“Only the victims of other genocides suffer” (Churchill, 1997, p. XVIII).
Ta'c méeywi (Good morning), everyone. Welcome to another installment of Monday Methods. Today, I will be touching on an issue that might seem familiar to some of you and that might be a new subject for some others. As mentioned in the title, that subject is the American Indian (Native American) Genocide(s) and how to combat the denial of these genocides. This is part one of a two part series. Find part two here.
The reason this has been chosen as the topic for discussion is because on /r/AskHistorians, we encounter people, questions, and answers from all walks of life. Often enough, we have those who deny the Holocaust, so much to the point that denial of it is a violation of our rules. However, we also see examples of similar denialism that contributes to the overall marginalization and social injustice of other groups, including one of the groups that I belong to: American Indians. Therefore, as part of our efforts to continue upholding the veracity of history, this includes helping everyone to understand this predominately controversial subject. Now, let's get into it...
In the United States, an ostensibly subtle state of denial exists regarding portions of this country's history. One of the biggest issues concerning the colonization of the Americas is whether or not genocide was committed by the incoming colonists from Europe and their American counterparts. We will not be discussing today whether this is true or not, but for the sake of this discussion, it is substantially true. Many people today, typically those who are descendants of settlers and identify with said ancestors, vehemently deny the case of genocide for a variety of reasons. David Stannard (1992) explains this by saying:
Denial of massive death counts is common—and even readily understandable, if contemptible—among those whose forefathers were perpetrators of the genocide. Such denials have at least two motives: first, protection of the moral reputations of those people and that country responsible for genocidal activity . . . and second, on occasion, the desire to continue carrying out virulent racist assaults upon those who were the victims of the genocide in question (p. 152).
These reasons are predicated upon numerous claims, but all that point back to an ethnocentric worldview that actively works to undermine even the possibility of other perspectives, particularly minority perspectives. When ethnocentrism is allowed to proliferate to this point, it is no longer benign in its activity, for it develops a greed within the host group that results in what we have seen time and again in the world—subjugation, total war, slavery, theft, racism, and genocide. More succinctly, we can call this manifestation of ethnocentric rapaciousness the very essence of colonialism. More definitively, this term colonialism “refers to both the formal and informal methods (behaviors, ideologies, institutions, policies, and economies) that maintain the subjugation or exploitation of Indigenous Peoples, lands, and resources” (Wilson & Yellow Bird, 2005, p. 2).
Part of combating the atmosphere of denialism about the colonization of the Americas and the resulting genocide is understanding that denialism does exist and then being familiar enough with the tactics of those who would deny such genocide. Churchill (1997), Dunbar-Ortiz (2014), and Stannard (1992) specifically work to counter the narrative of denialism in their books, exposing the reality that on many accounts, the “settler colonialism” that the European Nations and the Americans engaged in “is inherently genocidal” (Dunbar-Ortiz, 2014, p. 9).
To understand the tactics of denialism, we must know how this denialism developed. Two main approaches are utilized to craft the false narrative presented in the history text books of the American education system. First, the education system is, either consciously or subconsciously, manipulated to paint the wrong picture or even used against American Indians. Deloria and Wildcat (2001) explain that:
Indian education is conceived to be a temporary expedient for the purpose of bringing Indians out of their primitive state to the higher levels of civilization . . . A review of Indian education programs of the past three decades will demonstrate that they have been based upon very bad expectations (pp. 79-80).
“With the goal of stripping Native peoples of their cultures, schooling has been the primary strategy for colonizing Native Americans, and teachers have been key players in this process” (Lundberg & Lowe, 2016, p. 4). Lindsay (2012) notes that the California State Department of Education denies genocide being committed and sponsored by the state (Trafzer, 2013). Textbooks utilized by the public education system in certain states have a history of greatly downplaying any mention of the atrocities committed, if they're mentioned at all (DelFattore, 1992, p. 155; Loewen, 2007).
