Collective Guilt

[DrZoidberg]

I'd also like to point out that European imperialism was a pointless endeavor and nothing but a tremendous waste of money and resources. It was a net loss.

This is completely absurd and bravely counterfactual. Even today, even the most rudimentary of maps of resource flow show the obvious stamp of colonial history. The industrial revolution and mass extraction of resources from colonial properties aren't at all unconnected to one another.

OK. Go for it. Explain to me how I am wrong?

Great Britain dismantled their empire after WW2 because they were broke and couldn't afford to keep it. That tells you everything you need to know about how their empire benefited them financially. Or didn't. If the British empire enriched Great Britain then they would certainly have hung onto it at a time when they desperately needed cash.

The colonies were vanity projects. The only lucrative colonies are those with a natural resource they could suck dry. Like Sugar cane production in the Caribbean and beaver hunting in Canada. But the value of those were artificially inflated by the fanciness of sugar in European courts and the tricorn hat trend. Once sugar beet extraction became possible, and the top hat became fashionable those colonies stopped being profitable.

The flow of resources has to do with where industrialism started and that it was only very recently the developing world started to industrialise. The cold war didn't help matters either.

I think you are wrong and will find it very hard to find evidence for your claims

 

[Politesse]

[Great Britain dismantled their empire after WW2 because they were broke and couldn't afford to keep it. That tells you everything you need to know about how their empire benefited them financially. Or didn't.

You're confusing politics and economics. Just because a nation-state finds oppressive control of a country to be too expensive to maintain doesn't mean that certain individuals, families, and social classes aren't extracting enormous wealth from those colonies, before and after they might surrender direct political control. If indeed these nations were indebted to someone by the end of the Colonial period, to whom were they indebted? Who collected? Where did that wealth begin, and with whom did end up?

The flow of resources has to do with where industrialism started and that it was only very recently the developing world started to industrialise. Just out of what... coincidence? Of course all the factories were in the major colonial centers, that is literally the fuindamental structure of a colonial empire. Were you sleeping through your secondary school classes on this subject? They should have at some point shown you the little diagram of resource production, factory production, and resale.

And where does the money go, mostly? From those factories in the "developing world"? Who is "developing" them and why? Does the capital produced by that industrial development usually remain there, or does it somehow wind up in the markets of formerly colonizing empires?

 

[Trausti]

I'd also like to point out that European imperialism was a pointless endeavor and nothing but a tremendous waste of money and resources. It was a net loss.

This is completely absurd and bravely counterfactual. Even today, even the most rudimentary of maps of resource flow show the obvious stamp of colonial history. The industrial revolution and mass extraction of resources from colonial properties aren't at all unconnected to one another.

That European countries which did not have colonies do as well or better than those that had them shows Dr. Z is correct.

 

[Politesse]

I'd also like to point out that European imperialism was a pointless endeavor and nothing but a tremendous waste of money and resources. It was a net loss.

This is completely absurd and bravely counterfactual. Even today, even the most rudimentary of maps of resource flow show the obvious stamp of colonial history. The industrial revolution and mass extraction of resources from colonial properties aren't at all unconnected to one another.

That European countries which did not have colonies do as well or better than those that had them shows Dr. Z is correct.

Why consider only European countries, if you're trying to disprove the idea that racial boundaries subdivide the world? Shouldn't you be looking at all countries, regardless of racial majority?

 

[Trausti]

That European countries which did not have colonies do as well or better than those that had them shows Dr. Z is correct.

Why consider only European countries, if you're trying to disprove the idea that racial boundaries subdivide the world? Shouldn't you be looking at all countries, regardless of racial majority?

Dr. Z was speaking of the high cost and low return of imperialism.

 

[Politesse]

That European countries which did not have colonies do as well or better than those that had them shows Dr. Z is correct.

Why consider only European countries, if you're trying to disprove the idea that racial boundaries subdivide the world? Shouldn't you be looking at all countries, regardless of racial majority?

Dr. Z was speaking of the high cost and low return of imperialism.

He was. You, however, said that we should compare imperial nations to non-imperial ones, and observe whether the imperial nations were more affluent than those which weren't. Except that for some reason, you only want to compare to European non-imperial nations. Why only European ones? Why would it make any difference whether a coutnry is European or not, if there is no Europe-dominated neocolonial political order that strongly benefits upper class Europeans?

