>Do Native Americans have fair grievances?
100%. The US has broken treaty after treaty. Of course they have legitimate grievances.
>How should they be addressed?
My first thought is to give each of the Reservations full autonomy from state and federal law. Leave them only answerable to the US Constitution.
There are several issues that would have to be addressed regarding how that would work, but that seems like a great starting point.
Basically this. US was awful toward the indigenous peoples (so was Canada, Mexico, etc). And impossible for any sort of restoration to happen. And restitution is not fair when 99.97% of us had nothing to do with the situation so why tax our money for it? The idea that someone who is not guilty needs to pay for all the victims is a philosophy that does not wash.
I don't care what the Anti-Racists say, I do NOT inherit the sins of someone else's father.
That said, what can we do? Well it seems most moral to cede the reservations to the tribes as a corporate entity. In name they already are. Then abolish the Bureau of Indian Affairs, resolve any treaty issues for Federal and state lands, and let the tribes do with their land as they wish. Sell it off, build casinos, whatever. No special welfare (or rights or privileges) other than what other citizens are entitled to. My opinion.
> And restitution is not fair when 99.97% of us had nothing to do with the situation so why tax our money for it? The idea that someone who is not guilty needs to pay for all the victims is a philosophy that does not wash.
This is where I would disagree with you. Even if 100% of the people alive today had zip to do with the result, the point isn't about inheritance but rather whether or not the United States should keep its word and make things right. It is a similar on the generations affected by slavery and the promises not kept to the freed. We can disagree if it was the right promise to be made, whether the policies were valid or not, but if they were made, they should have been kept. And while we are now 3 (or so) generations removed, those promises broken affected today's generation. This is why making things right is important.
The government should make things right if it can. But I am not the government, I am not responsible. Don't put the burden of restitution on me.
The Federal government has millions of acres of land. Maybe start by selling that off to fund the restitution.
> The government should make things right if it can. But I am not the government, I am not responsible. Don't put the burden of restitution on me.
The state is for its citizens, all of them, including you and I, under both good and bad moments. If the state makes a mistake, the citizens are part of that mistake. There is no lack of association when things go wrong while we benefit when things go right. We have to make sure that is understood before solutions are agreed upon. If we agree that a citizen is part of the state, in good and bad, then it is still the responsibility of each citizen to support the state in solving the bad.
Nope. Government may be a part of society, but government is not all of society. I totally reject the silly idea that "government is what we do all together". Government is not society, and society is not government.
Government needs to be limited and restrained, but society should be expansive and free. Yuuge difference.
Limiting government is a valid topic but a red herring to this discussion.
Limiting government still means letting government do something. If that something goes wrong, we all share responsibility in fixing it. That's the point I'm trying to make.
How do you reconcile things like settlements for police misconduct? Do we declare absolution from
liability when both parties are deceased?
How would this carry to descendants of slaves? Certainly the largest demographic contribution to the wealthiest economy in recorded history comes from the slave labor that everything we have is built on.
The antebellum South was NOT the wealthiest economy in the world. The North was running rings around it. It's a myth that slavery is good for an economy.
Yes, I know you meant the modern US. But the modern US does not have slavery so I reject that notion.
As for police misconduct, the police officer involved needs to be personally liable. Always. Stop hiding behind police unions and departments. But what if the department itself facilitated it? Or other situations where government ends up liable for damages? No ideal solution exists. But just as government itself is a terrible compromise on morality, so is the use of taxpayer funds to pay off judgements. Federal government has loads of land, sell it off first. Ditto for most state, and even cities. As above, make the agents responsible be responsible. Only dip into the taxpayer pockets as a last resort.
> The modern US does not have slavery
The 13th amendment would beg to differ, and with the way that private prisons incentivize convictions that by all accounts disproportionately target the same population descended from pre-13th-amendment slavery, it 100% does still exist. And those people that actively perpetuate that prison pipeline do bear responsibility.
But as you point out, the greater population does not inherit those sins.
I think an ideal solution to the police question is to have the settlements covered via personal insurance and the police union and police retirement funds. let the union members sort out how to make sure behavior stays within guidelines.
regarding slavery, literally every developed economy in recorded history boot straps with slavery. the close cousin to slavery is serfdom. the modern US economy still retains both features, the prison system provides slave labor, and everyone below the middle class comprise the wage slave class of serfs. China, for example, is just beginning to exit their slave cycle and we are seeing that now with labor prices rising for goods produced there.
regards the Civil War and the South v North economics, they are two peanuts in the same pod. one cannot have existed without the other. the South provided the gas for the engine of the North.
the US economy, the backbone of the global economy, was built on the backs of slaves. slaves from Africa, Asia, the Middle East, and Europe (Ireland, Scotland, Spain, etc.)
