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Does make one wonder if it was "just" them being negligent morons, or if one could legitimately consider it a deliberate indirect attempt at genocide
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# ? Feb 14, 2021 02:52 |
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# ? May 28, 2024 14:38 |
drrockso20 posted:Does make one wonder if it was "just" them being negligent morons, or if one could legitimately consider it a deliberate indirect attempt at genocide
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# ? Feb 14, 2021 03:00 |
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drrockso20 posted:Does make one wonder if it was "just" them being negligent morons, or if one could legitimately consider it a deliberate indirect attempt at genocide Lord Curry seems like one actual moron at least
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# ? Feb 14, 2021 03:12 |
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drrockso20 posted:Does make one wonder if it was "just" them being negligent morons, or if one could legitimately consider it a deliberate indirect attempt at genocide Sir Charles Trevelyan, the British MP in charge of the famine relief effort in Ireland famously was of the opinion that "The judgement of God sent the calamity to teach the Irish a lesson"
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# ? Feb 14, 2021 03:39 |
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A comparison to the Holdomor would be more accurate IMO. Not an "intentional" genocide but those in power certainly didn't care at all about those dead people, same as the millions of people the British killed through famine and forced labor elsewhere in the empire. Like, they turned India into a massive drug plantation to produce opium that was sold in China to destabilize the Chinese government and buy tea. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-49404024 quote:Historian William Dalrymple, author of The Anarchy, a new book on the East India Company, says it "ferried opium to China, fighting the opium wars in order to seize an offshore base at Hong Kong and safeguard its profitable monopoly in narcotics". quote:The result of the research is published in Dr Bauer's new study of the trade, The Peasant Production of Opium in Nineteenth-Century India. His conclusion: the opium business was hugely exploitative and ended up impoverishing Indian peasants. "Poppy was cultivated against a substantial loss. These peasants would have been much better without it," Dr Bauer told me. quote:Interest-free advance payments were offered to poppy farmers who could not access easy credit. By itself, this was not a bad thing for those producing for the global market.
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# ? Feb 14, 2021 03:40 |
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SomeDrunkenMick posted:Sir Charles Trevelyan, the British MP in charge of the famine relief effort in Ireland famously was of the opinion that "The judgement of God sent the calamity to teach the Irish a lesson" It's worth pointing out that to Trevelyan "the Irish" very much included the landlords and land owning classes who he aggressively blamed for failing to uphold their moral duty of paternal stewardship. He was one of the key voices advising Russell to place the complete financial onus for all relief on Irish land owners through local taxation, which was eventually achieved after the stock market panic of 47 dried up any remaining parliamentary support for "subsidising" relief.
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# ? Feb 14, 2021 03:48 |
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kustomkarkommando posted:It's worth pointing out that to Trevelyan "the Irish" very much included the landlords and land owning classes who he aggressively blamed for failing to uphold their moral duty of paternal stewardship. He was one of the key voices advising Russell to place the complete financial onus for all relief on Irish land owners through local taxation, which was eventually achieved after the stock market panic of 47 dried up any remaining parliamentary support for "subsidising" relief. Irish property to support Irish poverty. Trevelyan was a [redacted], the land owners of the time would have very much considered themselves British not Irish. Ireland was a part of Britain at the time. Russel himself said: "I consider that the Union was but a parchment and unsubstantial union, if Ireland is not to be treated, in the hour of difficulty and distress, as an integral part of the United Kingdom; and unless we are prepared to show, that we are ready to grant to Irishmen a participation in all our rights and privileges, and to treat them exactly as if they were inhabitants of the same island." Yet the rights of of Irish men and women to aid were not extended to them as citizens of the United Kingdom. It may not have been genocide, but laissez-faire economics made it very easy for the British to blame the famine on the Irish themselves and accept the inadequate response as part of the natural order. With the upshot that it wiped out a particular class of Irishman, the subsistence labourer. To the advantage of the landowners. I'm not a historian and I just lurk this thread for interesting stuff, but arguably Peel, I think it was used the famine as an excuse to get rid of the corn laws. The repeal had negligible effect on the Irish Famine itself. Ireland was never considered an equal partner in the union and you can see that attitude persist to this day, from the brexit negotiations to what that prick said earlier in this thread. IRA retellings, good god. Anyway sorry for the derail, tomorrow I'll try to find the account of my great grandfather who tried to burn down a courthouse during the war of independence sometime around 1920. They were pretty crap at it and basically only survived almost burning themselves to death by the fact that they had spent so long out in the rain casing the place, and their coats were soaked through wet. [MOD EDIT: I agree with what you called Trevelyan, but we're trying not to use that word 'round PYF.] Somebody has a new favorite as of 18:35 on Feb 15, 2021 |
