British empire worse then the Nazis

Was creaky even before WW1. Gladstone's resignation and the contradictions over Ireland and home rule, the humiliation of the Boer War and the Concentration Camp solution to it and wider public disquiet over colonialism (as seen in likes of Heart of Darkness) and the internal disputes around social welfare and rights of the working population that led to the birth of Labour all torpedoed positivism really. The simple fact is that the British Empire was not sustainable as anything other than an upper class vehicle, as soon as it was made accountable to its British subjects it fell to pieces. It is one of the few empires which nonetheless permitted that to occur.

I think also as with many Empires and Great Nations that a final victory over an ancient and classically less democratic enemy (France) lead to a general malaise and complacency. There was a lot of stupid (Crimea, ME) and despicable (Opium Wars) Imperial misadventure once France were out the picture which basically came from just being big enough to be in everyone's business but without any justifiable reason to be involved
Good post. WWI was the final nail in the positivist coffin but the ideas that permeated WWI...eugenics (which I'm not necessarily knocking at that time), separation of the sexes and fear of sex, classification of homosexuality as a medical illness, racial superiority etc all went further than they should because of the honestly held belief that the British Empire was proof that logic and reason and commerce would solve all social ills. Positivism. Social experimentation.
Our foreign policy was to make the whole world England.
 
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Most great things have been achieved off the back of slavery, genocide or war to be fair. You could argue the greatest achievement in human history was landing on the moon, and that is directly linked to the Nazis.

Even the phone I'm typing this on was probably made in very immoral circumstances. Meaning we're all complicit.
 
There is no doubt that the British Empire was inherently racist and elitist, but it was never in the same league as Nazism.

The British Empire was different in that its ideological premise to the Nazis was in fact universalist.

The Empire advocated that Britishness was a civilization which could be imposed on other ethnic groups to become "like us"- i.e making Brown, Black and Indian Britains. We believed we were superior to the groups we colonized, but this was based on the premise of ideas and culture and not genetically inherent racism or the belief in a "Master Race" or the ideology of racial struggle within Nazism and Fascism.

This makes it different to Nazi Germany which argued in the genetic and absolute supremacy of one race above all others and the doctrine of not "colonizing lands to help them adapt to our civilization" (Like Britain) but literally seizing the lands of others on the premise of completely wiping out other ethnic groups and replacing them with Germanic peoples.

Many people died at the hands of the British Empire in various wars or imposed famines, but never at any point did we proclaim "ethnic Africans, Indians etc should not exist" and pursued industrial scale population replacement methods like the Holocaust. We said as an Empire other races were inferior, but we didn't want to destroy them, we wanted to "civilize" them. That's a big difference.

Let's put it this way, the world we live in today is a world where the British Empire technically "won". Do you think a world today where Nazi Germany triumphed over us would be in any way similar or equal to what we live in today?

There is no doubt that the Nazi regime was in league of its own as the literal and single worst regime and ideology in History, and comparing it to the British Empire is misleading.
 
Was creaky even before WW1. Gladstone's resignation and the contradictions over Ireland and home rule, the humiliation of the Boer War and the Concentration Camp solution to it and wider public disquiet over colonialism (as seen in likes of Heart of Darkness) and the internal disputes around social welfare and rights of the working population that led to the birth of Labour all torpedoed positivism really. The simple fact is that the British Empire was not sustainable as anything other than an upper class vehicle, as soon as it was made accountable to its British subjects it fell to pieces. It is one of the few empires which nonetheless permitted that to occur.

I think also as with many Empires and Great Nations that a final victory over an ancient and classically less democratic enemy (France) lead to a general malaise and complacency. There was a lot of stupid (Crimea, ME) and despicable (Opium Wars) Imperial misadventure once France were out the picture which basically came from just being big enough to be in everyone's business but without any justifiable reason to be involved.

Slavery today is not a state sanctioned and supported cornerstone of the economy of the major world powers though. Theres a substantial difference between criminals trafficking humans and a government openly doing it and enacting policy around it.

