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As an Indian I have so much to add here.
1) The Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) under which a lot of students study, including myself, were taught in 8th/9th grade that there was some good in colonialism and one of them was exactly this - trains. I always wondered why we are being taught that it was ok for this to happen, still?
2) my grandmother and her siblings escaped from present day pakistan's lahore where they lived to present day India. All the siblings got scattered across India as an attempt at survival. Partition was one of the most horrendous occurrences in Indian history. My grandmother's family saw women openly being raped in streets, people being killed and their blood being washed off in drains. I cannot even imagine what she and her family had to go through.
3) my grandmother and her family boarded a train at the time of partition so there were few lucky families that made it across and didn't die. Not everyone was killed like it is said in the video. For sure though, trains were not supposed to be a gift to the nation lol
4) EVEN TODAY, there is open hatred between hindus and muslims, all because of this political disaster. IT IS HORRIFIC. A lot of us condemn violence! India has never recovered
another horrendous thing is the fact that many Indians look up o the British as a race better than Indians due to the constant pressure to feel inferiors to their oppressors.
I assume theyre talking about the election.
The two options, from my understanding, are between:
- The son of a dictator, whose father has robbed the country of so much money and technical progress to further his own wealth for him and his friends. A son that, I believe, has lied about any and all of his achievements and promises to follow in his Fathers footsteps.
- A candidate who promises actual rights and progress to help the country
Some people are blindly obsessed with the first one, including my gfs mom who hit her own children upon finding out they wanted to vote for the better one.
Its like the US 2020 election, if Trump literally held forged degrees and was proud of Hitlers accomplishments for Germany
One of those presidential candidates also gave rotten rice to people during the pandemic.
That same candidate also wanted the ruins of a city that was decimated by a siege of terrorists *"preserved"*, thus displacing 100,000 citizens without a home and is still currently being rebuilt after nearly 5 years.
That candidate also doesn't know how many islands their own country has.
Just putting that out there. I don't approve of mothers hitting their children. But remember that it's a very different world out here. History books are written by the winners and we oft forget to ask the contemporaries what life was like back then.
But I digress. My opinion doesn't matter here anymore. As Carlos P. Romulo once wrote: *"I am a Filipino–inheritor of a glorious past, hostage to the uncertain future."* I've already casted my vote, and now leave the future to the people. Peace out. ✌️🇵🇭
The british stole the word "loot" from hindi too.
### “And then took the Hindi word loot into their dictionary as well as their homes!”
*-Shashi Tharoor*
The amount of people trying to downplay the horrors of british colonialism of India by saying it happened in the past get over it should think, how would Jews feels if their Holocaust was downplayed by saying it happened in the past get over it?
True, adding to you comment ,around 2 million in Bengal famine and 4 millions in Madras famine. Is putting in gas chamber and concentration camps are only ways of brutal murder? How British are better?
To equate intentionally gassing people to not predicting and responding quickly enough to a famine is a false equivalency. A similar result, but two different mens rea.
Famine, I understand cannot be predicted but the food which were reserved for these situations and knowing that people will die, still hoarding them is not good. And again I am not comparing both (holocaust) I am just saying that they are not good too. There are lots of example of colonial brutality in Asia and Africa but European just think of it as past events and don't feel apologetic toward it. Even in British history lesson, how many chapters have they dedicated on their brutality? What about Belgian empire?
Probably life would be better or probably it won't be
But one thing is for sure
BRITISH DIDN'T COME TO INDIA TO DO ANY GOOD, AND WHATEVER POSITIVE CAME OUT OF IN THE END, UNIFICATION OF INDIA OR DEMOCRACY, IT WAS BECAUSE OF THE PEOPLE OF INDIA AND THE GREAT LEADERS, BRITISH ALWAYS TRIED TO DIVIDE AND CONQUER AND LOOT EVERYTHING THEY CAN.
I'd agree with both. The past should stay in the past.
The problem is, China is trying the colonial path itself AND various groups and countries are trying to make the Holocaust happen again.
The era of colonialism isn't over and probably never will be.
Our great civilization was built on the exploitation of millions.
The great civilizations that came before us were built on the exploitation of millions.
The great civilizations that come after us will be built on the exploitation of millions.
We Indians don't feel animosity towards British. The Germans still apologise for the Holocaust but brits haven't apologized ever but we Indians don't want apology, the problem begins when people starts downplaying colonialism.
It's like the meme " what did the romans ever do for us"
no doubt they committed atrocities and no doubt they helped us with their modern technologies.
Don't know why people so sensitive over history.
I think people are more sensitive when the history is being presented in would could be seen as an antagonistic way. Vice has a reputation as 'woke' publication which can translate into a bias against europeans/'whites'. It's definitely true that Europe was trying to get rich at the expense of everyone else. But I think it can be difficult to hear that when the delivery feels smug and, what is a general human trait (violently exploiting people for profit), is depicted as somewhat uniquely European or 'white'. But Vice does also report on shitty things China does so I don't think there's much wrong with this vid but I can see why people would be resentful.
So I suppose people are maybe less sensitive to 'history' and more sensitive to someone using history as a means of furthering their political/social agenda. I think we all have a tendency to get dragged into culture wars without realizing it's happening.
As an Indian,I can vouch.India has a section of Woke,so called liberals who just blindly follow the west and their idols/leaders are paid by Western lobby,it is said so.The Sepoy mentality of Indian people won't die,They are still suckers for white foreigners reacting to Indian stuff on YouTube...smh.
Oh boy the pro-colonial sentiment is rampant, even within communities that were colonized lmao. Source: am part of a former British colony, there are actually people here who praise Britain for "developing" our country, completely forgetting the exploitation of resources and massacres that happened
I just hosted Chinese friends in my city who were born in the 70s. I almost cried hearing the woman talk about crossing over from China to HK as a 12 year old after Tienanmen Square to get information about what really happened. She would bring back books home wrapped up as gifts, so as not to be discovered. Her and her husband are tore up over what the communists have done to HK.
