Save poor Denmark
So missionaries from the Third World are coming to Europe to convert the heathen to Christianity. Very droll.
Denmark is a wealthy nation of 5.5 million people that always scores near the top of surveys of the world’s happiest nations. To Johansen, the problem is clear: “We’re just too well-off in Europe.”…Johansen’s work takes him all over the world, he said, and he has noticed much stronger religious faith in poorer societies…”We’re basically rich and spoiled.”
So…religious ‘faith’ correlates with poverty and the absence of it correlates with prosperity and happiness – and that’s a problem for the people who are prosperous and happy? I wonder if it occurs to Johansen that one could interpret the correlation in another way – that poor people need the consolations of ‘faith’ more than prosperous and happy people do, and that the absence of ‘faith’ is not in fact a problem at all.
Clearly, I’m way too prosperous and happy to seek out a deific friend. Oh for a steep stock market crash and a nasty depression! Those might save my benighted atheistic scientistic rationalist materialist superficial soul.
Gimme dat ol’ time relijun! Too much clear thought in this world.
O.B. you could make the same correlation between white and brown nations,although it would be no more valid than the religious one.
Richard,
so how would you categorise certain of the Gulf states?
light-brown?
off-white with lowlights?
mochalattes?
They’re certainly far richer than, ooh, an INCREDIBLY white country like, say, Poland, now aren’t they?
(N.B. all the countries I’m talking ’bout are packed full of rigorous supernaturalists…)
Speaking of missionaries, I wonder how many folk new that (Australian) Ken Hamm’s load of fundie loons – Answers in Genesis – have quite regular missions to the UK (amongst other places). Last time I was in their HQ, Glasgow was mentioned as one place they’d been targeting…
But what can ye expect from Weegies, eh?
;-)
(says the man from Edinburgh, originally)
Lang may yer lum reek! Wi’ither folks coal!.
May the best ye hae ivver seen be the warst ye’ll ivver see.
May the moose ne’er lea’ yer girnal wi a tear-drap in its ee.
May ye aye keep hail an hertie till ye’r auld eneuch tae dee.
May ye aye juist be sae happie as A wuss ye aye tae be.
Slàinte maith,
Andy I did say it was invalid for comparisoon as is using religion!
What it DOES correlate with is the sayings of the ghastly Albanian dwarf in Calcutta, about “suffering bein good for the soul” – or some such crap.
Or certain preachers in the USA who claim that the present” sufferings” of the US, including the 11/9/2001 attacks, are “Ghad’s punishments for [ insert favourd sin here ]”
G.T. I ould agree with that but that is a long way from answering why the 1st world is rich and the 3rd world poor!
Less corruption.
The Enlightenment.
The scientific method.
The Classical and Alexandrine scholls of philosophy.
The battle of Salamis. (Not Marathon)
Finally got round to reading this story and jesus fucking christ, the missionaries are from S’pore! The aspirational middle classes here got the charismatic/evangelical christianity bug in a big way over the last two decades and lots of traditional christians left their anglican and catholic churches for the new mega churches with their huge auditoriums, rockin’ music bands and pastors with celebrity profiles (and the unabashed luxury lifestyle that went with it). None of that old-style austere, do-good christianity seems attractive to people nowadays. By contrast, the people turning or returning to buddhism often opt for a personalised, traditional version that is strong on charity and quite mellow.
Anyhow, I am just glad that some of these crazy jokers have left the country- our gain, Denmark’s loss!
Richard
If you want to know much of the answer to your question, then I suggest a little study of the past 200 years (or so) might help?
Maybe start with the British Empire? Or how about the European scramble for African colonies?
Plenty of fun for all the family!
And Tingey’s list missed out industrial-scale armaments, for starters…
:-)
Oh dear Mr Gilmour, fallen for the fashionable-lefts’ “explanations” have we?
Look, the philosophical/”moral” fouindations of Europe were laid by the calssical and post-classical Greeks.
But they did not have the counterintuitive “scientific method”.
Much later, experimentation and pragmatism coupled up.
A significant move, which I missed was the foundation of the world’s first national scientific body – The Royal Society, founded 1660.
Not so much the “British Empire, in the 19th century sense, but how about those yoyages of discovery, privately/publicly funded, which got people like Sir Joseph Banks and his team discovering things?
And the first half of the Industrial revolution, during the period 1715-1792, where the foundations for the one everyone knows about were laid.
Armaments came AFTER the other inventions, like the spinning jenny, the Boulton-and-Watt engines, and water (later stem) powered hammers for inronworking.
