The Partition of India

[SasaS]

11 minutes ago, TheHowieLama said:

Neither is the very idea of reparations.

 

Fact is, any reparations by definition are an admission of guilt and a show of remorse neither of which the UK will be up for.

With the US it's pretty easy to throw a rope (no pun intended) around the issue - for the UK it is literally dozens of countries and hundreds of millions of people.

Yes, that's more or less what I said. Plus, it's not that easy, you can relatively easily compensate people who have actual property taken away, but then it gets progressively trickier and you can end up creating a proper mess, like in post-Communist countries. 

[TheHowieLama]

Yea, that is the argument against them.

[Lee909]

Reparations for Slavery is a nightmare for any government to deal with. Where do you stop. Asians and Africans want it from European powers. The Brits,Eastern Europeans would want it fron the Vikings. All of Europe and North Africa and Middle East goes after Rome. The Europeans then go at the North Africans for the Barbery Pirates. All the while the Arab states tell everyone to fuck off when they where sone of the first at it and it still pretty much goes on now with them and all through Africa

 

The only people who'd end up rich are the lawyers

[Captain Turdseye]

Going back to India for a moment, when watching people talk Hindi on TV with subtitles on I always love the random English words or phrases thrown in. It’s superb. Could be absolutely anything. 

[AngryOfTuebrook]

On 15/02/2024 at 13:11, Strontium said:

 

I think you're forgetting Rule 1 of historical revisionism - nothing is ever the fault of Muslims.

"The Mueslems are the men who will not be blamed for nothing".

[AngryOfTuebrook]

On 09/08/2017 at 10:02, skend04 said:

Nearly at the 70 year anniversary of the biggest movement of people the world has ever witnessed and many of the people old enough to remember are coming to the end of their time. I've never heard any of my grandparents talk about it and only one is still with us, but nearing the end too.

 

It's almost like a taboo, something that isn't talked about. When you read some accounts it's not hard to see why, like a national stain. Many stories that do come out are harrowing, burning trains, rape, infanticide where babies were snatched and literally thrown against walls.

 

I guess it's more in sharp focus here now because of Brexit and Empire 2.0 and how over 65s appear to think they'll be ruling the waves once again. However whereas Germany and in some ways the US have confronted their darker history, many in the UK appear to revel and romanticise their colonial past. It makes me seethe when I hear "oh we'll be okay, we ruled the world" without acknowledging it caused the death of 29 million people in India alone through manufactured famines. This is before you start looking elsewhere.

 

The more you read the more you have to conclude it was a crime against humanity, manufactured by the Empire as a way to get of India.

 

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Partition_of_India

The lack of knowledge and discussion in the UK gives weight to the saying "The problem with the British is that their history took place overseas."

[AngryOfTuebrook]

On 16/02/2024 at 10:19, Jose Jones said:

Or it was a bit of a joke?

It was a racist joke.

[AngryOfTuebrook]

On 16/02/2024 at 12:15, SasaS said:

Yes, that's more or less what I said. Plus, it's not that easy, you can relatively easily compensate people who have actual property taken away, but then it gets progressively trickier and you can end up creating a proper mess, like in post-Communist countries. 

The best approach to international reparations would probably be for the imperial countries to start trading with their former colonies on fairer terms: that would mean European countries accepting less favourable terms, but acknowledging that it's right, because the basis of our current wealth was (and continues to be) largely derived by impoverishing other countries.

 

Of course, that's asking the rich and powerful to give up some of their wealth and power, so I can't see it happening.

[AngryOfTuebrook]

On 16/02/2024 at 18:42, Lee909 said:

Reparations for Slavery is a nightmare for any government to deal with. Where do you stop. Asians and Africans want it from European powers. The Brits,Eastern Europeans would want it fron the Vikings. All of Europe and North Africa and Middle East goes after Rome. The Europeans then go at the North Africans for the Barbery Pirates. All the while the Arab states tell everyone to fuck off when they where sone of the first at it and it still pretty much goes on now with them and all through Africa

 

The only people who'd end up rich are the lawyers

Nah. The slippery slope argument doesn't work.  You look at current societies and see whether there's an argument that the descendants of the slavers still have unjust advantages over the descendants of the enslaved; that's where you draw the line.  The USA is an obvious case; so is the UK's relationship with its former colonies in Africa, Asia and the Caribbean.

[SasaS]

48 minutes ago, AngryOfTuebrook said:

Nah. The slippery slope argument doesn't work.  You look at current societies and see whether there's an argument that the descendants of the slavers still have unjust advantages over the descendants of the enslaved; that's where you draw the line.  The USA is an obvious case; so is the UK's relationship with its former colonies in Africa, Asia and the Caribbean.