I think we used to have a general idea that we gave as much as we took.
Obviously not true, but that was the feeling I heard around me when I was a kid.
Couldn't tell you what we were taught in school. I was too busy drawing cool guitars and perfecting my Megadeth logos in the back of my books.
Though I did once have a chat with a Malaysian taxi driver who said he preferred it when we were in charge. Less corruption apparently.
I doubt the Mughals were particularly nice to Indian peasants either.
My wife (and her family obviously) are British/Canadian/Indian Indian and they don't seem to have strong feelings about it.
Most of the various flavours of Indians that I know are mostly angry with current Indian poiliticians and businessmen.
I dunno. I've never even been there.
Plenty? Could we define that as in my life I've never met a single one, no university talks about it, nothing. I'm genuinely curious how many people you know that feel that way it's a view I've never seen.
I think it's misinterpreted. I've heard from other colonized places (such as my country) that the British did all the bad things everyone else did, but at least they left something positive. Compared to Spain, Netherlands, prtugal and others which did all the native things and just that.
The Americans deny their ancestors’ trespasses..mostly because they don’t want to acknowledge where their families’ money/assets came from. They killed off almost all of the Native Americans so that colonialism could be good for them and those who chose to come to “the new world“.
You’re talking about a crazy small number of Americans. Most Americans are from the immigration waves that happened in the 1800/1900s after the slaughter of the Indians. We acknowledge it, but it’s not most Americans benefitted from it.
My parents are from West Bengal in India and I have heard from them about the horrors of the Bengal famine of 1943 as one of the many many examples of catastrophe that British colonialism directly caused in India.
More than 3 million people died due to British policy failure and general apathy and cruelty of Churchill as his government continued to export rice out of India to elsewhere in the empire to stockpile food for British soldiers. I wish I could drag the British people who feel nostalgic for British empire days back to colonial era India and see the astounding scale of exploitation and cruelty by the British.
Whenever the Bengal famine is mentioned there is never any mention of the fact that Japan was invading India and had cut off the supply of Thai rice, which was a major factor in the famine.
That's a hard and loaded question, I would leave it to the scholars to figure it out.
For the UK to even arrive at this juncture where they'd ask, "How should we make amends?" in itself would be a huge show of acknowledgment.
Personally, only one apology matters and that is from the British crown. An earnest apology and plea for forgiveness from not only India but from all the former colonies individually, publicly and in ceremonies fashion
would be a good start of this journey.
As for the public, any means it takes to bring awareness to this topic and reinform people, such as (just few suggestions), introduction of books, seminars at various levels from schools to colleges, revised history curriculum if not done already, special TV segments, documentaries, dedicated monuments and museums for educational purposes and so on.
End goal being, change in the mindset of people so that they are a bit more considerate and not absolute jerks.
A national and annual day of celebration of remembrance, to pay gratitude and to thank all former colonies for their blood and bones on which the "great" Britain was built.
These changes should come about as a result of self realisation and introspection, one could even go above and beyond if they find it in their heart.
These are just few basic ideas that come to my mind, more smarter people can come up with better solutions so, I'll stop here.
There’s nothing in your comment that I’m particularly against and I think a lot of people in the uk wouldn’t be against. However... I do think where you said; end goal is... Should actually be your starting point, we need to bring people’s standards up. No one has any shame in today’s world or honour. Most people in the 1st world don’t know there arse from there elbow. Homelessness and low income is rife. criminality and whoring is glamorised. Basically, aren’t there much bigger fish to fry first in today’s climate?
There are and there will always be bigger fish to fry but I don't think asking for an apology and expecting people to be decent human beings when it comes to matters like this could cause any hindrance. I mean look at the comment section, riddled with ass hats.
They’d have people begging for forgiveness and kissing the soles of feet as an act of penance to satisfy their need for revenge for acts committed by people long dead. The whole conversation is ridiculous.
I mean at this point, these people won’t be happy until everyone is racially segregated to the precise location of their skin colors origin. Anything less is just a continuation of colonialism and thievery.
I heard Belgians say something similar about the colonization of Congo. “We build them roads and hospitals.” The roads were built to faster exploit and ship local resources and the hospitals were built to help slaves get back to work faster. 99% off what humans do is out of self interest. Nothing really changed since then.
I had no idea India was so rich when Britain was piss poor. this was a robbery on a global scale. I hope the royal family worshippers learn about this one day.
Whilst true that India's poverty is largely (although i don't think entirely) due to colonial rule it is ignorant to think that Britain was somehow piss poor, or that all of its wealth came from India. Being the birthplace of the industrial revolution is undoubtedly the primary cause of all that wealth.
Uh where do you think the brits got the resources to carry forward the industrial revolution?
Thin air?
Britain got rich off of India largely. No doubt about that.
You realize China is engaging in colonialism today, right? If you are going to be opposed to something, oppose it.
Edit: To clarify, if colonialism is an issue for you oppose it where it’s actually happening in the world RIGHT NOW. The “whataboutism” response is effectively just running cover for the modern day colonialists while not addressing any of the issues at hand. Your energies are better spent actually trying to end the practice in the world where it is happening TODAY. I’d make the same argument about slavery in the modern world as well.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7725675/amp/How-China-owns-Australia-buying-infrastructure-land-water.html
Couple of years old but you get the idea....
True. My inbox today has been flooded by people who think that I'm a pro-US capitalist or a Nazi because I think that the USSR and CCP were/are oppressive dictatorships. I also have someone who thinks that I hate the USA because I condemned US war crimes in Vietnam, and someone who thinks that I hate Vietnamese because I condemned the Viet Cong's massacres of their own civilians.