I believe there is section of this site devoted to fashionable nosesnse.
I vote that Mr. Glimour’s comment be sent there.
After all, one was born in 1769 – dfied 1821, the other lived 1781 – 1848.
The first was the son of minor nobility, and is intensively studied in history.
The second was a poor miner’s son.
The second changed the world for ever, whereas the first’s legacy was transitory, though not yet completely vanished.
Perhaps Mr Gilmour, or someone can guess whom I’m talking about?
Sorry G. Tingey, the West military superiority since the early days of the Greek civilization is a historical fact. I agree that this superiority was at least as much due to tactics and, how can I say, a VERY different state of mind when it came to warfare as actual modern weapons but the results are here for all to see: since the battle of Poitier the west has never been really been under threat of invasion from other parts of the world. (The only exception I can think of would be Japan in the 40s, but it’s hugely debatable).
Basicaly we have always been very good at killing people and winning wars. You yourself listed the Battle of Salamis.
That’s what permitted us to concentrate on warfare among ourselves (much more conductive to progress) in our little fortress of a continent and on bringing the shiploads of cheap resources and precious metals (not to mention cheap labour in the new world) without which the Industrial Revolution would not have happened.
Ah, the West’s military superiority since the Greeks.
Uh?
So, the Roman Empire wasn’t defeated and invaded by the Huns/Vandals/Goths etc?
And the armies of the various Khans (Olughai’s got the furthest, I think) never made it to as far West as central Bohemia, or central Hungary?
And the Crusades were so sucessful, that the christian states founded after the first crusade lasted – how long?
And the Ottoman Empire didn’t make it to the gates of Vienna (twice)?
I listed Salamis, because it ensured that the classical Greek outlook survived.
If Salamis had been lost, the Persians would have taken over the whole of the E. Mediterranean, with no transmission of Greek culture to Alexandria or Rome.
Warfare is NOT conducive to industrial progress – another popular myth.
Look, of the two people I listed above, one, the son of the minor nobility – was Buonaparte, who trained as a gunner.
Yet British guns were superior to French, throughout the wars of 1792-1815, because of the peaceful industrial advances the Brits had made, for their own use, before that conflict began.
BTW – has anyone yet worked out who the other one was – the miner’s son, born, 1781?
OB – glad you finally got to this story, which I thought would surely amuse you. But the best part to me is the American Ambassador, who seems to think he is an ambassador from Christiania, a kingdom of believers.
He is not alone in the Bush administration in that belief.
George Stephenson (1781-1848) any good?
“We swear by the Southern Cross to stand truly by each other and fight to defend our rights and liberties” we also will stand to joy and fight to defend.
Patrick Lalor who led the miner’s revolt. Any good?
Dear Tingey, G., your crit of my comments is, well, pointless, since I’m not basing my argument on anything “fashionable”, rather, er, the application of fairly basic economics. Nor was I saying that you were “wrong”…just offering another, slightly more materialist side, shall we say?
Simple principle, used for millenia, we did it too, works like a charm if you can get the balance right-
Annexe foreign country, strip valuable raw materials/assets/population/whatever yer after from said country for far below anything resembling a market price, use this to increase your advantage over local rivals.
I know, over-simplification, but it stands up pretty well as a basic model.
Perhaps the key difference between the European colonies was one of degree of brutality used in ensuring the natives’ co-operation…Belgian Congo, anyone? We British seemed to be awfully good at persuading the poor folks that we were, in fact, uplifting and improving them, for which they should be endlessly grateful. Which we did, of course, but only to the extent that they could keep the system going for us. Until it all finally went tits up when they twigged the con… :-)
Anyway, Monsieur Tingey might be interested that there’s a very good case for the birth of modern, organised (factory-style) Western capitalist endeavour being in the *cough* munition/armaments works *cough* of Venice…long before 1715!
And whereas warfare may play havoc with consumer-demand-orientated DOMESTIC industry, it’s pretty good for technological/scientific/military industrial development – much of which then carries over into the domestic sphere (eg. Radar, Jet engines, etc,etc)
“fashionable nonsense”? er…no.
Finally, if G.T.’s going to come over all condescending, they could at least try to get the apostrophe in the right place, huh?
[They wrote: fashionable lefts’ “explanations” ]
Unless, of course, there are a plethora of “lefts”, (all fashionable, naturally), of which I was unforgivably unaware, although simultaneously being somehow in their thrall…?
C’mon G.T., ya know I’m far too addicted to Hume to go for anything like that!
“The wise man proportions his belief according to the evidence” etc,etc,etc
roger, yes, thanks for the link – I thanked you very belatedly on the thread where you posted it.
