eye for eye
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British colonialism killed 100M Indians in 40 years
11–20 of 52 posts
Re: British colonialism killed 100M Indians in 40 years
#12Re: British colonialism killed 100M Indians in 40 years
#13Years ago I library-surfed a fun finance tome of papers on the financing of WWII. What struck me most, was the massive wealth transfer from GB to the US. With GB disgorging her wealth of empire, and going unrepayably into debt. The "debt", because US politics required framing further goods transfer, despite no hope of repayment, as "loans", which were then creatively discounted away. I've never seen US industrialization stories which quantify Empire funding, so I've wondered since how large a role it played. Or in the context of TFA, to what extent was US mid-century industrialization built on wealth extracted from India?
Re: British colonialism killed 100M Indians in 40 years
#14For one, Britain effectively destroyed India’s manufacturing sector. British colonisers established a system of legal plunder, known to contemporaries as the “drain of wealth.” Britain taxed the Indian population (that seems to be all)
There is a lot more to it than that. If we can stop caucasian-washing history for a second, britain did not simply arrive in india, and leave peacefully either. They lied about their motive as a trade company (the east india company). They used religion (Christianity) To scout the local population and worked with priests/nuns to see if the land as able to be invaded. And when they left they split the country into two, not really considering the implications of dividing a country in half based on their whims. (spoiler alert it caused a massive civil war and had a major historical figure killed). Trusting Britain, and not inventing the machine gun was the biggest mistake India could have done.
Britain literally employed slave labour on the local population, implemented a class based system which destroyed the local population, and murdered anyone who tried to rise up against their tyranny. Sad our history books conveniently ignore the evils of the empire's and the destructive effects of colonization we feel to this day.
During Britain's colonization period of india other channels of foreign trade with India like the French, the Dutch, the Portuguese and the Americans were driven out by vicissitudes of war. Solely the British now controlled the Indian trade with rest of the world.
You can imagine what happens when a foreign invader like Britain can do when they control a soil-rich country such as India.
Britain changed local laws and allowed the new Capital holders’ to own land in India. The British bought lands for plantations, which were manned by Indian slave labour. Thus even the agricultural export profits benefited only the British plantation owners, and not the starving labourers.
Britain resold Indian produced goods onto the global market for massive profits.
Indians were put into debt by the British during their rule and while they had the engineers to build their own cheaper alternative railways, they were forced to import British railroads and had to pay for it, as their exports were funneled from their home country to various parts of britain to be exported.
There is a lot more i could go into on this topic, but this isn't some sort of "woke police", this is pretty established history. Britain did invade India, this was a thing that happened, it was pretty horrible, sad we don't teach our children about the horrors of colonization.
http://www.srimatham.com/uploads/5/5/4/9/5549439/how_the_bri...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x_jGPf764d0&ab_channel=VICE
https://qz.com/india/290497/the-forgotten-story-of-indias-co...
Re: British colonialism killed 100M Indians in 40 years
#15For one, Britain effectively destroyed India’s manufacturing sector. British colonisers established a system of legal plunder, known to contemporaries as the “drain of wealth.” Britain taxed the Indian population (that seems to be all)
There is a lot more to it than that. If we can stop caucasian-washing history for a second, britain did not simply arrive in india, and leave peacefully either. They lied about their motive as a trade company (the east india company). They used religion (Christianity) To scout the local population and worked with priests/nuns to see if the land as able to be invaded. And when they left they split the country into two…
I literally copy and pasted what I could find from the brief article. Your beef is with the authors.
Re: British colonialism killed 100M Indians in 40 years
#16This article is suspicious because it is very opinionated. It feels like a study that would benefit China in attempting to create a gap between India and western powers. They would need a left wing Marxist type social justice argument about why India should feel like a victim.
This study seems to provide exactly this type of wedge. Down the language used.
India did not have an industrial base before Britain arrived there. England was the first to industrialize so any industrialization in India could only have come from Britain.
This study feels deeply biased and strongly suspect it is a Chinese influence operation. I would like to know who funded this.
Re: British colonialism killed 100M Indians in 40 years
#17For one, Britain effectively destroyed India’s manufacturing sector. British colonisers established a system of legal plunder, known to contemporaries as the “drain of wealth.” Britain taxed the Indian population (that seems to be all)
There is a lot more to it than that. If we can stop caucasian-washing history for a second, britain did not simply arrive in india, and leave peacefully either. They lied about their motive as a trade company (the east india company). They used religion (Christianity) To scout the local population and worked with priests/nuns to see if the land as able to be invaded. And when they left they split the country into two…
No post body was provided.
Re: British colonialism killed 100M Indians in 40 years
#18Perfidious Albion - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perfidious_Albion
People interested in knowing The Truth about what the British did to India should watch/read the following to get started;
1) Looking back at the British Raj in India - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OB5ykS-_-CI
2) British Raj siphoned out $45 trillion from India: Utsa Patnaik - https://www.livemint.com/Companies/HNZA71LNVNNVXQ1eaIKu6M/Br...
3) Why Capitalism Needs Imperialism To Drain Wealth From the Global South, w/ Economist Utsa Patnaik - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6RF5vx1W_kk
4) Empire in Asia, How we came by it : A Book of Confessions by W. M. Torrens - https://archive.org/details/dli.ministry.01877/page/n5/mode/...
Re: British colonialism killed 100M Indians in 40 years
#19India’s population in 1880 was about 250m and by 1920 about 319m. Sorry the 100m killed is infeasible on its face. But, then consider the source.
Really poor argument, "oh biased source". Invading a country and colonizing their people. Can really destroy a local population. Ask Native Americans. Ask Kenyans. Ask the Phillipines. Britiain truly commited some upseakable horrors to the countries they invaded, and really push their idea of caucasian supremacy. Deny the truth all you want, the unmarked graves of native american children remain. The evil of the brit…
Ask the Algerians.
Re: British colonialism killed 100M Indians in 40 years
#20Years ago I library-surfed a fun finance tome of papers on the financing of WWII. What struck me most, was the massive wealth transfer from GB to the US. With GB disgorging her wealth of empire, and going unrepayably into debt. The "debt", because US politics required framing further goods transfer, despite no hope of repayment, as "loans", which were then creatively discounted away. I've never seen US industrializat…
Relevant: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33979856
See the talks/works of economist Utsa Patnaik in particular.