These were the questions that surfaced in my mind upon reading Nafeez Mosaddeq Ahmed's article on the Colonial Holocaust and its legacy. It opened my eyes to a new point of view, a non "eurocentric" point of view. It made me ponder on the fact that the comfortable life I am living now could be a product of this "legacy". I never knew the story of Christopher Columbus well, other than the fact that he was a national hero. America has been taught to celebrate Columbus day, a representation their freedom and their progress, which makes you wonder how much the media has blinded them to the truth, for how could something achieved through genocide and the brutal slaughter of our own human race be something worth celebrating? This is the cruel state of our world; we celebrate marginalization, we celebrate inequality, we celebrate the elites. Have we really progressed when 80% of the worlds wealth is being consumed by the richest fifth of the population?
An interesting fact in the article that I was not aware of initially was that prior to colonization, much of the continents that eventually became victims to western conquest, were advancing economically and politically. They were doing fine on their own. There are many claims that the global dominance of the British and Americans was what brought many countries out of poverty and stagnation, however what they did was to replace a country's idea of development with their own idea of development, out of self-serving political interests and their thirst for power and material wealth.
I am careful not to overlook the benefits that have come with colonization and I don't want to appear ungrateful. The university I study in, is a product of the American system. The estate I live in, was beautified by the British during Colonial rule. The article has just broadened my perspective to what could have been. We will never know what our world would be like at present without Colonial influence. I was glad that Clement in his presentation argued against the notion that unipolarity is a bad thing, offering us a perspective from the flip side of the coin. The illustration of the double-edged sword arises again. There are those who gained from it, however there are also those who suffered and are suffering immensely because of it. There certainly lies a problem, question is, are the people who benefited going to do something to solve the problem?
So here we are today, and we can go on complaining about the injustice brought about by the hands of blood-thirsty and power-hungry man. I am not condoning the immorality of the Colonial troops on the indigenous people in the many native lands that were invaded. My heart goes out to the countless lives that could have stood for so much more but were wiped out by the greed and selfishness of their fellow man. As quoted in the article:“There are many humorous things in the world; among them the white man’s notion that he is less savage than other savages.” However, the stories of the past should only serve to spur us on in the fight for a better future. Applying here my favourite quote by Mahatma Gandhi: BE the change you want to see in this world!
It was brought up in the class discussion by one of the students that our world would be a better place if countries were to stop pressing for their own economic goals. I would definitely agree with her. However, I would use the word self-serving goals instead of economic goals. Economics, is the study of the allocation of scarce resources. Economics should be the solution to marginalisation and not the course of it. Is our resources being distributed to the people who really need them? Or is quest for excess bringing our world down in flames? There is enough freshwater and food to feed the planet, so where are the economists when we need them? Probably striving for a better pay cheque.
We're all guilty of this crime.
Class rating: 9
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