# ? Feb 14, 2021 05:09 |
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drrockso20 posted:Does make one wonder if it was "just" them being negligent morons, or if one could legitimately consider it a deliberate indirect attempt at genocide I don't think there's any evidence for it being deliberate; the Famine was just the gruesome consequences of unfettered capitalism and imperialism all on their own. Even in systems where 99% of the population had no political power, but the rulers were local, there were almost always relief efforts during famines, likely because the elites feared riots on their doorsteps or at least worried about their labor force dying off. With colonialism though, I think the elites are seated so far away and are so far removed from any threat of usurpation that they have no reason to give a gently caress. Sucrose has a new favorite as of 06:09 on Feb 14, 2021 |
# ? Feb 14, 2021 05:52 |
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It was also, as the Potato Book points out, exacerbated by the Irish being forced onto a monoculture crop because it's something of a wonder crop for peasants. They're not labor intensive to farm, are fairly resistant to damage, animals won't go after them, it's hard for soldiers to destroy them, and 1 acre of potatoes could feed a family for a year (plus dairy for the vitamins the potato doesn't provide), so almost all the output of the landless tenant farmers gets focused into growing cash crops (eg wheat for export to England) for absentee landlords. Salaman notes how crushing this would have likely been on the psyche, eating nothing but potatoes (which are also fed to your cow and the pig which is not for eating but for sale) while you live in a one room sod hut. And that's your entire life. To further note how absurd "uh it was bad for the rest of the British Isles too you know, unlike what those IRA exaggerators say" is, Scotland was the next heavily affected area by the blight, while officially there were no deaths to starvation there was likely a increase in mortality, but even then it would have been nowhere near as bad due to the Scots still growing oats/wheat for food, and there was a large increase in immigration. On the mainland it's estimated approximately 100,000 died mainly in the low countries and in Germany. (The French were not affected, as at that time the potato was only grown for animal fodder.)
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# ? Feb 14, 2021 07:21 |
Sucrose posted:I don't think there's any evidence for it being deliberate; the Famine was just the gruesome consequences of unfettered capitalism and imperialism all on their own.
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# ? Feb 14, 2021 07:35 |
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SomeDrunkenMick posted:Irish property to support Irish poverty. Yeah. The famine still occurred in living memory of a time when Catholics could not legally hold own land; things were gradually changing by the time the Famine hit, but a small Protestant minority still held the vast majority of the land. The famine itself was a major catalyst for land redistribution (although it was still barely a start), since there was a lot of land up for grabs due to landlords going bankrupt from lack of living tenants. Maybe that's what is meant by Britain hurting from the famine too
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# ? Feb 14, 2021 07:45 |
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'Families starving because of being forced to grow cash crops instead of food' is a pretty common theme especially with the British Empire.
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# ? Feb 14, 2021 07:50 |
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Starting to think this "Britain" thing was a big scam?
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# ? Feb 14, 2021 08:10 |
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C.M. Kruger posted:To further note how absurd "uh it was bad for the rest of the British Isles too you know, unlike what those IRA exaggerators say" is, Scotland was the next heavily affected area by the blight, while officially there were no deaths to starvation there was likely a increase in mortality, but even then it would have been nowhere near as bad due to the Scots still growing oats/wheat for food, and there was a large increase in immigration. When this first came up I did a brief search on my phone looking for the british deaths from the famine, and the first result I found was some british university paper talking about all the population in england as a whole and it didn't even mention the famine/starvation. It just listed the Irish population reduction in the 1840s as a "demographical catastrophe"
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# ? Feb 14, 2021 08:18 |
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The best, (and arguably only good), thing the British Empire ever did was introduce Test Cricket to the world. Well, the parts of the world civilized enough to listen. Historical fun fact: The first International cricket match was actually between the USA and Canada, decades before the first Ashes Test. There was also a tour of English professional cricketers to the US well before they burned that stump and put it in an urn. (Canada won the match by 23 runs. It was only a 2 day game.) And the one I always like to spout when talking to people. Australia had a national cricket team before we had a national parliament. Because ... priorities.
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# ? Feb 14, 2021 08:27 |
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BrigadierSensible posted:It was only a 2 day game. I'd say this most effectively sums up why cricket was never going to become a thing in the US. Regular baseball games are interminably long for most Americans.