 

Slavery is not the only element of colonialism, you would have to draw the line there, which will make some people unhappy. Slavery ended generations ago, who are descendants of the slavers now? How wold you compensate descendants of the slaves, would you look at their current assets and give proportionally, or would you look at purity of their blood line? What you exclude mixed race people, or descendant of immigrants who were not slaves?

 

Not to mention that you would be expected to go further and compensate descendants of other groups.

 

In the end, you would simply create new injustices. It would be much better to focus at removing barriers and create equal opportunities for current generation as much as you can.

[Strontium]

45 minutes ago, SasaS said:

In the end, you would simply create new injustices.

 

Sounds like the social justice movement alright.

[AngryOfTuebrook]

35 minutes ago, SasaS said:

 

Slavery is not the only element of colonialism, you would have to draw the line there, which will make some people unhappy. Slavery ended generations ago, who are descendants of the slavers now? How wold you compensate descendants of the slaves, would you look at their current assets and give proportionally, or would you look at purity of their blood line? What you exclude mixed race people, or descendant of immigrants who were not slaves?

 

Not to mention that you would be expected to go further and compensate descendants of other groups.

 

In the end, you would simply create new injustices. It would be much better to focus at removing barriers and create equal opportunities for current generation as much as you can.

Obviously, I know that slavery is not the only aspect of colonialism, and obviously there's no reason to draw the line at slavery when you're talking about colonialism. Equally obviously, any talk of "bloodlines" is bullshit and needs to be avoided.

 

Maybe "descendants" was the wrong word.  The point is that the USA still lives with the legacy of slavery; for some, it's a legacy of wealth and privilege; for others, it's a legacy of poverty and oppression.  And which side of that legacy you fall on depends on (the social construct of race).

 

In the USA, the impact of slavery never ended.  Reconstruction was botched, Jim Crow laws, segregation, mass incarceration, zoning laws, voter suppression, the deliberate underfunding of black-majority schools, the "war on drugs", etc, etc; all of these (and more) have their basis in racist ideas that were created to justify slavery and are still used today to disadvantage black Americans.  If you are serious about removing barriers, you need to be serious about how widespread and deeply entrenched those barriers are and the cost of removing them (e.g. with increased investment to make up for decades of under-investment in black Americans' housing, education, healthcare, etc.). That would be a huge transfer of wealth and power from (for want of better terminology) White America (specifically, rich white Americans) to Black America.  That transfer is what I understand by "reparations".

[AngryOfTuebrook]

6 minutes ago, Strontium said:

 

Sounds like the social justice movement alright.

Nope.

[SasaS]

2 minutes ago, AngryOfTuebrook said:

Obviously, I know that slavery is not the only aspect of colonialism, and obviously there's no reason to draw the line at slavery when you're talking about colonialism. Equally obviously, any talk of "bloodlines" is bullshit and needs to be avoided.

 

Maybe "descendants" was the wrong word.  The point is that the USA still lives with the legacy of slavery; for some, it's a legacy of wealth and privilege; for others, it's a legacy of poverty and oppression.  And which side of that legacy you fall on depends on (the social construct of race).

 

In the USA, the impact of slavery never ended.  Reconstruction was botched, Jim Crow laws, segregation, mass incarceration, zoning laws, voter suppression, the deliberate underfunding of black-majority schools, the "war on drugs", etc, etc; all of these (and more) have their basis in racist ideas that were created to justify slavery and are still used today to disadvantage black Americans.  If you are serious about removing barriers, you need to be serious about how widespread and deeply entrenched those barriers are and the cost of removing them (e.g. with increased investment to make up for decades of under-investment in black Americans' housing, education, healthcare, etc.). That would be a huge transfer of wealth and power from (for want of better terminology) White America (specifically, rich white Americans) to Black America.  That transfer is what I understand by "reparations".

 

I don't think this is what many other people think by reparations, from my understanding, they mean money.

 

From the numbers in the US I found when occasionally trying to see how true various claims were, black people have statistically reached or surpassed the average level in certain categories, income and higher education enrollment, where they still fall behind is assets, which for most people means inherited property, because this is where historically biggest barrier existed. This will probably have to wait a couple of generations. So rather than talking about a "huge transfer of wealth and power", it would help if people would actually look at some numbers and focus on practicalities and actual, specific changes. That is of course, unless people only use racial and other inequalities for their own desired model of redistribution of the said wealth and power, on ideological grounds. Which they did in  the past and continue doing.

