Do you mean we're being singled out for just using one race for slavery? But it's okay if you use a different number of races for slavery?
No, it's singled out because it created a class of human beings who were inherently regarded as property, it's the logic that starts with the doctrine of discovery and ends with the Zong.
Re slavery only being abolished when it had ceased to be profitable. Really? I understand the UK paid 40% of its annual budget to compensate slave owners when the law passed.
Would it really have been that much if they were worthless?
This is one of those 'hide the ball under the cup' tricks beloved of apologists for colonialism. Yes, it had ceased to be profitable. That has very little bearing on the governing classes choosing to compensate themselves for the loss of their "property" from the coffers of the state (in most cases they were able to continue to exploit those individuals as labour while divesting themselves of the cost of care).
Slaves regarded as property is most definitely not a modern European invention. It's historical fact. That's why you could buy and sell them. That's why you could inherit them.
Fair enough re profitability. Economics usually wins. We live in a broken, greedy world.
But the UK did quite a lot for abolishing slavery. Can't say I'm aware of any other historical nations that tried to and paid for it themselves.
China has been building soft power and economic influence for years. There have been alarmist think pieces about this since the nineties.
The question is whether what Trump is doing is going to do anything to change that. The answer is no: he is abandoning US soft power and is signalling that US economic cooperation is unreliable and one-sided.
For countries where the choice is between the US and China, Trump is making China the better bet. If his tariff policy was there to support liberal democracy - hah - he wouldn't be imposing tariffs on liberal democracies.
The old world order was working nicely for liberal democracies. It still is. It's in the interests of China and Russia to undermine it. That's what Russia has been doing. If one really cared about a world order that favoured liberal democracy one would act to shore the old order up. That means more respect for the rules by the US, not less. Trump is indeed helping bring down the old order. That's not good for liberal democracy.
This.
Oh I'm so glad you requoted that Bishop's Finger. That's my in re the old world order was working nicely for liberal democracies and still is.
It isn't. It really isn't.
<snip>
I was simply trying to say that I agreed with the view @Dafyd put forward.
I'm not quite sure what your second sentence means, but, of course, YMMV on this general issue. I appreciate that you speak from a different POV geographically!
You went hard then you demured.
I get it. It's hard being a christian.
Please don't get personal.
I apologise. That was out of line.
It's just that I struggle with this all the time. Stand up for justice but love your enemy. Very difficult calling. Whoever said Christianity is easy and a crutch is so, so wrong. It's much, much easier just to hate your enemy.
Do you mean we're being singled out for just using one race for slavery? But it's okay if you use a different number of races for slavery?
No, it's singled out because it created a class of human beings who were inherently regarded as property, it's the logic that starts with the doctrine of discovery and ends with the Zong.
Slaves regarded as property is most definitely not a modern European invention.
That is not addressing chrisstiles point, which is a distinction between regarding people as enslavable because of the contingent and universal fortunes of war or debt, and regarding them as enslavable because of the innate and particular trait of physiognomy elevated into the pseudoscientific trait of "race".
As that is a tangent to the subject matter of the thread please take it elsewhere if you wish to discuss it further. The appropriate place for serious discussion of "race" is Epiphanies which is governed by guidelines preventing ill-informed received opinions drowning out people who speak from experience.
But globalisation of manufacturing and cheap offshore labour can't have helped the cause.
With respect, if you don't understand the history of labour relations then you can't comment meaningfully on politics and economics. The relationship between and relative power of capital and labour is a large and unavoidable component of at least the last century and a half of economic history.
The world is on average a lot richer than it was before globalisation, and the people of liberal democracies are on average a lot richer. The problem is that developed countries are a lot more unequal so that most of that growth in wealth has gone to rich people in developed nations.
Even on the most favourable reading of Trump's actions, your argument amounts to the politician's fallacy:
Something needs to be done.
Trump is doing something.
Therefore, Trump is doing what needs to be done.
As I've repeatedly pointed out, there is a good deal of reason to believe that whatever the something is that needs to be done, it is not what Trump is doing. Tariffs, and further tax cuts for the wealthy, are not going to solve any problems.
It's been pointed out that even if tariffs would work if properly implemented what Trump is doing is not properly implementing them. Tariffs will only have the effect of motivating companies to move manufacturing to the US if manufacturers believe they're likely to be part of a permanent status quo. But Trump keeps threatening to raise and lower tariffs as a way to try to bully or reward countries into making deals he likes. That means manufacturers cannot be sure that moving manufacturing into the US will be worth the investment required to do so. And there are few signs that they are making the investment.
