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I'm British, and agree with everything you said. We did what we did, so I understand (to the extent I am able to, not having lived it). All I would say in our

I'm British, and agree with everything you said. We did what we did, so I understand (to the extent I am able to, not having lived it). All I would say in our defence (and I'm aware it isn't a great defence and certainly doesn't excuse it) is that: - That wasn't the current us, it was back then and I'd hope we were more enlightened now (despite the dross of our political machine). - Pretty much every nation at some time in their past has dealt terribly with others. We are in the position of being the most recent old-fashioned empire, whilst having had the technology (Industrial Revolution, coal, guns, ships) to scale our oppression. Most (all?) nations would have done the same thing if they'd got to that point of power first. I'm not my ancestors. I wouldn't choose the paths they did. But the above points are both true and also excuses, so to the extent that any current citizen is representative of their national history I apologise. As for the lack of sweetheart deals for re-joining the EU, again I agree but with the added comment that I think that's a good thing. Only by going all in could we ever truly be a part of the EU. As long as we demanded exclusion from, or preference in, so much we put our national interest first whilst ignoring the wider supranational interest that comes from a united whole. To be part of a union of equals we ought to go in as equals in the first place, thus forcing upon ourselves the incentives to do it properly and build a shared future.

blagie 3y ago
> I'd hope we were more enlightened now That would carry more weight if, for example, loot stolen from other nations were being returned, rather than sitting in your museums. England also still comes off as profoundly arrogant in its diplomacy and other international dealings. The English accent is sometimes used in American movies as a shortcut for "pretentious" or "smug." Perhaps this worked okay when there was something to back it up, but there's less and less there. See also: Post-imperial Spain a few hundred years ago (same problem). Current Russia (same problem). France had a bit of that too, although not nearly as bad as Spain / Russia / UK. > Most (all?) nations would have done the same thing if they'd got to that point of power first. This is absolutely not true. There are plenty of non-imperial nations both now and throughout history. It also absolutely doesn't matter. For my argument, what matters are impressions. Mao Mao Rebellion in Kenya was 1952-1960. Most of the people who participated are alive today, and it's such a major part of the national identity. Opium Wars are ancient history, but again, it's the narrative that counts. There are few nations whose name carries as much baggage as the UK. Even Germany -- post Nazi -- made an effort to dump all that baggage by in the form of anti-Nazi laws, apologies, and in some cases, even reparations. > Only by going all in could we ever truly be a part of the EU. I agree. I think the key thing, though, is that unless the England does something like this (or something analogous), I think it will eventually be in a pretty bad place. I'm not optimistic for England coming to the same conclusion. Good luck!
- kcartlidge 3y ago
  Return the loot? Totally agree. As do the majority of the British population. Arrogant diplomacy? Yes, you're right. I should point out that any nation with a history of importance would be daft not to play it up, though I really wish we were a lot less active on the world stage (except as part of a multinational grouping like the EU or UN). As for backing it up, we're still relatively good militarily. That said, even as the 6th or 7th largest economy (depends where you look) we're obviously going down the rankings and our permanent seat and veto on the Security Council for example is a little ridiculous (as is that of France). Accent? If others still have that perception I'm afraid that's not my fault. Apart from anything I'm a Northener which means my accent is not classical British anyway but, regardless, that's their perception not mine. And even in the US the movie villain is often British. I'm not denying it happens, but again that's on them. Most other nations? I've agreed on the other stuff but I'm afraid we're not going to agree on this one. But then, we don't have to and discussion is good. All about the impressions? Yes. Unfortunately short of stopping global adventuring and subsuming ourselves into a positive-looking EU (or similar) I don't know what we can do about that. And as for England re-joining the EU? Majority England didn't vote Leave (or Remain to be fair), and to my mind the people who failed to vote in the EU referendum effectively said they were okay with the status quo. Which means I personally think the Leave option, the one seeking change, should have required more than 50% of the electorate and not of the vote - and we'd have stayed in. But it didn't, so we are where we are. It'll take a generation or so but assuming no environmental collapse we'll re-join the EU or something similar. We'll have to, to retain any influence. And to be blunt whilst I find very few politicians trustworthy at all, the more I've seen over the last decade the more I realise I prefer the EU over my own government so the sooner the better. Thanks for the interesting reply :)
  - blagie 3y ago
    I think we agree on a lot. I usually just don't respond to the pieces I agree to since it's a lot of "Yup. Yup. You're right" (although reading your reply, I can see why those are important, so that's more about a flaw in me than in what one should do). > I should point out that any nation with a history of importance would be daft not to play it up I don't think so. For the most part, this feels more like rubbing salt on recent wounds than helping the UK in any way. A good way to think about this: How would you feel about Russia playing up Soviet glory? Germany playing up Nazi glory? You want to signal you moved the f- on. Old glory is sometimes okay, even if violent. There are few wounds remaining from the Roman or Mongolian empire, so Italy and Mongolia can leverage those, if they don't overdo it (for an example of "overdo," see Mussolini). Good glory: * Islamic Golden Age? Awesome. That's about scientific and intellectual progress. * US, 1940-1980? Economic superpower. Center of innovation. A few nasty incidents, but overall, the world's policeman providing rule-of-law and stability. * Polish Winged Hussars saving Vienna (and Europe, by proxy) from Ottoman invasion? Good. That's coming to help * China, during the late Tang dynasty? Known for massive progress in governance, poetry, architecture, science/engineering, etc. The British Empire didn't help (almost) anyone and didn't leave the world a better place. You conquered and looted a lot of land. Many places -- like India -- have still not come close to recovering, having moved from one of the wealthiest to one of the poorest places in the world. It's striking how much history has been rewritten in England to paper over this stuff, but English history is increasingly presented more honestly in former colonies, and that disconnect in narrative hurts. > I really wish we were a lot less active on the world stage (except as part of a multinational grouping like the EU or UN). To be honest, I'm not opposed to how active the UK is. Most recent times I've seen it active, it's had a positive impact. It took a leadership position a few times in military aid to Ukraine, which I really appreciated. It provides a lot of educational and medical interventions in former colonies and Commonwealth countries, which are a win-win (it almost certainly probably provides more economic benefit back to Britain than it costs, and it leads to a lot of goodwill to people who would otherwise hate you). I just wish it wasn't draped in that English superiority complex. That buys you nothing and costs you a lot. > our permanent seat and veto on the Security Council for example is a little ridiculous (as is that of France). For your benefit: * Permanent members of the UN security council: United States, Russia, United Kingdom, France, China * First countries with nuclear weapons: United States, Russia, United Kingdom, France, China (India, Pakistan, Israel, and North Korea came later) You might notice a 100% overlap. A lot of the justification for not changing it was to avoid a nuclear veto option. I agree the structure is obsolete, and I'm not sure we want a security council at all. However, I'm in no rush to change it. At some point, if we even have a security council, moving seats to the EU as a whole would make a heck of a lot of sense. The EU has a ways to go before it's organized enough to manage something like that (it seems to be on-track to get there). In the meantime, I'm okay with the UK and France keeping the seat warm. For all your criticisms of UK politicians -- which I probably agree with -- I think UK is better structured to do a good job on the security council than the EU. A lot of the role involves things like being able to make reasonable decisions quickly, as a situation evolves, and that's something the UK excels at.

