Was the Famine Genocide?

[Da Real Rover]

The Famine Was Genocide

Irish Echo/February 26-March 4, 1997

Some controversy has surrounded the use of the
word “genocide” with regard to the Great Irish
Famine of 150 years ago. But this controversy
has its source in an apparent misunderstanding of
the meaning of genocide. No, the British
government did not inflict on the Irish the
abject horrors of the Nazi Holocaust. But the
definition of “genocide” reaches beyond such
ghastly behavior to encompass other reprehensible
acts designed to destroy a people.

As demonstrated by the following legal analysis,
the Famine was genocide within the meaning of
both United States and International law.

The United States Government is party to the 1948
Convention On The Prevention And Punishment of
the Crime of Genocide (“Genocide
Convention”). As a Treaty of the United States,
the Genocide Convention is therefore “the Supreme
Law of the land” under Article VI of the U.S.
Constitution. The U.S. Government has also
passed implementing legislation which
substantially adopts the Genocide Convention and
makes any violation of the Convention punishable
under federal law. 18 U.S.C. § 1901.

Article II of the Genocide Convention provides:

In the present Convention, genocide means any of
the following acts committed with intent to
destroy, in whole or in part, a national,
ethnical, racial or religious group as such:

(a) Killing members of the group;

(b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;

(c) Deliberately inflicting on the group
conditions of life calculated to bring about its
physical destruction in whole or in part;

(d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within a group;

(e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.

(emphasis supplied)

From 1845-50, The British government
pursued a policy of mass starvation in Ireland
with the intent to destroy in substantial part
the national, ethnical and racial group known as
the Irish People. This British policy caused
serious bodily and mental harm to the Irish
People within the meaning of Genocide Convention
Article II(b). This British policy also
deliberately inflicted on the Irish People
conditions of life calculated to bring about
their physical destruction within the meaning of
Article II(c) of the Convention. Therefore, from
1845-50 the British government knowingly pursued
a policy of mass starvation in Ireland which
constituted acts of Genocide against the Irish
People within the meaning of Article II(b) and
(c) of the 1948 Genocide Convention.

While there are many legitimate
subjects of debate surrounding the Famine, there
is no doubt that the British Government committed
genocide against the Irish People. This
particular “debate” should therefore come to an end.

[GavinZac]

Well I suppose it depends on how much you trust this particular unqualified statement:

From 1845-50, The British government pursued a policy of mass starvation in Ireland with the intent to destroy in substantial part the national, ethnical and racial group known as the Irish People.

What about the people who stole maize imported to Ireland (by the British, of course), and tried to eat it and make flour from it despite it being tough, inedible planting stock rather than the final product? Enshrined as they may be in song, their greed and stupidity cost Ireland the opportunity to find a replacement crop. Was what they did genocide? The more you broaden the meaning of a word, the less meaningful it is.

[BohsPartisan]

Well I suppose it depends on how much you trust this particular unqualified statement:


What about the people who stole maize imported to Ireland (by the British, of course), and tried to eat it and make flour from it despite it being tough, inedible planting stock rather than the final product? Enshrined as they may be in song, their greed and stupidity cost Ireland the opportunity to find a replacement crop. Was what they did genocide? The more you broaden the meaning of a word, the less meaningful it is.

I wouldn't call stealing food when you're hungry and desperate greed.

[Lionel Ritchie]

Nor would I. Planting stock it may have been but I imagine they wouldn't have had months on their hands to hang around waiting for it to grow either.

I wouldn't consider the actions of the British administration genocidal but most definitely culpable. It happened on Westminsters watch and Westminster did scarce little to avert or aleviate -and I say that fully conscious that it's unhelpful to apply millenialist morality to a mid 19th century scenario.

But Britains actions or lack of them led large numbers of Irish people to conclude that Britain coveted Ireland as a resource bank but was quite happy to see the Irish thinned out substantially.

The only other major European famine of the 19th Century happened in Finland. Despite much harsher weather, lower temperatures and a complete collapse in the harvest the mortality rate was far lower than the Irish famine.

[DaveyCakes]

Who'll be next to jump on the genocide bandwagon after the this, the Armenians, and the Ukrainians?

[osarusan]

Who'll be next to jump on the genocide bandwagon after the this, the Armenians

Dont think the Armenians coule be accused of jumping on any bandwagons recently, as they've been saying it was genocide for decades. And there is a lot of support for the use of the term 'genocide' to describe what happened in Armenia in 1915.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2007-10-10-genocide-resolution_N.htm


http://alfreddezayas.com/Law_history/armlegopi.shtml

[GavinZac]

I wouldn't call stealing food when you're hungry and desperate greed.

