DGPOK @ 70 And the Pope is nice to know, I don't doubt! Yes, crimes were committed, but it was usual to at least try to run a (by the standards of the time) a fair show. Compare India and Pakistan, now, like I said. And if you are Irish-American, I suggest you examine the treatment of the Amerinds, especially in the period 1779 - 1861.
SoV @ 74 Like North Korea, or syria, do you mean? Um.
76 Some of us have a lot of time for Fairfax. Cromwell was a nsty piece of work, but then, CharlesI was totally untrustworthy - a recipe for disaster.
77 "John Norman"? Just dont mention subservient bondage .....
]]>Yup. Yet another edition of easy answers to simple questions. And if you're wondering - yes, I do happen to think that certain types of class systems, aristocracies, etc. select for sociopaths.
]]>'Tis a universal truth that some terrorists are more equal than others :-(
]]>It's only now that S. Ireland has finally realised, that bad though (some of) the Brits were, there are worse "masters" - starting with the bastards they morally enslaved themseleves to in 1923 - the RC church.
DGPOR @ 70 - I hope you are reading this!
]]>My take on it is that the Indian Empire was unconscionable. Yes, it did some good things -- abolishing Sutee and crushing the Dacoits and Thugee. But those pale into insignificance against the impact of an imperial occupation of an entire sub-continent that lasted centuries and killed millions by deliberate neglect during famines engineered by prioritizing the conquerors' cash crops over the natives' food. Praising the Indian Empire is about as insensitive as it would be to praise Fascism for delivering trains that ran on time and really funky police uniforms.
]]>MudCrab @ 102 I was thinking of the Aus/NZ take on "colonial" wars. The difference between th treatment of the "Abos" in Aus, and the Maori (Post-Waitangi) in NZ. And, of course, the real damage was done by missionaries, or so I think, anyway.
]]>Dirk Bruere @ 107 WRONG or at least partly so. The Maori understood PROPERTY RIGHTS, and the treaty of Waitangi acknowledged this. The "abos" did not have the concept of landed property. "Kicking" - not so, with the possible exception (again) of the Sikhs, and the Ghurka - though we never fought the Ghurkas - a very fortunate occurrence, actually!
@ 110 & 111 "Enslavement" refers to treating private persons as property. Please keep to the definitions? However, the old Mughal empire was disentegrating, as its rulers became more fundie-muslim (see my earlier reference to persecution of the Sikhs), the treatment of Dalit ("Untouchable") castes in Inda was (& remains in some places) a disgrace - it's racism, pure and simple, analagous to the Japanese treatment of the Burakumin. Yes, I know "It can't be racism, because it's not being done by Western Europeans" ... err .. no. AND Someone was going to fill the power-vacuum. The alternative contender was Bourbon France - look up battle of Plassey. As it happens, it was us.
And re @ 115 Several places became parts of the Brit Empire, because the slaughter and massacres and atrocities next door got so bad that the Brits felt obliged to move in (think Yugoslavia in the '90s for similar contaxt) Examples include Ghana/Gold Coast - the local ruler started massacring everyone, and bathing in their blood and .... Uganda, where something very similar happened. And upper Burma, when the local king had a lot of people deliberatly trampled to death by elephants. In all three of these cases, there was (at the time) no commercial reason for occupying the territory. Oh, and only about half of greater India was directly under Brit rule anyway - the rest wer Princely States. That's what caused the disaster over Kashmir - the then kahn couldn't make up his mind which way to go, until the new Pakistan invaded - at which point he asked for Indian help.
Alex @ 119 It was a LOT MORE COMPLICATED than that! Cromwell was a murdering bastard, and Chs I was totally untrustworthy. Chs II was determined not to "go on his travels" again, and had to balance the still-warring factions. Clarendon was wierd. He wrote some wonderful stuff, but was responsible for the Clarendon Code, which you refer to. The matter was finally resolved by the REAL revolution, in 1688, when the Army refused to support James II, and Wliiam brought Huguenot troops from the Netherlands. The really important bit about that was that it ensured the supremacy of parliament, resulting in our present status as a republic in all but name, with an hereditary head of State. And certain basic, garuanteed freedoms and rights, codified in the Bill of Rights. Which certain people and institutions, like the EU Commission seem determined to remove.
]]>I think one class was "European" history (so you can imagine how little we learned in that class: an entire continent in four months). I doubt I took anything else. There were more in-depth options for US history ... I suppose there could have been one more class for European history, but nothing more fine-grained than that. As a result, the chances of me learning much at all about Irish history were pretty small. (Granted, this is 25-30 years ago, so I may be forgetting some small things they did teach us. I doubt it's much, and I'm certain they weren't covering anything from modern times.)
]]>(You're fighting on all fronts, which is never a good sign. I suggest you drop off this thread completely -- it's obviously pushing your buttons, and not only are you getting angry, you're pissing off everyone else. This is not good, and if you weren't a regular I'd be handing you a red card at this point.)
D. J. P. O'Cane: Please back off on Greg, the matter is being dealt with. (Otherwise I'll start to wonder if you're part of the problem, too.)
I am in San Francisco attempting to unwind after a hard week; I do not need to spend my time moderating a discussion that's spiralled out of control.
]]>However, Dirk Bruere has hit it exactly in 129. The Brit Empire NOW would be vile. By the standards of the times, it was the least-worst, if not the best. Like I said it's COMPLICATED. In fact I wonder if this is morphing into the next thread, and becoming a "wicked" problem?
Meanwhile - I've got to go and dance outside a pub later (the hardship!) so I'm off shortly, anyway.
]]>I wonder. There has been peripheral discussion of the UK's Civil War(s). There is this song, admiitedly from the royalist side, but it underscores the tensions of the time, and some of which persist to this day.
Here we go: The Lawyer's farewell to Charing Cross Undone! undone! the lawyers cry, They ramble up and down; We know not the way to WESTMINSTER Now CHARING-CROSS is down.
(refrain) Now fare thee well, old Charing-Cross, Then fare thee well, old stump; It was a thing set up by a King, And so pull'd down by the RUMP.
And when they came to the bottom of the Strand They were all at a loss: This is not the way to WESTMINSTER, We must go by CHARING-CROSS. Then fare thee well, etc.
The Parliament did vote it down As a thing they thought most fitting, For fear it should fall, and so kill 'em all In the House as they were sitting. Then fare thee well, etc.
Some letters about this CROSS were found, Or else it might been freed; But I dare say, and safely swear, It could neither write nor read. Then fare thee well, etc.
The WHIGs they do affirm and say
To POPERY it was bent;
For what I know it might be so,
For to church it never went, Then fare thee well, etc
This cursed RUMP-REBELLIOUS CREW,
They were so damn'd hard-hearted;
They pass'd a vote that CHARING-CROSS
Should be taken down and carted: Then fare thee well, etc.
Now, WHIGS, I would advise you all, 'Tis what I'd have you do; For fear the King should come again, Pray pull down TYBURN too. Then fare thee well, etc.
I sometimes recite it at "ales"/folk-gatherings.
]]>The obvious one is the US, where the military are use to back-up a very corrupt commercial empire Though even there it is getting better in some places - the fruit-growing combines no longer control the Central American states. Blackwater (or whatever they are called this week) etc. Then there's China. A real colonial empire - Tibet And a growing commercial one, but with "planted" settlement, especially in Africa.
Perhaps we should be looking at those?
]]>You must be kidding. The stolen generation? One Nation? The casually-used "Abo", "Chink" and "Wog"?
Australia has an enormous problem with racism, but white Australians refuse to even see it.
]]>