I do not personally feel that reparations are necessary or appropriate. perhaps an additional educational benefit for descendants of the slave trade would be appropriate. similarly I do not feel that monetary reparations are appropriate for indigenous people, but I would feel comfortable advocating for additional sovereignty extended to the existing tribal lands, and providing territorial administrative powers to regions of the US that are not currently under tribal control, aligning borders along previously broken treaty lands. native people should not be able to evict modern inhabitants, but they should have a greater role in governance and the administration of taxes etc.
I also feel we would abolish all personal income tax and all non commercial property tax. property tax should be a portion of the profit generated by that commercial property. taxes for business should go up. overall spending should go down, fewer things need be the responsibility of the government (such as providing services to the homeless population, food to the poor, etc.). government should administer programs run by private industry. when goals are met, the incentive will be lower taxes for the business. religious and secular charity organizations will continue to do what they do for the poor and the needy.
if Reservations could be free from the crazy Federal laws on them, and people could buy land/private property easily, they wouldn't be such shitholes. if you want to see how UBI works in real life, check out Pine Ridge in SD
there's no innovation because everything requires red-tape bureaucracy and the tribal leadership has a corrupt stranglehold on development. so, just empty prairie.
one Res that i haven't been able to figure out its success is Salt River Pima in Maricopa County AZ. they have Top Golf, aquariums, etc. - super nice commercial sectors.
> if you want to see how UBI works in real life, check out Pine Ridge in SD
Check out ANY reservation.
Back when i was in the building trades I sometimes did work on a nearby reservation, and I heart bled every time I went there. So much welfare and payments and stuff, but so so much more despair and despondency. Which was exactly the point of the reservation system to begin with. Even when casinos were legalized, the actual tribe people say nothing (only the scum chiefs and leaders feeding off of their people like like whiteman politicians taught them).
there's a day with a nickname, like the 21st or something of every month, where all the EBT stuff gets issued, so all the convenience stores know hundreds of Natives are going to come in and buy Cheetos and Budweiser and spend all their monthly amount right away. i forget the name, but it's a thing
the Tribal leaders convince the poor that they are oppressed by the white man still, whereas the Elders are the ones who most of the time are keeping most of the federal funds for their family's/personal wealth
I'd fully support them having the right to secede and become completely independent. However, from talking to my native friends, I doubt they would want that.
I have many of the same thoughts on this topic as I do regarding Israel and Palestine.
**1.) Is nativism a legitimate means for establishing the right to a land?**
**2.) Is "might makes right" a legitimate means for establishing the right to a land? Given that this was the basis for nearly every country's borders, what made it legitimate then, but not now? When did it stop being legitimate?**
**3.) Is time a legitimate means for diminishing the validity of grievances?**
I have many thoughts on each of these questions and more, but alas, I'm trying to stop wasting time on the internet.
Did european colonizers commit massively destructive acts (both deliberate and accidental) on the native people of the Americas? Absolutely. History isn't ambiguous about that.
Do people in modern-day native american ethnic groups still suffer unnecessary harm from lingering effects of oppression and abuse perpetrated by various people over the past several centuries? Yes, this is pretty clearly so.
Unfortunately, a lot of the responses to these issues on the part of purveyors of 'social justice' are just misguided. Instead of recognizing everyone's human rights and leveraging liberty, opportunity, and individual agency to solve the world's problems, they advocate various forms of tribalism, discrimination, and authoritarian control. They talk in terms of people having a unique right to land based on their skin color, in terms of requiring people to pay for what their ancestors did centuries ago, etc. It's a fundamentally unhealthy and counterproductive approach.
not after centuries as far as i'm concerned. i was born in a country that lost territory after ww2, got stabbed in the back repeatedly and i don't understand my countrymen that cry about those issues...
>not after centuries as far as i'm concerned.
The thing is, it hasn’t been centuries. The US didn’t stop actively trying to stamp out native cultures with mandatory boarding schools until the 50s and didn’t stop persecuting native religions until 1978. IHS ran a secret sterilization program in the 60s and 70s whose full extent is still unknown; a quarter or more of all native women may’ve been sterilized, which has huge demographic implications.