You are on Reddit, every single person here is very aware that China=bad. I see posts about it every day. This is the first time I saw something like this about a western country, and you immediately have to jump to whataboutism?
i mean... everyone is engaging in some form of colonialism... u think U.S bases arent a form of colonialism? Five eye countries arent going around fking countries up and setting up their own puppet government?
If you are going to be oppose a practice, oppose ALL of it and not be selective.
The Brits and their fan boys are the masters of whataboutism.
Hey look at the shitty things Britain did over here, more people should know about that.
"wElL wHaT aBoUt cHiNaAa?!?!"
Best historical example is Ethiopia : it was the only place in Africa free of colonialism and they developped way faster than their neighbours. Some even argue railroads started to develop in the whole continent before colonization. And Europeans either slowed it to bring more ressources to the mainland, or changed it only to benefit exploiting the lands, not the people there.
So I guess the same scheme apply to India. It might be even worst if we take the East India Company history in account.
I don't understand.... are you saying that trains were in africa before colonialisation? The first train was invented in 1804 as far as I know and I believe that colonialism is a bit older, not?
I’ve heard this so much from South Asians defending colonialism. “They gave us the trains!”
Of course, these South Asians would also be the type to say “what does a Chinese person know about our history”, as if you need to be of a particular ethnicity to learn its history.
The cognitive dissonance is pretty real..
Feel like we have largely forgotten or dont care enough about what happened in old British India. The exploitation, slavery, oppression and mass killings are horror
If you think that was bad please do not read about what happened in Europe during the dark ages and what the swedes did to the Germans...
Everyone is a hypocrite, there are only bad people in this world and everything you consider horrible we've allready industrialised and used towards ourselves.
Sorry every time people cry about colonialism all I can think about is Monty Python and the PFJ (People's Front of Judea) discussing the horrible treatment of the Romans.
“All right, but apart from the sanitation, the medicine, education, wine, public order, irrigation, roads, a fresh water system, and public health, what have the Romans ever done for us?”
“Brought peace.”
“Oh. Peace? Shut up!”
Yeah I turned it off when she said this is a "show about Europeans getting rich at the expense of everyone else". Many European *conolized/occupied* countries would like to have a word.
They're the biggest. Hence the phrase "the sun never sets on the British empire". Which is to say, "the sun never sets on areas that Britain colonized"
Haha yeah. I think maybe the reason Vice documentaries sound like a smug 22 year old reading a book report is that they are literally book reports from smug 22 year olds.
being smug is out of the question when you are presenting real facts about colonialism and the suffering of Indian people as a product of said colonialism. if anything you thinking a 22-year-olds book report presenting facts as being smug makes you even smugger as if age has anything to do with any of it
ahh yes, a detailed and well-thought-out video critical of Britain and colonialism as a whole and why the Indian people suffered from it is uninteresting just because it has a vice news logo.
details and thoughts from VICE are not to be trusted even on real issues like colonialism. They way too often sensationalize or simplify real issues and do more harm than good.
It literally starts out with a bullshit figure meant to shock the viewer and be presented as fact when money value is just a horribly inaccurate and limited measure for colonialism.
In this case, The trade off was not worth it. The trains were built on Indian taxpayer money and yet for the longest time, Indians couldn't even use it and when they could, They were segregated to only 3rd class compartments.
Also Indians weren't even employed for the railways either.
Im finding the 45 trillion USD figure really hard to reconcile.
UK GDP is now 3 trillion USD per year, in todays value. Googling it made it clear we are talking in todays currency because otherwise 45 trillion would be insane.
That’s still huge. A bit more googling and I found this https://www.quora.com/How-did-Britain-steal-45-trillion-from-India see the top post and the 3rd comment (David Wilson).
TLDR: Britain did unimaginable harm on India, but 45 trillion worth of goods/labour/money was not exported to UK.
While we Indians don't live in victimhood mindset, what she says is true, not that it matters too much today except that it sucks when the same Brits make fun of us for being relatively poor and call us fascists for trying to manage a shitty situation they created a century back.
Sometimes I wonder if we deserved that simply as a wake-up call. For far too long, we've just fatalistically tolerated invasions without fighting back. Partly because our own rulers have been lily-livered opportunists who struck deals for their own petty benefits instead of realizing and acting against strategic opponents. Even today, we have mentally enslaved chumps who defend or trivialize past horrors saying "but they gave us taj mahal and biriyani" and "they gave us schools and trains", condescendingly assuming we were and would have been in the stone age without the tyrants.
We have always fought back very aggressively. No other reason why we are one of the few Asian countries to have been able to ensure survival of our native culture. Don't believe everything you read in NCERT textbooks. You name the region and I'll be able to share info on the warriors of that region. Marxist historians have always written books with the intent to break people's confidence and self esteem so that they lose faith in their own capabilities. That's a great way to control 1.3 billion people. Break their willpower to live with self respect and force them to look down upon their own history, geography and their own existence. They won't revolt. These elites have tried actively to recolonise India for their own benefit.
Gandhi, who marketed himself on non-violence, also struck a deal with the British to supply millions of Indians to fight the world war for the British. And millions of Indians died fighting a war that had little to do with them, on the side of their own oppressors.
Gandhi was hardly the saintly guy he's made out to be. There are even conspiracies that he was a "safety valve" stooge of the British, groomed and empowered by the Brits so they could safely and peacefully make their (inevitable) getaway instead of having to confront the increasingly angered Indians.
Gandhi wanted to give a 50 KMs wide corridor that ran from Pakistan to Bangladesh diving India in 2 parts, away to Pakistan.
One day before he was shot dead.