 

[TomC]

I'd also like to point out that European imperialism was a pointless endeavor and nothing but a tremendous waste of money and resources. It was a net loss.

This is completely absurd and bravely counterfactual. Even today, even the most rudimentary of maps of resource flow show the obvious stamp of colonial history. The industrial revolution and mass extraction of resources from colonial properties aren't at all unconnected to one another.

That European countries which did not have colonies do as well or better than those that had them shows Dr. Z is correct.

You and [MENTION=65]DrZoidberg[/MENTION]; seem to have a remarkable lack of historical knowledge.

Advances in navigation and weapons technology enabled Christendom to go on a global rampage of looting and genocide, that lasted for centuries. That's called Euro-colonialism. Wealth was flooding into Europe while much of the rest of humanity was getting hammered. The results are still easy to see.

Comparing France to Sweden is kinda dumb. Try comparing France to Haiti. England to India.

Or, to bring this all into the modern world post WWII, try comparing Haiti to Vietnam. Both were French possessions, that the USA kinda got hold of as French power waned and ours grew. Ho Chi Minh rescued Vietnam from EuroChristian domination. Folks like Papa Doc Duvalier prevented that from happening in Haiti. Consider the last five years of news. Not much from Vietnam, it's reasonably prosperous and peaceful for a poor country. Haiti is a cesspool of poverty and violence.

Vietnam is communist, Haiti is Christian.
Get it?
Tom

 

[Trausti]

That European countries which did not have colonies do as well or better than those that had them shows Dr. Z is correct.

You and [MENTION=65]DrZoidberg[/MENTION]; seem to have a remarkable lack of historical knowledge.

Advances in navigation and weapons technology enabled Christendom to go on a global rampage of looting and genocide, that lasted for centuries. That's called Euro-colonialism. Wealth was flooding into Europe while much of the rest of humanity was getting hammered. The results are still easy to see.

Comparing France to Sweden is kinda dumb. Try comparing France to Haiti. England to India.

Or, to bring this all into the modern world post WWII, try comparing Haiti to Vietnam. Both were French possessions, that the USA kinda got hold of as French power waned and ours grew. Ho Chi Minh rescued Vietnam from EuroChristian domination. Folks like Papa Doc Duvalier prevented that from happening in Haiti. Consider the last five years of news. Not much from Vietnam, it's reasonably prosperous and peaceful for a poor country. Haiti is a cesspool of poverty and violence.

Vietnam is communist, Haiti is Christian.
Get it?
Tom

So Norway, Sweden, and Switzerland, which did not have colonies, are today the poor countries of Europe?

 

[Politesse]

That European countries which did not have colonies do as well or better than those that had them shows Dr. Z is correct.

You and [MENTION=65]DrZoidberg[/MENTION]; seem to have a remarkable lack of historical knowledge.

Advances in navigation and weapons technology enabled Christendom to go on a global rampage of looting and genocide, that lasted for centuries. That's called Euro-colonialism. Wealth was flooding into Europe while much of the rest of humanity was getting hammered. The results are still easy to see.

Comparing France to Sweden is kinda dumb. Try comparing France to Haiti. England to India.

Or, to bring this all into the modern world post WWII, try comparing Haiti to Vietnam. Both were French possessions, that the USA kinda got hold of as French power waned and ours grew. Ho Chi Minh rescued Vietnam from EuroChristian domination. Folks like Papa Doc Duvalier prevented that from happening in Haiti. Consider the last five years of news. Not much from Vietnam, it's reasonably prosperous and peaceful for a poor country. Haiti is a cesspool of poverty and violence.

Vietnam is communist, Haiti is Christian.
Get it?
Tom

So Norway, Sweden, and Switzerland, which did not have colonies, are today the poor countries of Europe?

No, the poorest countries of Europe are those which have been colonized by external forces, as opposed to providing banking and material services to those forces.

But you know this. You know your argument doesn't withstand more than a few seconds of logical scrutiny. So why are you making it?

 

[Trausti]

So Norway, Sweden, and Switzerland, which did not have colonies, are today the poor countries of Europe?

No, the poorest countries of Europe are those which have been colonized by external forces, as opposed to providing banking and material services to those forces.

But you know this. You know your argument doesn't withstand more than a few seconds of logical scrutiny. So why are you making it?

Wut? These countries didn’t have colonies. Why are they prosperous?

