Apologising for colonial acts

[Mudball]

I'm sending Italy a bill for what they did to the Ancient Brits and the Israeli's are not happy about missing out of a cut of Egypt's tourism income from the Pyramids.... etc etc

BUT - that doesnt mean that folk shouldnt acknowledge what happened in the past. But it is hard (and fruitless) apologising for stuff that happened before you were born....however trendy it is.

What if the act pre-dates you but you still keep the spoils of war.. The statues from Greece, the diamonds looted from India that are part of the crown jewels, .... would you return it.
... as someone said, the guy missed out learning about it at school and only got the rosy version of the Raj - but not the brutal reality. yes, if it was not the Brits, it would be the French or the Spanish, but equally they would be asked the same question

 

[Hobbit]

If I received a letter from the German govt apologising for a Zeppelin raid on the chippy at the bottom of our street in 1918... its laughable. It has no relevance to me at all. As abhorrent as the massacre at Amritsar was it was a few generations back and has little relevance to the current generations.

Raking over old wounds achieves very few positives, although a few hand wringers might get all hot and bothered and shout and scream and stamp their collective foot.

 

[Mudball]

If I received a letter from the German govt apologising for a Zeppelin raid on the chippy at the bottom of our street in 1918... its laughable. It has no relevance to me at all. As abhorrent as the massacre at Amritsar was it was a few generations back and has little relevance to the current generations.

Raking over old wounds achieves very few positives, although a few hand wringers might get all hot and bothered and shout and scream and stamp their collective foot.

I would not be so quick to say that. Would love to get Foxys view of that as he lived in the area.. I believe that it still affects people in the area .. similarly the partition of India is still a traumatic experience as those who faced it are still alive

(BTW the partition even though very poorly planned and executed by the Brits is not seen as a Brit incident)

 

[SocketRocket]

I would not be so quick to say that. Would love to get Foxys view of that as he lived in the area.. I believe that it still affects people in the area .. similarly the partition of India is still a traumatic experience as those who faced it are still alive

(BTW the partition even though very poorly planned and executed by the Brits is not seen as a Brit incident)

Foxy lived on a suburb of Wellington New Zealand not India.

 

[IanM]

What if the act pre-dates you but you still keep the spoils of war..
... as someone said, the guy missed out learning about it at school and only got the rosy version of the Raj - but not the brutal reality.

Yep, I can understand some rational discussion of that.... but I did laugh out loud at the prospect of someone hearing ONLY a rosy side of colonial India. (which there was too) I bet he left school over 40 years ago!

 

[Mudball]

Foxy lived on a suburb of Wellington New Zealand not India.

I just read what Foxy said.. and it was Facepalm for me..

 

[Foxholer]

I just read what Foxy said.. and it was Facepalm for me..

Apologies for not being a bit more/absolutely specific!

But as I mentioned, that particularly incident did arise reasonably often because of the street/suburb naming. And many/most acquaintances were only a generation or so from the colonialist process too - Scottish Grandparents on Dad's side; German Great-Grandparents (though Mum only found that out by fluke, even though we, unknowingly, used to visit their '1st home' quite frequently!).

We (NZ-ers) were very likely taught that area of History from a significantly different perspective to Brits!