Cultural to economic imperialism: Breaking the backbone of India

[cyu]

From http://imgur.com/wFtV5

http://imgur.com/wFtV5.jpg

[Pyotr Tchaikovsky]

It's a bogus quote invented by Indian nationalists to feel good about themselves. Truth be told, India was a poor, uncivilized nation and Britain did earnestly believe that it was trying to civilize it. Lord M did actually believe that all the literature in the east wouldn't equal one bookshelf in the libraries of the west (or something to that effect). Point is, he and other British educators were pretty honest about wanting to educate and enlighten the uncivilized masses in India. Whether that was right or wrong is another matter...I am simply point out that their motives were clean and they honestly thought they were doing the masses a favor.

[cyu]

It's a bogus quote

Indeed there are people raising doubts about the quote here: http://www.reddit.com/r/reddit.com/comments/ak1nf/hey_reddit_i_thought_youd_find_this_interesting/



invented by Indian nationalists to feel good about themselves.


I'd presume Indian nationalists want this quote to be true, while British nationalists want this quote to be false.



Truth be told, India was a poor, uncivilized nation


"Uncivilized" by whose standards? Yours? How do you measure "poor"? GDP? HDI? Life expectancy? Infant mortality? I'm not saying India outperformed the UK in any of these stats - I'm just asking how you're measuring "poor".



Britain did earnestly believe that it was trying to civilize it.


So at what point did it switch from being an honest attempt to help India into a situation in which the locals had to try to kick them out and them refusing to leave?

[Ravachol]

It's a bogus quote invented by Indian nationalists to feel good about themselves. Truth be told, India was a poor, uncivilized nation and Britain did earnestly believe that it was trying to civilize it. Lord M did actually believe that all the literature in the east wouldn't equal one bookshelf in the libraries of the west (or something to that effect). Point is, he and other British educators were pretty honest about wanting to educate and enlighten the uncivilized masses in India. Whether that was right or wrong is another matter...I am simply point out that their motives were clean and they honestly thought they were doing the masses a favor.

Intentions are irrelevant in this case. People with the best intentions acted as agents of Capital because of the structures they operated in. The vary act of 'bringing "civilisation"' is nothing else but transposing structures created by capital onto another society. Civilisation-as-such does not exist. Obviously proper scientific research, bathing, housing and heating to all, etc are good things, but that's not what 'bringing civilisation' means. It means transposing certain social constructs, which arose out of a discourse guided by capital, to another society. All it does is encapsulate another group of people within these poisonous structures. And obviously a lot of people honestly wanted to help, but their attempts where channeled through both structures operating within the logic of capital and their own intentions and world-view (bringing 'civilisation to the barbaric masses') are the result of capital-guided discourse. I strongly support improving the objective conditions of life (food, housing,education (although this is tricky as well for obvious reasons),etc) but I object against the transposing of social structures and morals resulting from capital-guided discourse.

[Pyotr Tchaikovsky]

"Uncivilized" by whose standards? Yours? How do you measure "poor"? GDP? HDI? Life expectancy? Infant mortality? I'm not saying India outperformed the UK in any of these stats - I'm just asking how you're measuring "poor".

The fact that they were conquered is the evidence; everything else is secondary. Can Mexico conquer USA? Logically, the conqueror has to be superior in some ways and the conquered, inferior. Else, no conquest would be possible to begin with.



So at what point did it switch from being an honest attempt to help India into a situation in which the locals had to try to kick them out and them refusing to leave?

I am not a time traveler, so I cannot answer these questions. All I can say is that no good deed ever goes unpunished.:)

[cyu]

The fact that they were conquered is the evidence; everything else is secondary. Can Mexico conquer USA? Logically, the conqueror has to be superior in some ways and the conquered, inferior.

So by definition, murderers are more civilized than their victims, because they are superior in some ways to the victims? Would you say the same in cases of genocide?



All I can say is that no good deed ever goes unpunished.


So are you saying the British were doing good deeds all the way up to and including beating up Gandhi and his "barefoot hipsters"?