3 ms·

I think your approach could be used to argue that no famines are the result of policy. The Great Famine in China (during the Great Leap Forward) was preceded by

I think your approach could be used to argue that no famines are the result of policy. The Great Famine in China (during the Great Leap Forward) was preceded by several famines of similar magnitude, the most recent being in 1943. One sign that famines are man-made is if the nation involved is a net food exporter for the duration, regardless of historical frequency and/or natural conditions, because then it's basically unarguable that policy decisions are being made that are leading to starvation: the Great Famine in Ireland is the most common example of this, even though it's contemporary to the potato blight.

revelio 3y ago
My post didn't try to get to the root cause of the famine, only to observe that the article is deceptively worded. In other comments I talk about the root causes. The Bengal famine was indeed at least partly man made, but the men who made it were the Japanese and German dictators who were trying to take over the world. Lest we forget the Japanese were attacking India at the time, as well as interdicting shipping routes, and had occupied the regions that would normally have been able to export food to Bengal to relieve famine. Britain meanwhile was being bombed on a daily basis and was fighting for its own survival. It is absurd and offensive to the British to blame them for a famine worsened by a war they didn't start, and which if they had lost would have certainly led to far worse catastrophes in India.
- pasabagi 3y ago
  I think you have a bit of an axe to grind. The British were pursuing a fabian strategy which led to intentional destruction of food and food-producing industries. That alone would make it basically impossible to deny that this famine is the result of British policy. Presumably, since you are defending the actions of the British, you don't actually have any skin in the game - you're not like, a Bengali, who's grandparents starved as children. So I'm curious - why are you so strident? It's obviously not 'absurd' or 'offensive', from a cursory glance at the facts, to conclude that this is an anthropogenic famine. If you want to argue against the preponderance of obvious facts, you have to do a bit more work, and start with the recognition that you're departing from the normal and prima facie understanding of what has occurred. You can't just try and browbeat people into counterintuitive conclusions with a mass of forceful and cherrypicked assertions.

revelio 3y ago

My post didn't try to get to the root cause of the famine, only to observe that the article is deceptively worded. In other comments I talk about the root causes. The Bengal famine was indeed at least partly man made, but the men who made it were the Japanese and German dictators who were trying to take over the world. Lest we forget the Japanese were attacking India at the time, as well as interdicting shipping routes, and had occupied the regions that would normally have been able to export food to Bengal to relieve famine. Britain meanwhile was being bombed on a daily basis and was fighting for its own survival. It is absurd and offensive to the British to blame them for a famine worsened by a war they didn't start, and which if they had lost would have certainly led to far worse catastrophes in India.

pasabagi 3y ago
I think you have a bit of an axe to grind. The British were pursuing a fabian strategy which led to intentional destruction of food and food-producing industries. That alone would make it basically impossible to deny that this famine is the result of British policy. Presumably, since you are defending the actions of the British, you don't actually have any skin in the game - you're not like, a Bengali, who's grandparents starved as children. So I'm curious - why are you so strident? It's obviously not 'absurd' or 'offensive', from a cursory glance at the facts, to conclude that this is an anthropogenic famine. If you want to argue against the preponderance of obvious facts, you have to do a bit more work, and start with the recognition that you're departing from the normal and prima facie understanding of what has occurred. You can't just try and browbeat people into counterintuitive conclusions with a mass of forceful and cherrypicked assertions.