The Ambassador from Christiania – has a nice ring to it, doesn’t it…
So third world poverty is whiteys fault Andy?
That logic dosnt hold up we stuck it to the Irish for centuries look at Ireland today!
Yeah, I once worked in Tyseley Railway Museum Birmingham. As part of the job I went with other colleagues to various schools around spaghetti junction. We showed the primary school children mini-films concerning locomotives. They did not even know the meaning of coal. We had to show them samples.
I did not subsequently enjoy telling them about the Navvies. Whose mammoth input helped build the British railway structure? The Irish navvies were not depicted too satisfactorily by the texts from which we were given. They were on a par with Neanderthals. I did not then have the wherewithal to articulate my angst. But, nevertheless
in saying this I always somehow cleverly manage to sabotage discussions by some cunning diversion or other whenever possible.
The British railway system expanded exponentially during the nineteenth century. Its construction required an entire new workforce: in 1845 there were 200,000 men building 3,000 miles of new railway line. The navvies (shortened from ‘navigators’, the canal-builders of the eighteenth century) building the railways came from across the British Isles. One third were Irish, seeking escape from famine…[M]any Irish navvies sent their earnings home while the Scottish and English lavished their wages on alcohol.
The Railway Navvy: ‘That Despicable Race of Men’, (1984).
The industrial South does however acknowledge the Irish Navvies supremacy in the East and West Lowlands of Scotland. Route miles in Scotland would nevertheless be far fewer than in England.
So much then for ‘Paddy on the Railway’
Paddy on the railway
Picking up stones;
Along came an engine
And broke Paddy’s bones.
Oh, said Paddy,
That’s not fair.
Pooh, said the engine driver,
I don’t care.
Oh, said the Indian, I don’t care
Oh, said Paddy that’s not fair. Is another version I remember.
Oops! Am way off topic.
No, Richard, of course it isn’t as simple as that, but if you’re going to ignore the effects of centuries of colonial history, and simply brush them away with an “apples and oranges” comparison with Ireland, then more fool you.
(For an excellent mini-analysis on the Irish “economic miracle”, and the key role of US multinationals, see here:
http://angrybear.blogspot.com/2005/12/irish-economic-miracle-and-tax-policy.html
)
Yeh, corruption seems to be rife in a lot of these places – but then, how about cash for peerages, and BAE & the Saudis, f’rinstance? We’re not exactly “white as snow”, now are we? And if you’ve spent decades learning the art of theft and oppression from your colonial masters (weren’t the Portuguese sooo nice out east?), it’s always going to be a hard task to remove it once it’s become endemic. It’s always useful to look at the administrative structures that were left behind (or lack of them).
Again, I’m not excusing dictators like Mugabe – but how did he come to have the opportunity? What was our role, if any, in making him possible (cf. USA & Noriega)?
Also, in which regions/countries did we entertain ourselves by encouraging & funding/profiting from arms sales during a series of “low-intensity conflicts” as part of the Cold War?
Returning to my (fairly boring) previous theme about the economics of colonial acquisition, Ireland is actually a great early example, with records of English terror that the attempted takeover by Edward Bruce (1315-1318) would cut off the grain supplies that were vital to the English economy. And if Mr. Tingey (or anyone else, would like some stats, etc, on the importance of largely slave-based colonial imports/trade to the GB economy, then I heartily recommend “The British in the Americas, 1480-1815” by A. McFarlane. I’d quote a few passages about the West Indies, etc, but I can’t, ‘cos the baby is sleeping at this moment, with his cot right beside the relevant bookcase. Which is probably a good thing, because it’s a pretty dull book, unfortunately.
Ah well. G.T. will probably abuse me roundly after all that, but who cares? :-)
Hopefully I’ve killed this thread by the sheer dullness of this post alone!
So the answer to my question is yes Andy,sorry I dont buy this white guilt stuff! the empire was long ago enough for these people to sink or swim on their own merit,you dont help them by giving them a built in excuse for failing.
Yes, but the cash-for-peerages, ans Saudi arms deals are felt to be disgraceful, and stopped.
I didn’t say that we had no corruption – the difference is that it is not “normal” here, and is frowned on, and usually illegal, and the laws are usually enforced.
Oh dear, not “its-all-the-long-gone-evil-white-colnialists-fault” AGAIN!
