I’ve been thinking about this, and I think one of the factors is inter-generational wealth transfer.
If you look, here in the Netherlands, many of the families that made out like bandits in the slave trade and colonial exploitation are still very wealthy and influential. That results in an incentive, baked into the economic tissue of the country, to continue to ignore these topics.
I could be wrong, but my impression is that this is also true for England, but to a (much) higher degree than over here.
The Netherlands and Britain share a colonial history. In fact they became adversaries in a corporate sense, fighting over the spoils in many wars and areas, e.g. Boer war. It’s a commonly held view that Britain has one of the worst colonial records for widespread cruelty to indigenous people but no European power comes out looking great. Both countries seem unable to properly move on from that era. The institutions of oppression remain in place like vestigial organs e.g. royal families alive and well. The British just built a new aircraft carrier. You don’t need one of these to defend an island, it’s an offensive weapon and another vestige of the colonial mindset that lives like a disease in the hearts of the British.
Perhaps they were making the point that it’s not informative to talk about colonial history from an isolated standpoint or apply contemporary ethics to historical events. The Netherlands history is the UK context and vice versa.
How does the UK factor into this story and how is it relevant?
Not the person you’re replying to, but I’ve lived in both the Netherlands and the UK.
My experience is that the UK is far more in denial about the crimes of empire than the Netherlands.
Most European countries have a shameful colonial history. Many haven’t fully come to terms with it.
No… they haven’t. Colonialism is not the past… it’s the present. And the Netherlands still benefit from it to this very day.
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I’ve been thinking about this, and I think one of the factors is inter-generational wealth transfer.
If you look, here in the Netherlands, many of the families that made out like bandits in the slave trade and colonial exploitation are still very wealthy and influential. That results in an incentive, baked into the economic tissue of the country, to continue to ignore these topics.
I could be wrong, but my impression is that this is also true for England, but to a (much) higher degree than over here.
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The Netherlands and Britain share a colonial history. In fact they became adversaries in a corporate sense, fighting over the spoils in many wars and areas, e.g. Boer war. It’s a commonly held view that Britain has one of the worst colonial records for widespread cruelty to indigenous people but no European power comes out looking great. Both countries seem unable to properly move on from that era. The institutions of oppression remain in place like vestigial organs e.g. royal families alive and well. The British just built a new aircraft carrier. You don’t need one of these to defend an island, it’s an offensive weapon and another vestige of the colonial mindset that lives like a disease in the hearts of the British.
I know all that.
But what about this makes it a “crappy story”, besides the fact that it’s not about Britain?
Perhaps they were making the point that it’s not informative to talk about colonial history from an isolated standpoint or apply contemporary ethics to historical events. The Netherlands history is the UK context and vice versa.