The second approach occurs with the actual research collected. Anthropologists, scholarly experts who often set their sights on studying American Indians, have largely contributed to the misrepresentation of American Indians that has expanded into wider society (Churchill, 1997; Deloria, 1969; Raheja, 2014). Deloria (1969) discusses the damage that many anthropological studies have caused, relating that their observations are published and used as the lens with which to view American Indians, suggesting a less dynamic, static, and unrealistic picture. “The implications of the anthropologist, if not all America, should be clear for the Indian. Compilation of useless knowledge “for knowledge’s sake” should be utterly rejected by Indian people” (p. 94). Raheja (2014) reaffirms this by discussing the same point, mentioning Deloria’s sentiments:
Deloria in particular has questioned the motives of anthropologists who conduct fieldwork in Native American communities and produce “essentially self-confirming, self-referential, and self-reproducing closed systems of arcane ‘pure knowledge’—systems with little, if any, empirical relationship to, or practical value for, real Indian people (p. 1169).
To combat denial, we need to critically examine the type of information and knowledge we are exposed to and take in. This includes understanding that more than one perspective exists on any given subject, field, narrative, period, theory, or "fact," as all the previous Monday Methods demonstrate. To effectively combat this denialism, and any form of denialism, diversifying and expanding our worldviews can help us to triangulate overlapping areas that help to reveal the bigger picture and provide us with what we can perceive as truthful.
A number of scholars and those of the public will point out various other reasons as to the death and atrocities that occurred regarding the Indians in the Americas. Rather than viewing the slaughter for what it is, they paint it as a tragedy; an unfortunate, but inevitable end. This attitude produces denial of the genocides that occurred with various scapegoats being implemented (Bastien et al., 1999; Cameron, Kelton, & Swedlund, 2015; Churchill, 1997).
One of the reasons they point to and essentially turn into a scapegoat is the rapid spread and high mortality rate of the diseases introduced into the Americas. While it is true that disease was a huge component into the depopulation of the Americas, often resulting in up to a 95% mortality rate for many communities (Churchill, 1997, p. XVI; Stannard, 1992; Dunbar-Ortiz, 2014, pp. 39-42), these effects were greatly exacerbated by actions of colonization. David Jones, in the scholarly work Beyond Germs: Native Depopulation in North America (2016), notes this in his research on this topic when he states, ". . .epidemics were but one of many factors that combined to generate the substantial mortality that most groups did experience" (pp. 28-29). Jones also cites in his work Hutchinson (2007), who concludes:
It was not simply new disease that affected native populations, but the combined effects of warfare, famine, resettlement, and the demoralizing disintegration of native social, political, and economic structures (p. 171).
The issue with focusing so much on this narrative of "death by disease" is that it begins to undermine the colonization efforts that took place and the very intentional efforts of the colonizers to subjugate and even eradicate the Indigenous populations. To this notion, Stannard (1992) speaks in various parts of this work about the academic understanding of the American Indian Genocide(s). He says:
Scholarly estimates of the size of the post-Columbian holocaust have climbed sharply in recent decades. Too often, however, academic discussions of this ghastly event have reduced the devastated indigenous peoples and their cultures to statistical calculations in recondite demographic analyses" (p. X).
This belief that the diseases were so overwhelmingly destructive has given rise to several myths that continue to be propagated in popular history and by certain writers such as Jared Diamond in his work Guns, Germs, and Steel (1997) and Charles Mann's 1491 (2005) and 1493 (2011). Three myths that come from this propagation are: death by disease alone, bloodless conquest, and virgin soil. Each of these myths rests on the basis that because disease played such a major role, the actions of colonists were aggressive at worst, insignificant at best. Challenging this statement, Dunbar-Ortiz (2014) draws a comparison to the Holocaust, stating:
In the case of the Jewish Holocaust, no one denies that more Jews died of starvation, overwork, and disease under Nazi incarceration than died in gas ovens, yet the acts of creating and maintaining the conditions that led to those deaths clearly constitute genocide (p. 42).
Thus solidifying the marked contrast many would make regarding the Holocaust, an evident that clearly happened, and the genocides in North America, one that is unfortunately controversial to raise.
The Papal Bull (official Church charter) Terra Nullius (empty land) was enacted by Pope Urban II during The Crusades in 1095 A.D. European nations used this as their authority to claim lands they “discovered” with non-Christian inhabitants and used it to strip the occupying people of all legal title to said lands, leaving them open for conquest and settlement (Churchill, 1997, p. 130; Davenport, 2004; Dunbar-Ortiz, 2014, pp. 230-31).
