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I wasn't sure where exactly to post this, or if this has been covered before, but here I go.
Seems like lately that there has been a lot of controversy about monuments, statues, and other early pre abolitionist era Americana. This got me thinking the British empire had dominated the African slave trade, and colonized most of the world for hundreds of years along with other countries to a lesser degree. So why doesn't it seem that there is similar attitudes between the two?
I wasn't sure where exactly to post this, or if this has been covered before, but here I go.
Seems like lately that there has been a lot of controversy about monuments, statues, and other early pre abolitionist era Americana. This got me thinking the British empire had dominated the African slave trade, and colonized most of the world for hundreds of years along with other countries to a lesser degree. So why doesn't it seem that there is similar attitudes between the two?
Nothing to gain politically or economically or victimhood status from the British.
But otherwise, you have a good point as the US only had slavery for 89 years (1776 to 1865).
I wasn't sure where exactly to post this, or if this has been covered before, but here I go.
Seems like lately that there has been a lot of controversy about monuments, statues, and other early pre abolitionist era Americana.
This got me thinking the British empire had dominated the African slave trade, and colonized most of the world for hundreds of years along with other countries to a lesser degree. So why doesn't it seem that there is similar attitudes between the two?
[I have made the OP two paragraphs as it may make my question easier to understand.]
OK, so there is an initial statement about recent controversies in the U.S. which have had to do with slavery in the U.S.
But what is the second part about? It is not clear to me.
Are you asking about why there are no protests against the British because of their slave trade in the U.S. In other places where they sold slaves, e.g. the West Indies? Africa?
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Originally Posted by topher5150
I wasn't sure where exactly to post this, or if this has been covered before, but here I go.
Seems like lately that there has been a lot of controversy about monuments, statues, and other early pre abolitionist era Americana. This got me thinking the British empire had dominated the African slave trade, and colonized most of the world for hundreds of years along with other countries to a lesser degree. So why doesn't it seem that there is similar attitudes between the two?
You could say the same about many nations flags.
Indeed the US had apartheid type laws as recently as the the 1960's never mind hundreds of years ago, and how many people has Post WW2 US Foreign policy killed in numerous war zones where napalm and agent orange were used, as was carpet bombing.
Most great powers have flags that have not always represented what is mortally and social right, whether it is the of the US, Russia, China, Japan and a host of European countries and many third world countries where dictators and despots continue to murder citizens.
Furthermore a national flag of an ally is very different to a regional flag such as the Confederate flag and a nations flag should be respected, and it is not for other mations to determine what flag another nation should choose to represet them.
In terms of the Union Flag or Union Jack it is simply the incorportation of the flags of England, Scotlad, Wales ad Northern Ireland each of which have their own flag.
This is going to be a contentious topic for sure. Yikes. Good luck on getting it to survive.
Their is no easy answer except that race is an extremely political and polarizing topic in the US.
But you mention a symbol, a flag - The Union Jack. The confederate flag was actually used as the battle flag of the confederacy, not the national flag of the CSA. The actual national flag was a version of the stars and bars, later indeed incorporating the battle flag. The problem of course is recent racist group have hijacked the battle flag and taken it on to represent there crazy causes of hate. But one must ask these questions:
So it begs the question, why are not other battle flags given the same consideration? Why does the German battle flag/symbol, the Balkenkreuz used in WWII and displayed on Stuka dive bombers and Tiger tanks still survive today? The Nazi swastika of course is forbidden, but the actual battle symbol is still in use today and holds no reservation:
And why is the Rising Sun, associated with the Imperial Japanese Army and it's atrocities and responsibility of 11 million civilian deaths in WW2, still in use?
Plenty of people have referred to the Union Jack as 'the butcher's apron'. Regardless, this thread is simply an attempt at moral equivalency for the confederacy and slavery. Whether the British started it or not, America was responsible for its own practice of slavery.
Plenty of people have referred to the Union Jack as 'the butcher's apron'. Regardless, this thread is simply an attempt at moral equivalency for the confederacy and slavery. Whether the British started it or not, America was responsible for its own practice of slavery.
The OP is just trying to create controversy.
Plenty of people are not fans of the British Empire and their actions.
The problem of course is recent racist group have hijacked the battle flag and taken it on to represent there crazy causes of hate.
They employ it, but is "hijacked" the right word to describe what they did? The rebel banners originally stood for racism. It was the symbol of those fighting to preserve race based slavery. The inferiority of blacks was codified in their state's declarations of secession, in their national constitution, and perhaps most famously in vice president Alexander H. Stephens' "cornerstone speech."
"Hijacked" suggests that the banner once stood for something else but has been repurposed and corrupted by modern racists. I don't think that we would describe neo-Nazis as having "hijacked" the swastika emblem.
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