The Cold War-Communism vs Colonialism

[aneeshm]

Originally posted by chegitz guevara


I think we can agree that imperialism sucks with teeth and needs to be fought. I'm actually surprised that Berz looks upon America's conduct in the Cold War as imperialism. But hey, I'm not gonna look a gift horse in the mouth. Go Berz!

I shall ignore your communist leanings this time , and say about your stance on imperialism : Go Chegitz Geuvera .

[Spiffor]

Originally posted by Patroklos
There is no way someone in South Africa, no matter what class, can study the history of their people before colonialism and think they would be better off like that.

http://www.africamaat.com/

OK, the link is French-speaking. I'll give you the gist of it: it's a biased-historical site about Africa, made by Africans. The message is fairly clear: Africa was absolutely brilliant and wonderful before the colonization era.

While their point is extremist (they mostly base themselves on "Afrocentrist" historians, who manipulate historical facts to make precolonial Africa look better than what it really was), they do have a point: The slave trade and then the colonization utterly destroyed the fabric of African society, which was fairly stable, and better to the current situation in Africa today.

[Dr Strangelove]

Originally posted by chegitz guevara
India had been mostly united several times. India, however, has never been a single people, like the Germans or Italians. Uniting India would be like uniting all of Europe.

I think you'll find that since Buddha's time India had been united during a mere five dynasties, only one of which retained control of the bulk of India more than a half century and two of which were, like the Moghuls, foreign. In fact the Moghul dynasty lasted the longest of all the imperial dynasties. By the eighteenth century, when the British and French made their bid for control of the subcontinent India was divided into more than a dozen states, none of which were strong enough to seriously hope to dominate. Not only were these states divided into Muslim and Hindu dynasties, but there were a number of states with Hindu populations controled by Muslim rulers and others with Muslim populations controlled by Hindu rulers. If Indiia had continued under the weight of this baggae on into the twentieth century the results would have been truly catastrophic.

[Az]

Are the incomes of Brits profiting from looting India included in that amount ? Because if you treat the East India Company as an Indian company , those figures could be right . I guess those figures include the money Brits made from their loot . . . . . . . . .

It doesn't say one way or the other, so you can hardly say anything, besides, I might as well start counting foreign-owned corporations as non productive to my country now.

Also , as I've said in the previous post , that growth was mostly forced , and at the expense of human lives .

As was all growth at the time.

And how does that change the fact that India's share diped from 22 % to 2 % ? How does it change the fact that the Mughal emperor commanded resources ten times more than the richest European king of that time ?

It doesn't. It just means that India would've been worse without imperialism.

So Az , it definitely does not prove your point vis-a-vis India . Communist Russia experienced growth rates of 110% under Stalin for some short periods of time . But that growth was at the cost of human lives . The Brits did the same thing , only more slowly

Growth during stalin wasn't actually parallel to his purges. Read up on that and you'll see. In any case, saying that economic progress was coupled with poverty and atrocities in times before the modern age is stating the obvious. Now are you not being upset at the european rulers just because they were european?

. Nothing has been established . You apparently have no idea of the sort of stuff the Brits did in India . The atrocities are countless , and are both physical and economic . I can cite more if you want them .

I am sure that before the Brits it was ruled by a benevolent committee of doves - So, once again, it was a change for the better.

[Mr. Harley]

OK - let's try the Belgian Congo. You know, where the American missionaries, back before WW1, saw the Native troops smoking human ears over a fire. When he asked why, the sepoys had to account for every bullit shot in the village they had pacified, so they smoked the ears to bring the proof back to their Belgian "benefactors," I guess you pro-Imperialist/Colonial regime types would say.

The Belgians required the jungle villages to grow substantial amounts of rubber, to the point they could not feed themselves. But if they didn't supply the required rubber quotas, they were made an example of - see above. The estimates are that under Belgian rule over half the population in the hinterlands died.

The social fabric of the tribal societies was shattered, communal land ownership patterns destroyed, resources of the country raped, and the final result is the chaotic misery seen in the country today. Do I need to run through each major country in Africa to make my point? The so-called colonial experience in Africa for the native peoples was catastrophic. If you don't believe me, just ask the Hottentots. Wait, they are all dead....

[aneeshm]

Originally posted by Az

Are the incomes of Brits profiting from looting India included in that amount ? Because if you treat the East India Company as an Indian company , those figures could be right . I guess those figures include the money Brits made from their loot . . . . . . . . .

It doesn't say one way or the other, so you can hardly say anything, besides, I might as well start counting foreign-owned corporations as non productive to my country now.

I would consider it obvious that a corporation's sole aim was to gain political control over India so that it may drain wealth from it to the mother country would not be counted as belonging to the victim nation .

Originally posted by Az

Also , as I've said in the previous post , that growth was mostly forced , and at the expense of human lives .

As was all growth at the time.

There you're wrong . The previous growth rate was not built on killing people .

Originally posted by Az

And how does that change the fact that India's share diped from 22 % to 2 % ? How does it change the fact that the Mughal emperor commanded resources ten times more than the richest European king of that time ?

It doesn't. It just means that India would've been worse without imperialism.

There you're wrong , becuase that is pure assumption . Had indigenous industries not been crushed , who knows what would have happened ? And again you discount the effects of mass killings that the Brits perpetrated .

Originally posted by Az

So Az , it definitely does not prove your point vis-a-vis India . Communist Russia experienced growth rates of 110% under Stalin for some short periods of time . But that growth was at the cost of human lives . The Brits did the same thing , only more slowly

Growth during stalin wasn't actually parallel to his purges. Read up on that and you'll see. In any case, saying that economic progress was coupled with poverty and atrocities in times before the modern age is stating the obvious. Now are you not being upset at the european rulers just because they were european?

No , it wasn't parallel to his purges . But it did coincide with people ( the much-touted "workers" , in the language of Communism ) being worked to death - the whip ala Civ .

Originally posted by Az

. Nothing has been established . You apparently have no idea of the sort of stuff the Brits did in India . The atrocities are countless , and are both physical and economic . I can cite more if you want them .

I am sure that before the Brits it was ruled by a benevolent committee of doves - So, once again, it was a change for the better.

I never insinuated that the previous leadership was a paragon of virtue or kindness . But what the Brits did exceeds that the previous rulers did by a wide , wide margin . And the previous rulers were actually interested in the welfare of India ( or at least their territory ) , because they would be staying there , unlike the Brits , who plundered and left .

[:) Smiley]

Communism fights social problems, capitalism hides them.

[:) Smiley]

some more...

[:) Smiley]

military...

[:) Smiley]

social issues...

[Sprayber]

Originally posted by Smiley
social issues...

Are you saying that domestic abuse, child abuse, racial prejudice doesn't go on in communist societies?

[Dr Strangelove]

The public housing estate looked pretty sleazy to me, probably on par with any public housing project in Chicago or New York.
The heavy industry appeared to be heavily polluting.
Ask the Afghanis, Koreans, Hungarians, Ethiopians, and etc. about communist weapons in use.
Ask a Russian Jew or Chechen or a Chinese Tibetan about racial profiling.
In a country with a drinking problem the magnitude of the old Soviet Union's I can guarentee you there was domestic violence and child abuse.

[Sprayber]

The Competing Food Pyramids

[:) Smiley]

I'm not saying that communism is perfect - the pictures are indeed hardly flattering at all, only that capitalism isn't either.

and now on a lighter note...

[aneeshm]

Windows is hardly representative of capitalism , nor is Linux representative of communism .