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How about the fact that the British Empire, at great cost to its own interests, ended the practice of slavery widespread among Arabs and sub-Saharan Africans?

• boomboomsubban 6y ago
  I'm not watching a two hour video on this, but how exactly was it against their own interests? Not only had they finally exited the slave trade, their colonization of of the area allowed them to use the manpower in their own empire.
• filleduchaos 6y ago
  That is not at all how that works. How do you reconcile this altruism with Britain's continued trade with and reliance on goods from the Americas and their continued use of slave labour? How is it that so many Westerners keep making these strangely naïve and surface-level readings of history and politics? You might find this interesting: https://origins.osu.edu/review/after-abolition-britain-and-slave-trade-1807 https://origins.osu.edu/review/after-abolition-britain-and-s...
  • trabant00 6y ago
    > How do you reconcile this altruism with Britain's continued trade with and reliance on goods from the Americas and their continued use of slave labour? By simply not moving the goal posts. > so many Westerners keep making these strangely naïve and surface-level readings of history and politics So they are naive for noticing a good thing in an ocean of evil, and you are keeping it real by thinking that until everything is perfect no progress matters. Got it.
    • filleduchaos 6y ago
      It's not "moving the goal posts" to point out that the "great cost to her interests" was largely nonexistent considering that Britain kept right on benefiting from and funding it under the table - it's simply knowing enough of the history involved to not reason like a small child.
      • trabant00 6y ago
        Keep adding insults to your posts. Makes you right every time. And for the "benefiting", there's nothing anybody can do that you people won't label as benefiting even if it's 2nd, 3rd or 10th party. All the while posting this on devices produced by workers free only in name with materials from the poorest countries with the most horrible work conditions in their mines.
        • jhardy54 6y ago
          > you people Yikes. > All the while posting this on devices produced by workers free only in name with materials from the poorest countries with the most horrible work conditions in their mines. Sweet, so you're obviously an anti-capitalist too right?
        • rguiliani 6y ago
          Lolz. Fucktard here ^^. You pplz. Stfu
  • thu2111 6y ago
    The Empire traded with huge parts of the globe, not just America. Are you saying that a failure to wipe out slavery everywhere simultaneously means the Navy's sacrifices of so many British lives were meaningless? In the end, what ended mass slavery in the world? The British Empire and the American civil war, fought primarily by the descendents of the British. That's not nothing.
    • filleduchaos 6y ago
      I'll encourage you to read the linked article in my comment, thank you.
  • docent8 6y ago
    Britain as a society was no doubt for and against slavery, given that its economy had major dependencies on slave-driven commerce and production. But that does not justify a purely cynical reading. Most societies of that time did not even bother to outlaw slavery, let alone enforce those laws. There were contradictions within British society. That was an enormous advance over the many societies and nations that simply accepted slavery in that period. Societies in Africa, the Middle East, the Americas, Asia and elsewhere in Europe were open in their commitment to and acceptance of slavery as an institution. You could say that slavery was the norm historically. Britain was the exception. And as the exception, managing a global empire, it continued to have many interactions with slave-driven economies.
• baddox 6y ago
  Was the entire system of colonialism necessary in order for the British Empire to spend resources to end slavery there?