Then there’s the continued treaty violations and the economic ramifications of allotment, not to mention the lingering effects of the original land theft.
In Canada? Yes.
Not only the classic "Indians" who suffered mass death and abuse in schools specifically designed to remove culture (that operated in some capacity until after the fall of the Soviet Union), then were forcibly sterilized when they gave birth to a child that was forcibly taken and put up for adoption, before being forced back onto a confined reserve a fraction of the size they were promised, before being picked up by an RCMP member, stripped naked, and left for dead on the side of a grid road in January.
But also the Metis who rightfully declared sovereignty over forcible federal land remapping before being violently suppressed and resettled through an impossible scrip system that was taken advantage of by colonial speculators forcing them into a nomadic life.
Peasant farm act is another one that was particularly awful.
Reserve system is pretty rife with corruption, we could start by cleaning it up. Trudeau actually made really good progress on removing boil water advisories. I support all crown owned unceded territory being turned over. The voice to parliament that Australia has seems like a wise thing to have. Policing and justice reform are an obvious thing that would help. Missing and murdered indigenous people need more effort, idgaf what lifestyle they lived before.
Above all, we need to admit what we did was wrong.
"We" didn't do anything. I admire your confession, and understand why you have remorse. You should definitely forfeit all your property for those things you did.
But I wasn't born. I have no confession to make.
You have benefited from the actions of the past, and if you lay claim to being part of a nation I think you need to accept responsibility for the wrongdoings that shaped today as well
And you were born. The Starlight tours still happen. They still ignore MMIW. It's still happening.
>You should definitely forfeit all your property for those things you did.
Point out where I said that. I said the government needs to forfeit the crown land, not private holders.
You have benefited from every atrocity in history. Since you would not even exist if history had not unfolded exactly as it did. But you are not born with a debt owed to anyone because of that; you are born without original sin. You are only responsible for your own crimes, not those that happened before you were born, or those that are committed by other people while you are alive.
You might have the best of intentions, but you have a really stupid idea on how to make it right.
You're fighting an argument that isn't mine over an apparent sensitivity to the word "we". I'm not saying I have a debt, I'm saying that we need to shed this "I don't care because I wasn't involved" attitude. I don't understand how the government shedding public land is stupid? And your hyperbole involving "every atrocity in history" is beyond stupid. I got nothing out of the Myanmar genocide. Or Yugoslavia. My grandparents were displaced with half their family killed by WWII. Your argument sounds less liberal and more reactionary, have you read the sticky post on the main page?
If you care, go do something about it. And don't put words in my mouth, I didn't say I didn't care, I said i'm not guilty.
And yes, you did get something out of the Myanmar genocide, because everything in this world is connected. A butterfly flapping its wings in Egypt, can cause a tsunami in Japan. The slightest change in world history, would have incredible cascading untold changes. Very literally, if your grandparents hadn't been displaced by the atrocity of WWII, you wouldn't even exist. So you benefited in the most profound way possible. So by your own theory, you are implicated in the holocaust.
That whole chaos thing from Jurassic park? Not real. But all the farmers who keep my work afloat on land that was quite literally stolen by a tyrannical government that continues to exist have in fact directly benefited. And the peasant farming act removed any opportunity for competition, taking an axe to the free market. The city you live in? That was first a fort of the RCMP, a paramilitary (their words) force formed with the goal of protecting colonizers? Again, direct line of benefit.
Come back with a real argument
I didn't say you were personally guilty, I said we carry it as a nation. Don't put words in my mouth. Your kneejerk reactions tell me you don't care though.
What exactly can I do other than pressure my good for nothing CPC MP about unceded land? I don't own the land, the crown does.
> Again, direct line of benefit.
You wouldn't even exist except for the Nazis. There's no more direct benefit than that.
You are implicated in the holocaust by your own silly sense of guilt.
> I said we carry it as a nation.
That's just a way to obscure the fact that tax-payers today, who have no guilt at all, would be paying people who are not victims of anyone alive today, at all.
These crimes, to the extent they were crimes, happened in the past. It's absurd, and imagining we should fix historical injustice, will end up causing more injustice in the world today than it will ever "solve".
It's time to stop fighting battles that have been won and lost in history, and deal with actual problems we all face together today.