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# ? Feb 14, 2021 08:59 |
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Loxbourne posted:The Corn Laws finally died in the 1840s when the Irish Potato Famine hit (which, occasional idiot IRA retellings aside, actually hit Britain pretty hard too). amazing
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# ? Feb 14, 2021 09:57 |
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C.M. Kruger posted:A comparison to the Holdomor would be more accurate IMO. Not an "intentional" genocide but those in power certainly didn't care at all about those dead people, same as the millions of people the British killed through famine and forced labor elsewhere in the empire. it was intentional
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# ? Feb 14, 2021 09:59 |
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A famine is often much harder on the colonized than on the colonialist. However, I also know that it doesn't necessarily turn you into a sad, depressed sack of tears for the rest of your life. People can move past it, and heal.
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# ? Feb 14, 2021 10:20 |
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ChubbyChecker posted:it was intentional See also the idea that during the Bengal famine people in charge of the Raj thought it would be a marvelous time to illustrate how a free market would supply food to the most poverty stricken areas the most efficiently. On an entirely unrelated note, up to 35 million people potentially died from the famines in India under British rule, we can't say for certain because of a systematic, deliberate operation of the British government during the 60s and 70s to destroy all documents relating to British colonial practices - see Operation Legacy.
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# ? Feb 14, 2021 10:20 |
These are the works of a famous forger called the Spanish Master. No one knows who he is or where he's from (he's ,most likely not spanish). But his works have some telltale signs: The hair is more elaborate than it would be on real antique busts, he never makes a full body and the bronze is really thin because he uses real antique bronze which isn't that common. It is estimated that he made around fifty heads before he retired.
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# ? Feb 14, 2021 11:12 |
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C.M. Kruger posted:It was also, as the Potato Book points out, The Book of Spud
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# ? Feb 14, 2021 11:27 |
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FreudianSlippers posted:They made the trains run on time (on railroads built mostly by barely paid laborers hundreds of whom were maimed or killed in the process) and 30% of whom were Irish. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EFgWTGyjLB0
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# ? Feb 14, 2021 13:24 |
On October 5th 1914 Louis Quenault became the first person to win an air duel. He didn't know how to fly and presumably never learned it. He was onboard as the observer and grabbed a machine gun when he saw a german plane and got in some lucky shots.
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# ? Feb 15, 2021 19:53 |
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Wikipedia threw an interesting piece of history at my feet while I was reading about afrobeat musicians: The Black Hole of Calcutta quote:The Black Hole of Calcutta was a dungeon in Fort William, Calcutta measuring 4.30 × 5.50 metres (14 × 18 feet) It's like Satan decided to rent a studio apartment in 1700s Pre-Raj British India, and He had a real Hell of a banger one night because everyone decided to show up. quote:Modern historians believe that 64 prisoners were sent into the Hole, and that 43 died there. I thought we weren't allowed to do that poo poo until the post apocalypse collapse of society.
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# ? Feb 17, 2021 07:00 |
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Always surprising when it isn't the British committing atrocities in India.
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# ? Feb 17, 2021 07:12 |
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quote:Families starving because of being forced to grow cash crops instead of food' is a pretty common theme with the I thought that's one of the definition traits of every "Empire". Taking resources from the outer area's to the Imperial core and forcing the outer area's to give and grow the resources for them. What's an empire that hasn't done that?
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# ? Feb 17, 2021 07:58 |
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Comstar posted:I thought that's one of the definition traits of every "Empire". Taking resources from the outer area's to the Imperial core and forcing the outer area's to give and grow the resources for them. What's an empire that hasn't done that? Well, most empires don't have a state-sanctioned PR operation still active in 2021 which actively claims that the Brits were there to lift backwards peoples out of their misery and the natives should be thankful for all the good they did, drat it
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# ? Feb 17, 2021 18:22 |
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It should be mention depending on what you think of resources that’s mostly modern empire building
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# ? Feb 18, 2021 00:37 |
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Samovar posted:....we can't say for certain because of a systematic, deliberate operation of the British government during the 60s and 70s to destroy all documents relating to British colonial practices - see Operation Legacy. This reminds me of one of my 'favourite' British Empire factoids: If you want to access public or government records for (what is now) Nigeria or Ghana between 1871 and 1906 where would you have to go? Not Abuja or Accra, although those would be the obvious places. The Foreign & Commonwealth Office or the National Archives in London, as a lingering ghost of Britain's imperial legacy? Nope. You have to go to to the corporate archive of Unilever plc, the successor to the United Africa Company which ran and de facto owned (or at least was licensed by the British government to strip and pillage) a large part of western Africa between those dates.
