celebwatcher
Senior Member
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- Jun 28, 2006
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Originally posted by Iceberg:
Amen to that! We have/had nothing to do with these "sins" committed.
Yes, they WERE sins ----- if you consider terrible crimes committed against non-whites sins ( which, quite obviously, you don’t ) ! And anyone who doesn’t denounce them or defends colonialists, SHARES the blame for bleeding these people white ( excuse the pun ) ! Money looted from colonies was used to fund the construction of streets and bridges in parts of Europe which are still in use.
The international rule of law was not established until well after the colonial era. Therefore, no "crimes against humanity" charges can be levelled. As well, those who committed these "crimes" are long dead.
Er … WHEN exactly was this international rule of law established ? Three years ago ?
Hundreds of Indians died when British troops fired on them without provocation at a peaceful gathering in Jallianwallabagh, Panjab in 1919, the Sharpeville shootings in 1960 left 67 unarmed black demonstrators dead and ALL the killers walked free ( an Indian revolutionary called Udham Singh later managed to gun down Sir Michael O’Dyer, the then Lt Governor of Panjab who had backed the shootings ) which shows how colonialists literally got away with murder ! What price, modernization ?
Most Nazis are dead too but does that mean we should forget what they did ?
Also, whoever thought that colonialism constituted a "crime against humanity" is misguided.
Examples of colonised African nations include Egypt, Morocco, and South Africa. These colonised nations are in a much better position today, in part because of colonialism. European "colonisers" brought technology, better medicine, and skills uncolonised African nations would not have today. Life spans in colonised nations tend to be longer than those in the few nations uncolonised by Europeans.
Advanced technology thru colonization ? Bulls**t !
Iceberg, you’re forgetting that scientific knowledge, art and political ideas had been shared among civilizations for thousands of years thru exchange of information without the need to subjugate one another : had the Europeans maintained normal trade and cultural relations with Asian and African nations, the latter could still have learnt things from the West ! Of course, the white buccaneers found plundering nations infinitely more lucrative than doing business with them !
If ancient Hindu mathematicians didn’t invent the digit zero (0), and taught the Arabs its use ( who, in turn, passed on the knowledge to the Europeans ) , you probably wouldn’t be surfing the Net today ! Yet the Indians didn’t go around conquering half the world in the name of “modernizing” foreigners.
Let’s face it, there was NOTHING benevolent about colonization --- it was fuelled by naked greed for wealth ( which apparently ran in the blood of descendants of Goths, Vandals, Saxons and Gauls ) --- so, cut that we-civilized-those-ignorant-devils-they-should-be-thankful-to-us c**p because we’re sick and tired of hearing it ! There never was and never can be any justification for colonialism which is as shameful a chapter in the history of mankind as Nazism !
You’re beginning to sound like some of the right-wing English who try to glorify their imperial past by insisting that the British built an extensive railway network for the Indian masses, when in fact , the colonial rulers had built it to aid the Raj and NOT the natives ! Ditto for medical facilties and transport systems created by colonial powers throughout Africa keeping the white minority in mind --- only, there was a kind of trickle-down effect !
What about the Asian colonies which wound up poorer after their colonial masters had finished with them ? Besides, NOTHING is more precious than freedom.