A couple of loaves or apples is one thing, but warehouses full of seeds? That amount wasn't going to be used to make scones. You have to remember this wasn't deepest darkest Connacht either, it was the busy British trading port of Cork/Queenstown.

I'm aware that desperate times lead to desperate measures but taking vast quantities of something that you would have gotten your fair share of for free is greed. I'm sure you wouldn't say that desperation is an excuse for people cheating the current welfare system.

[Da Real Rover]

Who'll be next to jump on the genocide bandwagon after the this, the Armenians, and the Ukrainians?

Your a ****ing idiot.
The Armenian Holocaust was one of the worst in history.

[Da Real Rover]

A couple of loaves or apples is one thing, but warehouses full of seeds? That amount wasn't going to be used to make scones. You have to remember this wasn't deepest darkest Connacht either, it was the busy British trading port of Cork/Queenstown.

I'm aware that desperate times lead to desperate measures but taking vast quantities of something that you would have gotten your fair share of for free is greed. I'm sure you wouldn't say that desperation is an excuse for people cheating the current welfare system.

Why couldnt the paddys just have rolled over and died?

[kingdom hoop]

Da Real Rover, the question your thread title poses was answered some eleven years ago. Had you read the article you introduced the thread with you would understand.


In case you're utilising some self-ignore function on this site, here is the important bit again:

While there are many legitimate
subjects of debate surrounding the Famine, there
is no doubt that the British Government committed
genocide against the Irish People. This
particular “debate” should therefore come to an end.

[GavinZac]

Why couldnt the paddys just have rolled over and died?

:confused: Bizarre. You know who sent the corn, and what it was for, right?

[OneRedArmy]

I have trouble with people applying a term retrospectively before it was even thought up and when cultural and moral norms were completely different.

[pete]

For it to be genocide I think it would have to be a deliberate British plan. Did they take food off people? If they fail to step in to feed hungry people I don't think that is genocide.

[seanfhear]

For it to be genocide I think it would have to be a deliberate British plan. Did they take food off people? If they fail to step in to feed hungry people I don't think that is genocide.
there is no question that if it happened today that it would be considered genocide.I think it was genocide by neglect afterall the brittish were the goverment here at the time and they never tire of telling us even to this day how they bring order and civilisation to the indigenous populations of countries that they visit to enlighten.
I once heard an honest brittish professor explain in a debate that no country was in long term occupation of another country for the benifit of the occupied country.It is just not human nature.
With reguard to the famine there was just no profit in saving the starving
Does anybody think that our new capitalists would behave any differently If Ireland was an imperialist nation at that time or even today

[Dodge]

I can't see how not giving a **** is genocide.

[Closed Account 2]

It was genocide. The British occupied our land, they were in charge and their actions starved us to death. In my opinion it was a deliberate neglect in an attempt to weaken Ireland and to de-populate it so it could be occupied and settled with British people.

I would say it was a very similar policy to the conquistadors in Latin America or the colonials in North America vs the Amerindians. Foreign forces (Spanish) occupy a country (or many countries in the case of Latin America) and govern over a permanent* population decline (in the case of Latin America it due to a combination of disease and famine). Some might even argue that the conquistadors were less responsible, given the distances and the fact that it took place c.200-300 years before the famine. It took 2-3 days to travel from Britain to Ireland during the famine; it took months to travel from Spain to Latin America during the conquistador time.

I think it was a clear case of genocide by neglect, I would even go so far as to say in the context of other actions at the time, it seems to have been part of a deliberate policy to weaken Ireland's population with an eye to total and permanent absorbtion in to the British state - i.e. filling the empty country full of Brits.

*So far as I can tell the population of Ireland is still below what it was pre-famine, I'm not 100% sure on this but believe it to be correct.

[seanfhear]

I can't see how not giving a **** is genocide.
A goverment that taxes a population has a duty to protect that population with other reposibilities.These taxes are not for the personal advancement of politicians[please somebody tell our own spivs/elected representatives]
DELIBERATE NOT GIVING A **** FROM A SUPPOSEDLY SOVEREIGN GOVERMENT IS GENOCIDE
no taxes without responsibilities
IN America no taxation without representation

[osarusan]

Here's the United Nations definition -

Article 2 of the Convention defines genocide as

...any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:

(a) Killing members of the group;
(b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;
(c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;
(d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;
(e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.

– Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, Article 2
The point most likely to be considered here would probably be
(c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;
Looking at that definition, you'd have to prove that their inadequate efforts to help starving people was, part of a deliberate attempt "to bring about [the Irish people's] physical destruction in whole or in part", rather than just not caring a whole lot. Some scholars agrug that "intent to destroy must be obvious -

"the concept of genocide applies only when there is an actualized intent, however successfully carried out, to physically destroy an entire group (as such a group is defined by the perpetrators)" (The Holocaust in Historical Perspective, Vol. 1, 1994).
http://www.isg-iags.org/references/def_genocide.html

Some scholars see it as one and the same thing however -
Richard L. Rubenstein provides another definition of genocide in The Age of Triage: Fear and Hope in an Overcrowded World:


According to Cecil Woodham-Smith, the British government did not have a
plan to destroy the Irish people. Woodham-Smith holds that the misfortunes
occurred because Lord John Russell's government failed to foresee the
consequences of its actions. Although I am indebted to Woodham-Smith for
my knowledge of the famine, it is my opinion that a government is as
responsible for a genocidal policy when its officials accept mass death as
a necessary cost of implementing their policies as when they pursue
genocide as an end in itself. (14)
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0FKX/is_2002_Spring-Summer/ai_87915680/pg_5


Francis A. Boyle, Professor of International Law at the University of Illinois, with experience arguing on matters of genocide before the International Court of Justice in The Hague, wrote to the New Jersey Commission on Holocaust Education on May 2, 1996, saying, in part:

Clearly, during the years 1845 to 1850, the British government pursued a policy of mass starvation in Ireland with intent to destroy in substantial part the national, ethnical, and racial group commonly known as the Irish People.

Professor Boyle's legal opinion concludes that Britain's actions violated sections (a), (b), and (c) of Article II, and therefore constituted acts of genocide against the Irish People.

On April 26th, 1849, one hundred years before the Genocide Convention was signed, the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, the Earl of Clarendon, wrote to the Prime Minister, John Russell, expressing his feelings about the lack of aid from Parliament:

I do not think there is another legislature in Europe that would disregard such suffering as now exists in the west of Ireland, or coldly persist in a policy of extermination.
http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/8813

[pete]

Our we guilty of genocide for not assisting 3rd world countries suffering from Natural disasters (Burma) or famine? If our elected leaders so act but we still vote them back into government are we all guilty?

:confused:

[Lionel Ritchie]

the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, the Earl of Clarendon, wrote to the Prime Minister, John Russell, expressing his feelings about the lack of aid from Parliament:

I do not think there is another legislature in Europe that would disregard such suffering as now exists in the west of Ireland, or coldly persist in a policy of extermination.

...I think that sits well with my earlier post. Complicit by inaction. Clarendon was correct in his assertion about there not being another legislature in Europe that'd behave in such a way ...as the Finnish famine demonstrates.

[EAFC_rdfl]

Our we guilty of genocide for not assisting 3rd world countries suffering from Natural disasters (Burma) or famine? If our elected leaders so act but we still vote them back into government are we all guilty?

:confused:
do we occupy said 3rd world countries? the Irish people during the famine paid their taxes etc to Britain, this is why the responsibility of aiding the starving lay with Britain.

[Wolfie]

Its not a widely known fact that the Choctaw Indians in Mississippi, who were suffering their own woes, selflessly sent money they could not afford to Ireland as Famine relief.

"In 1841 the Choctaw Indians in Mississippi were forced from their homelands to journey many hundred miles cross country to Oklahoma. Many of them perished on what became known as the 'Trail of Tears'. A report in 'The Arkansas Intellegencer' of April 3rd 1847 stated that the Choctaw Indians, on learning of the Irish Famine, sent money to a famine relief fund in Ireland".

It puts Britains inaction into stark contrast.

[Block G Raptor]

Its not a widely known fact that the Choctaw Indians in Mississippi, who were suffering their own woes, selflessly sent money they could not afford to Ireland as Famine relief.

"In 1841 the Choctaw Indians in Mississippi were forced from their homelands to journey many hundred miles cross country to Oklahoma. Many of them perished on what became known as the 'Trail of Tears'. A report in 'The Arkansas Intellegencer' of April 3rd 1847 stated that the Choctaw Indians, on learning of the Irish Famine, sent money to a famine relief fund in Ireland".

It puts Britains inaction into stark contrast.

Damien Dempsey has a great song about that on his "Shots" Album