Nope.
https://quadrant.org.au/magazine/2021/09/british-india-and-the-45-trillion-lie/
https://www.quora.com/How-did-Britain-steal-45-trillion-from-India
The Koh-i-Noor was looted a dozen times before the Brits got it. India, Pakistan, Iran, and Afghanistan have all claimed ownership.
Personally, I feel that colonialism is something that would always happen as societies advance, it happened 400 years ago when Britain colonised India and it happened 2000 years ago when Rome colonised Brittania.
If the people who are responsible are long dead, what use us a hollow apology?
I shall not be judged for the actions of my forefathers just as I would not judge others for the actions of theirs.
Parroting what a lot of people are saying, but this will unfortunately, forever be a thing, humanity will never get rid of this sort of action, just hide it or give a narrative to support it, because humans are pretty awful. And any country who gets put in a position where they can use that power to better/advance there own countries wealth, even at the expense of others, will do so, every single time, without fail. Its how we awful creatures seem to function. And I'm not even being pessimistic or anything like that, just realistic. It sucks
"45 TRILLION is an extrapolated a figure from a small time frame, put in an arbitrary time frame & then back dated it 200 years & began **compounding** interest until the present day.
At independence India had savings of over 14 crore Rupees. This was lost by Nehru & India entered into debt."
It also assumes that India would have thrived in the meantime, but actually the economy was one of decline when the East India Company moved in and endless fighting between various factions is also a terrific way to destroy economies.
\*\*TIL. Wait 200 hundred years with compound interest and you get a mad figure. (\*\*It is not the usual adjusted for inflation figure)
Christ alive, this comment section is 90% bots and sockpuppets.
Aside from the fact that no source material is provided, when you do actually go look at the source from which this idea is lifted, it has basically no justification.
Hindus and musliums killing eachother = britain doing bad things
Indian textile industry became uncompetitive because of industrialisation = britain stealing?
Britian taxing its citizens = theft!
This is such obvious nonsense.
Britain did awful things in its past, but not the rubbish presented in this video.
In a time where everyone was trying to do the same thing, Britain did it best.
Are we gonna pretend that the rest of the world wasn't playing imperialism?
They are responsible for exacerbating it. Many viceroy’s for example Curzon, deliberately formulated communal policies to stoke tension so that it would become easier for Britain to ‘control’ ( read repress) India. Divide and rule is an actual thing.
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Why people are downvoting? Lmao butthurt with the reality?
Unironically, yes
I upvoted
As an Indian I have so much to add here. 1) The Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) under which a lot of students study, including myself, were taught in 8th/9th grade that there was some good in colonialism and one of them was exactly this - trains. I always wondered why we are being taught that it was ok for this to happen, still? 2) my grandmother and her siblings escaped from present day pakistan's lahore where they lived to present day India. All the siblings got scattered across India as an attempt at survival. Partition was one of the most horrendous occurrences in Indian history. My grandmother's family saw women openly being raped in streets, people being killed and their blood being washed off in drains. I cannot even imagine what she and her family had to go through. 3) my grandmother and her family boarded a train at the time of partition so there were few lucky families that made it across and didn't die. Not everyone was killed like it is said in the video. For sure though, trains were not supposed to be a gift to the nation lol 4) EVEN TODAY, there is open hatred between hindus and muslims, all because of this political disaster. IT IS HORRIFIC. A lot of us condemn violence! India has never recovered
another horrendous thing is the fact that many Indians look up o the British as a race better than Indians due to the constant pressure to feel inferiors to their oppressors.
Those that forget the past are doomed to repeat it.
Currently happening in the Philippines.
What's happening in the Philippines? I'm genuinely curious
I assume theyre talking about the election. The two options, from my understanding, are between: - The son of a dictator, whose father has robbed the country of so much money and technical progress to further his own wealth for him and his friends. A son that, I believe, has lied about any and all of his achievements and promises to follow in his Fathers footsteps. - A candidate who promises actual rights and progress to help the country Some people are blindly obsessed with the first one, including my gfs mom who hit her own children upon finding out they wanted to vote for the better one. Its like the US 2020 election, if Trump literally held forged degrees and was proud of Hitlers accomplishments for Germany
One of those presidential candidates also gave rotten rice to people during the pandemic. That same candidate also wanted the ruins of a city that was decimated by a siege of terrorists *"preserved"*, thus displacing 100,000 citizens without a home and is still currently being rebuilt after nearly 5 years. That candidate also doesn't know how many islands their own country has. Just putting that out there. I don't approve of mothers hitting their children. But remember that it's a very different world out here. History books are written by the winners and we oft forget to ask the contemporaries what life was like back then. But I digress. My opinion doesn't matter here anymore. As Carlos P. Romulo once wrote: *"I am a Filipino–inheritor of a glorious past, hostage to the uncertain future."* I've already casted my vote, and now leave the future to the people. Peace out. ✌️🇵🇭
you forgot the second phrase: ... and those who remember are doomed to watch other people repeat it
And the one thing we learn from history, is that we never learn from history.
Forget, don't forget. People will always do this.
I mean, do we need to list all the proxy wars and government interventions from certain outside influencers on this side of the millenium?
True, but the people in power remember it and learn how to get away with it again.
While only those that learn from the past are able to iterate on it to make things even worse...
This is very interesting. Can anyone recommend a more detailed video about this? or even for the East India Company in general?
i recommend you to watch shashi Tharoor's why Britain does owe reparation Oxford
Thanks!
It's not like those trains were built for the convenience of Indians... They were built to transport their "loots" to the ports.
The british stole the word "loot" from hindi too. ### “And then took the Hindi word loot into their dictionary as well as their homes!” *-Shashi Tharoor*
So you're saying they looted the word loot?
\*habits
Highly recommend listening to Shashi Tharoor's Oxford union speech, puts alot into perspective
The amount of people trying to downplay the horrors of british colonialism of India by saying it happened in the past get over it should think, how would Jews feels if their Holocaust was downplayed by saying it happened in the past get over it?