But as I said elsewhere, human trafficking today has fuck all to do with the history of British slavery. Totally irrelevant thing to bring up.
Slavery was abolished and policed by the British Empire BEFORE its height and before any other great power so why the fuck bring that up? :rolleyes:

Britain was engaging in slavery at the SAME TIME as every other significant power so why pick on them?
 
Even the phone I'm typing this on was probably made in very immoral circumstances. Meaning we're all complicit.
No moral high-ground,in this age of transparency every single one of us is complicit,but out of sight out of mind.
 
You can go on forever with this.
Look at all the old western colonial powers. Us, France, Spain, Portugal, Holland, Italy, Belgium. Then what about the Soviet Empire and the Japanese?
Then of course good old United States of America.
 
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No moral high-ground,in this age of transparency every single one of us is complicit,but out of sight out of mind.
Sent from your smartphone :lol:
 
The British empire plundered, enslaved and killed. Examples include, internment camps in South Africa, aboriginal suppression and murder in Australia, suppression and putting down Indian uprisings, starved the Irish etc
Meanwhile back in good old Britain the rich got very rich and the working class lived in squalor, deprivation, slums but could look at pink bits on the map if they got an education.
If people want to be proud of the Empire's accomplishments. They should equally be ashamed of some if its acts.

Personally I'm neither, it all happened before I was born and pretty sure my ancestors had more in common with the exploited than those ruling.

The fact that people today still think we're all one team is another area we were better that the Nazis - propaganda.
 
Meh. Every empire has a lingering demise. The Ottomans walked around a long time before they realised they were dead.

I love that second point. I'm gonna use that.

In Africa we left a legacy of anti gay culture which continues to be destructive to this day. Our colonial laws put that culture there where it wasn't before. We have left a poor legacy in some pockets around the empire that the sun never set on.
Was Africa previously a beacon for gay rights? (Don't know much about that one).
A legacy of stopping slavery in their country, plus ending canibalism/brutal rituals etc., as well as huge investment, raising living stadards, medicine etc are some of the positives
 
Totally agree. I'm just thinking about the damage we did over time, the lasting geopolitical issues today... don't necessarily agree with him but I can see the thought process.
Plundering was easy. Extracating from the Empire was difficult and we made many mistakes. However, when looking at Syria and Yugoslavia etc we didn't do too bad a job.
In Africa we left a legacy of anti gay culture which continues to be destructive to this day. Our colonial laws put that culture there where it wasn't before. We have left a poor legacy in some pockets around the empire that the sun never set on.
When we left we were fairly anti gay as well.
 
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Was Africa previously a beacon for gay rights? (Don't know much about that one).
A legacy of stopping slavery in their country, plus ending canibalism/brutal rituals etc., as well as huge investment, raising living stadards, medicine etc are some of the positives
Yeah. Apparently homosexuality in places like Nigeria effeminate men were treated as having a spiritual special gift. We criminalised it and left the legacy of that. Not just Africa either, There's an awful lot of homoeroticism in traditional Indian cultures but Section 337 passed in 1860 was definitely designed to bring civilization to the masses who we deemed culturally inferior.l
And let's not forget women's rights either. Muslim women have enjoyed rights to their name, their property and inheritance since the year dot but of course much of that ended with colonial rule. Good upstanding British law said that women don't have a name, rights or anything. The man got everything,
And then the wholly destructive role that the British played in reinforcing a caste system that did exist in theory in the region but the British used it as part of their central administration system, strengthening it giving jobs to Christians and certain castes only.

I'm not saying that we were any worse than anyone. Just that along with the building of infrastructure colonial British rule had its destructive qualities too.
 
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Slavery was abolished and policed by the British Empire BEFORE its height and before any other great power so why the fuck bring that up? :rolleyes:

Britain was engaging in slavery at the SAME TIME as every other significant power so why pick on them?
The Nazis were engaging in antisemitism at the same time as every other significant power so why pick on them.

f***ing hell. Poor slavers, being "picked on". Poor lads. Always painted out to be the bad guys, those slavers. Cant catch a break, just because they oversaw the single biggest intensity in slave trading by any one nation and built an economy around it. Oh the injustice of it all. Boo hoo.
 
