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Joined: Wed Jan 12, 2005 5:04 am
Posts: 571
Location: Calgary Alberta Canada
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| Quote (Nerroth @ 27 Oct. 2005 (13:42)) | | The point that France, the Netherlands, Belgium (whose occupation of Congo resulted in ten million deaths) or any other Western country with a history of empire cannot simply criticise the governments and textbooks of countries such as the PRC - who like to forget that Mao killed more Chinese than the Japanese did - and Japan, without also properly acknowledging their own pasts, is as valid as the point referring to the British empire. |
The difference is Gary is that your highly unlikely to see this kind of conversation in Japan, the PRC, Rwanada, Sudan, Etc...
And I for one am only second generation Canadian.
Prior to that my ancestors were either Irish subjects of the British Crown or Ukrainian subjects of the Czars.
Sorry, I'm not going to carry some pointless cultural guilt for something neither my ancestors nor myself ever had anything to do with and more often than not were victims of themselves.
| Quote (Nerroth @ 27 Oct. 2005 (13:42)) | | You fail to point out that the reason why certain formerly British-owned territories - such as Canada, Australia etc - are so much more succesful than African or Asian former colonies (of any European power), namely that the former countries had been settled by white immigrants. Note how well - relatively speaking - French Canadians and Boers in South Africa were treated, in comparison to the natives of North America, or the Aboriginals of Australia, or the Maori of New Zealand, or the tribespeople of Africa, or the peoples of the Indian subcontinent... |
Your right Gary... it was much better to let everybody hack each other to death with machetes because at least that way we don't offend their cultural sensitivities.
| Quote (Nerroth @ 27 Oct. 2005 (13:42)) | | A simple 'everyone's guilty of something' outlook gives scant regard to the suffering and lasting turmoil inflicted by the Empire on those whom it conquered (or the economic exploitation and cultural imperialism it carried out in its 'informal empire') |
In the immortal words of someone who's name I forget... get over it.
You can either live in the past or acknowledge it, deal with it and move on. Far too much of the world lives in the past and is perfectly happy to hack each other to death with said machetes because of something their great-great-grand-pappy had done to him by someone else's great-great-grand-pappy.
Frankly a good chunk of the world could benefit from the reimposition of British style colonialism. I?m quite comfortable with the concept of Western cultural imperialism because by and large:
a) they judge us so we can damn well judge them, and;
b) most of the world is stuck in a tribal stage where they are just as happy to kill you because your not the right tribe/religion/etc?
| Quote (Nerroth @ 27 Oct. 2005 (13:42)) | and does much to reinforce the notion that the British are all too proud of their imperial legacy, to the extent that they don't care about its negative impact.[/quote[
All in all the British have more to be proud of than most continental powers do. France in particular is largely responsible for the mess sub-Saharan Africa is in due to the way they treated their ?subjects?.
The British by and large at least mostly tried to bring some of the benefits of empire to their subjects such as common law, education, etc?
To misquote Python ?So, what have the British given us besides road, the rule of law??
[quote="Nerroth,27 Oct. 2005 (13:42)"]Oh, and many of those countries you say would like to return to the pink are in their mess, to a significant extent, either due to the Empire's actions in their countries |
Right Gary? The mess Zimbabwe has turned into is all the fault of those nasty British rather than Mugabe playing tribal politics. Kind of funny how all those troubles started after the British left.
| Quote (Nerroth @ 27 Oct. 2005 (13:42)) | | or even due to the arbitrary borders drawn up in European treaties |
That?s not an ?even? Gary that?s almost 100% of the problem right there.
You ignored tribal divisions in the Middle East and Africa and now you have a bunch of made up states with minority populations of certain tribes and guess what happens?
| Quote (Nerroth @ 27 Oct. 2005 (13:42)) | | or the continuing imapct that Western economic policy is ahving on these countries. If you take issue with the First World's exploitation of its Third, you can't divorce the systens causing this now from those which caused the exploitation of these regions under the old empires. |
I have issues with the first world treating the third world like children. We?ve turned half of humanity into a bunch of cargo cultists. Aid has destroyed most of Africa?s indigenous industries and in the Middle East politics has propped up a bunch of corrupt, hated regimes.
In an ideal world we have two choices here? either pulling out of everything and letting them sort it out for themselves which in the long run would be the most beneficial to the peoples in question or, reimpose all that ?cultural imperialism? in an impartial fashion until they?re ready to stand on their own two feet.
Since neither one is ever going to happen I?m not going to worry about it. Nor am I culturally required to apologize for it. Period.
You and I are just going to have to disagree on this and I?m done responding to this thread.
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