British people are proud of colonialism and the British Empire, poll finds

The British public are generally proud of their country’s role in subjecting the world to colonialism and the British Empire, according to a new poll.

At its height in 1922 the British Empire governed a fifth of the world’s population and a quarter of the world’s total land area, but its legacy divides opinion.

Common criticisms of the empire include its policies causing millions of famine deaths in British India, its running of brutal detention camps in occupied territories, and massacres of civilians by imperial troops.

The British Empire was also a dominant slave-trading power until the practice was outlawed in 1807, after which the Empire played key a role in ending the practice internationally.

The Empire’s proponents say it brought economic development to parts of the world and benefited the countries it controlled.

David Cameron has previously said the Empire should be “celebrated”.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/british-people-are-proud-of-colonialism-and-the-british-empire-poll-finds-a6821206.html

anyone finds this disturbing?

Like opium.

Your right, they were far worse. Much more brutal.



On small islands it's very possible that they did and they may even have been at peace but at an aggregate level you can't compare the fate of a few thousand success stories to the millions of violent and primitive people with whom we brought order to chaos.

Yes we can compare because a human is a human and no one has a right to impose their ideology on another no matter how "primitive" they may seem.

Rights are a modern idea you can't use them when talking about the past.

Yes we can compare because a human is a human and no one has a right to impose their ideology on another no matter how "primitive" they may seem.

That's cultural relativism. That's not how the world was or people thought be that right or wrong.

If it wasn't for the British empire they'd all be rubbing sticks together still. All countries wanted to do this, they aren't more moral for not doing it they just didn't have the resources or the civilisation to do so.

Well at that time, the British claimed it was their "right" to take lands and kill people for their own selfish gain. Was that wrong or right?

No matter what, it's hard to imagine the jackals of the European aristocratic and monied classes ignoring the opportunity to move in and exploit Africa in those centuries once the Ottomans went into decline and the North African Arab states were militarily neutralised. The British imperial fleets simply ended up as winners in a vicious battle of grab and exploit.

It's sad really that people are so down on the victims of it though - on the whole, many sub-Saharan and Southern Africans are decent, happy and friendly people and ill deserve the way they continue to be looked down on by Europeans with their rapacious history, often not taught (or hidden) from them.

Someone before spoke of Christianity. does God condone stealing? raping? murder? greed? envy? hatred?

In fact, slavery existed in the middle east as an institution up to the middle of the 20th century.

God given right yes that is what we claimed.

but 'rights' as you are using the term simply didn't exist

Rubbing sticks together worked though! and the scouts and girl guides teach that for when your're going camping init? smh You can help, no one says no but the way in which you help and the reasons behind helping thats the differencer. the colonial powers did not help for africa and the caribbean and the other colonies to be better, they helped to benefit themselves. To get as much wealth as possible. Even the poor whites back in the UK they treated like dogs eventually sending some to the colonies to also be slaves and turning their backs on them.

Yes but then God has always been a bit of a dick.

I also believed that rights did exist but only for a few. Rights only existed for the wealthy. Everyone else was nothing.

It works if you help yourselves, unfortunately staring at the sky with your palms touching doesn't really achieve much over time. A friend of mine worked in Africa for a charity, giving brick making machines to poor villages so they could build proper houses, when he returned a few months later they had sold the brick making machines, and used the money to buy bricks. You just can't help people who aren't willing to help themselves. Also you don't want to go down the road of slavery here, we've seen that the Africans certainly aren't above not only the enslavement of others (Barbary pirates) but the enslavement of their own people (transatlantic slave trade). But both pale in comparison to the Arab slave trade.

The British public are generally proud of their country’s role in subjecting the world to colonialism and the British Empire, according to a new poll.

At its height in 1922 the British Empire governed a fifth of the world’s population and a quarter of the world’s total land area, but its legacy divides opinion.

Common criticisms of the empire include its policies causing millions of famine deaths in British India, its running of brutal detention camps in occupied territories, and massacres of civilians by imperial troops.

The British Empire was also a dominant slave-trading power until the practice was outlawed in 1807, after which the Empire played key a role in ending the practice internationally.

The Empire’s proponents say it brought economic development to parts of the world and benefited the countries it controlled.

David Cameron has previously said the Empire should be “celebrated”.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/british-people-are-proud-of-colonialism-and-the-british-empire-poll-finds-a6821206.html

anyone finds this disturbing?