No, western culture doesn't hold the monopoly on historical crimes against humanity - it's time for the rest of the world to come down off their high horses to finally acknowledge their own atrocities
You capture the Western society guilt complex perfectly. It is guilt assumed that is not deserved.
When global society was more tribal, several hundred years ago, we operated more using our limbic emotional responses based on basic survival needs. Now that societies have evolved from survival to stable living standards with more than adequate food and shelter, our perceptions have moved to, the far more contemplative and analytical, frontal lobes. Protections to free speech and individual property rights became paramount. Thoughts nearly unknown 1,000 years ago. This evolution began when the Dutch began to reclaim land from the sea, a truly inventive activity, and became the US Constitution after long development.
Those today who feel guilty of behavior by ancestors do not have a sense of how far humanity, and themselves as part, have traveled in our perceptions of others. That some feel guilt should be a trigger to see themselves as very different between themselves and their ancestors. They should not feel guilty. They should be proud to recognize they recognize the differences.
As always, an excellent essay Lily. You always manage to make me see things in a more rounded way. I have just started reading Hidden History, the secret origins of the first World War, an excellent book btw, and makes you question the British Empire, but we were not the first empire and won't be the last, and we today are not responsible for their actions.
My stomach was in knots by the time I finished reading this. It touches on one of the biggest issues I experienced in the recent decade or two. I am sorry tired of reading about everyone saying they are "sorry" for this and "sorry" for that. The BBC in particular appears to publish some crap about slavery and descendants of slavers or people who made their money from the slave trade, on a routine basis. Its young and now highly diverse reporters seize on the topic with relish and their reporting style lets you know right away how much they enjoy their opportunity to document the white guilt. I try to mentally switch off each and every time I see some (usually left wing social liberal progressive) weeping, bleating person bemoan various historical injustices. The call for reparations is a topic that I sincerely hope doesn't come to fruition in these currently disunited States. My family came from the working class and had nothing to do with slavery and I will not be a happy , or peaceful, camper if my taxes or my children's taxes (currently being wasted to large extent) are redirected to pay reparations to folks living today who dont deserve it.
Personally I think the Japanese have done well refusing to apologize for their terrible treatment of POWs (and especially the Chinese) during WW2 and their period of Manchurian expansion. Not that I wouldn't have quite happily personally shot all Japanese prison guard officers proven to have tortured prisoners immediately post war, but at some point these human failings need to be put into historical perspective.
The human race do bad things to each other, irrespective of race or creed, to a greater or lessor extent. I note some commenter mentions how far we have come over time as a race but I am not really sure we have changed that much. We just have a thicker veneer masking our violent side, one that will slough off quite quickly in the right circumstances. We have seen this in modern times in Kosovo, Rwanda and in Israel/Gaza this very day. At the moment the pendulum has swung to the farthest it can in one direction and I believe the oscillation is about to change.
The study will help all of us understand many aspects of what we are experiencing, including treatments that people have tried.
The study is a collaboration between React19 and the University of Maryland, Baltimore. We plan to publish the results in top research journals and through our platforms.
Many have already joined and interesting patterns have already started to come out.
However we need all your contributions to send a clear message through the scientific community! You can truly make the difference if you participate.
You do not have to take the survey in one sitting. You can start the survey and save your progress so that you can continue when you prefer.
Feel free to send us an email if you have any questions.
#Vaccinelnjuries #CovidVaccine
Thank you so much for helping to gather this knowledge!!!!
You capture the Western society guilt complex perfectly. It is guilt assumed that is not deserved.
When global society was more tribal, several hundred years ago, we operated more using our limbic emotional responses based on basic survival needs. Now that societies have evolved from survival to stable living standards with more than adequate food and shelter, our perceptions have moved to, the far more contemplative and analytical, frontal lobes. Protections to free speech and individual property rights became paramount. Thoughts nearly unknown 1,000 years ago. This evolution began when the Dutch began to reclaim land from the sea, a truly inventive activity, and became the US Constitution after long development.
Those today who feel guilty of behavior by ancestors do not have a sense of how far humanity, and themselves as part, have traveled in our perceptions of others. That some feel guilt should be a trigger to see themselves as very different between themselves and their ancestors. They should not feel guilty. They should be proud to recognize they recognize the differences.
As always, an excellent essay Lily. You always manage to make me see things in a more rounded way. I have just started reading Hidden History, the secret origins of the first World War, an excellent book btw, and makes you question the British Empire, but we were not the first empire and won't be the last, and we today are not responsible for their actions.
My stomach was in knots by the time I finished reading this. It touches on one of the biggest issues I experienced in the recent decade or two. I am sorry tired of reading about everyone saying they are "sorry" for this and "sorry" for that. The BBC in particular appears to publish some crap about slavery and descendants of slavers or people who made their money from the slave trade, on a routine basis. Its young and now highly diverse reporters seize on the topic with relish and their reporting style lets you know right away how much they enjoy their opportunity to document the white guilt. I try to mentally switch off each and every time I see some (usually left wing social liberal progressive) weeping, bleating person bemoan various historical injustices. The call for reparations is a topic that I sincerely hope doesn't come to fruition in these currently disunited States. My family came from the working class and had nothing to do with slavery and I will not be a happy , or peaceful, camper if my taxes or my children's taxes (currently being wasted to large extent) are redirected to pay reparations to folks living today who dont deserve it.
Personally I think the Japanese have done well refusing to apologize for their terrible treatment of POWs (and especially the Chinese) during WW2 and their period of Manchurian expansion. Not that I wouldn't have quite happily personally shot all Japanese prison guard officers proven to have tortured prisoners immediately post war, but at some point these human failings need to be put into historical perspective.
The human race do bad things to each other, irrespective of race or creed, to a greater or lessor extent. I note some commenter mentions how far we have come over time as a race but I am not really sure we have changed that much. We just have a thicker veneer masking our violent side, one that will slough off quite quickly in the right circumstances. We have seen this in modern times in Kosovo, Rwanda and in Israel/Gaza this very day. At the moment the pendulum has swung to the farthest it can in one direction and I believe the oscillation is about to change.
Hi Everyone - REACT19 is a non-profit dedicated to helping the vaccine injured get treatment.
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Recruitment is now OPEN for REACT’s patient-led research collaboration:
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react19.org/study.
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The study will help all of us understand many aspects of what we are experiencing, including treatments that people have tried.
The study is a collaboration between React19 and the University of Maryland, Baltimore. We plan to publish the results in top research journals and through our platforms.
Many have already joined and interesting patterns have already started to come out.
However we need all your contributions to send a clear message through the scientific community! You can truly make the difference if you participate.
You do not have to take the survey in one sitting. You can start the survey and save your progress so that you can continue when you prefer.
Feel free to send us an email if you have any questions.
#Vaccinelnjuries #CovidVaccine
Thank you so much for helping to gather this knowledge!!!!
Take good care of yourselves, and be well.
Elizabeth
Do people go into pretzel formation about the formation of Pakistan ? More deaths and more displacement but also in 1948.