genocide

with the 1948 U.N. Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, the world outlawed targeting whole peoples, but it took a long time for the word genocide to be used; the United States did not ratify the Convention until 1988 (after the late Sen. William Proxmire, D-WISC, gave 3,211 speeches on the floor of the Senate, a different speech every day for 19 years). Do not use the euphemism "ethnic cleansing," which masks the realities and responsibilities of genocidal acts. "Ethnocide" (the mass destruction of an ethnic group, often by another ethnic group) is sometimes used interchangeably with "genocide." However, while genocide kills people, ethnocide destroys social cultures (Bartolomé Clavero, Genocide or Ethnocide, 1993-2007). See also American Indian Holocaust/Native American Holocaust, Armenian genocide, Darfur genocide, holocaust/Holocaust.