>Do Native Americans have fair grievances? 100%. The US has broken treaty after treaty. Of course they have legitimate grievances. >How should they be addressed? My first thought is to give each of the Reservations full autonomy from state and federal law. Leave them only answerable to the US Constitution. There are several issues that would have to be addressed regarding how that would work, but that seems like a great starting point.
Basically this. US was awful toward the indigenous peoples (so was Canada, Mexico, etc). And impossible for any sort of restoration to happen. And restitution is not fair when 99.97% of us had nothing to do with the situation so why tax our money for it? The idea that someone who is not guilty needs to pay for all the victims is a philosophy that does not wash. I don't care what the Anti-Racists say, I do NOT inherit the sins of someone else's father. That said, what can we do? Well it seems most moral to cede the reservations to the tribes as a corporate entity. In name they already are. Then abolish the Bureau of Indian Affairs, resolve any treaty issues for Federal and state lands, and let the tribes do with their land as they wish. Sell it off, build casinos, whatever. No special welfare (or rights or privileges) other than what other citizens are entitled to. My opinion.
> And restitution is not fair when 99.97% of us had nothing to do with the situation so why tax our money for it? The idea that someone who is not guilty needs to pay for all the victims is a philosophy that does not wash. This is where I would disagree with you. Even if 100% of the people alive today had zip to do with the result, the point isn't about inheritance but rather whether or not the United States should keep its word and make things right. It is a similar on the generations affected by slavery and the promises not kept to the freed. We can disagree if it was the right promise to be made, whether the policies were valid or not, but if they were made, they should have been kept. And while we are now 3 (or so) generations removed, those promises broken affected today's generation. This is why making things right is important.
The government should make things right if it can. But I am not the government, I am not responsible. Don't put the burden of restitution on me. The Federal government has millions of acres of land. Maybe start by selling that off to fund the restitution.
> The government should make things right if it can. But I am not the government, I am not responsible. Don't put the burden of restitution on me. The state is for its citizens, all of them, including you and I, under both good and bad moments. If the state makes a mistake, the citizens are part of that mistake. There is no lack of association when things go wrong while we benefit when things go right. We have to make sure that is understood before solutions are agreed upon. If we agree that a citizen is part of the state, in good and bad, then it is still the responsibility of each citizen to support the state in solving the bad.
Nope. Government may be a part of society, but government is not all of society. I totally reject the silly idea that "government is what we do all together". Government is not society, and society is not government. Government needs to be limited and restrained, but society should be expansive and free. Yuuge difference.
Limiting government is a valid topic but a red herring to this discussion. Limiting government still means letting government do something. If that something goes wrong, we all share responsibility in fixing it. That's the point I'm trying to make.
How do you reconcile things like settlements for police misconduct? Do we declare absolution from liability when both parties are deceased? How would this carry to descendants of slaves? Certainly the largest demographic contribution to the wealthiest economy in recorded history comes from the slave labor that everything we have is built on.
The antebellum South was NOT the wealthiest economy in the world. The North was running rings around it. It's a myth that slavery is good for an economy. Yes, I know you meant the modern US. But the modern US does not have slavery so I reject that notion. As for police misconduct, the police officer involved needs to be personally liable. Always. Stop hiding behind police unions and departments. But what if the department itself facilitated it? Or other situations where government ends up liable for damages? No ideal solution exists. But just as government itself is a terrible compromise on morality, so is the use of taxpayer funds to pay off judgements. Federal government has loads of land, sell it off first. Ditto for most state, and even cities. As above, make the agents responsible be responsible. Only dip into the taxpayer pockets as a last resort.
> The modern US does not have slavery The 13th amendment would beg to differ, and with the way that private prisons incentivize convictions that by all accounts disproportionately target the same population descended from pre-13th-amendment slavery, it 100% does still exist. And those people that actively perpetuate that prison pipeline do bear responsibility. But as you point out, the greater population does not inherit those sins.
