Niall Ferguson
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Zardnaar
Deity
I'm not a raving apologist for the BE but more than a few people joiuned the Empire willingly (Scotland, Maori, India). The British were brutal in the case of the Indian Mutiny but they were in India for 300 odd years and that is one incident. Gandhi led a mostly bloodless revolution against the British and last I looked India has willingly chosen to be part of the commonwealth (53 nations). The people of Hong Kong didn't get that option in 97. For the most part only the Arab nations did not join the Commonwealth and those nations are paragons of human rights in the modern era
They let anyone on these days though even without a constitutional connection to the Empire (Cameroon, Mozambique, Rwanda).
The Empire also facilitated the movement of people around the world in the second half of the 19th century. The first Indian restaurant opened in England before the first fish and chip shop as well.Portugese, Arab and African slavers also ravaged Africa and the British shut the slave trade down which had been going on since Roman and Egyptian times if not earlier. Britain itself was involved in the slave trade as well but everyone was to some extent or indirectly benefited from it. Thousands of Chinese and Indians came to my own country in Imperial times and they did have to pay a tax to enter the country but they were exploited so much they were allowed to buy land, and now are in the top half of the country in terms of welath- pure exploitation I know.
God save the queen
They let anyone on these days though even without a constitutional connection to the Empire (Cameroon, Mozambique, Rwanda).The Empire also facilitated the movement of people around the world in the second half of the 19th century. The first Indian restaurant opened in England before the first fish and chip shop as well.Portugese, Arab and African slavers also ravaged Africa and the British shut the slave trade down which had been going on since Roman and Egyptian times if not earlier. Britain itself was involved in the slave trade as well but everyone was to some extent or indirectly benefited from it. Thousands of Chinese and Indians came to my own country in Imperial times and they did have to pay a tax to enter the country but they were exploited so much they were allowed to buy land, and now are in the top half of the country in terms of welath- pure exploitation I know.
God save the queen
So the caste system persisting in to the 20th century is a product of the BE ? If you can make such an extravagant claim on the basis of a selective and flaky study, then I'm sure an analysis of princely rulers over three centuries would lead to a similar result.
If you can sum up the entire discussion with this flippant bit of nonsense, then you're just another looney with an axe to grind, like aelf. If we were talking about the Opium wars or the Boer war, I would be on your side of this discussion. You would have more credibility if you acknowledged that there was both good and bad that came with British Colonialism. But if you're going to say the whole package was a 'Bad Thing', then you have to prove that the last three centuries would somehow have been a nicer time if no British governance had been established in these territories.
PS: there were atrocities on both sides of the Indian Mutiny, and it was in 1857, not 1887.
No, it didn't.
I see. So your definition of willingly is dynastic succession, strong-arm diplomacy or violent conquest.
And yeah, like the Commonwealth has any serious relevance in the modern world whatsoever.
Oh where did I ever claim that. Oh right I didn't.
No I don't. I can look at what actually happened in history and say that, overall, it's Bad. And arguably the concept of colonialism, as a method of government that deprives people of self-determination and sanctions social and economic inequality on the basis of the unequal relationship between the Mother Country and the colony, is itself a Bad Thing. I don't need to compare it to an alternate history hypothetical, which is a dubious exercise in any case since anything could've happened in those three centuries.
Value judgements are personal things anyway. I may be looking at it from a modern perspective but that's well within my rights to.
Really, though, I'm just annoyed at how people would point to an example of people doing Bad Things and claim that, because another group of people's actions weren't as Bad, that's somehow that's makes it better or that their actions are being unfairly heavily scrutinised or targeted or (ha!) persecuted. I understand you can feel angry if people keep droning on about how Your Kind used to oppress people or whatever, but it's history.
And I'm sorry if my tone's a bit rough. I use this forum as a place to vent since people are way more scarier in real life.
Forget venting on the forum. Get yourself a gun. Nothing frightens bogans more. Except, you know, hard work.
A completely pointless question about Ferguson, but one that's always bothered me: how doyou pronounce his first name? Like Neil, or Nile?
A completely pointless question about Ferguson, but one that's always bothered me: how doyou pronounce his first name? Like Neil, or Nile?
The first one.
Zardnaar
Deity
Claiming the BE is bad though would essentially claim all imperialism is bad which is like saying all of humanities history has been bad for the last 3000 odd years with the exception of isolated tribal groups who engaged in warfare. Self determination was actually a minority concept even as late as the 20th century. Every monarchy and empire won't hold up to well to scrutiny if you judge it with modern day morality.
Surprise me then. Who did better than the British Empire at controlling more people?
The population of the modern People's Republic of China dwarfs that of the British Empire. This should be as surprising as the sunrise.
Yes, I will admit that. I'm not exactly a big fan of imperialism I'm afraid.
aelf
Ashen One
Um, this can lead to all sorts of absurd conclusions. If Hitler (as an easily identifiable example) were to somehow be transported to the Aztec 'empire' in its time and were to take power, where he were to kill off a sizeable enemy group instead of simply gruesomely sacrificing every prisoner, would you say that Hitler's Aztec Reich was not a 'Bad Thing'?
That's a ridiculous scenario, yes, but I find it disturbing that people with modern sensibilities are capable of relativising something objectively bad such that it is no longer bad if the alternatives are worse. Either they lack human empathy and perhaps some of those modern sensibilities they are supposed to have, or they have not used their brains enough.
LightSpectra
me autem minui
What does that have to do with the statement, "The British Empire had the largest population in history", which is what you originally said?
Verbose
Deity
482 128 000.
At least according to the good people at this site:
http://www.populstat.info/Asia/chinac.htm
British Empire was at 458 000 000 in 1922, at least according to the wikipedia article. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Empire
Pretty close, but China probable took the cake already in 1926.
It was a mistaken use of terminology. I don't think anyone would disagree that the British Empire controlled the most land (probably of all time), but if China still had a larger population then, that's just what happened.
Brian Shanahan
Permanoob
Gandhi.
You're talking to a UKIP voter here, he believes that white British are naturally better at everything than everybody else put together, despite ample evidence otherwise.
Brian Shanahan
Permanoob
And you don't pronounce Niall Nile either, it's closer to NY-al.
SnowlyWhite
Emperor
it's something called reality; I suppose someone 1k years from now will consider our society semi barbarian, but that doesn't mean I don't evaluate and try to reach that part of the society which is best in the current period. It'd be absurd to kill myself only because I won't be able to enjoy the advantages of a supposedly future better society.
leaving aside current society isn't good; it's relatively good.
And in absolute terms, on average, the English ex colonies are currently in a better state then, for instance, the French ones...
and moaning about past bad societies is absurd; our current one didn't spring out of thin air, but it's a result of a progress(faster or slower) precisely from those.
The historical myths thread is thataway --->
I won't moan as much when so many people aren't so ready to glorify past societies and their bloody conquests and injustices.
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