While numerous other Papal Bulls would contribute to the justification of the colonization of the Americas, this one worked toward another method that made its way down to our day. Going back to Stannard (1992), he criticizes other scholars purporting this notion:
Recently, three highly praised books of scholarship on early American history by eminent Harvard historians Oscar Handlin and Bernard Bailyn have referred to thoroughly populated and agriculturally cultivated Indian territories as "empty space," "wilderness," "vast chaos," "unopen lands," and the ubiquitous "virgin land" that blissfully was awaiting European "exploitation”. . . It should come as no surprise to learn that professional eminence is no bar against articulated racist absurdities such as this. . . (pp. 12-13).
This clearly was not the case. The Americas were densely population with many nations spread across the continents, communities living in their own regional areas, having their own forms of governments, and existing according to their interpretation of the world. They maintained their own institutions, spoke their own languages, interacted with the environment, engaged in politics, conducted war, and expressed their dynamic cultures (Ermine, 2007; Deloria & Wilkins, 1999; Jorgensen, 2007; Pevar, 2012; Slickpoo, 1973).
Similar to Holocaust denialism, critics of the American Indian Genocide(s) try to claim that the United States, for example, was just trying to "relocate" or "remove" the Indians from their lands, not attempting to exterminate them. Considering how the President of the United States at the time the official U.S. policy was set on removal was known as an “Indian Killer” (Dunbar-Ortiz, 2014, p. 96; Foreman, 1972; Landry, 2016; Pevar, 2012, p. 7), for example, many of these removals were forced upon parties not involved in a war, and typically resulted in the death of thousands of innocents, removal was not as harmless as many would like to think.
These are but several of the many methods that exist to deny the reality of what happened in the past. By knowing these methods and understanding the sophistry they are built upon, we can work toward dispelling false notions and narratives, help those who have suffered under such propaganda, and continue to increase the truthfulness of bodies of knowledge.
Please excuse the long-windedness of this post. It is important to me that I explain this to the fullest extent possible within reason, though. As a member of the group(s) that is affected by this kind of conduct, this is an opportunity to progress toward greater social justice for my people and all of those who have suffered and continue to suffer under oppression. Qe'ci'yew'yew (thank you).
References
Bastien, B., Kremer, J.W., Norton, J., Rivers-Norton, J., Vickers, P. (1999). The Genocide of Native Americans: Denial, shadow, and recovery. ReVision, 22(1). 13-20.
Cameron, C. M., Kelton, P., & Swedlund, A. C. (2015). Beyond Germs: Native Depopulation in North America. University of Arizona Press.
Churchill, W. (1997). A Little Matter of Genocide. City Lights Publisher.
Davenport, F. G. (2004). European Treaties bearing on the History of the United States and its Dependencies (No. 254). The Lawbook Exchange, Ltd.
DelFattore, J. (1992). What Johnny Shouldn't Read: Textbook Censorship in America (1st ed.). New Haven and London: Yale University Press.
Deloria, V. (1969). Custer Died For Your Sins: An Indian Manifesto. University of Oklahoma Press.
Deloria, V., & Wilkins, D. (1999). Tribes, Treaties, and Constitutional Tribulations (1st ed.). University of Texas Press.
Deloria, V., & Wildcat, D. (2001). Power and place: Indian education in America. Fulcrum Publishing.
Diamond, J. (1997). Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies. W.W. Norton & Company.
Dunbar-Ortiz, R. (2014). An Indigenous Peoples’ History of the United States (Vol. 3). Beacon Press.
Ermine, W. (2007). The Ethical Space of Engagement. Indigenous LJ, 6, 193-203.
Foreman, G. (1972). Indian Removal: The Emigration of the Five Civilized Tribes of Indians (Vol. 2). University of Oklahoma Press.
Hutchinson, D. (2007). Tatham Mound and the Bioarchaeogology of European Contact: Disease and Depopulation in Central Gulf Coast Florida. Journal of Field Archaeology, 32(3).
Jorgensen, M. (2007). Rebuilding Native Nations: Strategies for governance and development. Oxford of Arizona Press.
Landry, A. (2016). Martin Van Buren: The Force Behind the Trail of Tears. Indian Country Today.
