“White Americans considered themselves chosen by God to possess the continent and lord it over others — and they saw Native people as indelibly savage and fated by God to extinction.” — David J. Silverman
Was the colonization of North America a genocidal project? That is the delicate question David J. Silverman confronts in his powerful new book, The Chosen and the Damned: Native Americans and the Making of Race in the United States.
Yes, Silverman concludes, there was an American genocide. But with a crucial distinction. Rather than a top-down government-organised “Final Solution,” the fate of Native Americans was what Silverman calls a “structural genocide.” It reflected a complete indifference to Native American life, grounded in a religious and racial ideology that gave white Americans the right to possess the continent and viewed Native Americans as indelibly savage and fated by God to extinction.
The Spanish colonization of Latin America, Silverman notes, intended to subjugate the Native population and keep them as tributaries. The English, and their American successors, in contrast, intended to replace them. It’s the same structural genocide that occurred in Canada, New Zealand, Australia, and South Africa.
For all Silverman’s dark take, there is good news. He argues that this structural genocide came to an end in the late 1960s. In an extraordinary and underappreciated transformation, Native American activists convinced a broad majority of Americans that tribes as tribes should be a permanent part of the United States. White supremacy, Silverman concludes, has been a feature of North American history since its colonization. But so has pluralism. American genocide vs American pluralism. Is history once again repeating itself in Trump’s America?
Five Takeaways
• Structural Genocide. Not top-down government policy (though there was that too). A society-wide, culture-wide indifference to Native American life, grounded in a racial ideology of white election and Native damnation. Combined with the imperative to seize Native land: centuries of destruction through dozens of different forms.
• Anglo vs Spanish Colonialism. The Spanish intended to subjugate and keep Native people as tributaries. The English intended to replace them. That pattern is visible in Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa. Not unique to the US — particular to English-origin settler colonialism.
• The Theological Foundation. White Americans believed they were chosen by God to possess the continent. Native people were fated by God to extinction. Native people countered: the Great Spirit created Indians and Whites separately and intended America to belong to Indians. Not just a political dispute. A cosmic one.
• The Good News: Genocide Ended in the Late 1960s. A stunning, largely unacknowledged transformation. Bipartisan consensus that tribes as tribes should be permanent. Treaties honoured as the supreme law of the land. Native Americans are rising: in numbers, well-being, political power. Light years to go. But an extraordinary change.
• Honoring Treaties Is Not Reparations. It is the Constitution. The United States signed treaties with Native tribes in the nineteenth century. Under the US Constitution, those treaties are the supreme law of the land. Honoring them is not a special privilege. It is the republic living up to its word.
About the Guest
David J. Silverman is Professor of History at George Washington University and the author of The Chosen and the Damned (Bloomsbury, February 10, 2026) and This Land Is Their Land.
References
The Chosen and the Damned by David J. Silverman (Bloomsbury, February 10, 2026): bloomsbury.com/us/chosen-and-the-damned-9781635578386
About Keen On America
Nobody asks more awkward questions than the Anglo-American writer and filmmaker Andrew Keen.
Website: https://keenon.tv/ Substack: https://keenon.substack.com/ YouTube: https://youtube.com/@KeenOnShow
Chapters:
00:01:13 America’s 250th and Native American history
00:03:01 Structural genocide: what it means
00:05:16 Chosen by God to possess the continent
00:05:58 Anglo vs Spanish colonialism
00:08:06 The settler pattern across the Anglosphere
00:20:00 The post-1960s transformation
00:33:00 Honoring treaties: not reparations, the Constitution
00:40:59 Trump, immigration, and the long history of white supremacy
00:41:36 It’s a fight worth having