Yeah. Apparently homosexuality in places like Nigeria effeminate men were treated as having a spiritual special gift. We criminalised it and left the legacy of that. Not just Africa either, There's an awful lot of homoeroticism in traditional Indian cultures but Section 337 passed in 1860 was definitely designed to bring civilization to the masses who we deemed culturally inferior.l
And let's not forget women's rights either. Muslim women have enjoyed rights to their name, their property and inheritance since the year dot but of course much of that ended with colonial rule. Good upstanding British law said that women don't have a name, rights or anything. The man got everything,
And then the wholly destructive role that the British played in reinforcing a caste system that did exist in theory in the region but the British used it as part of their central administration system, strengthening it giving jobs to Christians and certain castes only.

I'm not saying that we were any worse than anyone. Just that along with the building of infrastructure colonial British rule had its destructive qualities too.

Yes but they got Football and trains.
 
The Nazis were engaging in antisemitism at the same time as every other significant power so why pick on them.

f***ing hell. Poor slavers, being "picked on". Poor lads. Always painted out to be the bad guys, those slavers. Cant catch a break, just because they oversaw the single biggest intensity in slave trading by any one nation and built an economy around it. Oh the injustice of it all. Boo hoo.
I didn't pick on the Nazi's :lol:. They were no worse in their actions than many world powers. The victors write the history.

You are associating the British Empire with slavery, when in reality EVERY nation at the time engaged in some form of slavery or other and had done since time immemorial.

We didn't introduce slavery, we ended it
 
Slavery was as bad as anything the Nazis did mind (I'm aware it was abolished)

There's an interview with Rolf Mengele ( Mengele's son) where he admits that his father had a large pit dug and filled with burning wood so that the fire was level with the top of the pit. Then he had two dumper trucks full of Jewish children, some as young as 5, backed up to it and emptied the kids into it. Apparently he killed 300 children in this way. Slavery was obviously terrible but you can't begin to compare it to burning children alive. Or gassing children or shooting their parents in front of them.
 
I didn't pick on the Nazi's :lol:. They were no worse in their actions than many world powers. The victors write the history.

You are associating the British Empire with slavery, when in reality EVERY nation at the time engaged in some form of slavery or other and had done since time immemorial.

We didn't introduce slavery, we ended it
Um

What you mean is we stopped enslaving people. We didnt end slavery. We stopped doing bad things for which we were entirely responsible. That's it. We didnt free the world of slavery. We didn't free anyone in fact. We just didnt enslave them. Theres nothing commendable in not enslaving people, you dont deserve an award or praise for it. I've never enslaved anyone but no-one gives me credit for that. Never stole from anyone it murdered anyone either. That dosent make mega saint, it just makes me not a perpetrator of slavery, theft or murder.

We also continued to use the labour and resources of subject populations in appaling circumstances for the benefit of the empire. They wernt traded as slaves but they wernt running around freely either.

Also slavery wasnt abolished before the Empires height, it happened after N America was lost but well into the period in which most of sub continent had been annexed. The subsequent colonisation of Africa and parts of East Asia didn't make up for the loss of what became the wealthiest continent in the world.

I dont think its worthy of praise. Well done, you stopped treating human beings like cattle. What a f***ing achievement. Such Heroes.
There's an interview with Rolf Mengele ( Mengele's son) where he admits that his father had a large pit dug and filled with burning wood so that the fire was level with the top of the pit. Then he had two dumper trucks full of Jewish children, some as young as 5, backed up to it and emptied the kids into it. Apparently he killed 300 children in this way. Slavery was obviously terrible but you can't begin to compare it to burning children alive. Or gassing children or shooting their parents in front of them.
You cant compare it at all no. They're all atrocities which thankfully defy comprehension and quantitative values due to how offensive they are to human decency.

What we can do however is condemn them for what they are, rather than try to weasel out of the issue with lame excuses such as "At least we stopped doing it after 400 years".
 
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