Lindsay, B. C. (2015). Murder State: California's Native American Genocide, 1846-1873. University of Nebraska.
Loewen, J. W. (2008). Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything your American history textbook got wrong. The New Press.
Mann, C. C. (2005). 1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus. Knopf Incorporated.
Mann, C. C. (2011). 1493: Uncovering the New World Columbus created. Vintage.
Pevar, S. L. (2012). The Rights of Indians And Tribes. New York: Oxford University Press.
Puisto, J. (2002). ‘We didn’t care for it.’ The Magazine of Western History, 52(4), 48-63.
Raheja, M. (2007). Reading Nanook's smile: Visual sovereignty, Indigenous revisions of ethnography, and Atanarjuat (the fast runner). American Quarterly, 59(4), 1159-1185.
Slickpoo, A. P. (1973). Noon Nee-Me-Poo (We, the Nez Perces): The Culture and History of the Nez Perces.
Stannard, D. E. (1992). American Holocaust: The conquest of the new world. Oxford University Press.
Trafzer, C. E. (2013). Book review: Murder state: California's Native American Genocide, 1846-1873. Journal of American Studies, 47(4), 2.
Wilson, A. C., & Bird, M. Y. (Eds.). (2005). For Indigenous Eyes Only: A decolonization handbook. Santa Fe: School of American Research.
Thanks so much for this essay and the time spent crafting it. This will be a most helpful resource to cite in future discussions.
We've had similar discussions on this topic before, debating the best methods, examples, and approaches to teach the unsavory, painful portions of American history. One of the greatest strengths of /r/AskHistorians as a forum is the chance to engage with interested readers who may not know about this place and time, and show the complexity hidden beneath our national mythology. This allows us to examine the past freely and openly, and understand how all our shared history, violent and peaceful, influences where we are today.
Prior to multiple conversations with you I believed the term genocide too broad to apply as an umbrella over all North American history. I studied the first few centuries after contact, when Europeans maintained only tenuous footholds on the coast, and were under the ever-present threat of being pushed back into the sea by far stronger Native American nations. Surely, I thought, genocide didn't apply even then?
Thanks to discussions with you, and diving ever deeper into topics like the pervasive and devastating Indian slave trade, the colonial obsession with land use/modification that was incompatible with neighboring indigenous lifeways, and the rhetoric justifying colonial endeavors I now see how I needed to change my perspective. The foundation for all that would come was laid in those initial encounters. We can't hope to understand the American Indian Policy if we don't examine the total war strategy adopted in conflicts that shaped our emerging national identity like the Yamasee War, the Pequot War and King Phillip's War. We can't understand the legal justification the emerging system of race-based chattel slavery if we don't read the arguments used for Native American slavery in Massachusetts. Our national story rests on a structurally violent foundation. Examining that history illuminates our past, and present, inequalities.
Thank you for your work here.
Where do we draw the line between modern genocide and renisance brutality? To a layman, I have a hard time taking this at face value because it feels revisionist. Unless you narrowly focus on 19th century Americans and completely ignore the Spanish.
The reconquesta. The 30 years war. The hundred years war. The march on Vienna. Contemporary monarchs don't seem too concerned about anyone's life. Is the treatment of the Americans just another tragic notch on the belt?
I'm in denial apparently. My reasonings were not considered in the OP, so I'd like to share.
Not all Native American tribes were/are the same. They were not one people united. American governments and its people did not treat every tribe equally.
At certain times various tribes were at war with America, with the backing of foreign nation states.
American governments, and Britain before them, had a wide range of policies towards the natives. At times they sought to protect the natives from settlers, while other times they actively persecuted the tribes. If you're talking about the late 19th century and the plains Indians, or the Trail of Tears then I'd agree that the US governments were carrying out a systematic persecution of native Americans, but I am not qualified to label such actions as genocide (but wouldn't argue). I would argue that the entire 200-300+ years of white/Native relations were a genocide against native Americans.
Native Americans did not share the same values as white Americans, in some respects they held completely opposing values. This led the white population to fear and denigrate the natives to the point that at certain times the removal/destruction of native tribes was a popular opinion by white Americans.
I've stated that not all tribes were treated equally, but certain tribes were universally hated by whites and other natives. Are these tribes to be considered victims of white persecution if other native tribes would have persecuted them too, if only they had the means?
