Reply to British colonialism killed 100 million Indians in 40 years

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]This is a bizarre thread. I mean no one is advocating for colonization to start back up again? Human history is full of people oppressing, rising up, and starting over to try again. Whole populations have been wiped out along the way. Cultures lost forever, great crimes committed. And great progress has happened alongside that.

Some cultures have been fortunate to remain fairly untouched for thousands of years like China and Japan and others have been through repeated upheavals.

Like the tectonic plates and volcanos you can say that great progress comes from great change. Sometimes change comes at you from within and sometimes externally. Sometimes change is good and sometimes it is horrible. But change has moved the world forward.

The current monarchy has essentially nothing to do with colonization other than that they have not actively set all these countries 'free' but they have essentially started saying 'whatever' to the ones who are seeking independence.

This is like slavery, it is a horrible thing, no one thinks it was good. But it has, for better or worse, shaped the modern world. All we can do is work with what is in front of us.

What should the UK do with this study OP? And this is truly not a defense of colonialism but it was kind of something EVERYONE was doing at the time. The way we think about the world and other cultures has really changed in the last century. But people have been dying because of cruel powerful people for all of human history, this is nothing new or unique to Britain.[/quote]
You’re kind of letting people off the hook when you liken colonialism, a policy choice, to plate tectonics.

I also love when people point out, as if this is supposed to be a new fact, that people around the world have been terrible to one another at varying scales and degrees since people existed. The British people claimed to be both more modern and superior. Being as cruel as they were was indefensible then and it’s indefensible now, and yes people on this very thread have defended colonialism.[/quote]

What 'people' am I letting off the hook. Human behavior on an individual level is something where accountability is relevant, but human behavior also happens on a larger scale. And there are patterns that emerge. And the inherent 'pattern' of colonialism was well trod by people prior to the British empire. The world today with no conquering and exploring and wresting control is NEW. Putin being seen as a monster for the invasion of Ukraine is a true sign that the modern world has moved past this phase of human history (maybe, I'm sure if we ever pull off space exploration we'll be at it again). So sure we can call out individual humans in history that did horrible things and hold them accountable, but those people are not Will and Kate or Harry and Meghan! It isn't Charles. QE2 kind of was on the straggling ends of it.

People have pointed out that like the volcano that wipes out pompei, change can be extremely destructive, and it can also build whole new islands. This is a really complex topic and it is impossible to look back through time and see what the world would be without colonialism. But it is also very ignorant to say that there were not many colonizing empires throughout this time period, and it is simply the ones that didn't die off that we are able to hold their descendents feet to the fire with. Are you hunting down South Americans with Incan blood? Mongol descendants. Heck ROMANS? Germans? The Dutch? The French? The Spanish? The Italians? Like I said we have what the world is today to work with. I think the atrocities of colonization should be taught to all, but holding modern day Britain accountable? I mean I don't get it sorry. [/quote]

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