"China to overtake US as world's biggest economy by 2028, report predicts"

@ashiitaka said
Really hacked off but that wouldn’t make them any more racist than Europeans, it would just mean they had developed ocean going vessels, the most advanced weaponry and economies based on mineral wealth before the Europeans.

I see. So inventing better weapons is justification enough to use them, wipe out three continents worth of cultures and occupy the other two. And of course, criticising this is "racist".

Talk about a fragile ego.

It was justification enough for the Maori to exterminate the Moriori, the Asian Gunpowder Empires to occupy others' lands (including the legendary Greek city of Constantinople by the Turks and Russia by the Mongols), the Ashkenazi to occupy Palestine, the Black Niger Congo people to dominate, occupy the land of and even eat the Khoisan, etc

The post that was quoted here has been removed

I can value and admire much in European culture without ever forgetting what
great (often irreparable) harm Europeans did to much of the rest of the world.

Well, likewise. But I will still oppose harmful aspects of modern European ideology and seek to clean up the mess they have made elsewhere. And I shall not indulge schizophrenic views of history.

I don't think monetary compensation can ever suffice, so I would rather just forgo it. Also, people would then see their debt as being "repaid" without actually learning anything. A shift in attitude would be more welcome.

@athousandyoung said
It was justification enough for the Maori to exterminate the Moriori, the Asian Gunpowder Empires to occupy others' lands (including the legendary Greek city of Constantinople by the Turks and Russia by the Mongols), the Ashkenazi to occupy Palestine, the Black Niger Congo people to dominate, occupy the land of and even eat the Khoisan, etc

It's okay, we don't need to talk about the brutal crimes of the recent past - it was inevitable and Europeans don't have to think about it at all.

When the United States invented nukes, was it inevitable that they would use them on every country to take them over?

You and Kev will likely still talk about other's crimes, and rightly so. Criticizing Israeli crimes must be racist against Jewish people. Criticizing American crimes must be racist towards Americans. Or we can just pretend that it doesn't matter because it was inevitable the moment they invented better weapons.

@ashiitaka said
Really hacked off but that wouldn’t make them any more racist than Europeans, it would just mean they had developed ocean going vessels, the most advanced weaponry and economies based on mineral wealth before the Europeans.

I see. So inventing better weapons is justification enough to use them, wipe out three continents worth of cultures and occupy the other two. And of course, criticising this is "racist".

Talk about a fragile ego.

No of course not but your assumption that the African, Australasian or Indigenous American imperialist would have acted differently to the European imperialist is fundamentally race based and I’m not sure why you think it’s ok.
There is plenty of evidence of domestic imperial activity in the regions you mentioned.
Just as examples do you think the Aztec or Chin empires were any less bloodthirsty or exploitive than the European one apart from its industrial scale especially with regard to the African slave trade?

@kevcvs57 said
“ I wonder how Europeans would feel if Europe had been invaded by Native Americans, Africans, Asians, or Australians, had their cities razed, people brutally murdered and enslaved, their lands stripped of their cultural treasures and mineral wealth and their languages wiped from history to the point at which there were only a few sparse pockets of Europeans left. Oh, rinse a ...[text shortened]... s were also wiped out by invading Europeans.
This whole debate is coming from a racist perspective.

Poor Europeans. Definitely victims of racism.

@ashiitaka said
When the United States invented nukes, was it inevitable that they would use them on every country to take them over?

No because the US as a society and culture had morally evolved beyond that....thank God that Germany Japan or Russia hadn't invented The Bomb first because each of them would have gleefully dropped nukes by the truck load until they did take over the world.

@kevcvs57 said
No of course not but your assumption that the African, Australasian or Indigenous American imperialist would have acted differently to the European imperialist is fundamentally race based and I’m not sure why you think it’s ok.
There is plenty of evidence of domestic imperial activity in the regions you mentioned.
Just as examples do you think the Aztec or Chin empires wer ...[text shortened]... the European one apart from its industrial scale especially with regard to the African slave trade?

If I ever see you criticizing a country's crimes, I'm going to accuse you of racism against the people of that country.

Get over your fragile ego already.

@ashiitaka said
Poor Europeans. Definitely victims of racism.

Your being a bit silly now but if your singling out one race as being innately more brutal and exploitative than other races how can that be anything other than a race based argument.
The European imperialist era was so wide reaching and impactful that it was probably the most negative example of empire and colonisation that we know of. But it didn’t happen because Europeans are intrinsically worse than anyone else on the planet.

@kevcvs57 said
Your being a bit silly now but if your singling out one race as being innately more brutal and exploitative than other races how can that be anything other than a race based argument.
The European imperialist era was so wide reaching and impactful that it was probably the most negative example of empire and colonisation that we know of. But it didn’t happen because Europeans are intrinsically worse than anyone else on the planet.

But it didn’t happen because Europeans are intrinsically worse than anyone else on the planet.

Never said that, of course. My body is mostly European. That doesn't mean that you can avoid talking about it, or pretend that accurately describing European crimes must be racism against Europeans.

European countries are not exactly popular in Africa, and it's not hard to see why.

@ashiitaka said
European countries are not exactly popular in Africa, and it's not hard to see why.

Meanwhile they totally overlook or acknowledge all the benefits of European technology and medical advances that they have benefited so much from.
Not to mention the billions in aid they get from the West every year and have been getting for, what, the last half century?

@dood111 said
Meanwhile they totally overlook or acknowledge all the benefits of European technology and medical advances that they have benefited so much from.
Not to mention the billions in aid they get from the West every year and have been getting for, what, the last half century?

That "European technology" still cannot control the water in the Anahuac Valley, 500 years from the Spanish conquest. Better weaponry and diseases, inferior hydraulics and engineering.

The post that was quoted here has been removed

But most white people shrug off centuries of racist oppression of non-white people
while being enraged...

How pertinent to the fragility in this thread.

They're happy to dish it out to America, China or whoever, but never happy when others do not flatter them with the required praise or undeserved pretence.

@ashiitaka said
It's okay, we don't need to talk about the brutal crimes of the recent past - it was inevitable and Europeans don't have to think about it at all.

When the United States invented nukes, was it inevitable that they would use them on every country to take them over?

You and Kev will likely still talk about other's crimes, and rightly so. Criticizing Israeli crimes must ...[text shortened]... st pretend that it doesn't matter because it was inevitable the moment they invented better weapons.

I rarely talk about others' crimes except when someone else is throwing stones from their glass house, as you are doing here.

@ashiitaka said
That "European technology" still cannot control the water in the Anahuac Valley, 500 years from the Spanish conquest. Better weaponry and diseases, inferior hydraulics and engineering.

Apparently the Mexican indigenous technology can't do it either since it isn't being done. I think that the population of Mexico City today has far better plumbing (Roman invention) supporting a much larger population (~8.8 million) than Tenochtitlan did (~300,000). I suppose if you really want you could grow food from the same water you defecate in, eat chihuahuas and engage in ritual cannibalism if you think that lifestyle is superior.

@ashiitaka said
But it didn’t happen because Europeans are intrinsically worse than anyone else on the planet.

Never said that, of course. My body is mostly European. That doesn't mean that you can avoid talking about it, or pretend that accurately describing European crimes must be racism against Europeans.

European countries are not exactly popular in Africa, and it's not hard to see why.

European countries seem to be extremely popular with Africans fleeing Africa.