Which Civilization has been the biggest bunch of bastards throughout history?

[Imran Siddiqui]

Imran : The colonization of the western hemisphere was serving primarily the interests of the European monarchies, not the pope. The top he was gaining is another cross that he had no control of. Christian catholics fought with each other to control lands, So they were not for "christianity" , but for " His Majesty" . That King was also " The protector of the faith" , or whatever, but it has little to do with that, because people regarded the pope as their supreme spiritual leader on earth , not the king. The English king is the exeption being the leader of his own , Anglican church, and even that because of a (relative to history ) minor feud over divorce.

In contrast , All the Expansionist wars of Islam were lead by Muhammad , A religious leader, and the ones that followed him were also the Khalifs , "the replacements" ( translation ) of muhammad. Muslims did fight with each other , but only after much after their initial expansion. The case with the two houses springs to mind. yes.

The invasion of the Balkans was not ordered by the Caliphs, but the Ottman Sultans.

Also European kings saw themselves as spreading the faith. The power of the Pope has always been contested by someone, and the expansion to the Americas, Africa, Asia were tied into the idea of spreading Christianity. Hell, the Pope even created the Treaty of Tordillsilas, dividing the colonial world between Spain and Portugal, so they wouldn't fight and spread the world. The Spanish crown actively promoted missionaries in the colonial empires for conversion.

[MrFun]

This thread is completely worthless. I want to apologize for my mistake in even putting my vote on this thread.

There is no WORST civilization, culture, or nation. They all have a history that is a mixture of humanistic progress, and crimes against humanity.

It is unfair, and unintelligent to try to compare such different historical developments of different cultures or civilizations.

Again, I regret the dumb mistake of voting and participating in this thread.

[KrazyHorse]

Originally posted by Dalgetti
but I don't remember any christian armies invading pagan Ireland , for example.

The original conversion of Roman Europe didn't require a foreign war (the Emperors accepted Christianity, and through persecution weeded out the earlier beliefs). The conversion of the Germanic tribes was more often than not accomplished through warfare between those tribes. A victorious tribe which had accepted Christianity often forced conversion on their victims as part of the peace deal. The Scandinavian tribes were quelled more peacefully, IIRC, through voluntary conversions at the end of their 400 year reign of terror.

The beginnings of the Irish church (originally a sovereign church, not subject to Rome's authority) are more shouded in mystery. Some conversions must have been voluntary at least, to gain it a foothold on the island, but tribal warfare probably played an important role again.

This spread of christianity took longer, but again was in no way accomplished through less violent means. There was no real central authority backing it as happened under Islam (Rome was in no position at this point to fight imperialist wars), but that doesn't diminish its distastefulness.