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On November 22 2012 19:31 KwarK wrote:Show nested quote +On November 22 2012 19:20 Caihead wrote:On November 22 2012 19:15 KwarK wrote:On November 22 2012 19:11 Caihead wrote:On November 22 2012 19:08 KwarK wrote:On November 22 2012 19:05 hypercube wrote:On November 22 2012 18:30 KwarK wrote:On November 22 2012 18:06 hypercube wrote:On November 22 2012 17:03 KwarK wrote:
Things were better when we owned the damn place. If it weren't for all the anti-imperialist protests we could invade, steal 90% of the natural wealth of the country and still be doing everyone a favour. These countries ought to be among the richest in the world, even in the grips of civil war and anarchy there is still enough wealth to fund constant warfare.
Unfortunately nobody wants the bad PR involved with imperialism these days, far better to indirectly sponsor it with demand for the riches of the country while ensuring that a black guy pulls the trigger. Please educate yourself before you post. You managed to pick the worst case of colonial brutality to argue that it was better under colonial rule. You should seriously ask yourself what are your views on imperialism based on and if you should trust them or not. I was referring to the region in general rather than just Congo. Obviously mad King Leopold got carried away, he really ought to have had locals cut off their hands rather than Belgians, but what's going on now isn't isolated to just the Congo, my comment stands. And to be honest, it still probably was. At least it was more honest, you knew who was chopping off your hand and why. I guess I'll clarify, obviously it would be ideal if the western world would stop sponsoring the ongoing catastrophe which is Africa but that's not realistic because there's far too much money to be made by continuing to do it. Bearing that in mind they should have the decency to just run the place rather than engage in this nonsense where you seed an ethnic/religious conflict and then arm both sides in exchange for them running the slave camps themselves. Seriously? Take a step back and realize how far you went to justify imperialism. If we were talking about something that happened 60 years ago, not 100 you'd never use that kind of language. I sort of understand your point, it would be better to act as benevolant dictators than let these places descend into chaos. I doubt that's even true: the moral cost is so high it would undermine democracy in the developed world. But even if it was better, it's not feasible. We're talking about about a country more than twice the population of Afghanistan and that's just the DRC itself, ignoring the wider region. They didn't descend into chaos. It's still us doing it, it's just now a black hand wields the machete. The money ends up in the same place. Kwark... the imperialist countries in the world aren't colonial any more, they don't build infrastructure, they don't contribute to developing local economy, they don't even provide basic health care and education through religious institutions. They are straight out parasitic, you can't find the British / Dutch colonial models in the world operating any more, people long since figured out that you don't need to have a physical presence in the population representation to efficiently control a region. Your point is pretty mute. My point is that it was nicer when we were doing all those things rather than the parasitic sponsoring of wars we now do. As for classic imperialism, actually invading a country was what you did after imperialism failed, the situation you have at the moment in South Africa is pretty much ideal, textbook imperialism. Well maybe we should move forward more independence and rights/ability for third world / developing countries to develop with out undue influence of the Western states instead of wishing for a return to colonialism. Obviously that'd be awesome but it's hardly realistic. Those in power are utterly shameless. It was only a decade ago that Tony Blair shook the hand of Gaddafi and sold him a bunch of military hardware to use against his own people and if anyone deserved the ongoing emnity of the British state it was him. I guess BP's lobbyists must have had something pretty spectacular to offer him but still, the guy sponsored the IRA and was intimately involved in terrorism committed on British soil. When you have the Prime Minister posing for photos next to dictators then it's hard to believe we're about to give up on the whole scam.
But the developed powers have moved past colonialism, as per the wage "slavery" example, it's better to rent a car anywhere in the world at the cheapest price when ever I need one than it is to take care of a car that I have personal stake in. Financial institutions are so embedded with in the economies of major powers that it almost necessitates this format of transfer / exploitation of wealth because the old models are simply not competitive any more. And ironically in most regions in the world too much freedom and awareness has been won by the indigenous population to ever accept the conditions of the past.
We all have horror stories about the corruptness of politics and the nature of state power, but it is true that great strides have been made and we shouldn't simply despair and give up. There was genuine progress in the Congo over the last decade, even though it wasn't reported upon. The mining of coltan, though the majority still illegal and funding western electronics firms, have since moved past militias forcing child labour to adults trying to make a living. It's a slow and arduous process to recovery, but the western world needs to be rid of this idea that the rest of the world needs them to rescue it from itself. Often times the people can sort out their own problems from the need of co-existence and the insertion of external interests only complicate an already difficult situation.
