White man's burden

[Nehru]

Your view ... with some historical context and hopefully from a leftist (progressive) perspective, how it helped in social evolution and so on ... no emotional appeals. Only conclusions based on historical evidence.

[TheGodlessUtopian]

...what burden?

[A Revolutionary Tool]

Ahh the burden of having to go into these savage places and killing all these people and enslaving the ones we didn't kill. Such a burden, why can't these brown people be as smart as us white men?

Actually I'd think it's more like a gift, you get to go in an area that has not been exploited by capitalism and you're free to viciously rape it. :rolleyes:

Maybe you should have worded that a little better...

[#FF0000]

yeah they got telephones and railroads and stuff

in exchange they all got so fucked that they're still reeling from the consequences.

so no it didn't help any.

[Geiseric]

White mans burden = imperialism + racism

[Nehru]

Thanks, but I needed something a little more substantial, less emotional.

For instance, some people may argue along these lines: even without invasions, natives would've suffered because they were constantly fighting each other. At least, the invasion brought progress. In short, no invasion = suffering without progress. Invasion = suffering with progress.

[TheGodlessUtopian]

Thanks, but I needed something a little more substantial, less emotional.

For instance, some people may argue along these lines: even without invasions, natives would've suffered because they were constantly fighting each other. At least, the invasion brought progress. In short, no invasion = suffering without progress. Invasion = suffering with progress.

Sounds like you are an imperialist apologist. :thumbdown:

[#FF0000]

Thanks, but I needed something a little more substantial, less emotional.

For instance, some people may argue along these lines: even without invasions, natives would've suffered because they were constantly fighting each other. At least, the invasion brought progress. In short, no invasion = suffering without progress. Invasion = suffering with progress.

I don't think you can compare their conflicts to what Europeans inflicted on them, though.

Are telephones a good trade off for being brutalized and having the natural wealth of the place you live in plundered?

[Rusty Shackleford]

Thanks, but I needed something a little more substantial, less emotional.

For instance, some people may argue along these lines: even without invasions, natives would've suffered because they were constantly fighting each other. At least, the invasion brought progress. In short, no invasion = suffering without progress. Invasion = suffering with progress.
har har har.



And the Europeans weren't fighting each other?


The only thing it did was annihilate one society and impose a new one over the old. You say "no emotional appeals" and you talk about the "natives" suffering because "they were constantly fighting each other"


You are apologizing for imperialism.

[citizen of industry]

Plus, imperialist powers didn't incorporate the native peoples into the societies they created equally, so you can't make the philanthropic argument. It's not like it was a gift of technology to make their lives easier. It was just plundering. Native American's, relegated to poor reservation land for example. Or the British exploiting the population of India.

[Nehru]

I don't think you can compare their conflicts to what Europeans inflicted on them, though.

Are telephones a good trade off for being brutalized and having the natural wealth of the place you live in plundered?

Was that natural wealth utilized in any way, or were people too busy fighting over it? I suspect it's the latter, so 'foreign' powers thought it fit to utilize those resources for the sake of development.

NOTE: I am just playing the devil's advocate here, hoping to understand this historical development from multiple angles. So let's stop accusing each other.

[NoOneIsIllegal]

Thanks, but I needed something a little more substantial, less emotional.

For instance, some people may argue along these lines: even without invasions, natives would've suffered because they were constantly fighting each other. At least, the invasion brought progress. In short, no invasion = suffering without progress. Invasion = suffering with progress.
What the hell is wrong with you?
Do you honestly think that without imperialism and violent racism that some people aren't capable of inventing technology and progressing in society?

"They died, but for a worthy cause! Now the children can call each and talk about how their parents died!"

[Fopeos]

I've read quite a bit about the early history of the western hemisphere and how native populations related to one another pre- and post- European invasion. Most indian peoples regarded war as a sport. A chance for men to show off their bravery and prowess. It was generally done between planting and harvest when the men had idle time. Early explorers witnessed and documented some of their "battles" and wrote that there was mostly lots of posturing and insults followed by a few volleys of arrows. Then each side would gather their wounded and go home.
It's only after the economic pressures of trade with Europeans and the settlement of land that the wars bacame brutal and body-counts increased.
I can only imagine that the story was similar in Africa.
Contact with Whites only brought benefit after the devestation of traditional norms and decimation of populations.

[Ismail]

I can only imagine that the story was similar in Africa.In Southern Africa resources tended to be scarce which led to conflict, while in Western and Eastern Africa you had Muslim vs. Pagan (or in the East African case, Muslim vs. Ethiopian Orthodox) conflicts, although that's obviously the result of outside influences.