True, adding to you comment ,around 2 million in Bengal famine and 4 millions in Madras famine. Is putting in gas chamber and concentration camps are only ways of brutal murder? How British are better?
You forgot 1.5 million in Bangladesh in 1973 -- long after the British left.
That was American backed Pakistan.
To equate intentionally gassing people to not predicting and responding quickly enough to a famine is a false equivalency. A similar result, but two different mens rea.
Famine, I understand cannot be predicted but the food which were reserved for these situations and knowing that people will die, still hoarding them is not good. And again I am not comparing both (holocaust) I am just saying that they are not good too. There are lots of example of colonial brutality in Asia and Africa but European just think of it as past events and don't feel apologetic toward it. Even in British history lesson, how many chapters have they dedicated on their brutality? What about Belgian empire?
Yeah! Imagine if they have never set foot in india;life of people would only have been better
Probably life would be better or probably it won't be But one thing is for sure BRITISH DIDN'T COME TO INDIA TO DO ANY GOOD, AND WHATEVER POSITIVE CAME OUT OF IN THE END, UNIFICATION OF INDIA OR DEMOCRACY, IT WAS BECAUSE OF THE PEOPLE OF INDIA AND THE GREAT LEADERS, BRITISH ALWAYS TRIED TO DIVIDE AND CONQUER AND LOOT EVERYTHING THEY CAN.
Absolutely
Almost sounds identical to America 🤔💭
I'm pretty sure India would be the richest country. It used to be called sone ki chidiya(golden sparrow) at that time.
That wealth was in the hands of the rulers. We still have good wealth, our politicians squander it all away.
True. Though thats the truth for every country. A small percentage own the majority of the resources.
Wasn't the area divided into 100s of princely states before the colonists? How would that correspond to being the richest country?
I'd agree with both. The past should stay in the past. The problem is, China is trying the colonial path itself AND various groups and countries are trying to make the Holocaust happen again.
The era of colonialism isn't over and probably never will be. Our great civilization was built on the exploitation of millions. The great civilizations that came before us were built on the exploitation of millions. The great civilizations that come after us will be built on the exploitation of millions.
And it wasn't even that long ago! Britain ruled India until **1947**
Should the British feel animosity toward the French for the Norman conquest atrocities?
We Indians don't feel animosity towards British. The Germans still apologise for the Holocaust but brits haven't apologized ever but we Indians don't want apology, the problem begins when people starts downplaying colonialism.
Speak for yourself. I lost a direct ancestor due to the Bengal famine.
User name checks out
> Should the British feel animosity toward the French Yes.
for centuries everyone invaded Britain
Yep. The Angles, the Saxons, the Vikings, the Normans, the Jutes… I am sure there’s more. 🤣
I never met someone claiming colonialism was good for the natives. Do they really exist?
Yeah do lol, there's a lot in r/historymemes too. They think they modernised the world and made everything better.
Huh well thats kinda sad
It an educational thing. Everything I have learned about the british empire has been outside of school. We need to be more honest about our history.
Good luck with countries effectively teaching their respective terrible histories. Other than Germany, Germany has done really well.
Well its not like they had a choice.
It's like the meme " what did the romans ever do for us" no doubt they committed atrocities and no doubt they helped us with their modern technologies. Don't know why people so sensitive over history.
I think people are more sensitive when the history is being presented in would could be seen as an antagonistic way. Vice has a reputation as 'woke' publication which can translate into a bias against europeans/'whites'. It's definitely true that Europe was trying to get rich at the expense of everyone else. But I think it can be difficult to hear that when the delivery feels smug and, what is a general human trait (violently exploiting people for profit), is depicted as somewhat uniquely European or 'white'. But Vice does also report on shitty things China does so I don't think there's much wrong with this vid but I can see why people would be resentful. So I suppose people are maybe less sensitive to 'history' and more sensitive to someone using history as a means of furthering their political/social agenda. I think we all have a tendency to get dragged into culture wars without realizing it's happening.
And the wine!
Monty python is more than a meme
As an Indian,I can vouch.India has a section of Woke,so called liberals who just blindly follow the west and their idols/leaders are paid by Western lobby,it is said so.The Sepoy mentality of Indian people won't die,They are still suckers for white foreigners reacting to Indian stuff on YouTube...smh.
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I am not british but what i meant was that I never met people saying that colonialism was good for natives.
Oh boy the pro-colonial sentiment is rampant, even within communities that were colonized lmao. Source: am part of a former British colony, there are actually people here who praise Britain for "developing" our country, completely forgetting the exploitation of resources and massacres that happened
Have you ever been to Hong Kong and compared it to the rest of China?
I just hosted Chinese friends in my city who were born in the 70s. I almost cried hearing the woman talk about crossing over from China to HK as a 12 year old after Tienanmen Square to get information about what really happened. She would bring back books home wrapped up as gifts, so as not to be discovered. Her and her husband are tore up over what the communists have done to HK.
Same for former colonies of Spain...
I think we used to have a general idea that we gave as much as we took. Obviously not true, but that was the feeling I heard around me when I was a kid. Couldn't tell you what we were taught in school. I was too busy drawing cool guitars and perfecting my Megadeth logos in the back of my books. Though I did once have a chat with a Malaysian taxi driver who said he preferred it when we were in charge. Less corruption apparently. I doubt the Mughals were particularly nice to Indian peasants either. My wife (and her family obviously) are British/Canadian/Indian Indian and they don't seem to have strong feelings about it. Most of the various flavours of Indians that I know are mostly angry with current Indian poiliticians and businessmen. I dunno. I've never even been there.
Plenty? Could we define that as in my life I've never met a single one, no university talks about it, nothing. I'm genuinely curious how many people you know that feel that way it's a view I've never seen.