blagie 3y ago

> I'd hope we were more enlightened now That would carry more weight if, for example, loot stolen from other nations were being returned, rather than sitting in your museums. England also still comes off as profoundly arrogant in its diplomacy and other international dealings. The English accent is sometimes used in American movies as a shortcut for "pretentious" or "smug." Perhaps this worked okay when there was something to back it up, but there's less and less there. See also: Post-imperial Spain a few hundred years ago (same problem). Current Russia (same problem). France had a bit of that too, although not nearly as bad as Spain / Russia / UK. > Most (all?) nations would have done the same thing if they'd got to that point of power first. This is absolutely not true. There are plenty of non-imperial nations both now and throughout history. It also absolutely doesn't matter. For my argument, what matters are impressions. Mao Mao Rebellion in Kenya was 1952-1960. Most of the people who participated are alive today, and it's such a major part of the national identity. Opium Wars are ancient history, but again, it's the narrative that counts. There are few nations whose name carries as much baggage as the UK. Even Germany -- post Nazi -- made an effort to dump all that baggage by in the form of anti-Nazi laws, apologies, and in some cases, even reparations. > Only by going all in could we ever truly be a part of the EU. I agree. I think the key thing, though, is that unless the England does something like this (or something analogous), I think it will eventually be in a pretty bad place. I'm not optimistic for England coming to the same conclusion. Good luck!

