https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maya_codices

What about the Nazi party? The Japanese occupiers of Korea and China during WWII?

The British burning the Burmese royal library in the late 19th century? Or the current massacres of Muslims in Myanmar by Buddhists?

The US Army in its genocide of indigenous North American tribes?

My impression is that there are at least some anti-intellectual authoritarians in every country, religion, and political movement.

Yes, actually. The religion was Marxism (i.e., the most murderous religion in history), with Mao Zedong as its Prophet.

Hoffer's treatment of the phenomenon is just as fresh and relevant today as it was when he wrote the book in the 1950s.

I got downvoted for suggesting that Maoism was a religion, but it quite clearly had more commonalities than differences with the more extremist religious cults (as did Stalinism, Nazism, etc.)

Look at the (pagan/polytheist) Romans' actions in the seige and destruction of (monotheist) Jerusalem, for one example. Or (pagan) Viking raids on English/Welsh/Irish Christian monasteries for another.

> We found a large number of books in these characters and, as they contained nothing in which were not to be seen as superstition and lies of the devil, we burned them all, which they regretted to an amazing degree, and which caused them much affliction. – Bishop De Landa

EDIT: My best guess is that this was intended as a reply to https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16292738 an referring to Charles C Mann and his book?

Yet in terms of lost culture, putting a high enough percentage of individuals in prison, and confining enough of the others to ghettos, while driving them out of historical cultural centers, has an equivalent result to genocide in some ways.

Essentially, a percentage of the people can be alive while also having “the culture” be as dead as dead can be.

Of course the culture is born again in a different form, as Native American culture endures today, despite “genocide”. And rendering that invisible is just a continuation of that genocide so I certainly don’t want to intimate that such culture is truly gone.

Well, a culture is born again; culture just tends to happen if you put people together, it's in our blood. The question is whether it flourishes. I am from Europe so cannot say this for certain, but I get the impression that all over both American continents, Native Americans are still very much an ethnic minority whose rights are being trampled over.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

A targeted effort by people with power to liquidate white peoples' group identity ("abolish whiteness") and to marginalize and obscure their traditional cultural touchstones ("don't teach books by dead white men" and related efforts to avoid teaching Shakespeare, the Bible, old white philosophers, etc), efforts to bring in many immigrants to make whites minorities in areas where they were previously a majority (and gleeful anticipation of this outcome), etc."

In his defense, it's difficult to want to waste time debating with this line of reasoning. There are some huge unfounded assumptions being made right here in a well thought out way. A nugget of possible truth, mixed with a lot of personal opinion. With that said, doesnt seem like it would lead to a productive conversation.

I'm not sure why the need to insert white males into the equation. That argument is based on you believing there is a secret organized attack against white men going on. I think thats open to interpretation depending on who you are. If anything, I, as a minority, see a balancing of power. Im also aware that whitw males still dominate the economical and political spectrum, so its even harder to agree with this logic. Is thus attack being perpetuated by other white males? To what gain? It seems to me that it appears as an attack on white males, when white males are no longer allowed to dominate culturally, economically, or in numbers in certain areas. They arent being excluded, others are being allowed to the table. That means more chairs need to be pulled up and you cant have the entire meal to yourself. I can't call that "cultural genocide". The role of white male in society remains much the same. This argument makes me think of the people who complain about AA hires, while ignoring the fact that the company is comprised of 85% white hires.