From my understanding North America tended to not have much conflict since in many cases resources weren't particularly hard to come by and the system of "primitive communism" didn't develop much beyond "here are tribes that generally just exist because of how geographically afar some guys are from other guys."

[maskerade]

Thanks, but I needed something a little more substantial, less emotional.

For instance, some people may argue along these lines: even without invasions, natives would've suffered because they were constantly fighting each other. At least, the invasion brought progress. In short, no invasion = suffering without progress. Invasion = suffering with progress.

That's a racist an extremely simplified account of "natives". Europe has been at war with some part of the world, if not with parts of itself, for pretty much all of living history. That argument would use a western notion of what progress is; "natives" wouldn't know what their progress would've been as we destroyed any hope of allowing them to find their own path.

The "progress" we brought Africa included infrastructure built purely to extract raw materials, which we later indebted them for and then charged them billions to "help" build the rest of their infrastructure. We also reinvented their culture and destroyed their right to self-determination, destroyed their religions and rituals, social structures and left them with legacies of poverty, violence, oppressive institutions, a culture of kleptocracy and generally made it unrecognisable to those who had a memory of what it was before.

Imagine a thought experiment where European explorers weren't driven by racism and by the desire to conquer, and instead established mutually beneficial relationships with the world at large. We would live in a much richer world. Fuck imperialism, fuck colonialism, and fuck any disgusting degenerate who dares apologize for it.

[Red Commissar]

I don't think the OP is advocating imperialism or this sort of paternalism. I think it's a relevant question though- WE all know that "White Man's Burden" is a crock of shit, but that might be as easy for those who apologize for imperialist adventures overseas. Here, even today, you can see the same kind of logic and condescending attitude towards Iraq and Afghanistan over what they are doing there.

We must be able to point out that when these infrastructure developments were built and factories constructed were for the express benefit of the imperialist. Often times when they came, they preserved if not bolstered existing social power structures, keeping the majority of the populace in servitude or poor conditions.

[Fopeos]

I agree wholeheartedly with maskerade's assessment. I recently read a book by Eduardo Galeano in which he comes to a similar conclusion in regards to Latin-America. It's entire infrastructure was designed to extract resources. Over the years, the attention has shifted from one "hot" comodity to another but the "great funnel" has remained the same. Real social developement was never the intention of the colonial overlords.

[dodger]

I don't think the OP is advocating imperialism or this sort of paternalism. I think it's a relevant question though- WE all know that "White Man's Burden" is a crock of shit, but that might be as easy for those who apologize for imperialist adventures overseas. Here, even today, you can see the same kind of logic and condescending attitude towards Iraq and Afghanistan over what they are doing there.

We must be able to point out that when these infrastructure developments were built and factories constructed were for the express benefit of the imperialist. Often times when they came, they preserved if not bolstered existing social power structures, keeping the majority of the populace in servitude or poor conditions.
India was a drug cartel...pure and simple! It enriched but a few. During the 19th century, the British ruling class paid for its empire by producing opium in India and exporting it to China. The British state promoted, protected and profited from the trade. Revenue from the opium trade financed all its governments in Southeast Asia.
By the 1830s, opium was the largest commerce of the time in any single commodity. In 1860, the British Indian government legalised India's narcotics trade with China as a government monopoly, run by the Opium Department. It became the Indian government's second largest source of revenue.
We can see that Empire was a grand delusion brought on by Opium.

"You may say what you like about not holding India by the sword, but you have held it by the sword for 100 years and when you give up the sword you will be turned out. You must keep the sword ready to hand and in case of trouble or rebellion use it relentlessly. Montagu calls it terrorism, so it is and in dealing with natives of all classes you have to use terrorism whether you like it or not." General Rawlinson, the commander in chief in India, speaking in 1920.

Nehru....I think our general puts matters into place far more eloquently than I..........it was Churchill who played the Muslim card as he did in Ireland with the Orange Protestant. Turk and Greek in Cyprus. Sunni against Shiite in Arabia. So no great surprise that Hindu and Muslim were targeted for the old,old old, DIVIDE and RULE game.
Between 1757 and 1947 the GDP per head was to increase by 14%........cold hard facts are what you wanted ...they lead us to some very harsh judgements. what is more some brutally frank questions might be in order.

[Invader Zim]

The problem with the responces to this thread is that they are simplistic and lack any kind of serious consideration of the issue.

"White mans burden = imperialism + racism"

"Ahh the burden of having to go into these savage places and killing all these people and enslaving the ones we didn't kill. Such a burden, why can't these brown people be as smart as us white men?"

Etc.