 

[TomC]

So Norway, Sweden, and Switzerland, which did not have colonies, are today the poor countries of Europe?

No, the poorest countries of Europe are those which have been colonized by external forces, as opposed to providing banking and material services to those forces.

But you know this. You know your argument doesn't withstand more than a few seconds of logical scrutiny. So why are you making it?

Wut? These countries didn’t have colonies. Why are they prosperous?

Because they adopted secular humanist values and didn't launch wars against their European neighbors. This isn't hard to understand.
Tom

 

[repoman]

Well, were they part of the economic zone hoovering up raw materials from the colonies?

 

[TomC]

Well, were they part of the economic zone hoovering up raw materials from the colonies?

Is this a reply to me? I'm not sure. If so, it doesn't have much to do with my post or colonial history.
Tom

 

[Politesse]

So Norway, Sweden, and Switzerland, which did not have colonies, are today the poor countries of Europe?

No, the poorest countries of Europe are those which have been colonized by external forces, as opposed to providing banking and material services to those forces.

But you know this. You know your argument doesn't withstand more than a few seconds of logical scrutiny. So why are you making it?

Wut? These countries didn’t have colonies. Why are they prosperous?

What is your answer to this question? It's obvious to me that the wealth of the colonies is flowing into those places through mutual trade with the colonizers. Indeed, many of the individual families whose wealth pulls up those nation's economic metrics were very directly involved in colonial enterprises. Also, no hjas claimed that colonialism is the only source of welath in the world, inly that vast amounts of resoueces were stolen from colonial properties and accumulated in Europe, which is obviously true whether or not this or that country happens to be wealthy now, four hundred years after the advent of the colonial paradigm and a two centuries since the loss of direct political most of those colonies.

Why aren't all non-colonial nations equally wealthy as those favored by colonial trade networks? Why is it just those who are on good trade terms with similarly wealthy imperial nations? And why do you keep repeating your stupid question instead of answering mine?

 

[DrZoidberg]

[Great Britain dismantled their empire after WW2 because they were broke and couldn't afford to keep it. That tells you everything you need to know about how their empire benefited them financially. Or didn't.

You're confusing politics and economics. Just because a nation-state finds oppressive control of a country to be too expensive to maintain doesn't mean that certain individuals, families, and social classes aren't extracting enormous wealth from those colonies, before and after they might surrender direct political control. If indeed these nations were indebted to someone by the end of the Colonial period, to whom were they indebted? Who collected? Where did that wealth begin, and with whom did end up?

Economy isn't a zero sum game.

The reality of it is that an industrial economy outperforms an agrarian economy by magnitudes. This is what enabled European imperialism. Their industrial output and standardisation allowed rifles, modern artillery and warships. The agrarian kingdoms and empires didn't have a chance.

But this also meant that the colonies they took were pretty worthless compared to European countries they were not industrial economies. They tried their best with exploitative monocrop resource harvesting to get any "return on investment". But the fact is that England would have been better off not taking the countries. European settlers who moved there mostly invested and improved the economies. But it takes a long time. Africa is only now finally reaching a point where its industrial output is where England was in 1870.

India is a special case. Since it was less industrial in 1947 than it was in 1857. India had an advanced economy and was technologically advanced when the Brits took it over. For brevity I'll jiust, say that England wrecked the Indian economy to make it easier to control. This benefitted nobody.

The flow of resources has to do with where industrialism started and that it was only very recently the developing world started to industrialise. Just out of what... coincidence? Of course all the factories were in the major colonial centers, that is literally the fuindamental structure of a colonial empire. Were you sleeping through your secondary school classes on this subject? They should have at some point shown you the little diagram of resource production, factory production, and resale.

And where does the money go, mostly? From those factories in the "developing world"? Who is "developing" them and why? Does the capital produced by that industrial development usually remain there, or does it somehow wind up in the markets of formerly colonizing empires?

Yes. But this isn't the fault of Europe. Its the fault of local ductators keeping their populations retarded so they can cling to power. Nobody but the dictator is winning here

 

[TomC]

So Norway, Sweden, and Switzerland, which did not have colonies, are today the poor countries of Europe?

No, the poorest countries of Europe are those which have been colonized by external forces, as opposed to providing banking and material services to those forces.

But you know this. You know your argument doesn't withstand more than a few seconds of logical scrutiny. So why are you making it?