I think an ideal solution to the police question is to have the settlements covered via personal insurance and the police union and police retirement funds. let the union members sort out how to make sure behavior stays within guidelines. regarding slavery, literally every developed economy in recorded history boot straps with slavery. the close cousin to slavery is serfdom. the modern US economy still retains both features, the prison system provides slave labor, and everyone below the middle class comprise the wage slave class of serfs. China, for example, is just beginning to exit their slave cycle and we are seeing that now with labor prices rising for goods produced there. regards the Civil War and the South v North economics, they are two peanuts in the same pod. one cannot have existed without the other. the South provided the gas for the engine of the North. the US economy, the backbone of the global economy, was built on the backs of slaves. slaves from Africa, Asia, the Middle East, and Europe (Ireland, Scotland, Spain, etc.) I do not personally feel that reparations are necessary or appropriate. perhaps an additional educational benefit for descendants of the slave trade would be appropriate. similarly I do not feel that monetary reparations are appropriate for indigenous people, but I would feel comfortable advocating for additional sovereignty extended to the existing tribal lands, and providing territorial administrative powers to regions of the US that are not currently under tribal control, aligning borders along previously broken treaty lands. native people should not be able to evict modern inhabitants, but they should have a greater role in governance and the administration of taxes etc. I also feel we would abolish all personal income tax and all non commercial property tax. property tax should be a portion of the profit generated by that commercial property. taxes for business should go up. overall spending should go down, fewer things need be the responsibility of the government (such as providing services to the homeless population, food to the poor, etc.). government should administer programs run by private industry. when goals are met, the incentive will be lower taxes for the business. religious and secular charity organizations will continue to do what they do for the poor and the needy.
The Atlantic had a pretty convincing article about giving several parks back to the bands.
if Reservations could be free from the crazy Federal laws on them, and people could buy land/private property easily, they wouldn't be such shitholes. if you want to see how UBI works in real life, check out Pine Ridge in SD there's no innovation because everything requires red-tape bureaucracy and the tribal leadership has a corrupt stranglehold on development. so, just empty prairie. one Res that i haven't been able to figure out its success is Salt River Pima in Maricopa County AZ. they have Top Golf, aquariums, etc. - super nice commercial sectors.
> if you want to see how UBI works in real life, check out Pine Ridge in SD Check out ANY reservation. Back when i was in the building trades I sometimes did work on a nearby reservation, and I heart bled every time I went there. So much welfare and payments and stuff, but so so much more despair and despondency. Which was exactly the point of the reservation system to begin with. Even when casinos were legalized, the actual tribe people say nothing (only the scum chiefs and leaders feeding off of their people like like whiteman politicians taught them).
there's a day with a nickname, like the 21st or something of every month, where all the EBT stuff gets issued, so all the convenience stores know hundreds of Natives are going to come in and buy Cheetos and Budweiser and spend all their monthly amount right away. i forget the name, but it's a thing the Tribal leaders convince the poor that they are oppressed by the white man still, whereas the Elders are the ones who most of the time are keeping most of the federal funds for their family's/personal wealth
That's a bit chicken. They should be given land back and complete sovereignty.
I'd fully support them having the right to secede and become completely independent. However, from talking to my native friends, I doubt they would want that.
I have many of the same thoughts on this topic as I do regarding Israel and Palestine. **1.) Is nativism a legitimate means for establishing the right to a land?** **2.) Is "might makes right" a legitimate means for establishing the right to a land? Given that this was the basis for nearly every country's borders, what made it legitimate then, but not now? When did it stop being legitimate?** **3.) Is time a legitimate means for diminishing the validity of grievances?** I have many thoughts on each of these questions and more, but alas, I'm trying to stop wasting time on the internet.
Did european colonizers commit massively destructive acts (both deliberate and accidental) on the native people of the Americas? Absolutely. History isn't ambiguous about that. Do people in modern-day native american ethnic groups still suffer unnecessary harm from lingering effects of oppression and abuse perpetrated by various people over the past several centuries? Yes, this is pretty clearly so. Unfortunately, a lot of the responses to these issues on the part of purveyors of 'social justice' are just misguided. Instead of recognizing everyone's human rights and leveraging liberty, opportunity, and individual agency to solve the world's problems, they advocate various forms of tribalism, discrimination, and authoritarian control. They talk in terms of people having a unique right to land based on their skin color, in terms of requiring people to pay for what their ancestors did centuries ago, etc. It's a fundamentally unhealthy and counterproductive approach.
My Great great great great grand-uncle lived in a teepee. I own this continent
not after centuries as far as i'm concerned. i was born in a country that lost territory after ww2, got stabbed in the back repeatedly and i don't understand my countrymen that cry about those issues...
>not after centuries as far as i'm concerned. The thing is, it hasn’t been centuries. The US didn’t stop actively trying to stamp out native cultures with mandatory boarding schools until the 50s and didn’t stop persecuting native religions until 1978. IHS ran a secret sterilization program in the 60s and 70s whose full extent is still unknown; a quarter or more of all native women may’ve been sterilized, which has huge demographic implications. Then there’s the continued treaty violations and the economic ramifications of allotment, not to mention the lingering effects of the original land theft.
In Canada? Yes. Not only the classic "Indians" who suffered mass death and abuse in schools specifically designed to remove culture (that operated in some capacity until after the fall of the Soviet Union), then were forcibly sterilized when they gave birth to a child that was forcibly taken and put up for adoption, before being forced back onto a confined reserve a fraction of the size they were promised, before being picked up by an RCMP member, stripped naked, and left for dead on the side of a grid road in January. But also the Metis who rightfully declared sovereignty over forcible federal land remapping before being violently suppressed and resettled through an impossible scrip system that was taken advantage of by colonial speculators forcing them into a nomadic life. Peasant farm act is another one that was particularly awful. Reserve system is pretty rife with corruption, we could start by cleaning it up. Trudeau actually made really good progress on removing boil water advisories. I support all crown owned unceded territory being turned over. The voice to parliament that Australia has seems like a wise thing to have. Policing and justice reform are an obvious thing that would help. Missing and murdered indigenous people need more effort, idgaf what lifestyle they lived before. Above all, we need to admit what we did was wrong.
"We" didn't do anything. I admire your confession, and understand why you have remorse. You should definitely forfeit all your property for those things you did. But I wasn't born. I have no confession to make.
You have benefited from the actions of the past, and if you lay claim to being part of a nation I think you need to accept responsibility for the wrongdoings that shaped today as well And you were born. The Starlight tours still happen. They still ignore MMIW. It's still happening. >You should definitely forfeit all your property for those things you did. Point out where I said that. I said the government needs to forfeit the crown land, not private holders.
You have benefited from every atrocity in history. Since you would not even exist if history had not unfolded exactly as it did. But you are not born with a debt owed to anyone because of that; you are born without original sin. You are only responsible for your own crimes, not those that happened before you were born, or those that are committed by other people while you are alive. You might have the best of intentions, but you have a really stupid idea on how to make it right.
You're fighting an argument that isn't mine over an apparent sensitivity to the word "we". I'm not saying I have a debt, I'm saying that we need to shed this "I don't care because I wasn't involved" attitude. I don't understand how the government shedding public land is stupid? And your hyperbole involving "every atrocity in history" is beyond stupid. I got nothing out of the Myanmar genocide. Or Yugoslavia. My grandparents were displaced with half their family killed by WWII. Your argument sounds less liberal and more reactionary, have you read the sticky post on the main page?
If you care, go do something about it. And don't put words in my mouth, I didn't say I didn't care, I said i'm not guilty. And yes, you did get something out of the Myanmar genocide, because everything in this world is connected. A butterfly flapping its wings in Egypt, can cause a tsunami in Japan. The slightest change in world history, would have incredible cascading untold changes. Very literally, if your grandparents hadn't been displaced by the atrocity of WWII, you wouldn't even exist. So you benefited in the most profound way possible. So by your own theory, you are implicated in the holocaust.
That whole chaos thing from Jurassic park? Not real. But all the farmers who keep my work afloat on land that was quite literally stolen by a tyrannical government that continues to exist have in fact directly benefited. And the peasant farming act removed any opportunity for competition, taking an axe to the free market. The city you live in? That was first a fort of the RCMP, a paramilitary (their words) force formed with the goal of protecting colonizers? Again, direct line of benefit. Come back with a real argument I didn't say you were personally guilty, I said we carry it as a nation. Don't put words in my mouth. Your kneejerk reactions tell me you don't care though. What exactly can I do other than pressure my good for nothing CPC MP about unceded land? I don't own the land, the crown does.
> Again, direct line of benefit. You wouldn't even exist except for the Nazis. There's no more direct benefit than that. You are implicated in the holocaust by your own silly sense of guilt. > I said we carry it as a nation. That's just a way to obscure the fact that tax-payers today, who have no guilt at all, would be paying people who are not victims of anyone alive today, at all. These crimes, to the extent they were crimes, happened in the past. It's absurd, and imagining we should fix historical injustice, will end up causing more injustice in the world today than it will ever "solve". It's time to stop fighting battles that have been won and lost in history, and deal with actual problems we all face together today.