I think I've addressed a number of your above issues before so I won't go again except to say again globalisation has helped the west enormously, and emerging economies (even withstanding corruption as you point out) but it's no longer working for the west.
The trouble is these days, it really depends on what you read don't you think?
You've got to read both right wing and left wing propaganda to try understand what's really going on.
But rise of the right wing in recent times in western liberal democracies tells us something, and I think we need to pay attention to what those people think and why. Being democratic and all.
Solutions? Everyone seems hell bent on AI fixing all our productivity issues.
Maybe we should start a thread on the New World Order where globalisation is passe, the US no longer wants to be the world's peace keeping force and we all have to pull our defence weight against China and Russia and other nations that don't share our values?
The US doesn't share our values just now and has rarely acted as a peacekeeping force. There are way more peacekeepers deployed by African Union members than the US has ever had.
China has been building soft power and economic influence for years. There have been alarmist think pieces about this since the nineties.
The question is whether what Trump is doing is going to do anything to change that. The answer is no: he is abandoning US soft power and is signalling that US economic cooperation is unreliable and one-sided.
For countries where the choice is between the US and China, Trump is making China the better bet. If his tariff policy was there to support liberal democracy - hah - he wouldn't be imposing tariffs on liberal democracies.
The old world order was working nicely for liberal democracies. It still is. It's in the interests of China and Russia to undermine it. That's what Russia has been doing. If one really cared about a world order that favoured liberal democracy one would act to shore the old order up. That means more respect for the rules by the US, not less. Trump is indeed helping bring down the old order. That's not good for liberal democracy.
This.
Oh I'm so glad you requoted that Bishop's Finger. That's my in re the old world order was working nicely for liberal democracies and still is.
It isn't. It really isn't.
<snip>
I was simply trying to say that I agreed with the view @Dafyd put forward.
I'm not quite sure what your second sentence means, but, of course, YMMV on this general issue. I appreciate that you speak from a different POV geographically!
You went hard then you demured.
I get it. It's hard being a christian.
Please don't get personal.
I apologise. That was out of line.
It's just that I struggle with this all the time. Stand up for justice but love your enemy. Very difficult calling. Whoever said Christianity is easy and a crutch is so, so wrong. It's much, much easier just to hate your enemy.
Our military cannot be under the command of a foreign entity. It is just in our laws. Goes all the way back to Washington's Farewell address. In addition, we are trained for high intensity warfare, we fall down on low intensity policing activities. Why put in a battalion of American soldiers that cost over $100 Billion a year to support when a lightly armed force of costing $50 million a year to do the job. American forces often do participate in the background, providing logistics, airlift, satellite imagery, training of foreign peacekeepers, special operations support and naval deterrence. We did provide military for Korea, Bosnia, Kosovo and the Sinai. We were also in Somalia but had disastrous results.
Headline in the Guardian, Trump makes China great again. Well, it made me laugh.
A link to the article, which is making cogent points. One point he makes is that Trump has ended restrictions on exporting sophisticated computer chips to China, running counter to the policy of previous US regimes and national security advice.
Headline in the Guardian, Trump makes China great again. Well, it made me laugh.
A link to the article, which is making cogent points. One point he makes is that Trump has ended restrictions on exporting sophisticated computer chips to China, running counter to the policy of previous US regimes and national security advice.
And to the arguments being made in this thread about Trump containing China.
But rise of the right wing in recent times in western liberal democracies tells us something, and I think we need to pay attention to what those people think and why.
Factoring how much of it is funded by rich donors, which may belie the idea that it's wholly organic.
For one thing, Trump is rapidly eroding the US' soft power, while China at least has a consistent foreign policy.
Now here's the rub.
Do you want China leveraging you or the US? One is a communist state with clear human rights violations, the other a democracy, however mad or bad the current president is.
I know what I would choose. The lesser of the evils.
As for consistent and transparent foreign policy, the current US administration has recently published 2 documents for all to see on National Security Strategy (1st Nov 2025 and a new recent one Jan 2026). They are clear on Taiwan and other threats. Just as China is clear on taking Taiwan.
If only the current US administration didn't constantly attempt to subvert democracy/the rule of law, and weren't so picky about who was permitted human rights, and if only China weren't so obviously a capitalist economy.
If only it was all as simple as some paint it.
The current US administration is bound by the constitution. The president does not have unlimited power at all, however it might feel like it to the democrats. Border control is a republican priority. Trump was popularly elected. That is democracy, whether you like it or not.
China is most definitely not a capitalist economy as we hoped it would be when we let them into the WTO. Heavy subsidies and control by the government. No free market there.