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On November 22 2012 19:34 1Dhalism wrote:
takes a special kind of ignorance to, while talking in hypotheticals, out of all possible imaginable situations to pick a murderous and oppressive regime and talk about it with such pride and affection.
There is something very wrong with you Kwark.
Kwark is arriving at his conclusions by logic. Now, while that logic may be flawed and the conclusions are certainly absurd, to engage in that sort of critical thinking without presuppositions is a mark of intellectual bravery, and to be admired.
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On November 22 2012 17:10 Tobberoth wrote:
Should be noted that if it weren't for the imperialism of the past, Africa would probably not be in the.... questionable shape it is right now. Would it be a better place if the imperialism hadn't ended? Maybe. But that doesn't make imperialism a good idea, it probably got us where we are today, in terms of the instability.
actually the world united under one banner would make the world a far better place. If it requires imperialism to do it, then its ok.
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On November 22 2012 19:40 CptCutter wrote:Show nested quote +On November 22 2012 17:10 Tobberoth wrote:
Should be noted that if it weren't for the imperialism of the past, Africa would probably not be in the.... questionable shape it is right now. Would it be a better place if the imperialism hadn't ended? Maybe. But that doesn't make imperialism a good idea, it probably got us where we are today, in terms of the instability. actually the world united under one banner would make the world a far better place. If it requires imperialism to do it, then its ok.
Imperialism explicitly implies subjugation, nothing about it says that the ruling party shares any interests with subordinate parties. It would be the exact same as now except more direct.
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On November 22 2012 19:38 Caihead wrote:Show nested quote +On November 22 2012 19:31 KwarK wrote:On November 22 2012 19:20 Caihead wrote:On November 22 2012 19:15 KwarK wrote:On November 22 2012 19:11 Caihead wrote:On November 22 2012 19:08 KwarK wrote:On November 22 2012 19:05 hypercube wrote:On November 22 2012 18:30 KwarK wrote:On November 22 2012 18:06 hypercube wrote:On November 22 2012 17:03 KwarK wrote:
Things were better when we owned the damn place. If it weren't for all the anti-imperialist protests we could invade, steal 90% of the natural wealth of the country and still be doing everyone a favour. These countries ought to be among the richest in the world, even in the grips of civil war and anarchy there is still enough wealth to fund constant warfare.
Unfortunately nobody wants the bad PR involved with imperialism these days, far better to indirectly sponsor it with demand for the riches of the country while ensuring that a black guy pulls the trigger. Please educate yourself before you post. You managed to pick the worst case of colonial brutality to argue that it was better under colonial rule. You should seriously ask yourself what are your views on imperialism based on and if you should trust them or not. I was referring to the region in general rather than just Congo. Obviously mad King Leopold got carried away, he really ought to have had locals cut off their hands rather than Belgians, but what's going on now isn't isolated to just the Congo, my comment stands. And to be honest, it still probably was. At least it was more honest, you knew who was chopping off your hand and why. I guess I'll clarify, obviously it would be ideal if the western world would stop sponsoring the ongoing catastrophe which is Africa but that's not realistic because there's far too much money to be made by continuing to do it. Bearing that in mind they should have the decency to just run the place rather than engage in this nonsense where you seed an ethnic/religious conflict and then arm both sides in exchange for them running the slave camps themselves. Seriously? Take a step back and realize how far you went to justify imperialism. If we were talking about something that happened 60 years ago, not 100 you'd never use that kind of language. I sort of understand your point, it would be better to act as benevolant dictators than let these places descend into chaos. I doubt that's even true: the moral cost is so high it would undermine democracy in the developed world. But even if it was better, it's not feasible. We're talking about about a country more than twice the population of Afghanistan and that's just the DRC itself, ignoring the wider region. They didn't descend into chaos. It's still us doing it, it's just now a black hand wields the machete. The money ends up in the same place. Kwark... the imperialist countries in the world aren't colonial any more, they don't build infrastructure, they don't contribute to developing local economy, they don't even provide basic health care and education through religious institutions. They are straight out parasitic, you can't find the British / Dutch colonial models in the world operating any more, people long since figured out that you don't need to have a physical presence in the population representation to efficiently control a region. Your point is pretty mute. My point is that it was nicer when we were doing all those things rather than the parasitic sponsoring of wars we now do. As for classic imperialism, actually invading a country was what you did after imperialism failed, the situation you have at the moment in South Africa is pretty much ideal, textbook imperialism. Well maybe we should move forward more independence and rights/ability for third world / developing countries to develop with out undue influence of the Western states instead of wishing for a return to colonialism. Obviously that'd be awesome but it's hardly realistic. Those in power are utterly shameless. It was only a decade ago that Tony Blair shook the hand of Gaddafi and sold him a bunch of military hardware to use against his own people and if anyone deserved the ongoing emnity of the British state it was him. I guess BP's lobbyists must have had something pretty spectacular to offer him but still, the guy sponsored the IRA and was intimately involved in terrorism committed on British soil. When you have the Prime Minister posing for photos next to dictators then it's hard to believe we're about to give up on the whole scam. But the developed powers have moved past colonialism, as per the wage "slavery" example, it's better to rent a car anywhere in the world at the cheapest price when ever I need one than it is to take care of a car that I have personal stake in. Financial institutions are so embedded with in the economies of major powers that it almost necessitates this format of transfer / exploitation of wealth because the old models are simply not competitive any more. And ironically in most regions in the world too much freedom and awareness has been won by the indigenous population to ever accept the conditions of the past. We all have horror stories about the corruptness of politics and the nature of state power, but it is true that great strides have been made and we shouldn't simply despair and give up. There was genuine progress in the Congo over the last decade, even though it wasn't reported upon. The mining of coltan, though the majority still illegal and funding western electronics firms, have since moved past militias forcing child labour to adults trying to make a living. It's a slow and arduous process to recovery, but the western world needs to be rid of this idea that the rest of the world needs them to rescue it from itself. Often times the people can sort out their own problems from the need of co-existence and the insertion of external interests only complicate an already difficult situation.
