191–200 of 327 posts
Not a fan of the British crown (why are they exempt from taxes during record high inflation) but who should they return the diamond to - Afghanistan (it was the Durranis that looted it from Nader Shah after he looted it from the Mughals), India (Maharaja Ranjit Singh took it as tribute from Shah Shuja after conquering Kashmir from the Durranis), or Pakistan (the Sikh Empire capital was Lahore and the Durrani Empire c…
They can keep the stupid rock provided they return the $45 trillion they stole from India over 200 years. https://www.financialexpress.com/india-news/british-took-45-...
IIRC that is an absolutely bullshit number based on taking what the Brits actually did steal, giving it the most favorable conversion to USD, and then applying a few hundred years of compounding interest. 7% APR for 300 years is a 650,000,000x return.
Yeah that is unfortunately how money works. Why do you think countries like USA are so rich, they've been making investments for a few centuries now.
Robbers and looter should pay for opportunity costs, this is how it should work.
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> If there’s an archaeological record of anything as terrible as the Bengal famine The Mongol invasion of China, and the German invasion of the Soviet Union caused far more deaths.
Entirely possible and supported by mainstream historians that the colonial regime did lead to a number of deaths around the same magnitude of both of those events though, fwiw.
Not a fan of the British crown (why are they exempt from taxes during record high inflation) but who should they return the diamond to - Afghanistan (it was the Durranis that looted it from Nader Shah after he looted it from the Mughals), India (Maharaja Ranjit Singh took it as tribute from Shah Shuja after conquering Kashmir from the Durranis), or Pakistan (the Sikh Empire capital was Lahore and the Durrani Empire c…
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How about because it is the Year of our Lord 2022, the last monarch of the British Empire is dead, and humanity generally agrees now that theft through conquest is a bad idea, and Britain realizes that decolonization has to cost it something to mean something, and giving back a shiny rock on the Queen's hat which literally serves no purpose besides being a gaudy symbol of a shameful, spiteful legacy, really isn't muc…
> decolonization has to cost it something to mean something Didn't they, you know, give up their empire? And invite their former colonies to colonize them , to the point that they are now a minority in their own capital? If anything this should have taught them that, not only will it never be enough, but every act of atonement will count for nothing and be immediately forgotten and discredited.
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David Frum's new Atlantic article shows a similar situation in Nigeria: https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2022/10/benin-b... Basically the Nigerian federal government, the state government of Benin, and the descendants of the kings of Benin who originally owned the stolen Benin bronzes all think they should be the ones to whom the bronzes should be returned -- and in the case of the current king, he assert…
Okay. But that's surely not a reason why the Brits get to keep it. "This is too hard, let's give up and keep bringing in tourist money to our museums through these artifacts" feels like an awfully convenient excuse.
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Or the money from it being on display in the museum could be split as a charitable donation to all the countries involved. Seems like a win-win-win-win-win.
People screech in terror and hide their wallets anytime the word "reparations" is said. I don't think colonial empires are going to be sending a considerable amount of plundered money back any time soon.
Compare that to Nazi Germany, where reparations were paid in significant quantities, and kids in schools are still taught to be embarrassed by that section of their country's history. Whereas you get the sense that Britain is still, in some ways, proud of its rather ruthless and barbaric empire.
Well, it was a long time ago, so why bring up the atrocities now, eh? Thanks for the wealth, and here are a few meaningless pennies in aid. You can consider us your heroes now. /s
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> decolonization has to cost it something to mean something Didn't they, you know, give up their empire? And invite their former colonies to colonize them , to the point that they are now a minority in their own capital? If anything this should have taught them that, not only will it never be enough, but every act of atonement will count for nothing and be immediately forgotten and discredited.
The idea that the British left their colonies because they just gave them up is hilariously naive
If they give up the Koh-I-Noor to whomever plundered it before them, ten years later someone like you will be claiming that it is hilariously naive to believe they just gave it up.
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[citation needed]
Sure; as an example, the attack on the USS Cole. Clear military target, widely described as a terrorist attack, including by the FBI ( https://www.fbi.gov/history/famous-cases/uss-cole-bombing ).
Were we at war with Yemen when this happened?