kcartlidge 3y ago
Return the loot? Totally agree. As do the majority of the British population. Arrogant diplomacy? Yes, you're right. I should point out that any nation with a history of importance would be daft not to play it up, though I really wish we were a lot less active on the world stage (except as part of a multinational grouping like the EU or UN). As for backing it up, we're still relatively good militarily. That said, even as the 6th or 7th largest economy (depends where you look) we're obviously going down the rankings and our permanent seat and veto on the Security Council for example is a little ridiculous (as is that of France). Accent? If others still have that perception I'm afraid that's not my fault. Apart from anything I'm a Northener which means my accent is not classical British anyway but, regardless, that's their perception not mine. And even in the US the movie villain is often British. I'm not denying it happens, but again that's on them. Most other nations? I've agreed on the other stuff but I'm afraid we're not going to agree on this one. But then, we don't have to and discussion is good. All about the impressions? Yes. Unfortunately short of stopping global adventuring and subsuming ourselves into a positive-looking EU (or similar) I don't know what we can do about that. And as for England re-joining the EU? Majority England didn't vote Leave (or Remain to be fair), and to my mind the people who failed to vote in the EU referendum effectively said they were okay with the status quo. Which means I personally think the Leave option, the one seeking change, should have required more than 50% of the electorate and not of the vote - and we'd have stayed in. But it didn't, so we are where we are. It'll take a generation or so but assuming no environmental collapse we'll re-join the EU or something similar. We'll have to, to retain any influence. And to be blunt whilst I find very few politicians trustworthy at all, the more I've seen over the last decade the more I realise I prefer the EU over my own government so the sooner the better. Thanks for the interesting reply :)
- blagie 3y ago
  I think we agree on a lot. I usually just don't respond to the pieces I agree to since it's a lot of "Yup. Yup. You're right" (although reading your reply, I can see why those are important, so that's more about a flaw in me than in what one should do). > I should point out that any nation with a history of importance would be daft not to play it up I don't think so. For the most part, this feels more like rubbing salt on recent wounds than helping the UK in any way. A good way to think about this: How would you feel about Russia playing up Soviet glory? Germany playing up Nazi glory? You want to signal you moved the f- on. Old glory is sometimes okay, even if violent. There are few wounds remaining from the Roman or Mongolian empire, so Italy and Mongolia can leverage those, if they don't overdo it (for an example of "overdo," see Mussolini). Good glory: * Islamic Golden Age? Awesome. That's about scientific and intellectual progress. * US, 1940-1980? Economic superpower. Center of innovation. A few nasty incidents, but overall, the world's policeman providing rule-of-law and stability. * Polish Winged Hussars saving Vienna (and Europe, by proxy) from Ottoman invasion? Good. That's coming to help * China, during the late Tang dynasty? Known for massive progress in governance, poetry, architecture, science/engineering, etc. The British Empire didn't help (almost) anyone and didn't leave the world a better place. You conquered and looted a lot of land. Many places -- like India -- have still not come close to recovering, having moved from one of the wealthiest to one of the poorest places in the world. It's striking how much history has been rewritten in England to paper over this stuff, but English history is increasingly presented more honestly in former colonies, and that disconnect in narrative hurts. > I really wish we were a lot less active on the world stage (except as part of a multinational grouping like the EU or UN). To be honest, I'm not opposed to how active the UK is. Most recent times I've seen it active, it's had a positive impact. It took a leadership position a few times in military aid to Ukraine, which I really appreciated. It provides a lot of educational and medical interventions in former colonies and Commonwealth countries, which are a win-win (it almost certainly probably provides more economic benefit back to Britain than it costs, and it leads to a lot of goodwill to people who would otherwise hate you). I just wish it wasn't draped in that English superiority complex. That buys you nothing and costs you a lot. > our permanent seat and veto on the Security Council for example is a little ridiculous (as is that of France). For your benefit: * Permanent members of the UN security council: United States, Russia, United Kingdom, France, China * First countries with nuclear weapons: United States, Russia, United Kingdom, France, China (India, Pakistan, Israel, and North Korea came later) You might notice a 100% overlap. A lot of the justification for not changing it was to avoid a nuclear veto option. I agree the structure is obsolete, and I'm not sure we want a security council at all. However, I'm in no rush to change it. At some point, if we even have a security council, moving seats to the EU as a whole would make a heck of a lot of sense. The EU has a ways to go before it's organized enough to manage something like that (it seems to be on-track to get there). In the meantime, I'm okay with the UK and France keeping the seat warm. For all your criticisms of UK politicians -- which I probably agree with -- I think UK is better structured to do a good job on the security council than the EU. A lot of the role involves things like being able to make reasonable decisions quickly, as a situation evolves, and that's something the UK excels at.