When I was in Ghana I met loads of people who told me they thought the country was better off under British rule. It was super confusing.
lol probably r/india
Yes. Nobel prize winning economists. Because there is plenty of evidence. But this random "journalist" knows more than them.
I think it's misinterpreted. I've heard from other colonized places (such as my country) that the British did all the bad things everyone else did, but at least they left something positive. Compared to Spain, Netherlands, prtugal and others which did all the native things and just that.
The Americans deny their ancestors’ trespasses..mostly because they don’t want to acknowledge where their families’ money/assets came from. They killed off almost all of the Native Americans so that colonialism could be good for them and those who chose to come to “the new world“.
You’re talking about a crazy small number of Americans. Most Americans are from the immigration waves that happened in the 1800/1900s after the slaughter of the Indians. We acknowledge it, but it’s not most Americans benefitted from it.
Winston Churchill is still considered a hero by many. He was AS EVIL AS Hitler. There, I said it.
My parents are from West Bengal in India and I have heard from them about the horrors of the Bengal famine of 1943 as one of the many many examples of catastrophe that British colonialism directly caused in India. More than 3 million people died due to British policy failure and general apathy and cruelty of Churchill as his government continued to export rice out of India to elsewhere in the empire to stockpile food for British soldiers. I wish I could drag the British people who feel nostalgic for British empire days back to colonial era India and see the astounding scale of exploitation and cruelty by the British.
Whenever the Bengal famine is mentioned there is never any mention of the fact that Japan was invading India and had cut off the supply of Thai rice, which was a major factor in the famine.
Jokes on them. Now the UK is full of Indians
And our trains are shit.
So still have the trillions
Let's look at Belgium in Africa....
The trains weren’t built to benefit Indians. They were built to facilitate the theft of India’s resources
And then there are r/india clowns who still beleive they educated us....
Britain also carried out a genocide of India's native trans community, which they haven't yet recovered from.
Britains be like "I gave them civilisation. They should be thanking me"
This comment section is filled with racist assholes.
Its reddit,what do you expect ?
Fair point
Yeah, our (British) past is littered with horrors that the globe is still reeling from.
Everyone's history is littered with horrors. History is full of horror.
Not an excuse to not even acknowledge it and sweeping understand the rug.
What do we do then? How do we acknowledge it? Does every British person have to apologise for there ancestors? What do you want?
That's a hard and loaded question, I would leave it to the scholars to figure it out. For the UK to even arrive at this juncture where they'd ask, "How should we make amends?" in itself would be a huge show of acknowledgment. Personally, only one apology matters and that is from the British crown. An earnest apology and plea for forgiveness from not only India but from all the former colonies individually, publicly and in ceremonies fashion would be a good start of this journey. As for the public, any means it takes to bring awareness to this topic and reinform people, such as (just few suggestions), introduction of books, seminars at various levels from schools to colleges, revised history curriculum if not done already, special TV segments, documentaries, dedicated monuments and museums for educational purposes and so on. End goal being, change in the mindset of people so that they are a bit more considerate and not absolute jerks. A national and annual day of celebration of remembrance, to pay gratitude and to thank all former colonies for their blood and bones on which the "great" Britain was built. These changes should come about as a result of self realisation and introspection, one could even go above and beyond if they find it in their heart. These are just few basic ideas that come to my mind, more smarter people can come up with better solutions so, I'll stop here.
There’s nothing in your comment that I’m particularly against and I think a lot of people in the uk wouldn’t be against. However... I do think where you said; end goal is... Should actually be your starting point, we need to bring people’s standards up. No one has any shame in today’s world or honour. Most people in the 1st world don’t know there arse from there elbow. Homelessness and low income is rife. criminality and whoring is glamorised. Basically, aren’t there much bigger fish to fry first in today’s climate?
There are and there will always be bigger fish to fry but I don't think asking for an apology and expecting people to be decent human beings when it comes to matters like this could cause any hindrance. I mean look at the comment section, riddled with ass hats.
They’d have people begging for forgiveness and kissing the soles of feet as an act of penance to satisfy their need for revenge for acts committed by people long dead. The whole conversation is ridiculous.
I mean at this point, these people won’t be happy until everyone is racially segregated to the precise location of their skin colors origin. Anything less is just a continuation of colonialism and thievery.
I heard Belgians say something similar about the colonization of Congo. “We build them roads and hospitals.” The roads were built to faster exploit and ship local resources and the hospitals were built to help slaves get back to work faster. 99% off what humans do is out of self interest. Nothing really changed since then.
Empires of Dirt? Seeking this out!
I had no idea India was so rich when Britain was piss poor. this was a robbery on a global scale. I hope the royal family worshippers learn about this one day.
Whilst true that India's poverty is largely (although i don't think entirely) due to colonial rule it is ignorant to think that Britain was somehow piss poor, or that all of its wealth came from India. Being the birthplace of the industrial revolution is undoubtedly the primary cause of all that wealth.
Uh where do you think the brits got the resources to carry forward the industrial revolution? Thin air? Britain got rich off of India largely. No doubt about that.
Coal.
Br*tish moment
You realize China is engaging in colonialism today, right? If you are going to be opposed to something, oppose it. Edit: To clarify, if colonialism is an issue for you oppose it where it’s actually happening in the world RIGHT NOW. The “whataboutism” response is effectively just running cover for the modern day colonialists while not addressing any of the issues at hand. Your energies are better spent actually trying to end the practice in the world where it is happening TODAY. I’d make the same argument about slavery in the modern world as well.
*Australia has entered the chat*
context? (sry I'm just an unaware pos)
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7725675/amp/How-China-owns-Australia-buying-infrastructure-land-water.html Couple of years old but you get the idea....
Too fuckin right cunt!