Lastly, I take exception to the tactic that anyone who disagrees with an idea/notion is in denial. If your idea needs to belittle opposition in the first sentence, then you've already lost the ability to persuade or make your point known.
Would you consider extremely narrow terminology as a method of denial? I'm thinking of the famous case regarding Rwanda where the US used the phrase 'acts of genocide' instead of 'genocide'.
Are there any generally agreed upon definitions of 'genocide' for Native Americans, and does this differ from other definitions?
This raises a difficult question: Is there any instance of imperialism and colonialism that isn't intimately connected with mass-murder?
Or is the very nature of political power that those culturally and ancestrally unlike the ruling group and it's retainers must eventually be killed merely for existing?
It's really interesting reading this from an Australian perspective, because here mention of genocide and even war between white people and Indigenous people has been heavily politicised. I wasn't aware of similar American debates, but well, of course there's similar American debates.
The historian Henry Reynolds has written a long series of books, including Why Weren't We Told? in 2000 and An Indelible Stain? The Question Of Genocide In Australia's History in 2001, which in great detail lay out the evidence for brutal frontier skirmishes and systematic poisonings of Indigenous people, etc, that the public is largely ignorant of. Reynolds' arguments were attacked by a conservative historian, Keith Windschuttle, in a 2002 book, The Fabrication Of Aboriginal History, which mostly relied on a lack of official mention of these events in government archives to make its arguments, and which was generally not received well by historians; Robert Manne - who historically had been somewhat on the right, politically, but who moved quite left, towards the end of the 1990s - wrote a 2003 book, Whitewash, lambasting Windschuttle as a denialist.
This has all been quite controversial, politically; according to the conservative Prime Minster John Howard, the most dominant Australian political figure of the last 20 years, for better or worse, Reynolds' views were 'a black arm-band view of history' and should be ignored - students, according to Howard, should be taught a version of history that paints Australia in a good light. In this context it was sadly controversial, in 2007, that the Labor Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, made a speech apologising to living Indigenous peoples that their children were systematically taken from them, often largely on racial grounds, and placed in foster care that was seen as 'better'.
I agree with the notion that there are some people who try to claim that the death count was lower than it really was, but there are also people who try to claim that the death count was higher than it really was. The comparison to Holocaust denial seems inappropriate given that we don't have good numbers on how many Native Americans lived in the Americas prior to colonization and so the use of estimates is inevitable. Hopefully it's inadvertent, but I feel this post suggests those who favor estimates toward the lower end of the credible range are somehow morally at fault. That seems like a bad implication to send out to people.
You claim that the actions of settlers made deaths due to disease worse. But how much worse? I'm inclined to think that the vast majority of deaths due to disease were unavoidable, although maybe I'm wrong to think that. If I'm not, the comparison to the victims of the Holocaust who died due to disease again seems inappropriate. There's a tremendous difference between exposing a tribe to a disease through incidental contact and intentionally keeping a group in conditions where they are malnourished, overcrowded, and overworked, and so get diseases and die.
I don't have a problem with calling the intentional killing of Native Americans a genocide. But I do have a problem with using every rhetorical trick possible to make the genocide seem as large and as bad as possible. I don't think that promotes an accurate understanding of the past. We can acknowledge that the majority of deaths were unintentional without implying that the deaths which were intentional were somehow acceptable. To frame any attempt at moderating more extreme historical claims as "denialism" seems very biased and concerning to me. The analogy to the Holocaust is not fair because the quality of our knowledge of pre-colonial North America is much lower than the quality of our knowledge concerning Nazi Germany.
Have an honest question I was always curious about. Why do people of Native heritage such as yourself use the term "American Indians" or more specifically "Indians" when when describing yourselves?
I always thought the story I learned in school about why we call those peoples "Indians" because when Columbus landed they thought they were in India, just sounded silly. And if it's true why did the name last so long? I feel like it would have become a derogatory or insulting name. But I see many native Americans and you as well use the term to refer to yourselves.
Would you be willing to provide some history on the use of that name and the views on it in native communities, as well as perhaps even your personal take?
Thank you!
Im confused, but I didn't think there was anything generally defined as a genocide on American Indians?
