Dienekes, in response to Living Anthropologically, Petty identity politics indeed, or, holding a grudge is no excuse for anti-science:
I won’t argue about the veracity or details of this version of history, but surely native Americans from the US were not especially mistreated compared to other people colonized by Europeans?
I mean, there are now samples from Native Australians, East Indians, Sub-Saharan Africans, Native Americans from all over the Americas except the US. Why don’t all these people not “hold a grudge” for their bad treatment at the hands of Europeans, but, apparently, are perfectly willing to participate in genetic research if it’s explained to them how they might learn more about their ancestors from it?
And, why limit ourselves to people colonized by Europeans? Surely, Slavs, for example, have a lot of things to say about German Rassenkunde scientists belittling them, studying their skulls to “prove” they are an inferior race, and hatching up and executing plans for their annihilation. So, why do the Russians give the Denisova fingerbone to ze Max Planckfolks to study, or allow them to study ancient DNA from all over their territory?
Scour the literature for a while, and you’ll find plenty of (modern) Germans studying Jews, and Jews studying pretty much everybody, …