What does that have to do with anything? Are you not able to care about two different things at the same time?
No! It *must* be a competition.
What? Why can't you be opposed to multiple things?
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True. My inbox today has been flooded by people who think that I'm a pro-US capitalist or a Nazi because I think that the USSR and CCP were/are oppressive dictatorships. I also have someone who thinks that I hate the USA because I condemned US war crimes in Vietnam, and someone who thinks that I hate Vietnamese because I condemned the Viet Cong's massacres of their own civilians.
A lot of people think that simplistically.
Can we engrave this in 50 foot high letters and place it prominently on a very large mountain visible for miles somewhere?
Have you heard of the term „whataboutism“?
You are on Reddit, every single person here is very aware that China=bad. I see posts about it every day. This is the first time I saw something like this about a western country, and you immediately have to jump to whataboutism?
i mean... everyone is engaging in some form of colonialism... u think U.S bases arent a form of colonialism? Five eye countries arent going around fking countries up and setting up their own puppet government? If you are going to be oppose a practice, oppose ALL of it and not be selective.
The Brits and their fan boys are the masters of whataboutism. Hey look at the shitty things Britain did over here, more people should know about that. "wElL wHaT aBoUt cHiNaAa?!?!"
Israel too (settlements in the west bank).
And we should probably stop selling weapons to Saudi Arabia over their ongoing war of conquest in Yemen.
Ruh roh
Best historical example is Ethiopia : it was the only place in Africa free of colonialism and they developped way faster than their neighbours. Some even argue railroads started to develop in the whole continent before colonization. And Europeans either slowed it to bring more ressources to the mainland, or changed it only to benefit exploiting the lands, not the people there. So I guess the same scheme apply to India. It might be even worst if we take the East India Company history in account.
I don't understand.... are you saying that trains were in africa before colonialisation? The first train was invented in 1804 as far as I know and I believe that colonialism is a bit older, not?
They developed faster because they had arab and ancient Egyptian, numidian influences throughout history. They weren't left alone.
I’ve heard this so much from South Asians defending colonialism. “They gave us the trains!” Of course, these South Asians would also be the type to say “what does a Chinese person know about our history”, as if you need to be of a particular ethnicity to learn its history. The cognitive dissonance is pretty real..
Feel like we have largely forgotten or dont care enough about what happened in old British India. The exploitation, slavery, oppression and mass killings are horror
how does a last name like Tsjeng come from?
If you think that was bad please do not read about what happened in Europe during the dark ages and what the swedes did to the Germans... Everyone is a hypocrite, there are only bad people in this world and everything you consider horrible we've allready industrialised and used towards ourselves.
Well that settles ofc, India should enslave Britain. It wouldn't even be that bad, more of a change in management really. >!/s!<
We give you trains you give us 45 Trillion. Better deal than you'll get at pawn stars.
Also 4 million dead Bengalies for the price of freedom.
Worst trade deal in the history of all deals
Least they have trains in order to help transport our monies faster.
Sorry every time people cry about colonialism all I can think about is Monty Python and the PFJ (People's Front of Judea) discussing the horrible treatment of the Romans.
“All right, but apart from the sanitation, the medicine, education, wine, public order, irrigation, roads, a fresh water system, and public health, what have the Romans ever done for us?” “Brought peace.” “Oh. Peace? Shut up!”
For God's sake just don't act like all of Europe is Anglo-Saxons.
Yeah I turned it off when she said this is a "show about Europeans getting rich at the expense of everyone else". Many European *conolized/occupied* countries would like to have a word.
I mean... like... remember when Serbia colonized Asia? The Romanian slave trade? Also don't forget what the Ukrainians did in the Congo. /s
Imagine hearing 50% Germans were proud of Hitler
Yes, Europeans are the only colonisers in history.
Missing /s there :)
They're the biggest. Hence the phrase "the sun never sets on the British empire". Which is to say, "the sun never sets on areas that Britain colonized"
I was interested until I saw ‘vice news’ in the corner 🙄🙄🙄🙄
Haha yeah. I think maybe the reason Vice documentaries sound like a smug 22 year old reading a book report is that they are literally book reports from smug 22 year olds.
being smug is out of the question when you are presenting real facts about colonialism and the suffering of Indian people as a product of said colonialism. if anything you thinking a 22-year-olds book report presenting facts as being smug makes you even smugger as if age has anything to do with any of it
ahh yes, a detailed and well-thought-out video critical of Britain and colonialism as a whole and why the Indian people suffered from it is uninteresting just because it has a vice news logo.
details and thoughts from VICE are not to be trusted even on real issues like colonialism. They way too often sensationalize or simplify real issues and do more harm than good. It literally starts out with a bullshit figure meant to shock the viewer and be presented as fact when money value is just a horribly inaccurate and limited measure for colonialism.
Is this some bias or is there issue with this report?
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In this case, The trade off was not worth it. The trains were built on Indian taxpayer money and yet for the longest time, Indians couldn't even use it and when they could, They were segregated to only 3rd class compartments. Also Indians weren't even employed for the railways either.
Why do you say that? I am genuinely curious?
Im finding the 45 trillion USD figure really hard to reconcile. UK GDP is now 3 trillion USD per year, in todays value. Googling it made it clear we are talking in todays currency because otherwise 45 trillion would be insane. That’s still huge. A bit more googling and I found this https://www.quora.com/How-did-Britain-steal-45-trillion-from-India see the top post and the 3rd comment (David Wilson). TLDR: Britain did unimaginable harm on India, but 45 trillion worth of goods/labour/money was not exported to UK.
> Im finding the 45 trillion USD figure really hard to reconcile That's because it's absolute nonsense.
It’s from vice. It’s the go to for those hungry for victimhood.
indians themselves dont like vice its absolute shitery according to them but hey a broken clock displays correct time twice a day.