Isn't the golden standard for defining genocide international recognition, which is completely lacking?
Wouldn't it be useful to use a less partisan term?
Amazing essay! Learned a lot about this touchy subject. I distinctly remember the extent of my high school learning on the subject of American Indians was to watch 'Bury me at Wounded Knee' in social studies, then listen as the teacher/basketball coach bitterly complained about how 'nasty everyone wants America to look these days' and that 'Indians would never want to go back to the way they were living before we got here.' So you can imagine it's refreshing to actually learn a little about the matter, lol.
Two questions:
What level of responsibility lies between colonists and the U.S. government? Colonists from other countries (French, Dutch, English) were in what is now the United States as settlers long before the U.S. was a country and partook in atrocities. How is this addressed?
I've heard that many Native American tribes were violent towards not only settlers but other Native Americans. To the point it accounted for a lot of death and destruction among Native Americans. How much truth does this hold?
As a layperson among laypeople, how much effort is reasonable to expect from others in working to counteract the prevailing effect of public education and scholarship of the past regarding the relationship of settlers and average European-Americans to Native Americans? How much effort is required of the historian and education community to bring the received view on these issues in line with current scholarly opinion?
I just wanted to point out that you cited Ward Churchill many times here. Churchill is largely discredited in this area. He was fired from the University of Colorado because of "serious research misconduct". He falsified and fabricated documents related to Americans purposely giving Native Americans blankets containing small pox when in reality the documents showed the opposite to occur.
Great post, I wanted to give you appreciation for it. My personal stance on this issue has changed over my adult life, not because I was unaware of the horror of this past, but because I laboured under some mistakenly narrow assumptions about what "genocide" means. That confusion seems to be widespread, though it comes in two flavours. 1) Mistaken, open to correction. 2.) Entrenched denial.
Out of curiosity what is Ward Churchill's (since you cited him) standing among historians on this topic? He is definitely a contentious figure due some of his political statements but there is also controversy over his claims of Indigenous ancestry which would be a third rail considering the topic.
Isn't it better to say that genocides were committed against natives instead of saying genocide was committed?. It might come across as semantics but I think there is a important distinction between coloring the whole relationship as just one of genocide (and ignoring the complex relationships/alliances/wars/agreements of this tribe and that colony) and looking at particular interactions as genocidal.
After this point its easier to ask whether the trail of tears or Sioux Wars was a genocide or part of a genocide.
Also people think the Holocaust and Rwanda when the term genocide is used. It seems to be that there is a difference between the colloquial definition of genocide as a special horror and the more academic definition where there are plenty of ongoing genocides and thousands/millions of historical genocides including genocide by Native Americans. People don't even have to die for it to be genocide. There is a huge disparity in the academic and common usage of the words.
As a general rule of thumb I just assume anytime something is called genocide its genocide because of how broad a lot of definitions are. Its sad but the more I learn about the term the less horrible it becomes. Its even comical to see people try to argue that the a genocide is only x when x is still genocide.
To what degree can a meaningful distinction be drawn between colonialism and imperialism, in the modern period?
In addition, I want to give just a few brief reminders for this thread in case it gets more traction than I imagine.
The Civility Rule is always in effect! Please keep that in mind and don't start throwing around insults and such, even as part of your characterization of deniers. Please keep your private opinions of people with opposing views to yourself, as it doesn't add to the discussion.
As made clear in the above post, this is a space where you can ask questions, even uncomfortable ones, in good faith, but we aren't giving a platform to hate-speech here, or anywhere else in the sub.
Be mindful of the rules concerning modern politics. We will be removing comments/chains which veer away from the discussion of history and historiography and into current political issues.
Thank you!
--AH Mod Team
Would ethnic cleansing be a more accurate term than genocide?
This clearly was not the case. The Americas were densely population with many nations spread across the continents,
How true is this statement for the southernmost regions of South America?
I've thoroughly enjoyed reading this thread, good back and forth dialogue with a civil tone and constructive talk for the most part. The mods here do a fine job.