Wut? These countries didn’t have colonies. Why are they prosperous?

Remember the Swiss Armada? The gigantic military operation that nearly bankrupt the Swiss government with the goal of forcing Italy to accept Swiss authority? The one that foundered off the coast of Italy in a huge storm, failing their goal and leaving the Swiss aristocracy to deal with the economic disaster?

Nobody does, because the Swiss didn't do that. They weren't the predatory power certain other EuroColonialist cultures were.
They built themselves up, rather than stealing from weaker cultures.

And sometimes losing bigly when they miscalculated.
Tom

 

[Politesse]

Economy isn't a zero sum game.

The reality of it is that an industrial economy outperforms an agrarian economy by magnitudes. This is what enabled European imperialism. Their industrial output and standardisation allowed rifles, modern artillery and warships. The agrarian kingdoms and empires didn't have a chance.

But this also meant that the colonies they took were pretty worthless compared to European countries they were not industrial economies. They tried their best with exploitative monocrop resource harvesting to get any "return on investment". But the fact is that England would have been better off not taking the countries. European settlers who moved there mostly invested and improved the economies. But it takes a long time. Africa is only now finally reaching a point where its industrial output is where England was in 1870.

India is a special case. Since it was less industrial in 1947 than it was in 1857. India had an advanced economy and was technologically advanced when the Brits took it over. For brevity I'll jiust, say that England wrecked the Indian economy to make it easier to control. This benefitted nobody.

The flow of resources has to do with where industrialism started and that it was only very recently the developing world started to industrialise. Just out of what... coincidence? Of course all the factories were in the major colonial centers, that is literally the fuindamental structure of a colonial empire. Were you sleeping through your secondary school classes on this subject? They should have at some point shown you the little diagram of resource production, factory production, and resale.

And where does the money go, mostly? From those factories in the "developing world"? Who is "developing" them and why? Does the capital produced by that industrial development usually remain there, or does it somehow wind up in the markets of formerly colonizing empires?

Yes. But this isn't the fault of Europe. Its the fault of local ductators keeping their populations retarded so they can cling to power. Nobody but the dictator is winning here

What are these "industries" you refer to that do not rely on resources and labor extracted from colonial properties?

 

[DrZoidberg]

Economy isn't a zero sum game.

The reality of it is that an industrial economy outperforms an agrarian economy by magnitudes. This is what enabled European imperialism. Their industrial output and standardisation allowed rifles, modern artillery and warships. The agrarian kingdoms and empires didn't have a chance.

But this also meant that the colonies they took were pretty worthless compared to European countries they were not industrial economies. They tried their best with exploitative monocrop resource harvesting to get any "return on investment". But the fact is that England would have been better off not taking the countries. European settlers who moved there mostly invested and improved the economies. But it takes a long time. Africa is only now finally reaching a point where its industrial output is where England was in 1870.

India is a special case. Since it was less industrial in 1947 than it was in 1857. India had an advanced economy and was technologically advanced when the Brits took it over. For brevity I'll jiust, say that England wrecked the Indian economy to make it easier to control. This benefitted nobody.



Yes. But this isn't the fault of Europe. Its the fault of local ductators keeping their populations retarded so they can cling to power. Nobody but the dictator is winning here

What are these "industries" you refer to that do not rely on resources and labor extracted from colonial properties?

Swedish steel or lumber production. German coal.

Do you want more examples?

Its not Belgiums fault that chocolate producing countries are actively preventing their people from refining the product themselves. Its bizarre that Belgium still is the world's leader in this. But still not their fault. They aren't exploiting anyone

 

[Politesse]

Its not Belgiums fault that chocolate producing countries are actively preventing their people from refining the product themselves.

What's bizarre is the massive weight of Colonial history you're ignoring. If every time we bring up a concrete account of Colonial expoitation, you merely cry "that doesn't count", you're wasting everyone's time.

 

[TomC]

Its not Belgiums fault that chocolate producing countries are actively preventing their people from refining the product themselves. Its bizarre that Belgium still is the world's leader in this. But still not their fault. They aren't exploiting anyone

What's bizarre is you bringing up fancy chocolate as though it's important in a discussion about historical genocide and looting.

That's what is bizarre.
Bizarre in the sense of "What kind of history did you learn that fancy chocolate is an important part of it? Google Belgian Congo for more information.
Tom