The "Benefits" of British Colonialism

[insight-out]

Well articulated.

 

[Indus Pakistan]

We Hindoo, Muslim, Sikh, Buddhist, Jain, Christian were all brothers, all shared our wives, fed each other from the same table, made love all the time, the sun was shining, the air was fresh, the cold wind was like a balm, food, meat, choice vegetebales, milk, honey flowed like rivers, we all lived in gold painted palaces, murder was a Western disease, rape was a Western pestilence, greed was a Western curse, nobody died, nobody got sick, we are all united as brothers and lived in one huge heaven that the world called heaven. It was called Mata India.

The the freakin British came and look what they did

Yeh of course !!!

 

[Luffy 500]

Shashi Tharoor, although a congressi imperialist and advocate of Indian hegemony is spot on regarding British colonialism. The british did more harm than good. Western colonialist never had any benign intent behind whatever they did. British colonial system did more harm to Muslims than it did to hindus. The brits to an extent favoured the Hindus. While the Muslims were 3rd class subjects of the raj, at the bottom of the ladder, the hindus were in the middle, slightly privileged yet discriminated & subjugated by the white brits. One of the worse effects of british colonialism is intellectual colonization of certain groups of people within the Muslim cultural community.

 

[Indus Pakistan]

The british did more harm than good

Talk about your swamp. The British did good in our desert.

 

[insight-out]

We Hindoo, Muslim, Sikh, Buddhist, Jain, Christian were all brothers, all shared our wives, fed each other from the same table, made love all the time, the sun was shining, the air was fresh, the cold wind was like a balm, food, meat, choice vegetebales, milk, honey flowed like rivers, we all lived in gold painted palaces, murder was a Western disease, rape was a Western pestilence, greed was a Western curse, nobody died, nobody got sick, we are all united as brothers and lived in one huge heaven that the world called heaven. It was called Mata India.

The the freakin British came and look what they did

Yeh of course !!!

Your argument, if one could call it that, is classic reductio ad absurdum.

No one is claiming that India was heaven before the British colonized it. And no one is arguing that the circumstances that India (and the other former colonies in the region) found itself in after independence were the result only of British colonialism.

What he is saying is that British colonialism had an adverse impact on India and its people, and that their policies were self serving, and not benevolent as is often claimed.

 

[Luffy 500]

Talk about your swamp. The British did good in our desert.

You ilk mass produced by the British colonial factory are a good example of the enormous harm british did.

 

[Chhatrapati]

British colonialism had an adverse impact on India and its people, and that their policies were self serving, and not benevolent as is often claimed.

That's exactly the point.

Many of the hate that exist now are as a result of the divide and conquer method used by the British.

 

[war&peace]

You ilk mass produced by the British colonial factory are a good example of the enormous harm british did.

You hit the nail on the head . But people find it difficult to embrace the truth....
When the population grows at such a rate and most of the control methods fail...things like that slip out.

 

[Indus Pakistan]

good example

A fine example. A happy example. I am loving it example. I am.

British colonialism had an adverse impact on India

To begin with there was no India - to think that which itself exposes you to having fallen to British colonial narrative that you on another level disparage. There was a huge sub-continent bigger then all of Europe but with twice the population. Dozens and dozens of colonial stories were played out on this canvas. And as commonsense would dictate the effects of colonialism were differant by each story on this huge canvas. Some gained, some lost, some stayed same, some got shafted. So you accuse me of being reductive when that is exactly what you have done. A 200 years experiance on a sub-continent with over 400 million people abbreviated to one index. Pathetic.

I don't have time but when I do we will open a ledger account and see what British rule did for us. Most of Pakistan was being ruled by Sikhs. You should keep that in mind. Then use that as the benchmark - from year 1849 plus.

 

[Pakistani E]

Many of the hate that exist now are as a result of the divide and conquer method used by the British.

Was it the British who told the Sikhs to butcher the men from my tribe and take women and children as slaves? Or was it the British who told the Sikhs to attack our strongholds and drive us out of our agricultural land and destroy our homes and mosques?

The attempt by people on this thread to simplify British colonialism and paint the narrative as simple black and white is an affront to history.

 

[Indus Pakistan]

And here is what coterminous Pakistan looked like in 1843 just before the big bad, rapacious British came barging in. All of -

(1) Punjab, most of K-Pk was part of Sikh Empire
(2) Sindh was a independant Emirate ruled by Mirs of Talpur
(3) Balochistan was broken into various Khanates and tribal federations.

So this "India" people talk about certainly did not exist when British came kocking in coterminous Pakistan. And after defeating the Sikhs, building canal colonies, military structures, railways [albeit for their interests] they left after 98 years in 1947. This is the perspectve Pakistanis should be looking at. Our history with the British colonialism is entirely differant to Banglas and others and we should look at it accordingly.

Ruling family of Sindh - http://www.talpur.com/gal/
Ruling family of Sikh Empire - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ranjit_Singh

 

[313ghazi]

The Chinese call colonialism the century of shame. Accepting that shame has today made them a super power. Meanwhile we desi folk still argue over who "master was kinder too", the railways he built and the turncoats amongst us who dutifully served him. That is why we are still the third world.

 

[MultaniGuy]

Of course the British treated the South Asians as savages and favored the Hindus over the Muslims.

Pakistan did not benefit being a British colony.

British colonization was savage and nothing to be proud of.

Sikhs were also savage when treating the Muslims.

Good thing Sikhs are just a minority in the world.

 

[Indus Pakistan]

That is why

Partly why nearly 3 million of "us" are here today. And did you bother even reading properly my previous post? Can you place yourself in one of these three regions of Pakistan -

(1) Punjab, most of K-Pk was part of Sikh Empire
(2) Sindh was a independant Emirate ruled by Mirs of Talpur
(3) Balochistan was broken into various Khanates and tribal federations.

And then tell me where you would have been today if British had not arrived in 1840s? You might have been living in independant Sind today, or depending on what trajectory Sikh Empire might have taken living under Sikh rule or if your from Balochistan living in some tribal khanate. You emphatically would not have been living in India - indeed you never would have been made into British India and there would be no Pakistan. Please look at the map above and place yourself in context.

 

[jamal18]

I have met many British people who think the empire was a benevolent enterprise that elevated the black man.

I am astounded the some black folk agree with them.

When the British came to India, the standard of living in India was higher than in Britain. When they left, the standard of living in Britain was 20 higher than in India. In real terms, the average Indian was poorer than before. Millions of Indians died of famine. When Winston Churchill was told about the Bengal famine and Indian complaints, his reply was:
" These Indians are always complaining. I've got a good idea to get 'Bomber' Harris ( head of strategic bombing) to bomb the lot of them."