I might catch a bit of flak for this, but this post in some ways is putting the cart before the horse because I think the problem in the US is ignorance more than (outright) denialism. Certainly the lack of information makes it much easier to deny the existence of an Indian genocide (to be quite honest this isn't something I've given much thought to and am wrestling with as I type this), but I think the core problem is that most people in the US are largely unaware of the gravity and magnitude of native suffering at the hands of the US and its settlers and citizens. While that's a function of their having been educated in a system that, as OP describes, largely glosses over the plight of Indians (using OP's terminology), I think the problem is systemic, rather than individual.
I think the reason I feel this way is because of OP's title and the connections that it suggests to Holocaust denial. However, I think there's an important difference between the two in that Holocaust deniers tend to be relatively few in number (although quite vocal), while there's probably a strong majority of what I might term passive Indian genocide deniers in the US because they're largely unaware of the magnitude of the atrocities. To me, at least, there's a pretty big difference between someone who actively chooses not to believe in something despite having good evidence to the contrary and someone who doesn't believe in something because they haven't been given enough information. Now, I will certainly concede that most Americans would probably push back at least a little at the term "genocide" because it's such a loaded word, and that goes back to what OP wrote about "protecting the reputations" of ancestors, but again, I think it's the fault of the educational system, rather than of individuals.
TL;DR: I feel like OP framed this as an individual problem when I think it needs to be addressed first on a societal/systemic level before taking individuals to task for a sin they may be at best dimly aware they're committing.
I bit my tongue when this thread was brand new. But I think I have a more grounded approach to deconstruct for conversation.
Between history and politics wouldn't it be hard from any facet of American majority, a.k.a. white society to admit to genocide?
First, America was never committing acts of domestic genocide from its origin to present day. Scapegoats for Native American population decline are convenient, as well as, are effective in writing off issues. Aren't the way most people understand genocide today based on nation-states turning in on themselves and creating a disposable population? The overpraised example is the World War 2 Third-Reich holocaust. Take away genocide being nation-states turning in on themselves and creating a disposable population.
America until the 1890s, and arguably until the ending of the Dawes Severalty Act America was still an expanding nation on foreign land. Native Americans were sovereign people and owned sovereign land exclusive and politically separate from the United States of America. Therefore current understanding of genocide is not applicable on a political level. That is if nation-states turning in on themselves and creating a disposable population is the foundation for a qualified genocide. To place further emphasis on the irrelevance of Native American genocide being made a public importance they make up 1% of the American population. That 1% is not economically or politically important to larger awareness that American citizens should have. Beyond that America fulfills its treaty and fiduciary responsibilities to Native Americans as sovereign people.
Going further on denial of Native American genocide Neo-Liberalism does not constitute a political body to say American imperialism or colonialism had committed acts of genocide. Again, during the imperial and colonial phases of America America was never turning in on its population and creating a disposable population of human beings on a domestic front. Native Americans were always on a foreign front.
Where does that leave America in a neoliberal era? Well we live in an age and nation (America) that turned from hemispheric protection to an internal security state. Minorities in America are now superfluous populations that are subjugated to prison culture. Again Native Americans vacuumed into stereotypes, but no genocide itself is taking place.
Maybe an argument for ethnocide is possible, but that is not the focus of this thread. Between the main time periods of colonization, imperialism, globalization (neoliberalism) there is no way that a genocide against Native Americans could be asserted. Therefore, making denial of genocide an acceptable belief and practice.
This may sound very vague and elliptical as a reason for genocidal denial, but I am not in a place where I can sit down and cite all my sources.
Please comment on inherent flaws you see with what has been presented. I will go the extra mile and cite the materials that support the statements I have made.
I can use examples from fiction to well documented journalism and federal records. Noam Chompsky is one person that I have learned a lot from on many modern issues regarding genocide, arms dealing, drug trafficking, and dehumanization as a whole.
I will point to the Armenian genocide, the Bosnian genocide, Kurdish genocide, and political events that might not be considered genocide, but meet the essential qualifications in Central and South America. I will also point to genocides, or similar acts of dehumanization in the Middle East through out the 1960s to present day. There is great discussion for genocidal denial against Native Americans and beyond.
I am an enrolled member of the Rosebud Sioux Tribe. What I have presented here is for discussion and new methods of thought, not trolling and racist or uniformed mudslinging. Between the rigorous teachings of traditional ways to American education and thought this is a very long discussion if real understanding is to be concluded.
Thanks for your time.