40.240 being the Turkish or no the Tolerian being the Armenian 0:15:40.280 --> 0:15:43.440 who assassinated one of the Turkish officials who was responsible 0:15:43.440 --> 0:15:46.920 for organizing the Armenian genocide. Yeah, he shot Talat Pasha 0:15:46.920 --> 0:15:50.800 and broad daylight in Berlin, UM with the sole purpose 0:15:50.840 --> 0:15:53.040 of going on trial admitting that he killed him and 0:15:53.160 --> 0:15:55.640 using it as a pulpit to talk about the genocide, 0:15:55.880 --> 0:15:59.800 which he successfully did day with Yeah, he's a cool dude. 0:16:00.280 --> 0:16:04.560 Yeah he rocks. Yeah. UM and Lemkin was watching this 0:16:04.640 --> 0:16:07.280 on well, reading it unfolding the newspaper, and he asked 0:16:07.280 --> 0:16:10.600 one of his professors, like, how a state could get 0:16:10.640 --> 0:16:14.320 away with doing this? Um? And why isn't more Turkish 0:16:14.320 --> 0:16:16.920 authorities on trial because none of them would ever stand trial. Uh. 0:16:16.960 --> 0:16:20.600 And his and his professor effectively believe in the in 0:16:20.640 --> 0:16:23.720 the sovereign idea that a sovereign could do with its 0:16:23.760 --> 0:16:25.880 people as they pleased and it wasn't any other states 0:16:25.920 --> 0:16:30.080 to tell them what to do. Um. And he immediately believed, 0:16:30.080 --> 0:16:33.920 I believe this is a nineteen something like that. He's like, 0:16:34.360 --> 0:16:37.640 that doesn't seem right to me. So by the time 0:16:37.680 --> 0:16:42.640 the Holocaust started and his family died in the Holocaust, UM, 0:16:42.760 --> 0:16:45.360 he had studied the Armenian genocide, the genocide of the 0:16:45.440 --> 0:16:49.120 natives in North America. Uh and uh He's like, this 0:16:49.200 --> 0:16:53.040 is you know, history doesn't repeat itself, but often fucking rhymes, 0:16:53.360 --> 0:16:56.120 and it's it's it's probably worth noting here too. We're 0:16:56.160 --> 0:16:58.560 we're getting a field from the ancient days. But in 0:16:58.600 --> 0:17:02.720 the same way that like limp Can started thinking about 0:17:02.880 --> 0:17:06.960 what a genocide was and started like, you know, attempting 0:17:07.000 --> 0:17:09.679 to get other people to talk about this as it like, 0:17:09.840 --> 0:17:12.160 as a crime and to kind of change attitudes about 0:17:12.200 --> 0:17:16.439 like that. Um, he was motivated and inspired by the 0:17:16.480 --> 0:17:19.280 same things that in a very different way, we're motivating 0:17:19.280 --> 0:17:22.679 and inspirational to Hitler, because Hitler also studied the genocide 0:17:22.680 --> 0:17:26.240 of the Native Americans and was like, oh, this seems cool, Um, 0:17:26.280 --> 0:17:28.520 this seems like a good way to get a bunch 0:17:28.520 --> 0:17:31.000 of land. And also Hitler was directly inspired by the 0:17:31.000 --> 0:17:33.320 genocide of the Armenians. I think his exact quote was 0:17:33.400 --> 0:17:36.840 like people were asking him like this is and this 0:17:36.920 --> 0:17:38.439 is I think from his table talk. But he was 0:17:38.480 --> 0:17:41.399 being asked by one of his officials like are we 0:17:41.440 --> 0:17:43.119 not going to get in trouble for this? And he 0:17:43.200 --> 0:17:47.080 was like, well, shit, who remembers the Armenians. Yeah, and 0:17:47.080 --> 0:17:50.120 and not to mention they're only um, I mean during 0:17:50.119 --> 0:17:55.680 World War One, the German Empire had in the Ottoman Empire. Yes, ironically, 0:17:55.960 --> 0:18:00.679 one of them is the the main prime very resource 0:18:00.720 --> 0:18:03.359 for pictures about the Armenian genocide because he took pictures 0:18:03.400 --> 0:18:05.600 of it and smuggled them out. Yeah. And and then 0:18:05.600 --> 0:18:08.240 the German Empire committed genocide and Namibia a couple of 0:18:08.280 --> 0:18:10.760 years before that. Yeah yeah, yeah, Which we'll we'll talk 0:18:10.800 --> 0:18:12.560 about all of this in more detail at some point, 0:18:12.600 --> 0:18:15.800 but let's talk about the definition of genocide because people 0:18:15.840 --> 0:18:19.560 don't you know, Limpcoln's foresight is not widely appreciated, and 0:18:19.600 --> 0:18:22.960 it is not until nineteen forty four, um that it 0:18:23.040 --> 0:18:25.120 starts to like the kind of the stuff he's talking about, 0:18:25.119 --> 0:18:27.040 starts to gain more ground. And that's also the year 0:18:27.400 --> 0:18:30.520 that he proposes the term genocide to describe the destruction 0:18:30.520 --> 0:18:33.359 of a nation or ethnic group. Um. And this is 0:18:33.400 --> 0:18:36.280 one of those Greek Latin hodgepodge is that I think 0:18:36.320 --> 0:18:39.920 frustrates some linguistic nerds. Here he basically took the Greek 0:18:39.960 --> 0:18:43.040 word genos for race or tribe, and he merged it 0:18:43.080 --> 0:18:46.480 with Latin's side which obviously means killing. I think everyone 