Hear, hear.
True, many times government leaders and governments themselves act in a corrupt or amoral fashion, but that doesn't mean that we, as citizens, should simply throw up our hands and assume the best supervisory struture is the most cynical one.
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On November 22 2012 19:40 CptCutter wrote:Show nested quote +On November 22 2012 17:10 Tobberoth wrote:
Should be noted that if it weren't for the imperialism of the past, Africa would probably not be in the.... questionable shape it is right now. Would it be a better place if the imperialism hadn't ended? Maybe. But that doesn't make imperialism a good idea, it probably got us where we are today, in terms of the instability. actually the world united under one banner would make the world a far better place. If it requires imperialism to do it, then its ok.
Why would it be a better place?
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United States43960 Posts
On November 22 2012 19:40 Shady Sands wrote:Show nested quote +On November 22 2012 19:34 1Dhalism wrote:
takes a special kind of ignorance to, while talking in hypotheticals, out of all possible imaginable situations to pick a murderous and oppressive regime and talk about it with such pride and affection.
There is something very wrong with you Kwark. Kwark is arriving at his conclusions by logic. Now, while that logic may be flawed and the conclusions are certainly absurd, to engage in that sort of critical thinking without presuppositions is a mark of intellectual bravery, and to be admired.
By no means do I think the colonial rule in the past was a good thing, I just think it was simpler and more honest than the current system. Had it continued the locals would at least hate Europeans rather than each other.
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On November 22 2012 19:45 KwarK wrote:Show nested quote +On November 22 2012 19:40 Shady Sands wrote:On November 22 2012 19:34 1Dhalism wrote:
takes a special kind of ignorance to, while talking in hypotheticals, out of all possible imaginable situations to pick a murderous and oppressive regime and talk about it with such pride and affection.
There is something very wrong with you Kwark. Kwark is arriving at his conclusions by logic. Now, while that logic may be flawed and the conclusions are certainly absurd, to engage in that sort of critical thinking without presuppositions is a mark of intellectual bravery, and to be admired. By no means do I think the colonial rule in the past was a good thing, I just think it was simpler and more honest than the current system. Had it continued the locals would at least hate Europeans rather than each other.
It's not that it was a more "honest" system, it's the fact that the awareness and educational degree of the masses has increased drastically. It would be equally fraudulent to claim that theocracies were "honest" in their subjugation. All of these control systems made every attempt to lie and deceit the subjugated party. The population just eventually outgrew it so more complicated formats of control are necessitated.
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On November 22 2012 19:45 KwarK wrote:Show nested quote +On November 22 2012 19:40 Shady Sands wrote:On November 22 2012 19:34 1Dhalism wrote:
takes a special kind of ignorance to, while talking in hypotheticals, out of all possible imaginable situations to pick a murderous and oppressive regime and talk about it with such pride and affection.
There is something very wrong with you Kwark. Kwark is arriving at his conclusions by logic. Now, while that logic may be flawed and the conclusions are certainly absurd, to engage in that sort of critical thinking without presuppositions is a mark of intellectual bravery, and to be admired. By no means do I think the colonial rule in the past was a good thing, I just think it was simpler and more honest than the current system. Had it continued the locals would at least hate Europeans rather than each other.