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# ? Feb 18, 2021 01:33 |
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I was just looking up something relating to the Norman invasion of Ireland, and came across a very interesting insight into the difference between what was considered proper behaviour in Irish and English Royal circles: According to the Chronicles of John Froissart, a man called Henry Castide was sent by the then English King to coach the 4 Irish kings (each province had its own king) on how to behave in the English court:quote:“Because the Irish language is as familiar to me as English, for I have always spoken it in my family, and introduce it among my grandchildren as much as I can, I have been chosen by our lord and king to teach and accustom the four Irish kings, who have sworn obedience for ever to England, to the manners of the English. I must say, that these kings who were under my management were of coarse manners and understandings; and, in spite of all I could do to soften their language and nature, very little progress has been made, for the would frequently return to their former coarse behaviour. Source: From Chronicles of England, France and Spain and the Surrounding Countries, by Sir John Froissart https://elfinspell.com/FroissartVol2/Book4Chap60.html tl;dr Irish kings thought it right and proper to eat with, and share everything with their senior household servants, a very different attitude to the very strict hierarchy in English and Norman courtly circles.
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# ? Feb 21, 2021 11:36 |
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Posted it in the MilHist thread- any questions about the Korean War? My grandfather was a draftee and has an account.
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# ? Feb 21, 2021 11:43 |
This is from Topographia Hibernica (1180) that shows how the english viewed the irish: Bearded savages who were too dumb to operate a rowing boat (and they also hosed their goats).
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# ? Feb 21, 2021 11:44 |
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Ugly In The Morning posted:Posted it in the MilHist thread- any questions about the Korean War? My grandfather was a draftee and has an account. has he seen goatse before?
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# ? Feb 21, 2021 12:43 |
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The circumstances of the Norman invasion of Ireland are kind of farcical. A regional Irish king hired a bunch of Norman mercenaries to assist him in a succession dispute, and then the noble died during the fighting and the Normans were finding it so easy to conquer Irish territory that they just kept on going with it. Then the English king joined the invasion because the Norman mercenaries were technically his subjects, and he didn't want them to establish their own fiefdoms outside of his control. The rest is (bloody, miserable, colonial) history.
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# ? Feb 21, 2021 12:57 |
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Red Bones posted:The circumstances of the Norman invasion of Ireland are kind of farcical. A regional Irish king hired a bunch of Norman mercenaries to assist him in a succession dispute, and then the noble died during the fighting and the Normans were finding it so easy to conquer Irish territory that they just kept on going with it. Then the English king joined the invasion because the Norman mercenaries were technically his subjects, and he didn't want them to establish their own fiefdoms outside of his control. The rest is (bloody, miserable, colonial) history. wasn't the pope involved too
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# ? Feb 21, 2021 12:57 |
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ChubbyChecker posted:has he seen goatse before? I suspect he saw a lot worse in the military.
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# ? Feb 21, 2021 15:20 |
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Red Bones posted:The circumstances of the Norman invasion of Ireland are kind of farcical. A regional Irish king hired a bunch of Norman mercenaries to assist him in a succession dispute, and then the noble died during the fighting and the Normans were finding it so easy to conquer Irish territory that they just kept on going with it. Then the English king joined the invasion because the Norman mercenaries were technically his subjects, and he didn't want them to establish their own fiefdoms outside of his control. The rest is (bloody, miserable, colonial) history. I was just posting about this in another thread, it's what got me thinking about that period. Just the absolute stupidity of inviting an entirely foreign, entirely mercenary army into your own country to 'help' you regain power without considering that maybe they'll decide to just keep going and take over themselves. Read about the king in question Diarmit mac murchuda. His historical reputation is basically - 'evil gobshite, so evil that when he died no priest would give him the last rites and he's buried in a ditch somewhere, who cares where.'
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# ? Feb 21, 2021 17:35 |
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I mean the normans did basically the exact same thing in southern Italy. They were very convincing
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# ? Feb 21, 2021 19:54 |
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# ? May 28, 2024 14:38 |
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Pookah posted:I was just posting about this in another thread, it's what got me thinking about that period. Just the absolute stupidity of inviting an entirely foreign, entirely mercenary army into your own country to 'help' you regain power without considering that maybe they'll decide to just keep going and take over themselves. That's basically how the Saxons took over England, as well. The Britons didn't have any standing army of their own and the Romans took the army, the armor, and most of the skilled tradesmen with them when they left. It only took a few years for the Picts to figure out the southerners were nearly defenseless and take advantage of the situation. The Britons appealed for help to the Saxons, who obligingly beat back the Picts. Then they realized that Britain was great farmland and mostly undefended, so they came back with armies of their own and lots of settlers. ETA: From the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle: quote:A.D. 449. This year Marcian and Valentinian assumed the empire, and reigned seven winters. Deteriorata has a new favorite as of 20:11 on Feb 21, 2021 |
# ? Feb 21, 2021 19:59 |