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hn_throwaway_99 | on: Meta's memo to employees rolling back DEI programs
Thanks for this bit of sanity. Arguing that Native Americans didn't have a concept of land ownership, while still having the concept "I'm going to murder you and your compatriots so that I can occupy the land where you live.", seems a bit like splitting hairs.
dcrazy | parent | next
It’s not splitting hairs. There’s a recognizable difference between a tribe collectively defending exclusive access to certain land, and the concept of transferable, heritable private land interest.
ethbr1 | root | parent | next
Yes and no.

Even in the US, commons-deeded land between multiple people is still a thing. Albeit one that lawyers hate to mess with because it's more work for them.

For purposes of this thread, exclusive control of an area, absent other claims, would certainly entitle indigenous American peoples to ownership of that land.

throwway120385 | root | parent
We even form corporations to try to deed land as a group. That's the entire purpose of an HOA -- to confer private ownership of community-owned land and equipment among the members of the community as their private land changes hands.
PaulDavisThe1st | root | parent | next
HOAs do not confer private ownership of land among members of a group.

They impose a mutually agreed upon set of rules on everyone who owns land that is covered by the HOA (with one of the rules preventing severance of the property from the HOA).

jjnoakes | root | parent
I'm pretty sure all of the common areas in HOAs that I used to live in were equally owned by all members.
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dcrazy | root | parent
You don’t need a corporation to deed land to a group. Any group of persons can hold title to a property. My wife and I had to choose whether to buy our condo as joint tenants or as tenants in common.
hn_throwaway_99 | root | parent | next
Fine, but recall what started this discussion, this issue of land acknowledgements (which I agree are absolute peak stupidity which literally managed to piss off everyone on all sides - the right thought it was useless virtue signalling, and lots of actual indigenous people pretty much agreed, considering it a vacuous gesture). For all intents and purposes, native tribes owned that land before settlers kicked them off and said you couldn't live there anymore.
philipwhiuk | root | parent
> transferable, heritable private

None of this is guaranteed by 'ownership'.

stonesthrowaway | parent | next
> seems a bit like splitting hairs.

It isn't splitting hairs. It's outright propaganda invented to justify stealing native land. The idea being if natives had no sense of property, we didn't really steal anything from them because they had no property to begin with.

The other trope justifying theft of the land is of the "dumb indians" who sold the land for cheap. Like indians selling manhattan for a handful of beads.

SpicyLemonZest | root | parent
I don't think that's accurate. The historic colonizers fully understood that native Americans had a sense of property, which is why even the most blatant land grabs were almost always justified by a forced sale or treaty. I've only ever heard the idea that natives didn't own land from people promoting the myth of the noble savage.
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