0:18:46.640 --> 0:18:49.639 knows that bit of latin. Um. So because of his 0:18:49.720 --> 0:18:53.040 tireless work, on December eleventh, ninety six, the United Nations 0:18:53.119 --> 0:18:56.920 General Assembly passed a resolution declaring genocide is the denial 0:18:57.000 --> 0:18:59.920 of the right of existence of entire human groups. Many 0:19:00.000 --> 0:19:02.679 instances of such crimes have occurred when racial, religious, political, 0:19:02.760 --> 0:19:06.320 or other groups have been destroyed entirely or in part. Um. 0:19:06.359 --> 0:19:09.880 Now that the definition of genocide that's kind of given 0:19:09.880 --> 0:19:14.240 there in that and this is the resolution is immediately challenged. UM. 0:19:14.280 --> 0:19:17.680 A number of nations, including the USSR, disliked the inclusion 0:19:17.680 --> 0:19:20.520 of political groups as victims of genocide for reasons that 0:19:20.920 --> 0:19:26.679 should be obvious, right, And that wording not that the 0:19:26.760 --> 0:19:29.280 USSR is the only state that killed a bunch of 0:19:29.280 --> 0:19:33.719 political groups. But yeah, the wording is was eventually dropped. Um. 0:19:33.800 --> 0:19:37.800 The argument was that the terms etymology excluded those groups 0:19:38.359 --> 0:19:40.840 because I mean and and that's not in a I 0:19:40.880 --> 0:19:43.000 think it's wrong, but that's not inaccurate, right, Like the 0:19:43.600 --> 0:19:48.560 word genocide does imply racial or national groups. UM. So 0:19:48.600 --> 0:19:51.199 it's not hard to see why, like a number of 0:19:51.600 --> 0:19:54.480 states were concerned about this. For example, was the killing 0:19:54.520 --> 0:19:56.560 of the Russian nobility a genocide. And this is an 0:19:56.600 --> 0:19:58.200 area in which like, well, yeah, I think it actually 0:19:58.200 --> 0:20:00.960 would be wrong to say that, like killing the royal 0:20:01.000 --> 0:20:04.440 family of Russia was a genocide. That seems weird to me. Um, 0:20:04.960 --> 0:20:07.240 But but like the killing is the killing of like 0:20:07.480 --> 0:20:11.399 the Ukrainian you know, starvation genocide, which was justified as 0:20:11.440 --> 0:20:13.840 the killing of like rich peasants. Is that a genocide? Sure, 0:20:13.920 --> 0:20:17.440 that's absolutely a genocide, and ironically, according to Raphael Imkin, 0:20:17.560 --> 0:20:22.240 it sure is. Yes, yes, um, so yeah, I mean 0:20:22.280 --> 0:20:25.320 it's obviously, like I think we can all agree how 0:20:25.400 --> 0:20:29.760 exactly to separate other mass killings from genocide is important 0:20:29.800 --> 0:20:32.320 because not all mass killings are the same, and we 0:20:32.359 --> 0:20:35.920 shouldn't call all of them genocides. But also I think 0:20:36.040 --> 0:20:40.520 it's also worth saying that like, yeah, political groups being 0:20:40.560 --> 0:20:44.960 massacred can absolutely be a genocide. And I mean that 0:20:45.080 --> 0:20:47.120 wasn't even the only thing that got stripped out of there. 0:20:47.160 --> 0:20:51.159 They also got rid of like then, umh Lemkin wrote 0:20:51.200 --> 0:20:56.920 about the concept of genocidal settler colonialism and genocidal slavery, yes, 0:20:57.160 --> 0:21:01.960 as well as assimilation as being a form of cultural genocide. Um. 0:21:02.000 --> 0:21:04.720 You know, like famously in North America, there was the 0:21:04.800 --> 0:21:09.080 saying kill the Indians saved child, which we all rightfully 0:21:09.119 --> 0:21:14.159 accept now as genocide. But yeah, well and then let 0:21:14.280 --> 0:21:17.520 Limpkin had that on there and again the US, the 0:21:17.640 --> 0:21:20.440 UK and the USSR. I was like, we'll pump the 0:21:20.480 --> 0:21:24.120 brakes somebow. None of all of the states that were 0:21:24.160 --> 0:21:27.800 responsible for like winning World War two also had vested 0:21:27.840 --> 0:21:31.480 interests in certain things not being called genocide because spoilers, 0:21:31.640 --> 0:21:35.280 they had all done genocides. As someone who holds a 0:21:35.320 --> 0:21:38.520 lot of stock in big genocide, I have a problem 0:21:38.600 --> 0:21:42.720 with Stephanie. Yeah ah man though it is a good 0:21:42.760 --> 0:21:46.240 time to be invested in genocide. Wow, doing better than Tesla. 0:21:47.920 --> 0:21:50.639 To be fair, I have a feeling that the white 0:21:50.680 --> 0:21:55.720 South Africa also holds stuck in the yea. UM. So 0:21:55.800 --> 0:21:57.800 when it comes to how we're going to define genocide 0:21:57.800 --> 0:22:01.119 for this UM, at least my proposition show UM. I 0:22:01.119 --> 0:22:03.960 want to go to scholar Irvan Staub And now Staub 0:22:04.040 --> 0:22:07.560 is another Holocaust survivor UM and his he wrote a 0:22:07.600 --> 0:22:11.359 really good book called UM The Origins of Evil UM, 0:22:11.440 --> 0:22:16.440 which goes over kind of what inspired perpetrators in a 0:22:16.520 --> 0:22:19.480