None of that provides any of the actual ideological defences for foreign intervention and the construction of empire, or really get us any close to understanding what was at the heart of the imperial mindset.

And we also haven't had any serious discussion of the actual effects of imperialism.

[dodger]

With respect Zim , naked greed covers most if not all the imperial mindset. What a tea planter or district officer might pontificate about in the club or mess, we can only guess at or gain insight from biographies or those that were sent out in the ww2. My mother left home at 14 as a dancer and volunteered to go to entertain troops. my pa was a 2nd lieutenant ...they got on well with most people on their travels but had nothing but pure scorn for the colonial 'types'...and regular Indian Army officers. Their hatred and snobbery was dispensed equally amongst native Indian and working class British. Though a sense of decorum had to prevail where Nabob, Maharajah or rich merchant was concerned. Both British and French had their East Indian Companies..swiftly followed by MISSIONARIES." Orientalism And Race: Aryanism in the British Empire" By BALLANTYNE...gives us a taster of the mindset, you asked of us. Though working in hotel trade, textiles and LONDON TUBE..a mixed bag of people from the four corners...never gave me much insight into colonial or colonist mentality. It was all old hat even in 1960's. Ancient history....life had never been better without the Empire. The workers who had origins in India etc...were no less living in the present...keen to better themselves and educate their offspring. Imperial myths about host countries benefiting are put into focus by the shear scale of famines and lack of development. Empire is undemocratic in total, because it is based on rule by one class over other nations. Empire benefits its rulers, never the peoples, whatever the forms in which people think. A hammering rather than a written or spoken communication characterizes colonial mindset. That din we can hear is capitalist mode of production...not a discourse.

[Magón]

Thanks, but I needed something a little more substantial, less emotional.

For instance, some people may argue along these lines: even without invasions, natives would've suffered because they were constantly fighting each other. At least, the invasion brought progress. In short, no invasion = suffering without progress. Invasion = suffering with progress.

I think you need to revisit the definition of progress before speaking anymore. To achieve something progressive, you have to achieve something that's more forward than at the point you're currently at in life. Just changing the name of who's doing the killing, while there's still suffering, is not progress by any means.

[Invader Zim]

With respect Zim , naked greed covers most if not all the imperial mindset.
And with respect Dodger, you don't know what you are talking about. Imperialism operates on numerous different levels, not merely the colonial. In the 18th and 19th centuries one of the most forceful imperialistic agents at work was that of protestant religion. The individuals I am thinking of, such as Coke, Carey, etc, who pioneered a culturally devistating form of imperialism, and where heavily concerned with the "white mans" burden to bring "god" to the heathens were not remotely concerned with temporal, material assets, beyond their ability facilitate their missionary activities.

And if you want to discuss the idea of the "white man's" burden, then it is their motivations, expectations that allow a full understanding of the results. Your analysis of impeirlaism and imperialists is perfunctory to the level of characture and doesn't aid this discussion, or our understanding at all.

[dodger]

Let rip Zim...I have learnt to follow the money. My apologies for my efforts, but did the good people in the missionary society cause more than a ripple?. Either here or in India. Religion has never played any part in my life. Here in Philippines my wife's father a protestant pastor never converted a single Muslim. Rice Christians we have heard of, as Christian magistrates appointed by the French in Yunnan and Indo-China. Surely an incentive with land disputes an everyday fact of life. In fact I have just gone out into backyard 2 middle aged fellows utterly apologetic when confronted..explained they had set up a small fire on the birthday of a twin who did not survive childbirth, and was buried alongside our septic tank. The smoke wards off evil spirits that might lurk there. A common ritual at funerals is to walk over the fire on leaving the internment. True because I found the bones whilst digging a couple of years ago. So centuries of religious indoctrination.....and ...smoke to ward off any Wak-WAKS. With a corrupt set of venal churches here , forgive me if I hold my breath whilst you tell me that the protestant missionaries were not motivated by financial reward. Coke at least petitioned the prime minister of the day to make him a church of England Bishop of some tropical region(the better to do Gods work??). Carey by contrast seemed to have taken up the burden and left a trail of wreckage in his wake...Still one positive point...they left our shores...as did the pilgrims before them, maybe they did indeed have better luck converting foreign heathen, than the pagan English working classes. Still the clanging of industry and roar of chain shot, plus the ringing of shop tills drowned out any pious hymns or cries of the starving and dispossessed.

[Invader Zim]

My apologies for my efforts, but did the good people in the missionary society cause more than a ripple?

They caused the abolition of the slave trade. And, similarly, they saw the destruction of indigenous religion in more areas than I choose to count.



Either here or in India. Religion has never played any part in my life.