Isn't that kinda like mercantilism, but with more of a direct state-ownership structure, rather than whatever legal fiction was used to rationalize the Brirish East India Company into independence?
But globalisation of manufacturing and cheap offshore labour can't have helped the cause.
With respect, if you don't understand the history of labour relations then you can't comment meaningfully on politics and economics. The relationship between and relative power of capital and labour is a large and unavoidable component of at least the last century and a half of economic history.
I can comment on current stuff because the unions are no longer main players in the recent economic games. They hardly get a mention in current geopolitics.
The US doesn't share our values just now and has rarely acted as a peacekeeping force. There are way more peacekeepers deployed by African Union members than the US has ever had.
I meant peacekeeping in the global sense, as a deterrent to countries like China and Russia that threaten liberal democracies. They shored up NATO and the UN and gave places like Europe and Australia a sense of security so they didn't have to build up their own defences.
My uncle actually wrote a book about this called Britain Disarmed ten or twenty years ago. It was ignored.
Now Europe and Australia are expected to pay their way defence wise and suddenly it's an outrage!
Australia is selling off something like 1.8 billion dollars currently to shore up its defence because it's been so pathetic up to now cos we relied on the US. Europe is now scrabbling to do the same.
As for sharing values. As I said previously, you have to choose between the lesser of the evils. Current US administration or communism and Putin.
Headline in the Guardian, Trump makes China great again. Well, it made me laugh.
A link to the article, which is making cogent points. One point he makes is that Trump has ended restrictions on exporting sophisticated computer chips to China, running counter to the policy of previous US regimes and national security advice.
So many holes in that article. Doesn't sound like they've read the recent National Security strategy at all.
But that's to be expected. It's a very left wing publication.
What is the right or the US administration countering with?
If you want to be informed. That's what you have to look at.
Headline in the Guardian, Trump makes China great again. Well, it made me laugh.
A link to the article, which is making cogent points. One point he makes is that Trump has ended restrictions on exporting sophisticated computer chips to China, running counter to the policy of previous US regimes and national security advice.
So many holes in that article. Doesn't sound like they've read the recent National Security strategy at all.
But that's to be expected. It's a very left wing publication.
What is the right or the US administration countering with?
If you want to be informed. That's what you have to look at.
If there's holes, say what they are. Don't just flannel.
But globalisation of manufacturing and cheap offshore labour can't have helped the cause.
With respect, if you don't understand the history of labour relations then you can't comment meaningfully on politics and economics. The relationship between and relative power of capital and labour is a large and unavoidable component of at least the last century and a half of economic history.
I can comment on current stuff because the unions are no longer main players in the recent economic games. They hardly get a mention in current geopolitics.
Labour relations are important if your goal is to end stagnation of middle/working class wages (your complaint in a previous post).
Just a thought, and possibly a tangent. During my recent visit to Australia my relatives and other British ex-pats were all telling me how left-wing the current Australian government is.
When I pressed them for examples of how that worked out in practice they didn't seem able to provide any actual examples other than blaming it for apparent 'wokery', the dreadful Bondi massacre and for allowing the wrong kind of immigrants into the country.
For the 'wrong kind' read Indians, Pakistanis and Somalis.
In other words, non-white people.
Yes, I know Australia has a Labour government but can anyone give examples of 'very left wing' policies that don't rely on the kind of racist tropes that I encountered among many Australians who really ought to know better, such as the sons and daughters of Italian and Greek migrants whose parents were called 'w*gs' - a term they use themselves - and treated as shittily as subsequent groups of migrants appear to be?
Not to mention the Aboriginal population who appear to be blamed for their own subjugation, poverty and social problems?
I'm no raving lefty but the attitudes I encountered among many former liberal/lefty folk who appear to have done a 360-degree turn as soon as they've crossed the equator left me breathless.
On other observations here. Yes, I'd see Wilberforce as one of the good guys and yes, the Royal Navy did play a role in stamping out slavery but things are more complicated than the 'evangelicals to the rescue' view of history.
I hasten to add that I have no strong views on Albanesi as Australian PM one way or another but whenever I asked people to explain what they considered wrong with him and his party I didn't hear anything more concrete than that they were trendily 'politically-correct.'
At the risk if answering my own question, it all depends on where we are standing of course, but the current Labor government looks more 'centre-left' to me with the Liberals generally 'centre-right' and the Australian Greens being further left than Labor.
Or am I missing something?
I did meet some lefty/liberal types in Australia but most people I discussed politics with over there struck me as pretty conservative leaning. Some very much so.
At the risk if answering my own question, it all depends on where we are standing of course, but the current Labor government looks more 'centre-left' to me with the Liberals generally 'centre-right' and the Australian Greens being further left than Labor.
