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Undertoad · 02-26-2003, 04:52 PM

Monbiot's starting point seems to be that private industry is by definition tyrannical.

So when he talks about "construction of empire" and "imperial designs" and such, we aren't reading what he is thinking.

It would be helpful to compare what actual empire and imperialism mean. Historically, a powerful nation gains some advantage, usually military, and uses it to completely overrun and dominate another nation. That means the people in that other nation become subjects - not citizens - to the new empire. They may have their culture completely removed by force. They may become slaves to the conquerors. They certainly don't set the rules; if lucky they are too far to be effectively controlled as a colony, and only suffer abusive taxation and such. If really unlucky they may be decimated.

Monbiot is a Brit. Having grown up in, um, "old Europe" where this is what is meant by empire and imperialism, of COURSE Monbiot is dead frightened of it, and hey - of COURSE the French are too. And PART of the reason why is that they live in countries and cultures that actually did all that stuff! They are mortified by their own history.

And it was only a few generations ago, in fact. So they've got this huge monkey on their back, because part of their history is having the monkey of REAL empire on their back, when they had to be dealt a lesson in morality by the likes of Gandhi (because they didn't learn it from Jefferson and Washington).

Is that what the worst-case scenario is with American force? No. The very worst case scenario is that tw's dream of Bush's doctrine being Democracy as a new kind of manifest destiny is TRUE, and at the end of the day the US is not some sort of empire maintaining itself with guns, but a trading partner with a ton of free people who have jobs and a future and lots of money to spend on stuff.

Could we fuck it up? Yeah, that's human nature. But I for one am not moved by the leftovers of British shame. Empire means something quite different to us - that's what Europe doesn't understand. We don't take people over. We liberate them and then they get to choose what they want.

02-26-2003, 04:52 PM	#3
Undertoad Radical Centrist Join Date: Jan 2001 Location: Cottage of Prussia Posts: 31,423	Monbiot's starting point seems to be that private industry is by definition tyrannical. So when he talks about "construction of empire" and "imperial designs" and such, we aren't reading what he is thinking. It would be helpful to compare what actual empire and imperialism mean. Historically, a powerful nation gains some advantage, usually military, and uses it to completely overrun and dominate another nation. That means the people in that other nation become subjects - not citizens - to the new empire. They may have their culture completely removed by force. They may become slaves to the conquerors. They certainly don't set the rules; if lucky they are too far to be effectively controlled as a colony, and only suffer abusive taxation and such. If really unlucky they may be decimated. Monbiot is a Brit. Having grown up in, um, "old Europe" where this is what is meant by empire and imperialism, of COURSE Monbiot is dead frightened of it, and hey - of COURSE the French are too. And PART of the reason why is that they live in countries and cultures that actually did all that stuff! They are mortified by their own history. And it was only a few generations ago, in fact. So they've got this huge monkey on their back, because part of their history is having the monkey of REAL empire on their back, when they had to be dealt a lesson in morality by the likes of Gandhi (because they didn't learn it from Jefferson and Washington). Is that what the worst-case scenario is with American force? No. The very worst case scenario is that tw's dream of Bush's doctrine being Democracy as a new kind of manifest destiny is TRUE, and at the end of the day the US is not some sort of empire maintaining itself with guns, but a trading partner with a ton of free people who have jobs and a future and lots of money to spend on stuff. Could we fuck it up? Yeah, that's human nature. But I for one am not moved by the leftovers of British shame. Empire means something quite different to us - that's what Europe doesn't understand. We don't take people over. We liberate them and then they get to choose what they want.