Look at Ghana – thriving and prosperous when the Brits left. Kwame Nkrumah & his mates then stole everything …
Or Nigeria, which has got to the point where even the OIL COMPANIES are thinking of abandining it, because none oif the money they’e spent over the years has gone to the Nigerian people – their “government” has stolen the lot.
etc ad nauseam …
Ah, the slave trade – the Brits got into an existing trading system, and expanded it, as did the other European countries that were in a position to do so. But, Mr. Gilmour, who got out of it first? And who urged others to get out of it? And who kept the slave trade going for longest – the answer to the last is the E-coast-of Africa trading Arabs, of course.
I never claimed that “we” were pure, or “holy” just that we were probably (a lot) less nasty than the others.
Erm – I’ve just noticed – one of my intermediate posts on this thread has vanished – where did it go to?
( The one that mentioned Geordie Stephenson, that provoked Ms. O’Loughlin’s magnificent post ?)
Which reminds me – about technical progress, and enlightenment …
Here is a poem, written by Erasmus Darwin, grandfather of Chrles, in 1791 (!)
Soon shall thy arm, Unconquer’d STEAM! afar
Drag the slow barge, or drive the rapid car;
Or on wide-waving wings expanded bear
The flying-chariot through the fields of air.
Fair crews triumphant, leaning from above,
Shall wave their fluttering kerchiefs as they move
Or warrior bands alarm the gaping crowd
And armies shrink beneath the shadowy cloud.
Cahnging subject completely
Sorry –
And STILL full of typos, and mis-postings of lines inside the message – obviously not enough coffee inside the system yet!
G.T.
Thanks for making this a rational debate, as opposed to Richard, who offers, er..nothing. But then, given the nature of most of his posts, I ain’t too surprised.
Ok, this is my last post on this one, but I’ll try to address as much as possible:
Slavery – yes, we were first out, but we then acquired further colonies – partly for good by helping to eradicate slave trade, but also for economic advantage/profit/ripping-off the locals. Also, you can’t ignore the advantage that had ALREADY been gained, and the colonial trade which had massively boosted the Industrial Revolution.
BAE deal with Saudi Arabia – er..we stunningly cleared ourselves of any naughtiness, so no laws enforced there!
Nor should we forget such joys as Mrs T. and the Pergau dam aid financing.
You said:
“Oh dear, not “its-all-the-long-gone-evil-white-colnialists-fault” AGAIN!”
If you look, you’ll find I never said that, so feel free to retract it. :-)
Colonial misrule & economic theft of resources – and again, you might have noticed I gave examples of nations (Belgium, Portugal, but let’s not forget the French & Germans) who were significantly more oppressive/horrendous than we were – cannot be denied as factors in the current situation. Niall Ferguson’s book was well-written, but didn’t tell the whole story, now did it?
Do you seriously want to discuss the role of western oil companies in Africa? Shell never helped to prop up the Abacha regime, now did they? Only forced to clean up their act after Ken Saro-wiwa was murdered. BP was forced to disclose a $111m “signature bonus” paid to the government of Angola in 2001. Elf Aquitaine in the Gabon… and Bush ‘n’ Blair have refused to back legislation to make publication of payments to govts mandatory. None of that supports your case very well.
Finally, since you didn’t answer my point about the “colonialism-by-stealth” and de-stabilisation tactics that were in operation during the cold war, nor the one about western interests assisting dictators, here are a few bits and pieces:
CIA in Angola, by the man who did it:
http://www.serendipity.li/cia/stock1.html
Kissinger’s 1969 National Security Memorandum 39 on southern africa “The whites are here to stay and the only way that constructive change can come about is through them.” This lead, amongst other fun, to the US supporting UNITA in Angola.
Mobuto Sese Seko, dictator of Zaire, and good friend of America until 1990…again, aimed mostly against Angola.
“Dropping Bongo. (Western government must stop backing African dictators; Omar Bongo of Gabon) (editorial)
Economist (US), The, June, 1990″
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_hb5037/is_199006/ai_n18314732
And for anyone seeking an academic overview:
“Africa Since Independence: A Comparative History” by Paul Nugent
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Africa-Since-Independence-Comparative-History/dp/0333682734/ref=pd_bowtega_1/203-0652219-0659908?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1182345731&sr=1-1
And that’s all from me folks, thankfully.
oooh..forgot to mention –
Nkrumah took cash from both the USSR and the West to aid his regime…
and then there’s the CIA-sponsored overthrow & assassination of Patrice Lumumba, democratically-elected leader of Congo in 1960…by the previously mentioned Mobutu
sorry!
:-)
Andy I dont need to spend a hundred words to tell you that your veiw of history amounts to blame whitey!anyway it would only duplicate without the eloquence what Mr Tingey has already said.
Did he say “eloquence”?