Or am I missing something?
I did meet some lefty/liberal types in Australia but most people I discussed politics with over there struck me as pretty conservative leaning. Some very much so.
The present Labor government covers the range from centre left to well and truly left. Both Labor and the Liberals understand that the path to a parliamentary majority lies in not venturing too far from the centre. As to the Greens - who knows what they think?
As for holes @Arethosemyfeet the most glaringly obvious is that Biden was carrying on policies that were started by the previous Trump administration in terms of caution with China. They were the first administration to change their policy from "we can change China's communism and human rights abuses by allowing them into the WTO. Then they'll become good little capitalists like us".
The US can't get critical minerals for its defence force. I imagine a deal was struck re the chips so China would give them some. Weaponising economics. But the current administration only gave China the second rate chips, not the top shit and there are a number of restrictions.
The other glaring holes I've mentioned previously.
I think this conversation has come to its natural end. I seem to be repeating myself and we're starting to go in circles.
When China invades Taiwan and ww3 starts, if Australia is in the firing line, I'll be chatting to you all from the UK. My passport is being renewed as we speak and we're saving canned goods.
Did I mention China threatened Australia again recently with retaliation for trying to recover the Port of Darwin?
If your governments are stupid enough to try become dependent on China, don't vote for them.
The other glaring holes I've mentioned previously.
You have not mentioned anything that counts as a hole in the article, let alone a glaring one.
If world leaders are "stupid" enough to become dependent on China despite Trump's National Security Strategy then Trump's National Security Strategy is failing. If Trump is doing and saying things that lead the US allies to conclude that dependency on China is preferable then it doesn't matter what the National Security Strategy says.
Your defence amounts to saying that Trump has abandoned his strategy of not selling chips to China because the US defence force needs China's critical minerals. If he is genuinely serious about his strategy of not being dependent on China then by your own account it's not working out very well for him.
Football fan: "The commentator says that Barchester Wanderers are a timid shambles and they're two down at half time, including an own goal; he's wrong because he clearly didn't take any notice of Barchester Wanderers pre-match strategy document in which they said they would not be a timid shambles or two down."
Comments
Slaves regarded as property is most definitely not a modern European invention. It's historical fact. That's why you could buy and sell them. That's why you could inherit them.
Fair enough re profitability. Economics usually wins. We live in a broken, greedy world.
But the UK did quite a lot for abolishing slavery. Can't say I'm aware of any other historical nations that tried to and paid for it themselves.
I apologise. That was out of line.
It's just that I struggle with this all the time. Stand up for justice but love your enemy. Very difficult calling. Whoever said Christianity is easy and a crutch is so, so wrong. It's much, much easier just to hate your enemy.
But globalisation of manufacturing and cheap offshore labour can't have helped the cause.
As that is a tangent to the subject matter of the thread please take it elsewhere if you wish to discuss it further. The appropriate place for serious discussion of "race" is Epiphanies which is governed by guidelines preventing ill-informed received opinions drowning out people who speak from experience.
Dafyd Hell Host
With respect, if you don't understand the history of labour relations then you can't comment meaningfully on politics and economics. The relationship between and relative power of capital and labour is a large and unavoidable component of at least the last century and a half of economic history.
I think I've addressed a number of your above issues before so I won't go again except to say again globalisation has helped the west enormously, and emerging economies (even withstanding corruption as you point out) but it's no longer working for the west.
The trouble is these days, it really depends on what you read don't you think?
You've got to read both right wing and left wing propaganda to try understand what's really going on.
But rise of the right wing in recent times in western liberal democracies tells us something, and I think we need to pay attention to what those people think and why. Being democratic and all.
Solutions? Everyone seems hell bent on AI fixing all our productivity issues.
Maybe we should start a thread on the New World Order where globalisation is passe, the US no longer wants to be the world's peace keeping force and we all have to pull our defence weight against China and Russia and other nations that don't share our values?
I think that's the bottom line.
Thank you.
Our military cannot be under the command of a foreign entity. It is just in our laws. Goes all the way back to Washington's Farewell address. In addition, we are trained for high intensity warfare, we fall down on low intensity policing activities. Why put in a battalion of American soldiers that cost over $100 Billion a year to support when a lightly armed force of costing $50 million a year to do the job. American forces often do participate in the background, providing logistics, airlift, satellite imagery, training of foreign peacekeepers, special operations support and naval deterrence. We did provide military for Korea, Bosnia, Kosovo and the Sinai. We were also in Somalia but had disastrous results.
I've heard that MAGA can stand for 'Make America Go Away', or (more recently) 'Make All Greenland American'...
