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Puzzleheaded-Ad-2746 t1_iujhty7 wrote

Reply to comment by DJ_Slex in Human burial grounds and bullets from Spanish guns uncovered at site of last Mayan stronghold in Guatemala by getBusyChild

You don’t really have to wonder mate.

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DJ_Slex t1_iujhyhu wrote

Oh I know, it’s kinda sad the article didn’t seem to care to mention why those bullets were there.

This is an archeological site of a genocide. I hope they’re respecting it as such

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juliohernanz t1_iujkal9 wrote

At least it's clear that Mayas weren't exterminated like other natives further north. There are around five million today.

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MGD109 t1_iujq4c0 wrote

Just to be clear is this really genocide? I mean the Spanish were ruthless conquers, but they weren't trying to kill the Mayan's they wanted to conquer and enslave them.

Did they really kill all Mayan's in Guatemala?

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Capt_morgan72 t1_iujvz8f wrote

So. Genocide dosent have to be a 100% annihilation of a race, ethnicity, religious, or national group. And it dosent have to only be done by killing.

While they can be and we do have examples of complete and total genocide like the Taíno people of the Caribbean or the Jōmon people of japan.

Another very common form of genocide can come from culturally killing a people. Like what happened in the USA and Canada. And is also happening right now in Ukraine. This is accomplished by kidnapping and indoctrination of a groups young people until they no longer remember or At least no longer practice the culture of their ancestors.

And I’d argue that the Mayan way of life no longer exist. Making this not only genocide. But a successful one.

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MGD109 t1_iujwtku wrote

Ah you mean cultural erasure, that sort of genocide. Yeah that's understandable, its certainly true the Spanish destroyed the native culture (or at least most of it, parts were adopted and continued but it was no longer dominant).

I understand genocide doesn't have to be 100% annihilation, but it does generally have to have the intent. Simply conquering and killing a lot of people doesn't meet the criteria of genocide.

>This is accomplished by kidnapping and indoctrination of a groups young people until they no longer remember or At least no longer practice the culture of their ancestors.

That's very true. But did the Spanish ever actually do that? They had forcible conversions certainly, and they had a lot of people who switched to get on with the new boss. But did they ever flat out take people's children to indoctrinate them into being raised to be Spanish?

Not saying they didn't you understand, but I've just never heard that bit of the colonisation.

>And I’d argue that the Mayan way of life no longer exist. Making this not only genocide. But a successful one.

I suppose that depends on how you define the "way of life", I mean on a day to day level the life of most Mayan people didn't change that much they just had to shift religions and had a new bunch who they had to pay taxes to.

Their are still over 9 million Mayan people living through Central America.

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