I read a lot of woke “scholarship,” and the way the term “Indigenous” is used makes it clear it’s being treated as the antithesis of “white,” because “white” is viewed as nearly synonymous with “colonizer/settler.” In this framework, “Indigenous” refers to “pre-settler societies” (see figure). But if “white” and “settler” are treated as synonyms, the logic forces the bizarre conclusion that most of Europe has no Indigenous population at all, and white people are native to nowhere. The left likes to criticize what they call “scientific racism,” but there are few clearer examples of it than this.