Comment by priforce | Hacker News Reader

Comment by priforce | Hacker News Reader

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Americans didn't enslave Indians for centuries, have a civil war that created deep political fractions till this day, made it illegal for Blacks to read or drink from Whites-only water fountains, and then launch a series of legal structures that prevented Blacks from being treated as human beings.

In actuality, a landmark Supreme Court case was of an Indian man who wanted to own US property but couldn't and his defense was that he was related to Aryans and therefore could be considered White.

Black isn't so much a color, it's both an individual and collective experience, and the experiences of Blacks in America in relations to Whites is what makes race-relations and social, political, economic progress unique to Blacks as opposed to other ethnic groups who have faced discrimination and even oppression but not to the degree of Blacks.

The closest comparison I would make to Blacks and Indians is of the higher Indian castes and the Dalits (Untouchables). So, yes, Black and Indians can be distinguished from one another and at the same time learn from one another.

  > Black isn't so much a color, it's both an individual and collective experience, 
  > and the experiences of Blacks in America in relations to Whites is what makes 
  > race-relations and social, political, economic progress unique to Blacks as 
  > opposed to other ethnic groups who have faced discrimination and even 
  > oppression but not to the degree of Blacks.

Typing this on a reservation, I would like to dispute your "unique" view. I feel compelled to mention Native Americans didn't exactly have it easy in america (e.g. forced marches, genocide, smallpox blankets, re-education, suppression of language and religion, etc). The death toll among the tribes is pretty high.

[I know the original Indian referred too, I was disputing the "unique" part]

I don't think this is a game of who was oppressed more/worse. The plane and simple fact is that no ethic group endured 400 years of hardcore slavery in the US other than African-Americans. Slavery which was also followed by hardcore and legal discrimination.

You need to read up on the history of other ethnic groups in the USA. Look up the word genocide in American History. Native Americans have suffered through hundreds of years of genocide (by action or neglect) and laws meant to remove all culture and rights. Heck, lookup Pres. Lincoln's record with the tribes (or maybe for more fun the dude on the $20 bill). Some of these laws and programs lasted into the 1960's.

Like I said, I was rather unhappy with the "unique" comment. I would bet there are far fewer tribal members in Silicon Valley startups compared to other ethnic groups.

@protomyth I worked with the Dept. of Indian Affairs so I really don't need a lecture or directions on what to look up from you. The situation of Native Americans is heartbreaking. It was most certainly genocide and disgusting. Again, it is not about who had it worse it is just that there are distinct differences. The number of Native Americans in the valley is inherently going to be smaller because of the genocide that took place and the fact that unlike African slaves they didn't have anywhere to go to get more once they worked them to death. But native americans were not enslaved in the same way that Africans were--if that was the case there would be no reservations and no trail of tears.

"I really don't need a lecture or directions on what to look up from you"

Then you shouldn't use the word "unique" in a context of "had it worse" then other groups.

"Dept. of Indian Affairs"

Are you out of Canada or at one of the states? The Federal level is called "Bureau of Indian Affairs".

I never used the word unique. Also re: bureau v. Dept-- Im not ashamed to admit I can't spell to save my life so I used dept instead of bureau because I was on my way out of the office and was too rushed to google when my spelling was so far off the browser's spell check didn't even know what I was trying to spell. It actually has two official names, I forget the other but it may very well be dept, or office. at least it did 2004-06 when I was working with them.

my mistake, my original response was to the person saying "unique" and I got confused on who was what.

If you apply for a computer security job, make sure to not list "Dept of Interior" in the context of tribes. They had some serious data loss issues (as in whole Dept of Interior (parent org of BIA) being taken off the internet. I still want to talk to the damn judge since he removed the tribal college access to the internet at the same time (including those schools not getting their internet from the BIA). The bricks just keep on being stacked.

Chinese were effectively imported as a mass of slave labor, and American Indians were subjected to slavery and genocide. (The European colonies in America joined the African slave trade because the supply of American Indian slaves was being exhausted, as a matter of fact.)

I think it is pretty clear from the context of his comment that Indian refers to people from India.

I think we are arguing the "unique" part and are aware of what group he was referring too.

Ah, since OP's example groups were Chinese and Indian, and your examples were Chinese and (American) Indian, was pretty easy to get confused! :)

Are you seriously saying that Native Americans were the go-to slaves? Have you heard of a little country called Brazil? Do you know about the trans-Atlantic slave trade? It doesn't seem you do.

If you actually read my comment, you would know that it said. And it said none of that. Hint: the part that's in parentheses is part of my comment too.

Let me flesh it out for you. I said, "The European colonies in America joined the African slave trade because the supply of American Indian slaves was being exhausted, as a matter of fact." Which means I'm not only aware of the trans-Atlantic slave trade, but I even outlined the specific reason why slavery of American Indians wasn't sustainable and why the North American colonies had to engage in the trans-Atlantic slave trade to begin with. The fact is, west Africa had more slaves to sell.

Speaking of Brazil, if you start at the end of the second paragraph of Wikipedia's article about slavery in Brazil, it says the exact same thing happened in Brazil:

    Starting around 1550, the Portuguese began to trade   
    enslaved Africans due to two main reasons:

    * The unenculturated indigenous peoples deteriorated 
      rapidly, and became increasingly wary of the 
      Portuguese, thus, obtaining new indigenous slaves was 
      becoming harder and harder.

I try to play nice on Hacker News, but when people don't even read and comprehend what I write, and then accuse me of saying the exact opposite of what I said, I get a little annoyed. Part of common courtesy is to understand and respond honestly to others, and frankly, you've failed to do that.

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