The importance of the term "genocide" for many Indigenous Peoples is that it is more than a term or an accusation; it is a word created in the wake of the Shoah in Europe to describe what happens when a people are targeted by a government for extermination, as were the Jews of Europe, and which is the term used in the most important international law related to concerned Indigenous Peoples, as the only international human rights law that pertains specifically to collectivities of people rather than individuals.
Roxanne Dunbar-OrtizPassionate, organized hatred is the element missing in all that we do to try to change the world. Now is the time to spread hate, hatred for the rich.
Roxanne Dunbar-OrtizThe objective of US authorities was to terminate their existence as peoples - not as random individuals. This is the very definition of modern genocide.
Roxanne Dunbar-OrtizThe caste system, in all its various forms, is always based on identifiable physical characteristics - sex, color, age.
Roxanne Dunbar-OrtizThe importance of the term "genocide" for many Indigenous Peoples is that it is more than a term or an accusation; it is a word created in the wake of the Shoah in Europe to describe what happens when a people are targeted by a government for extermination, as were the Jews of Europe, and which is the term used in the most important international law related to concerned Indigenous Peoples, as the only international human rights law that pertains specifically to collectivities of people rather than individuals.
Roxanne Dunbar-OrtizCases of genocide carried out as policy may be found in historical documents as well as in the oral histories of Indigenous communities.
Roxanne Dunbar-OrtizInvestors, monarchies, and parliamentarians devised methods to control the processes of wealth accumulation and the power that came with it, but the ideology behind gold fever mobilized settlers to cross the Atlantic to an unknown fate. Subjugating entire societies and civilizations, enslaving whole countries, and slaughtering people village by village did not seem too high a price to pay, nor did it appear inhumane. The systems of colonization were modern and rational, but its ideological basis was madness.
Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz