Colonialism: Imperial greed or evolutionary imperative?

[MagnetMan]

I have been involved with the contradictions of race relations since childhood. And as a professional television documentary producer as an adult. Almost every comment that I will post on this thread will not be found in any textbook. Most of my commentary will challenge and in places even contradict conventional wisdom, not only about the socio/economic forces that motivated imperialism and colonialism, but also the missionary zeal and dogmatic view of our Christian culture that helped to subjugate and enslave indigenous peoples to our purpose and our way of life – before anti-colonial revolutionary forces rose up and tore the world into the dispirit pieces that we are trying to deal with and put back together into a coherent world picture today.

 

Having been down this road before on two other forums, and forced to listen to weeks of outraged demands for credible verification and even personal attacks as to my integrity, (even outright banning on one forum) due to my unconventional view, I am going to learn by my past mistakes and begin first by giving you some of the background by which I arrived at the conclusions that will be presented. If it is found at the end of this post, that this background is not credible enough, then we can end the thread before we even begin it and no further effort or emotional output need be invested.

 

After reading through the posts on Africa. What to do? and engaging in another on slavery, I see the same old syndrome of moderns peering at each other through the labyrinth of leaves and branches at the top of the family tree, earnestly trying to understand and explain to each other why humans behave the way we do - without unearthing the roots of our strengths and subsequent dysfunctions.

 

Every child who was born and raised in South Africa during the apartheid era was forced to listen to endless arguments about racism. We heard it daily in the home, at school, in the playground, in the arts, in science, in church and in the mass media. Added to the black/white divide we also had to deal with the ethnic divide of a bilingual system and struggle with the dislike between English-speaking Rooineks and Afrikaans-speaking Jaapies That dislike had its origins in the Anglo/Dutch war of the 1800's which England won and inherited the Dutch colony in the Cape. It got a whole lot worse during the Anglo/Boer war which again England won, this time unfairly. When they realized they could not beat the Boer commandos in the field, Kitchener was brought in to initiate a scorched earth policy that burnt down Afrikaans farms and killed forty thousand Boer women and children in unsanitary concentration camps, when typhoid broke out. This forced the unbeaten Boer commandos to surrender and we kids lived with that bitterness through the generations that followed.

 

The Black/white divide began in the Kaffir wars on the Cape borders in the 1800's - when the two migrating cultures clashed on the Kei River. It got worse when Dingaan, King of the amaZulu, massacred 70 Boer leaders in his kraal at kwaBulawayo during a peace talk. He then sent an impi of five thousand warriors to kill off the rest of the Voortrekker wagon train camped on the banks of what is now known as the Blood River. Against all odds 400 Boers won the day and as a result swore a Covenant with God that they would rule over South Africa forever.

 

The racial soup in South Africa got more complex, when Zulu's refused to demean themselves by working on the sugar plantations and indentured Indians where shipped over to do the job. By the time Mahatma Gandhi got there at the turn of the 20th Century, they were a million strong and had to be classified separately as Asians.

 

One either graduated through this bizarre experiment in racial management as an out and out racist/ethnisist or switched off completely as an apathist. I was trapped in the middle - pulled in three different directions because of my heritage of all three bloods - English/Afrikaans/Bantu. The Bantu blood was eight generations back, so technically, according the Apartheid Laws of racial segregation I was classified as a white. If my black ancestry had been seven generations I would have been classified as colored - and lived a life in the vacuum of being disliked by everybody. My mother and grandmother were born in Pondoland. Both somehow escaped the beady eyes of the system and got white classification too. Of course nobody in the family admitted to the black blood, as did not thousands if not tens of thousands of other "white" families - for that would have cut off all our privileges. I only discovered the family secret myself as an adult when, of all places, I gave some blood for the first time in a Cambodian refugee camp situated in Thailand. Among fifty other white UN refugee workers I was the only donor in the camp with type O. which is compatible with all blood types. That got me curious, for that is the standard blood type for Africans. I had always wondered why my mothers hair was so wiry and her nose bridgeless - black characteristics even more prominent in my grandmother – who, except for her white skin, could have been easily been mistaken for Mandela's sister. The Pondo's have Hottentot and Bushman blood in their ancestry mainly through concubinage - for one did not pay labola (bride-price) for them. My subsequent investigation not only confirmed my black blood, but also revealed that my mother's father was Jew who had escaped from a Russian pogrom in Lithuania when he was a boy. Another hidden skeleton in the family closet.

 

40 years ago, within 400 miles of Johannesburg one could visit every single Age of human evolution. Family groups of hunter/gatherers still lived an uncontaminated Stone Age existence in the Central Kalahari Bushmen Reserve. In Pondoland and Zululand, clans still lived in a largely Bronze Age milieu of oral-based tribal lore and agricultural disciplines. The Afrikaaners were still gripped in an Iron Age of craftsmanship and rigid scriptural orthodoxy with a fierce hold on a nationalistic identity. The English population was more orientated on science and an international business outreach. The recent upsurge of ontological sects introduced Johannesburg to a more globally orientated Nuclear Age perception of human morality.

 

So right there, on my doorstep, was a complete laboratory of mankind's social and spiritual evolution just waiting for me to personally investigate and rid me of my identity crisis. It could get me beyond the Apartheid rules and biases of human classification. I could go and see for myself and reach my own conclusions as to my own identity and evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of my various cultural heritages.

 

What I subsequently unearthed over the past 40 years, first in Africa, then in the Middle East, and the far East and finally in the United States of America, contradicts conventional wisdom to a marked degree - in almost everything we know about the evolution of education, religion, politics, colonialism and economics.

 

Having somewhat established what I think are necessary personal credentials for posting what will probably (if previous reactions are any guide) be a highly contentious thread, I will leave it here for comment and further clarification if necessary.

[soulatom]

 

Having somewhat established what I think are necessary personal credentials for posting what will probably (if previous reactions are any guide) be a highly contentious thread, I will leave it here for comment and further clarification if necessary.

Well, I found this post different from what I am used to reading. I too have been on other forums and have followed similar debates on racism and this issue. You seem to have given alot of backgound information as the basis for some very potent statements.

So...Is colonialism Imperial greed, which seems to be the consensus amongst anthropologists today or is it an evolutionary imperative? ....whatever that means. Would like to see you give further explanation and detail on this.

[Boerseun]

MagnetMan, I can see we're going to have a few good chats around this issue.

 

However, I don't see the point you're trying to make?

 

If the point of discussion here are your question in the thread title about what Colonialism is, and we are presented with only the two options you mention, I would have to go for Imperial Greed and all that it might entail, although I do feel that there's a lot more to Colonialism than simply these two options.

 

Look at the Cape, for instance. There never was any intention of creating a 'nation' or even a colony, for that matter. It was solely intended as a pit-stop for Dutch merchantmen on their way to and from the East, in order to load fresh veggies and meat to ward off scurvy on these long ocean voyages (traceable to Greed, then, I guess). The colonial experiment in South Africa was a non-intended result of this when the locals started identifying themselves more with Africa than with far-off Europe.

(By the way - the 'Deal' the Boers made at Blood River doesn't anywhere mention governing South Africa for ever - it only thanks God for the victory over the Zulus, and promises to celebrate the 16th December as a Sabbath from that date forward).

 

Apart from that, you've only given us your credentials. How about taking in the controversial 'stand' you've mentioned, that got you banned from previous forums? Maybe you do have a silly opinion that deserves banning, or you might be on to something that'll keep things going here?

[Webbly]

This might be a ‘science’ forum but I suspect an issue like this will generate keen debate and some fairly exciting, if not zealous, posts - yet never be resolved.

 

Even if a formidable expert or two were to weigh in and present detailed proofs that bolt the matter down, I can’t imagine that will either impress or assist those who nevertheless still wish to know what we can actually do about it.

 

MagnetMan, whilst ‘conquest’ is a feature of life itself and colonialism might have followed such an imperative, I lit upon the ‘imperial greed’ component when your post appeared. It is this greed that today is shaping our future and driving commerce, if not science.

 

Good old modern everyday greed, a descendent of imperial greed, is overriding intellect in most every decision-making process. Decades ago whilst at high school I envisaged a distant twenty-first century having swept ignorance aside.

 

You mention Christian ‘missionary zeal.’ Last week in Australian news an outspoken Aborigine proclaimed he converted to Islam because of his hatred for the destructive Christian church. Such comments rarely reach mainstream press and, instead of alarming me, it simply rang true!

 

So please, MagnetMan, draw the curtain aside and let us have it.

[Eclogite]

Someone is going to have to explain to my simple mind in exactly what way Imperial Greed and Evolutionary Imperative are different.

 

By evolutionary imperative, I take it you mean the drive to control resources as a means of ensuring, or at least encouraging, survival of a particular gene line.

 

Imperial greed, the desire of nations to subjugate other nations as a means of exploiting their resources, is then simply the mechanism by which the evolutionary imperative functions on a global scale.

[MagnetMan]

MagnetMan, I can see we're going to have a few good chats around this issue, However, I don't see the point you're trying to make?

If the point of discussion here are your question in the thread title about what Colonialism is, and we are presented with only the two options you mention, I would have to go for Imperial Greed and all that it might entail, although I do feel that there's a lot more to Colonialism than simply these two options.

 

This might be a ‘science’ forum but I suspect an issue like this will generate keen debate and some fairly exciting, if not zealous, posts - yet never be resolved. !So please, MagnetMan, draw the curtain aside and let us have it.

 

Someone is going to have to explain to my simple mind in exactly what way Imperial Greed and Evolutionary Imperative are different.

.

 

First of all, I would like to state that - next to the debate over Religion and Science - there is no other social issue on the planet more pressing than race relations.

 

To this day the echoes of colonial occupation resound throughout every region where it operated as well as among the 200,000 ,000 off-spring of black slaves around the world. The issues that sparked the violent anti-colonial revolutions, have never been resolved.

 

The consensus of opinion among sociologists and anthropologists in general is that colonialism was a serious mistake. For all its abuses, I do not believe that it was. Colonization is a natural evolutionary imperative – it is the prime dynamic that has produced all the diversity we enjoy on the planet today. When any region is impacted by over-population, the law of colonization comes into play. Mankind is no exception. Europe was becoming over-populated centuries ago – colonization was a natural response and our big brain was employed to relieve the pressure. Finding a sea route to India got the subliminal impulse going and colonization followed. Of course Imperial greed played a part in it by exacerbating the problem with its impervious drawing of artificial political boundaries and land grants, but that came in the after-wash.

 

Though, in my opinion, the positives far outweigh the negatives, I would like to deal with the dark side of colonization first. Though most already know what the major transgressions are, few know how deep and how far back in history they go. The founding of our Christian religion is a case in point. I believe the Christ doctrine of Love your neighbor and turn the other cheek was the inspired realization of a simple Jewish carpenter during a period of Roman occupation, when every man and his son, believed that might was right, and could do no wrong. Jesus saw that retaliation was an endless destructive process, and called for something deeper in the human character to resolve it. Rome of course let him spread that pacifist idea, but Jewish resistance leaders found that it undermined their own interests and so had him crucified on a trumped up charge.

 

Christ dying on that cross has resounded through colonial history. It would have been an entirely different history if the message itself had been behind missionary zeal – but that was not to be and the anti-Christ bogeyman came into being.

 

That dark prediction of the coming colonial problem was made some 90 years later by a holy man in a cave on an island in the Mediterranean and I will get to that shortly, but first a little snippet of contemporary history, which underlines the current problems of race relations that colonialism initiated.

 

From 1984 through 1988, when divestment in South Africa was the hottest issue in America, I argued against it in university debates with ex-Black Panther leader Bobby Seales and South African author Mark Mathabane, on a score of campuses across America. The emotional outrage against Apartheid at that time, was not leavened in any honest way by the hypocrisy that came of scape-goating white South African colonials, when all other colonial countries had similar and even worse histories of racial abuse. Any chance of presenting a rationalized argument in that charged climate - about what would happen to South Africa’s economy and what that impact would have on the blacks themselves and the rule of law, not including the food supply to all the other countries in Southern Africa who relied on the South African grain basket, if divestment became a reality, went sailing out the window. So now, as we all know with uncle Nelson free and the majority ruling - AIDs and starvation and crime runs rampant. What I was saying, in effect, was that the collapse of colonial rule was premature – that instead of divestment, the opposite should take place . With investment increased, it would accelerate education and industrial development and give Africa a sound base of her own craftsmen and technologists - with a real chance to stand on her feet when majority rule came. Obviously that argument fell on deaf ears.

 

The social history of colonization goes hand in hand with our Christian culture’s missionary zeal to spread the Christ doctrine and in the process, stamp our indigenous belif systems. Thus, in a very real way our religion is directly responsible for much of the bitterness that colors race relations today and why so many expatriate Africans are turning to Islam for spiritual support

 

Okay, so now to that ancient ominous anti-Christ prediction. The eerie similarities between the prediction and what subsequently occurred – and how that relates to colonization - is hard to refute.

 

The Book of Revelations is believed to be the apocalyptic visions of the Apostle John, author of the 4th Gospel in the New Testament. He is said to have experienced the visions in a cave on the island of Patmos where he had been exiled by the order of the Roman Emperor Domitian in 95 C.E. The passage below predicts the rise, the deceptions and the idolatry of the Anti-Christ as a world dictator.

 

We have seen the devil and he lives within

 

"The Beast whom rose out of the sea...he had two horns like a lamb.….and he doeth great wonders.. and deceiveth them that dwell on the earth by means of great miracles saying to them that they should make an image of the Beast which had the wound by a sword and did live and cause that as many who would not worship the image of the Beast would be damned…and he causeth all, both small and great both rich and poor, free and bond to receive a mark on their foreheads." REVELATIONS 13: 11-16

And so the prophecies were fulfilled:

 

"The Beast rose from the sea …. bearing the sign of the lamb…"

 

We came from the sea with our ship's sails and our crusading banners emblazoned with the sign of the cross, representing the Lamb of God – and we came not in search of truth but in search of gold and more land. We excused our invader's lust by labeling those we robbed and put to the sword, as heathens and savages, not worthy to be children of God.

 

"….who deceive them that dwell on the earth by means of miracles…."

 

The conquered people were awed by the miracles of our superior technology, which undermined their faith in themselves and their view of God, and so they adopted our ways and our view of God and shamed themselves by dishonoring the faith and beliefs of their own forefathers.

 

"….who made an image of the Beast …who had the wound of the sword and did live…."

 

We made effigies of the wounded Christ suffering on the cross and proclaimed how he was resurrected from the dead and planted those ideas and idols all around the world.

 

"….as many as would not worship the Beast be dammed…"

 

We preached that Christ was God and those who did not believe in his divinity would suffer in hell for eternity.

 

"…that all people high and low, rich and poor, would receive the mark of the beast on their foreheads"

 

The baptismal sign of the cross symbolically made on our foreheads during Christening (with the threat that if this was not done, and the babe died, it would be lost forever in the void, twixt heaven and hell.)

 

The facts at hand reveal that the predictions of St. John have come true to the letter. The anti-Christ is alive and well and has been living among us for centuries – side by side with the true Christ. We have finally seen His deceptive evilness and the time has come for us to cast him back into the hell from which he came.

 

The "Holy" crusades and the torture chambers of the Inquisitions and the tens of millions who have died in Christian turf wars aside, no history of mankind's total anti-Christian disregard for the central tenet of the New Testament: "Love your neighbor as you would yourself" provides clearer evidence of the world-wide presence and domination of the anti-Christ than the bloody history of our search for a sea-route that would allow Christian nations access to the riches of the East – and in that process of discovery occupy by force new lands, and set about systematically looting, murdering, infecting, enslaving and destroying each and everyone of the indigenous cultures of the world – all in the name of Christ.

 

 

So this is the bad of colonialism side that most alude to and which has been duplicated in Australasia and the Americas. And up until that time we all see it and admit to it and accept the damage that it did to the blackman’s psyche, and continues to hurt him to this day, and we publicly admit it, (before the United Nations) and ask for forgiveness and then make adequate retribution, the colonial issue and bad race relations will never be resolved.

 

I will wait for comments ion this, and then post what I believe to be the positive side of that whole sorry colonial history.

[Eclogite]

It is my perception that you wish to preach rather than discuss. Good luck with that.

[MagnetMan]

It is my perception that you wish to preach rather than discuss. Good luck with that.

When you get to my age it is hard to distinquish between the two. Obviously you don't like the dark side of colonialism. The good news comes last. In the meantime, I will take all the luck I and Africa can get and keep preac....er discussing. (excuse the Freudian slip)

[Boerseun]

MagnetMan, I have to say that you're taking quite a novel approach to Revelation!

However, the parallels you draw between Colonialism and Revelation, is, in my mind, completely coincidental and the product of only one perspective on the matter.

I believe, on the other hand, that the Book of Revelation is as much bunk as the rest of the Good Book, and is resonant with many other ancient non-Christian Apocalyptic prophecies. It might be a pagan tradition that got assimilated in Christianity when the first Bible to include Revelation was compiled. To draw any truths from that regarding anything might be a little presumptious.

If the offspring of African slaves are trading in Christianity for Islam, I can't say that they are making any vertical progress - this is just a horisontal shift from one delusion to another. This is not the place to say or even insinuate that the Christian take is right.

 

Interesting take on Colonialism, though - it might indeed be a function of overpopulation in the Mother Countries. David Attenborough have shown how chimps have an almost irresistable urge to shag strangers (strange chimps, that is). What would make strangers so alluring and irresistable to an amourous ape? Seems its an evolutionary thing, whereby individuals from geographically remote pockets of a species are drawn to each other for the purpose of sharing infections, bettering the gene pool, etc. That might be part of the allure of travel. Foreigners. Quickies! With strangers!

And I think it might actually even have something to do with Colonialism!

[Webbly]

I'm happy to let ideas unfold here and, honestly, know too little for serious comment, though the stupendous overview being attempted has my devout attention.

 

Juxtaposing Christ's brief impromptu with the Anti-Christ's perrenial Juggernaut reminds me of something I find perplexing. Raised Christian I acquired agnosticism with puberty (but wouldn't be too shrill about it). That said, I am fascinated by the apparent naive preachings from (a possible person known as) Christ - if not all the 'messiahs.'

 

How do such gentle and essentially pure ideas propagate to survive the barbarity and dishonesty that is our past? Religion is a great organiser but, if you strip it away, what really captivates people are noble ideas, or ideals. (Why?)

 

Oh, and Boerseun, thanks for putting your finger on it. Till now I dimly sensed there were additional reasons I married an Asian :0

[MagnetMan]

I am fascinated by the apparent naive preachings from (a possible person known as) Christ - if not all the 'messiahs.'

 

How do such gentle and essentially pure ideas propagate to survive the barbarity and dishonesty that is our past? Religion is a great organiser but, if you strip it away, what really captivates people are noble ideas, or ideals. (Why?)

 

It is not organized religion that propagates pure ideas and helps them to survive, but serious individuals, who, when confronted by the obstacles and barbarities of life, search dilligently inside themselves and come up with the same truthful answers. Thus the originator is revered and called a messiah. Organized religion muscles in on that universal Truth, deifies the originator, scambles the simple message with convoluted theological argument and gains power by self appointment and dire threat.

[Webbly]

I know we are 'hard-wired' to see patterns in the noise, and have no trouble making coincidences fit slim facts, but I'll grant you for now an ingenious explanation prophesying colonialism.

 

Remarking, also, that while most such attempts to fit forebodings to future events go clean over my head, this one makes me shiver a little. Give such thoughts an inch and they take a mile in the imagination. But then, the alternative, in our abject ignorance, is to simply deny all.

 

Where's the fun in that?

 

Do continue, I seem to be the one hand clapping.

[MagnetMan]

I'll grant you for now an ingenious explanation prophesying colonialism.

 

Remarking, also, that while most such attempts to fit forebodings to future events go clean over my head, this one makes me shiver a little. Give such thoughts an inch and they take a mile in the imagination. But then, the alternative, in our abject ignorance, is to simply deny all.

 

Where's the fun in that?

 

Do continue, I seem to be the one hand clapping.

 

A change of consciousness usually comes via a shocking revelation. Am glad you saw the eerie way that old prophecy seemed to unfold. But no need to shiver too much. The anti-Christ, real as He may be, is still just a childish bogeyman in the Christian closset. When we shine a light on him. all he is is a reflection of our darker side. The brighter side is the true Christ - the being who really represents our culture. But I am jumping my own gun here. I am hoping to have more discussions on the negative side of colonilaism before we examine all the good we did.

[Webbly]

Okay

 

Define colonialism for the purpose of this thread. Are we talking primarily about Europeans in the last 600 years, or most every migration since our ancestors stood upright?

 

The focus appears to be the former.

 

Other than "US Imperialism," of the last 100 years - openly berated by Communist Chinese forty years ago - the European push is the most significant and recent, and there seems a long wagging of a colonial tail. To quote an acerbic Inga Clendinnen: "Recently we have been extending the reach of democracy [in Iraq] by killing people in the hope that the survivors might get to vote."

 

Not to mention (so I will) the tremendous amount of commercial activity still protecting assets and resources for "the haves" who, when I last looked at the contents of my home, are doing far too well, thank you very much.

[MagnetMan]

Okay

 

Define colonialism for the purpose of this thread. Are we talking primarily about Europeans in the last 600 years, or most every migration since our ancestors stood upright?

 

The focus appears to be the former.

 

Colonialism is a dirty word today. All university students are made to think so. Whites in South Africa ended up as the final scape goats, blamed by fellow colonials who themselves commited the same and in cases even worse racial atrocities. That hypocracy has got to be cleared up - for scape-goating does not automatically wash everubody else clean - especially in America where so many of the slaves ended up and where Red Indian cultures were smashed. Black rule in South Africa has not made the problem of race relations dispappear. It continues to simmer below the surface all over the globe. Every now and then cities burn and planes fly into buildings.

 

The view that colonization was a bad mistake, could not be more wrong. The whole idea of how human consciousness evolved has to be revised in order to get the last 600 years into proper perspective. That is what I have reaerached for the past thirty years, around the globe, and put down in my book on Psyche-Genetics. My argument is that the sooner we institute a more holistic teaching about the way humans have developed since the year dot - and show the logical sequence of wevolutionary imperatives that have led us to the present - the quicker will race and international relations heal. We have to find some solid ground to work out those pressing problems.

 

Right now 200 milllion expatraite Africans, living in impoverished conditions in the poorest areas of white cities around the globe, Red Indians in the reservations and starving nations in Africa, feel justified in their grieviences against whites. By simply agreeing with them, and not doing a whole lot more than we presently are in making reparations, as wella as revising our history, the situation can only get worse. Indigenopus cultures certainly suffered under colonilaiism and they certainly do have a lot to be bitter about - but they are only getting a truncated view of the whole story.

 

As this thread progressed I am hoping to get the whole story accross. But too many are arguing that there is no problem to fix, which I find astonishing. What is the point of saying what is right, if nobody thinks anything is wrong?

So I am waiting for more questions (or rationalized objections that i can understand) so as to get a feel of how much interst there really is in this subject. Race relations concerns us all - and colonialism holds the key to a full understanding of it..

[Eclogite]

But too many are arguing that there is no problem to fix, which I find astonishing. What is the point of saying what is right, if nobody thinks anything is wrong?

I think you need to revisit every contrary post in this thread. I see no one denying problems of conflicts between races, religions, cultures and nations. I see several people questioning the importance, indeed postulated dominance, of colonialism in generating such hostilities.

If you have spent thirty years researching this you will naturally have a strong bias to believing your view is correct. Might this now blind you to alternate views expressed by others whose interpretation of history is different?

[Webbly]

I'll admit some difficulty warming to the thread exactly as titled, which is why I haven't attacked colonialism (yet!) - plus more than slightly suspicious M'Man is gonna spring some heavy contrary positions on if I do.

 

Eclogite's got it - no one’s denying the problems and we haven't the heart to lump it all on colonialism, even if it's the most prominent candidate.

 

It might help if MM plays devil's advocate to kick things along.

 

[PS: This is what I like. A nice relaxing quiet forum after ten hours enduring the madhouse bunfight that is my company workplace]