I agree here. We should try to aim for a system where locals can use their natural endowments for economic activity without hating their trading partners, though.
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Independence from colonial powers seemed like a coin flip from what I saw. In most scenarios, things for the independent nation initially goes bad but it gets better, but not utopian. America, India, China, Ghana, and Singapore seem to be examples.
I remember Milton Friedman advocating British colonialism for India because they had a dysfunctional government with lots of war and assassinations but now they are doing better than they would have under British rule in my opinion.
And then we have Congo, Haiti, Angola, and many other African nations who obtained independence, but they are in an even worse mess. I do not mean to be a typical biased anti-imperialist leftist from Russia Today, but forcing civilization next to malaria did take a major toll on the population and still does to this day..
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On November 22 2012 19:53 Shiragaku wrote:
Independence from colonial powers seemed like a coin flip from what I saw. In most scenarios, things for the independent nation initially goes bad but it gets better, but not utopian. America, India, China, Ghana, and Singapore seem to be examples.
I remember Milton Friedman advocating British colonialism for India because they had a dysfunctional government with lots of war and assassinations but now they are doing better than they would have under British rule.
And then we have Congo, Haiti, Angola, and many other African nations who obtained independence, but they are in an even worse mess. I do not mean to be a typical biased anti-imperialist leftist from Russia Today, but forcing civilization next to malaria did take a major toll on the population and still does to this day..
It just takes a while, and for ANY country to develop, not simply exclusive to the case of coming out of a colonial system. It needs to operate with out the undue influence and economical stranglehold of developed countries. Almost every case of modern post 20th century failures particular to colonialism has undue influence from the world bank / IMF with utterly impossible to sustain development plans. You can find individual success stories in every part of the world coming out of the most depressing and torn conditions, post WWII Japan / Germany, Taiwan, Brazil, Venezuela, South Korea (not simply referring to post Korean war, but also post subsidiary state to China), etc etc. You can find an example for every ethnic, religious, and even geopolitical system that's statistically relevant.
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I recall an economics paper detailing potential effects of imperialism on various countries. Turned out that countries that had rulers primarily interested in colonization had better post-independence GDP growth than countries that had rulers primarily interested in resource extraction. Or something like that, I can't find the paper and the details are fuzzy.
What is true is that the institutions and norms required to, say, create a healthy environment for future cities are radically different from institutions and norms required to extract as much ivory as possible from neighboring tribes. For example, one method of ivory extraction was to carve up a territory consisting of multiple feuding tribes, and hand guns to tribes in exchange for ivory.
Not the best way to create stable nation-states. Good way to get ivory, though.
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On November 22 2012 20:04 acker wrote:
I recall an economics paper detailing potential effects of imperialism on various countries. Turned out that countries that had rulers primarily interested in colonization had better post-independence GDP growth than countries that had rulers primarily interested in resource extraction. Or something like that, I can't find the paper and the details are fuzzy.
What is true is that the institutions and norms required to, say, create a healthy environment for future cities are radically different from institutions and norms required to extract as much ivory as possible from neighboring tribes. For example, a common method of ivory extraction was to carve up a territory consisting of multiple feuding tribes, and hand guns to tribes in exchange for ivory.
Not the best way to create stable nation-states. Good way to get ivory, though.
Good way to get minerals for computer chips and electronics equipment too. The notion that we might all be using blood stained electronics is just disturbing.
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On November 22 2012 17:28 zalz wrote:Show nested quote +On November 22 2012 17:17 Shai wrote:On November 22 2012 17:10 RenSC2 wrote:
Dear America (my country),
We already have Afghanistan and Iraq. We have a potential major threat in Iran which can't be ignored completely. We have conflict in Israel/Palestine. We have some involvement in Libya. We're waiting on Syria, but will likely be involved in some way soon. There's always a threat from N. Korea looming and even China seems to be pushing it's borders.
We are stretched thin. We don't need the Congo. We'd spend more money stabilizing that region than we could ever hope to gain from it in mineral wealth. They aren't attacking us. They aren't threatening us. They have nothing to do with us. Let's keep it that way.
Let the world see what happens when the United States doesn't get involved (5 million deaths and counting!). Maybe then the world will see that we aren't the big baddies that go around sowing conflict like they blame us for in the middle east. Maybe then the world will see that our military activities actually prevent more deaths than they cause. Maybe then the world will get back to wanting us involved.
Not now. Don't worry, you can get involved in your own civil war some time this century; the world is fine with Americans fighting Americans. Don't read so much Russia Today. It fries your brain and makes you say stupid things.
lol im actually subbed to them on youtube and all I see is how America is such a bad place. I mean, it does kinda suck to live here but if you have money, its really not that bad. I dont have money so I hate it, but I cant really do anything about it. Its not that bad once you get used to it anyway.
