putting an eu flag on this feels anachronistic
The EU is literally doing colonialism in Africa today.
modern european colonialism doesn’t have much to do with god or promised land anymore, and even then a british or a french flag would be more appropriate imo
I think you’re forgetting the Netherlands, Spain, Belgium, Germany, Portugal, Italy, and others. Africa was (and still is) exploited by many European nations. It is more than appropriate to use the EU flag here.
and there are still many eu member states that can hardly be accused of directly engaging in modern colonialism, I’m simply saying we shouldn’t lump them all together
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inner_Six
Oh, wow, almost the whole gang is here! What a coincidence…
This is a conversation about history. It doesn’t include modern member states because they were not member states when the modern European colonization of Africa first occurred.
This is a conversation about history. It doesn’t include modern member states because they were not member states when the modern European colonization of Africa first occurred.
therefore,
EU flag doesn’t fit here because it’s a symbol that’s used nowadays to represent 27 countries, not just colonisers. that’s why I initially said it was anachronistic
You say “therefore,” but you didn’t make an actual assertion, you just quoted me. Your point isn’t self-evident, so maybe you should make it?
The meme references a historical event. If you took the use of the flag to mean the current iteration of the EU, that doesn’t really feel like my problem. I’m neither you nor OP.
What makes up the majority of the nationalities of the settler-colonialists in occupied Palestine, and how much money + from which continent (aside from North America) goes into the settler-colonial entity?
Brits and the French are just the most well known colonialists. Meanwhile, modern european colonialism is a direct extension of the promised land colonialism. The EU flag is just a convenient way to indicate Europe as a whole.
so… not the British? Because they’re not EU
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downvote me more for pointing out that you’re glossing over british colonialism. i believe in you!
wdym?
I mean literally what I wrote there. EU countries are subjugating African nations and extracting their labour and resources.
You mean Russia and Wagner? Cause Russia ain’t actually part of the EU
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So I guess you just ran out of space if you left out the stupid shit Russia is pulling in Africa, right?
Oh yes, it’s so terrible how Russia is helping countries like Niger and Burkina Faso shake off western colonialism. Cry harder.
Lol Russia can’t even help themselves
Can’t help themselves is an interesting euphemism for defeating all of NATO in Ukraine.
There it is. When Russia does it, it’s helping, but when Western countries do it, it’s colonialism. God I hope you’re at least being well paid for your doublethink
Feel free to provide examples of Russian colonialism in Africa. Last I checked, these kinds of things are happening, where Niger is NATIONALIZING their resources. If Russia was doing what the west was doing, then Niger would have a Russian puppet for a president who’d be selling the country off to Russian corps.
Either you’re utterly clueless, or intentionally trying to create a false equivalence to whitewash western crimes against humanity. Either way, you’re a slimy colonizer apologist.
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That is what many “anti-colonial” gets wrong… they see it as a “white” vs “colored”; it is power against powerless. A carpenter in Slovenia does not have anything to do with colonialism in Africa, Americas or Asia, neither does a farmer in Salisbury or a fisherman in Bilbao… but their white vs colored argument is gold for the architects of colonialism since it shovels that carpenter, farmer and fisherman toward the powers be just for the skin color. Let us remember that groups of people, before embarking in colonialism, did not have any problem abusing and killing the neighbor. Racial distinction only became far more prominent in recent history.
The living standard of a carpenter in Slovenia is directly built on the brutal exploitation of the Global South.
That would be nice to debate, but I hardly see how that is possible. I see you posted that the EU does colonialism in Africa… The EU per se, only finances some NGOs that may have some hidden agenda but hardly substantial in those countries. The other EU’s domain is to assign free trade agreements with the poorest countries, but I don’t think it is conditional and hard to see as malicious. Now, the EU is clearly now exercising power well beyond its mandate and, what it is worse, for evil… Gosh, it is now even blatantly violitig it is own laws. What I do see exercising colonialism is by some member states, usually correlated with its own GDP and that they now shield themselves behind the EU flag.
I recommend reading this article going over imperialism. Imperialism is the monopoly stage of capitalism, whereby capital seeks to exploit foreign markets and leverage economic and millitary power to get super-profits domestically. The Slovenian carpenter likely gets cheap nails and tools based on exploitation of the global south, and is paid with money gained by others based on that exploitation in other areas.
I hear you Cowbee! I’ll be be reading that wiki page latter on today. But again, the regular European carpenter does not benefit from an “exploited” cheaper iron ore in the form of cheaper nails… Not even from cheaper wood, if anything, people will appreciate more wood and hire more carpenters to fix wood cabinets rather than dispose after being worn out… It is a complicated economy…Companies like Ikea do indeed benefit from exploitation, but not the Slovenian carpenter with a market with cheaper wood and cheaper nails.
Now, you could go with that Ikea does benefit, so that those companies pay taxes that the carpenter will ultimately benefit from… I could see that, but, again, we know that these large corporation do not pay their fair taxes, let alone, compensate for the negative externalities they create, so i do see no net benefit to the average EU citizen on the exploitation their countries participate on.
First, there’s no “fair share” with taxes, capitalism is built on unpaid labor as capital valorization. However, again, as a country, Slovenia benefits from Imperialism. The robust healthcare system and other social safety nets are largely paid for via the profits of imperialism. IKEA benefits from imperialism more than the carpenter, but also passes along its profits in higher wages and cheaper commodities. The reason IKEA and Slovenia does this is to depress revolutionary pressure and maintain profits. Thus, there is a labor aristocracy in the global north, and a super-exploited proletariat in the global south.
I have to disagree here. The carpenter would ultimately had a similar quality of life with empire or without… Life in the west would be very different for sure, but i would not qualify it as worse. Consumerism would be replaced by a far more sustainable lifestyle and we would have replaced our incentives based on GDP long ago, but does not mean less quality of life, just a more just one.
Funnily enough the economies of all these countries are built on colonial exploitation of the Global South. All of them rely on cheap production in countries dominated by the west. Their economies are not self sufficient.
Poland certainly shouldn’t be involved in this.
This God guy kinda sounds like a dickhead
18th century EU
I think this meme is a bit of an oversimplification. Every colonialism was bad, but each had a very different kind of exploitation, incitement and violence. It’s important to look at history carefully so as not to repeat it.
