OT: Something odd about that queue?

[Dave Plowman (News]

Interesting point on Twitter. People queue 24 hours to look at a coffin. Endless media coverage. People queue at A&E for 24 hours to avoid being in a coffin - perfectly normal.

[Harry Bloomfield Esq]

Not unreasonable, many will have spent long hours during the night waiting in the queue - hardly a place to wear one's best.

[Harry Bloomfield Esq]

Then it seems reasonable that those countries should pay the UK for the boost in trade and civilization it received during those years, or perhaps we should just call it even Steven.

[Harry Bloomfield Esq]

+1

[Harry Bloomfield Esq]

+1

[Ian Jackson]

Some of the countries we occupied had a high degree of individual cultures and government (although often quite alien-looking to what the European countries had). You only have to look at some of their old buildings and monuments to see that this is so. Although most of them have now been completely 'westernised', and their historical cultures are now mainly a draw for tourists, there could be an argument that they should have left to continue doing things 'their way', and only adopt western ways at their own rate (if ever).

[Cursitor Doom]

Yup. Once upon a time they certainly did have respect for the Monarchy.

[williamwright]

Like white people then?

Bill

[Cursitor Doom]

Yes, but you also have to identify who precisely got the loot, so it goes back from those who took it or it was passed down to. I only know for sure *my* family never got a bean from the slave trade (and I'd be very surprised if there's anyone else's here that did, either.)

[williamwright]

A freind of mine who manages an office found that one morning everyone except one person had dressed in black. It was a way of making that one person feel 'out of it'. In other words, black clothes used for bullying.

Bill

[williamwright]

I agree with it. You never know when it might be needed. Even when it's not de rigeur it doesn't do any harm to dress up when the need arises.

The only problem is that an infrequently worn garment seems to shink as the years go by.

Bill

[Cursitor Doom]

But overall, in due time, Britain liberated far more enslaved peoples world-wide than it itself had earlier enslaved. And by orders of magnitude, too.

[williamwright]

He always does that. He seems to think he knows better than the rest of humanity.

Bill

[Colin Bignell]

I've noticed that too, especially around the waist

[williamwright]

Yes you can end up looking like a right pillock.

Bill

[RJH]

Oh behave. We roundly plundered, trashed, and left spent.

[Max Demian]

A lot of the colonised countries had advanced civilisations in the past, but they had collapsed before the Europeans arrived. For example, the Islamic countries and China. Also Africans had abandoned their cities. India was already colonised by the Moguls.

[williamwright]

Ha! The pot calling the kettle! I bet you're sat there in your shack in the outback, dressed in your pants and with a hat with corks hanging from it.

Bill

[Tim Streater]

And straining very hard mentally to come up with (yet) another nym.

[RJH]

We could fund that little lot if we redistributed the wealth more evenly, and took notable assets (back) into public ownership. I think anyone with assets connected with the slave trade should have the whole lot appropriated for a start.

We didn't take, but we certainly received. Where do you think the infrastructure that provides the basis of our relative wealth came from?

Oh absolutely. So far as I can tell most of my lot were serfs. Personally, I've done OK and not because of any talent, brains or industry, but because of a working class aspirational mother, and social and economic infrastructure provided in large part by colonial looting. So it's only right and proper that, come the day, part of what little I have should go towards trying to put things right.

I find that a tired trope. To answer your question, we'd need to ask the people who are living with the legacy. My guess, informed by my own reading of history, is the answer would be 'perhaps, to some, but certainly not worth the cost to the majority'.