Oh well, that changes everything.


Coke at least petitioned the prime minister of the day to make him a church of England Bishop of some tropical region(the better to do Gods work??).

No. He was a founding bishop of the Wesleyan Chuck in America, the second largest religious denomination in the USA. While Willian Carey was a missionary of the largest single Protestant denomination.

And Coke wa salso the chief fundraiser and figure in the expansionist efforts to spread Christianity into the West Indies and Africa, and founded churches that soon grew to number hundreds of thousands of individuals and co-ordinated efforts in Africa.


they left our shores...as did the pilgrims before them, maybe they did indeed have better luck converting foreign heathen, than the pagan English working classes.

Well, as it happens, the Wesleyan society of Great Britain, as well as their Calvinist bretherin, numbered in the millions, and their expansionist efforts in the New World, Africa and India also produced churches numbering in the millions of individuals. There's was an imperialism that has been unsurpassed except, perhaps, by their Catholic counterparts.

[dodger]

Thanks for your response Zim...I must say I am bit like a frog at the bottom of a well here...in Mindanao. My late father in law employed as a pastor by an American protestant outfit, was a sincere man with a fear of the lord. Viewed here the soup looks pretty thin. In the time of Coke there were some 150 missionaries, worldwide, reaching a zenith of 15,000 by 1900. Many were to perish within 2 years of arrival. There ability to leave any sort of mark puzzles me. Schism, incoherence and naked self interest for the most part and a population still wedded to QUACK doctors and spirits is the way of things here. My step son a science teacher will tell me straight faced that the world was made in 6 days, my catholic neighbour crosses himself every time he step into the clear waters, children are warned of WAK-WAKS if they stray too far after dusk. Although the once mighty dollar buys fewer pesos one pastor still managed to build a fine olympic infinity pool . Yesererday after the hurricane the pool did stretch to infinity and I picked him up on my canoe off the roof of his magnificent 4x4 dodge. Life goes on and happily for a christian country the people are marked by a total lack of judgemental ideas. Whatever it takes to survive......Nobody here is in any doubt about what imperialism is...its powerful and to be feared. I am shown every courtesy, addressed as SIR, my skin colour or age..or just a natural formal politeness...maybe all three. Who knows. They all shout HEY JOE when I walk down the street , mistaking my height for a yank. Most friendly, as I am to them...My wifes helper just turned 18 surprised me, shy, face of an angel with a fine voice to match, leading member of the church choir. HE HAD STRIPPED DOWN MY BABY ARMELITE DOWN AND WAS REASSEMBLING IT, WHEN I asked him where he learned that skill he blushed and smiled, no use pressing him. He has been gone a month and asking wifey where he was , was told .".don't ask!" looking darkly at the hills behind! So the white mans burden is shouldered by Bono....Sir Bob Geldoff ..and aspiring beauty queens wanting to make the world a better place. Hope the dollar goes up....the good pastor is putting in a basketball court, for all to enjoy.....my quip about water polo was met with incomprehensible laughter.

[Luís Henrique]

Thanks, but I needed something a little more substantial, less emotional.

The problem is, the expression "white man's burden" in itself isn't substantial. It is an outright lie to justify imperialist aggression. If you want a better discussion, try asking whether and how imperialism/colonialism had any progressive aspects.

Luís Henrique

[Geiseric]

Look at how the aboriginees in australia lived before the whites, they were basically a tribe of communal environmentalists, and when the prisoners started their genocide as soon as they got into australia many tribes simply stopped wanting to live. It's a bastardation of what some people see as "progress." My definition of progress is something that satisfies as many peoples needs and wants as possible. In order to do that, a society needs to cooperate with eachother, not compete. Those 18th century philosophers were really bastards, justifying their wealth.

[tir1944]

My definition of progress is something that satisfies as many peoples needs and wants as possible.
That's some fucked up definition all right...

[RedRevolution1938]

There is no denying that Europeans have, in the past as in the present, been guilty of imperialism and exploitation. Do we really blame all ethnic Europeans for this? No. It has been the ruling class of Europeans, the Monarchs, the Feudal Lords, the Capitalists who are responsible. The peasantry in Spain had little say and benefited very little when it came to the imperialist endeavors of the Spanish crown into the Americas.

Fomenting hatred onto white men does nothing to forward a progressive objective. Fomenting hatred onto any one group, regardless of ethnic makeup of said group, does nothing to forward a progressive object. It is the capitalist exploiters of all nations and races we must fight.

Let us not forget, also, the imperialist invasions of the Moorish army into Europe, or the invasion of the Turks. All races have done bad things, all have done good things.