And to the arguments being made in this thread about Trump containing China.
Factoring how much of it is funded by rich donors, which may belie the idea that it's wholly organic.
Isn't that kinda like mercantilism, but with more of a direct state-ownership structure, rather than whatever legal fiction was used to rationalize the Brirish East India Company into independence?
I can comment on current stuff because the unions are no longer main players in the recent economic games. They hardly get a mention in current geopolitics.
I meant peacekeeping in the global sense, as a deterrent to countries like China and Russia that threaten liberal democracies. They shored up NATO and the UN and gave places like Europe and Australia a sense of security so they didn't have to build up their own defences.
My uncle actually wrote a book about this called Britain Disarmed ten or twenty years ago. It was ignored.
Now Europe and Australia are expected to pay their way defence wise and suddenly it's an outrage!
Australia is selling off something like 1.8 billion dollars currently to shore up its defence because it's been so pathetic up to now cos we relied on the US. Europe is now scrabbling to do the same.
As for sharing values. As I said previously, you have to choose between the lesser of the evils. Current US administration or communism and Putin.
So many holes in that article. Doesn't sound like they've read the recent National Security strategy at all.
But that's to be expected. It's a very left wing publication.
What is the right or the US administration countering with?
If you want to be informed. That's what you have to look at.
If there's holes, say what they are. Don't just flannel.
Labour relations are important if your goal is to end stagnation of middle/working class wages (your complaint in a previous post).
When I pressed them for examples of how that worked out in practice they didn't seem able to provide any actual examples other than blaming it for apparent 'wokery', the dreadful Bondi massacre and for allowing the wrong kind of immigrants into the country.
For the 'wrong kind' read Indians, Pakistanis and Somalis.
In other words, non-white people.
Yes, I know Australia has a Labour government but can anyone give examples of 'very left wing' policies that don't rely on the kind of racist tropes that I encountered among many Australians who really ought to know better, such as the sons and daughters of Italian and Greek migrants whose parents were called 'w*gs' - a term they use themselves - and treated as shittily as subsequent groups of migrants appear to be?
Not to mention the Aboriginal population who appear to be blamed for their own subjugation, poverty and social problems?
I'm no raving lefty but the attitudes I encountered among many former liberal/lefty folk who appear to have done a 360-degree turn as soon as they've crossed the equator left me breathless.
On other observations here. Yes, I'd see Wilberforce as one of the good guys and yes, the Royal Navy did play a role in stamping out slavery but things are more complicated than the 'evangelicals to the rescue' view of history.
I hasten to add that I have no strong views on Albanesi as Australian PM one way or another but whenever I asked people to explain what they considered wrong with him and his party I didn't hear anything more concrete than that they were trendily 'politically-correct.'
At the risk if answering my own question, it all depends on where we are standing of course, but the current Labor government looks more 'centre-left' to me with the Liberals generally 'centre-right' and the Australian Greens being further left than Labor.
Or am I missing something?
I did meet some lefty/liberal types in Australia but most people I discussed politics with over there struck me as pretty conservative leaning. Some very much so.
The present Labor government covers the range from centre left to well and truly left. Both Labor and the Liberals understand that the path to a parliamentary majority lies in not venturing too far from the centre. As to the Greens - who knows what they think?
The US can't get critical minerals for its defence force. I imagine a deal was struck re the chips so China would give them some. Weaponising economics. But the current administration only gave China the second rate chips, not the top shit and there are a number of restrictions.
The other glaring holes I've mentioned previously.
When China invades Taiwan and ww3 starts, if Australia is in the firing line, I'll be chatting to you all from the UK. My passport is being renewed as we speak and we're saving canned goods.
Did I mention China threatened Australia again recently with retaliation for trying to recover the Port of Darwin?
If your governments are stupid enough to try become dependent on China, don't vote for them.
It's been fun.
Thank you for flying Qantas.
If world leaders are "stupid" enough to become dependent on China despite Trump's National Security Strategy then Trump's National Security Strategy is failing. If Trump is doing and saying things that lead the US allies to conclude that dependency on China is preferable then it doesn't matter what the National Security Strategy says.
Your defence amounts to saying that Trump has abandoned his strategy of not selling chips to China because the US defence force needs China's critical minerals. If he is genuinely serious about his strategy of not being dependent on China then by your own account it's not working out very well for him.
Football fan: "The commentator says that Barchester Wanderers are a timid shambles and they're two down at half time, including an own goal; he's wrong because he clearly didn't take any notice of Barchester Wanderers pre-match strategy document in which they said they would not be a timid shambles or two down."