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On November 22 2012 19:40 CptCutter wrote:Show nested quote +On November 22 2012 17:10 Tobberoth wrote:
Should be noted that if it weren't for the imperialism of the past, Africa would probably not be in the.... questionable shape it is right now. Would it be a better place if the imperialism hadn't ended? Maybe. But that doesn't make imperialism a good idea, it probably got us where we are today, in terms of the instability. actually the world united under one banner would make the world a far better place. If it requires imperialism to do it, then its ok.
As a British person I think it is important that we realise and admit how badly we fucked over Africa. We criticise other countries for doing it now, so we should not pretend we did not do it in the past.
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United States43960 Posts
On November 22 2012 20:08 hzflank wrote:Show nested quote +On November 22 2012 19:40 CptCutter wrote:On November 22 2012 17:10 Tobberoth wrote:
Should be noted that if it weren't for the imperialism of the past, Africa would probably not be in the.... questionable shape it is right now. Would it be a better place if the imperialism hadn't ended? Maybe. But that doesn't make imperialism a good idea, it probably got us where we are today, in terms of the instability. actually the world united under one banner would make the world a far better place. If it requires imperialism to do it, then its ok. As a British person I think it is important that we realise and admit how badly we fucked over Africa. We criticise other countries for doing it now, so we should not pretend we did not do it in the past.
Or pretend that we aren't still doing it now. It was just months ago that British investors safeguarding British interests arranged for South African armed police to gun down miners striking over poor pay. The profits from that are spent in London and taxed in London, the dividends of the company go to British people. We're still entirely complicit.
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On November 22 2012 20:07 LgNKami wrote:Show nested quote +On November 22 2012 17:28 zalz wrote:On November 22 2012 17:17 Shai wrote:On November 22 2012 17:10 RenSC2 wrote:
Dear America (my country),
We already have Afghanistan and Iraq. We have a potential major threat in Iran which can't be ignored completely. We have conflict in Israel/Palestine. We have some involvement in Libya. We're waiting on Syria, but will likely be involved in some way soon. There's always a threat from N. Korea looming and even China seems to be pushing it's borders.
We are stretched thin. We don't need the Congo. We'd spend more money stabilizing that region than we could ever hope to gain from it in mineral wealth. They aren't attacking us. They aren't threatening us. They have nothing to do with us. Let's keep it that way.
Let the world see what happens when the United States doesn't get involved (5 million deaths and counting!). Maybe then the world will see that we aren't the big baddies that go around sowing conflict like they blame us for in the middle east. Maybe then the world will see that our military activities actually prevent more deaths than they cause. Maybe then the world will get back to wanting us involved.
Not now. Don't worry, you can get involved in your own civil war some time this century; the world is fine with Americans fighting Americans. Don't read so much Russia Today. It fries your brain and makes you say stupid things. lol im actually subbed to them on youtube and all I see is how America is such a bad place. I mean, it does kinda suck to live here but if you have money, its really not that bad. I dont have money so I hate it, but I cant really do anything about it. Its not that bad once you get used to it anyway.
But you have running water, you have electricity, you have a computer, you have clothes, and you have freedom of speech. The worse you will get in terms of repression is either debt or possible beating at an Occupy protest.
Though Russia Today favors many of my views such as anti-imperialism and anti-NATO, they present their material in a way that would make FOX News blush. They complain about Israeli atrocities while turning a blind eye to their atrocities in Chechnya. Most people, even poor people should have nothing but contempt for that channel unless you want some eye candy.
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On November 22 2012 19:40 Shady Sands wrote:Show nested quote +On November 22 2012 19:34 1Dhalism wrote:
takes a special kind of ignorance to, while talking in hypotheticals, out of all possible imaginable situations to pick a murderous and oppressive regime and talk about it with such pride and affection.
There is something very wrong with you Kwark. Kwark is arriving at his conclusions by logic. Now, while that logic may be flawed and the conclusions are certainly absurd, to engage in that sort of critical thinking without presuppositions is a mark of intellectual bravery, and to be admired.
You can't arrive to conclusions by logic if you're logic is flawed, hence, it's not critical thinking, no matter if you intended it to be. Or where you being sacastic?
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Oh Africa. If only Europe hadn't fucked you up so much back in the day 
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On November 22 2012 20:42 Slaughter wrote:Oh Africa. If only Europe hadn't fucked you up so much back in the day
Not europe's fault at all. They had war with eachother way before we came to africa.
This didn't begin there.
As long there are people, there is war...
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EPT