 

 

 

[TheHowieLama]

2 hours ago, AngryOfTuebrook said:

Obviously, I know that slavery is not the only aspect of colonialism, and obviously there's no reason to draw the line at slavery when you're talking about colonialism. Equally obviously, any talk of "bloodlines" is bullshit and needs to be avoided.

 

Maybe "descendants" was the wrong word.  The point is that the USA still lives with the legacy of slavery; for some, it's a legacy of wealth and privilege; for others, it's a legacy of poverty and oppression.  And which side of that legacy you fall on depends on (the social construct of race).

 

In the USA, the impact of slavery never ended.  Reconstruction was botched, Jim Crow laws, segregation, mass incarceration, zoning laws, voter suppression, the deliberate underfunding of black-majority schools, the "war on drugs", etc, etc; all of these (and more) have their basis in racist ideas that were created to justify slavery and are still used today to disadvantage black Americans.  If you are serious about removing barriers, you need to be serious about how widespread and deeply entrenched those barriers are and the cost of removing them (e.g. with increased investment to make up for decades of under-investment in black Americans' housing, education, healthcare, etc.). That would be a huge transfer of wealth and power from (for want of better terminology) White America (specifically, rich white Americans) to Black America.  That transfer is what I understand by "reparations".

 

What do you tell the "descendants" who have done quite well economically? Like, millions of folks.

Not all black Americans are in the same boat - no pun intended.

Do they sit this out?

[AngryOfTuebrook]

8 minutes ago, TheHowieLama said:

 

What do you tell the "descendants" who have done quite well economically? Like, millions of folks.

Not all black Americans are in the same boat - no pun intended.

Do they sit this out?

Have a proper read of that post.

 

Obviously, some black Americans are well off despite the racist legacy of slavery and many white Americans are doing poorly despite the racist legacy of slavery; but the overwhelming mountains of evidence of centuries of economic history is that black Americans have had the shitty end of the stick since 1619.  Morally, payback time is long overdue; that means redressing the long-standing imbalance of investment in communities, by tipping the balance the other way until some sort of fairness can be achieved.

[TheHowieLama]

1 minute ago, AngryOfTuebrook said:

Have a proper read of that post.

 

Obviously, some black Americans are well off despite the racist legacy of slavery and many white Americans are doing poorly despite the racist legacy of slavery; but the overwhelming mountains of evidence of centuries of economic history is that black Americans have had the shitty end of the stick since 1619.  Morally, payback time is long overdue; that means redressing the long-standing imbalance of investment in communities, by tipping the balance the other way until some sort of fairness can be achieved.

 

The US has implemented a number of social programs of that design for decades.

 

As this discussion started re: California, those current reparations proposals revolve around property and potential financial restitution at the individual level.

[Strontium]

I'd love to know how they'd decide who gets reparations. Maybe they can repurpose that Family Guy skin colour chart.

[AngryOfTuebrook]

Just now, Strontium said:

I'd love to know how they'd decide who gets reparations. Maybe they can repurpose that Family Guy skin colour chart.

No you wouldn't.  You'd love to keep making shitwitted snarky jibes that would fit right in on GB News. It's much easier than trying to learn stuff.

[TheHowieLama]

5 minutes ago, Strontium said:

I'd love to know how they'd decide who gets reparations. Maybe they can repurpose that Family Guy skin colour chart.

 

California is using eminent domain, property and tax records.

[Strontium]

5 minutes ago, AngryOfTuebrook said:

No you wouldn't.  You'd love to keep making shitwitted snarky jibes that would fit right in on GB News. It's much easier than trying to learn stuff.

 

There's nothing to learn. Your position is nonsensical and inherently self-contradictory. You don't defeat unfairness by introducing more unfairness. You don't punish and reward people who are alive now for what their distant ancestors may or may not have done or suffered.

[Strontium]

2 minutes ago, TheHowieLama said:

California is using eminent domain, property and tax records.

 

Seems pretty straightforward to me, just give it all back to the Indians, if you really want to right wrongs.

[TheHowieLama]

2 minutes ago, Strontium said:

 

Seems pretty straightforward to me, just give it all back to the Indians, if you really want to right wrongs.

 

That was the plan originally but the Indians could not produce any property or tax records.

[SasaS]

Also, Pawnee may disagree with giving back lands to the Lakota who stole if from them.

[Lee909]

34 minutes ago, SasaS said:

Also, Pawnee may disagree with giving back lands to the Lakota who stole if from them.