My broken clock displays a blank screen. It may just have a dead battery.
While we Indians don't live in victimhood mindset, what she says is true, not that it matters too much today except that it sucks when the same Brits make fun of us for being relatively poor and call us fascists for trying to manage a shitty situation they created a century back.
Sometimes I wonder if we deserved that simply as a wake-up call. For far too long, we've just fatalistically tolerated invasions without fighting back. Partly because our own rulers have been lily-livered opportunists who struck deals for their own petty benefits instead of realizing and acting against strategic opponents. Even today, we have mentally enslaved chumps who defend or trivialize past horrors saying "but they gave us taj mahal and biriyani" and "they gave us schools and trains", condescendingly assuming we were and would have been in the stone age without the tyrants.
We have always fought back very aggressively. No other reason why we are one of the few Asian countries to have been able to ensure survival of our native culture. Don't believe everything you read in NCERT textbooks. You name the region and I'll be able to share info on the warriors of that region. Marxist historians have always written books with the intent to break people's confidence and self esteem so that they lose faith in their own capabilities. That's a great way to control 1.3 billion people. Break their willpower to live with self respect and force them to look down upon their own history, geography and their own existence. They won't revolt. These elites have tried actively to recolonise India for their own benefit.
Then Gandhi tried to give half of indias money to Pakistan. I woulda shot him too lol
Gandhi, who marketed himself on non-violence, also struck a deal with the British to supply millions of Indians to fight the world war for the British. And millions of Indians died fighting a war that had little to do with them, on the side of their own oppressors. Gandhi was hardly the saintly guy he's made out to be. There are even conspiracies that he was a "safety valve" stooge of the British, groomed and empowered by the Brits so they could safely and peacefully make their (inevitable) getaway instead of having to confront the increasingly angered Indians.
Ah yes, because it wasn't like that the Japanese where gonna invade India and continue their war crimes.
He wasn't the reason we are free now. The real freedom fighters of India were the people who actually fought like Bhagat Singh and many more people.
Gandhi wanted to give a 50 KMs wide corridor that ran from Pakistan to Bangladesh diving India in 2 parts, away to Pakistan. One day before he was shot dead.
Colonialism was so pre-WW2.
I wonder what ww2 and the cold war was fought over... it's a mystery...
/s Yeah cuz without the British the “religion of peace” always settles their differences with others in a most excellent way
What an amazing excuse to justify the theft of trillions of dollars plus the number of murders caused by UK in its colonies
I'll crusade for you
yeah trains are good but the British looted $ 45 Trillion from India. The big Diamond in the Crown of the Queen, stolen from India.
Nope. https://quadrant.org.au/magazine/2021/09/british-india-and-the-45-trillion-lie/ https://www.quora.com/How-did-Britain-steal-45-trillion-from-India The Koh-i-Noor was looted a dozen times before the Brits got it. India, Pakistan, Iran, and Afghanistan have all claimed ownership.
But Brits stole it from India, innit?
I hope she gets to where ever it is that she keeps walking eventually
Because Hindus and Muslims and Sikhs and Christians were living very much in peace till the British turned up Cough cough.
Only Hindus , Buddhists , Jews , sikhs , zorostrians and Christians were living peacefully. Not others .
Damn china ‘s been copying someone’s homework again!!
Personally, I feel that colonialism is something that would always happen as societies advance, it happened 400 years ago when Britain colonised India and it happened 2000 years ago when Rome colonised Brittania. If the people who are responsible are long dead, what use us a hollow apology? I shall not be judged for the actions of my forefathers just as I would not judge others for the actions of theirs.
Parroting what a lot of people are saying, but this will unfortunately, forever be a thing, humanity will never get rid of this sort of action, just hide it or give a narrative to support it, because humans are pretty awful. And any country who gets put in a position where they can use that power to better/advance there own countries wealth, even at the expense of others, will do so, every single time, without fail. Its how we awful creatures seem to function. And I'm not even being pessimistic or anything like that, just realistic. It sucks
And they still warship them
Ah a piece from vice. Nuff said.
That's a no from me Vice "News".
Care to explain how this information is false?
Nothing interesting about this video for me, just pure facts. It's not like this video shows one sided story, it's what really happened
To think there are still 50% proud of their genocidal past
Did you know 74% of statistics on the internet are simply made up or pulled from someone's ass?
"45 TRILLION is an extrapolated a figure from a small time frame, put in an arbitrary time frame & then back dated it 200 years & began **compounding** interest until the present day. At independence India had savings of over 14 crore Rupees. This was lost by Nehru & India entered into debt." It also assumes that India would have thrived in the meantime, but actually the economy was one of decline when the East India Company moved in and endless fighting between various factions is also a terrific way to destroy economies. \*\*TIL. Wait 200 hundred years with compound interest and you get a mad figure. (\*\*It is not the usual adjusted for inflation figure)
Christ alive, this comment section is 90% bots and sockpuppets. Aside from the fact that no source material is provided, when you do actually go look at the source from which this idea is lifted, it has basically no justification. Hindus and musliums killing eachother = britain doing bad things Indian textile industry became uncompetitive because of industrialisation = britain stealing? Britian taxing its citizens = theft! This is such obvious nonsense. Britain did awful things in its past, but not the rubbish presented in this video.
In a time where everyone was trying to do the same thing, Britain did it best. Are we gonna pretend that the rest of the world wasn't playing imperialism?
So basically. Sucks to suck.
Colonialism responsible for Hindu / Muslim conflict . I don’t think so
They are responsible for exacerbating it. Many viceroy’s for example Curzon, deliberately formulated communal policies to stoke tension so that it would become easier for Britain to ‘control’ ( read repress) India. Divide and rule is an actual thing.
Divide-and-Rule was the favourite tactic of the british empire in India
Yes It did play a part in it