Belgian Congo

[Jebus]

At first I didn't want to go into a discussion over this, because unfortunately I'm not all too well documented on Belgian Congo, and 20th century history isn't my strong point anyways. But, recently, I saw some things on television that irritated me greatly.

1. Earlier this week, the 10th anniversary genocide in Rwanda of April 1994 was commemorated. On this event, the Belgian prime minister openly apologised for the lack of intervention from the Belgians in that event. Now, as far as I know, an official apology issued by a state is a very rare and 'noble' thing.
But; the Rwandese President Kagame, instead of accepted the apology, went even further. He actually had the audacity to put the entire blame for the genocide on the Belgians.
Yes, he did. The fucking nerve.
To be more precise, he claimed that that the Belgians were responsible for creating the system in which the ethnic larger group of Hutus were ruled over by a minority of Tutsis, and thus sowing the seeds of hatred that led to the genocide.
According to me, the guy is either ignorant of his own country's history or is picking a fight. You see, that social structure already existed LONG before the Belgians even set foor on Rwandese soil! All the Belgians did was to perpetuate the historical tradition of the royal courts of the Tutsis. That actually led to the riots that heralded the independance of Congo in the first place, actually.

So, in a way the Belgians were indeed to blame for keeping the social structure intact. But, the fact is that the structure wasn't created by the Belgians. And, as everyone knows, the best way to create a new form of government is to build on the foundations of pre-existing ones. If you start with eliminating all the traditional structures, then you get chaos. Just look at what happened in Iraq... So, it was actually quite logical for the Belgians to do that.

And add to that the fact that, ever since their independance, which was about thirty years before the genocide, the Rwandese people were free to change their social structures to their liking. The fact that they didn't can hardly be blamed on the Belgians....

IMHO, this is just another example of a backward African nation that is too cowardly or weak to take responsibity for its own actions, and therefore blames it all on colonial times. It sickens me.

2. I saw a documentairy entitled 'White king, Red Rubber, Black death', or something. It was an English-made documentairy about the events in Congo Freestate. It was compromised of two parts, of which I was unfortunately unable to watch the second one. Exams, you know. (not that it fucking matters, but hey!)

In that documentairy, they claim that during the reign of Leopold II over Congo, the native population was brought back from 20 million to ten million.

I call bullshit.

BIG fucking bullshit.

One, there is no way to know how may people lived in Congo Freestate at the beginning, or the end, of the reign of Leopold II. Secondly, the present population of Kongo IS 10 million. Would somebody then please explain to me how come after more then 80 years, the population of the country seems not to have grown? If there indeed were 10 million congolese after the reign of Leopold II, then there really should be more by now. And Three: the antrocities and cruelties that were commited by the AIA only happened in a relatively small part of Kongo, also called the 'Black Heart': specifically the portion of Kongo were rubber can be found. So, that means that in that piece alone, 20 million people must have lived, in that time. So that would mean that the entire population of Kongo must have been around 100 million people then. Wow! Very impressive, for a country that exists mostly out of rainforest and didn't have anything but tribes back then!

The point is: it's very easy to make people look bad - or worse then they already do. While it is true that Leopold II allowed for horrible thing to be done to the native population, the severity and impact of those thing continues to be overexaggerated by foreign writers. And that sickens me.
Everybody knows that colonial powers treated the native populations bad, and every colonial power did. But, strangely, the Belgians (well, more specifically Leopold II) seem to get bashed more severely then any other power. By all means necessary - even blatant lies.

As somebody who is dedicating most of his time to accurate historical research, this angers me greatly.

 

[welsh]

Jebus welcome to the "your international relations/ foreign policy has caused atrocities across the world" club.

Get used to it.

This is actually an issue of history but also one of perception and identity. Belgians want to walk away from Congo thinking they did great things for the people, left them a great system, and were good colonials. This isn't exactly true. The colonized, especially the Rawandans, need someone to blame for their condition and to a certain extent that blame falls, justifiably, on the colonials.

Whose right? Neither. Sure the local folks could have built a better system than they inherited. From what I have read, the Hutu and Tutsi were distinct, but the colonialists favored one group as rulers and the others are subordinates for racial reasons, thereby setting up greater ethnic conflict than you originally found. The post colonial ties that were left behind allowed for those tensions to flourish. Sure they might have been there before you came, but by creating a repressive and exploitive colonial administrative state you increased the ability of one ethnicity to exploit and repress the other, setting up internal security issues which have continued to haunt Rawanda and Congo till today.

That said, the Rawandans are trying to rebuild their society, remember the act of the holocaust to prevent a future one, give their society a taste of humility and shame so that it might not happen again, and build a society in which the idea of Tutsi and Hutu is replaced by Rawandese- a more integrated society. If they want to blame the Belgians for making social tensions worse because of colonialism, ok. The Belgians weren't there to be saintly, but to exploit. If the Rawandese social experiment of intergration comes at the expense of Belgian pride, small costs.

Saying, "Oh they had 30 years to change?" is silly. They had a system of power and repression, and the game throughout Africa has been to hold the state and repress the rest to profit. But you created the state that allowed that.

As to the rest. Most of what I have read suggests that the period of rule by Leopold was devestating, and that the Congoloese population dropped by 1/2 to 2/3 of what they estimate the population to be.

In fact the reason why COngo had such a good medical system during the period of Belgian rule was in part due to the fact that so many people had died that there was a labor shortage.

The reasons, though, are not necessarily that Belgian colonialists or Leopold's people went out and shot them or killed them personally. Leopold's policies were vicious and did kill many people, and while the Belgians were a bit better, they weren't exactly saints (also don't forget that the Belgians benefitted from much of the infrastructure and administration that Leopold left behind). But you are also talking about social dislocation, conflicts between tribes, local wars, disease. For example, cannibalism did exist in Congo before the Belgians arrive, but was rarely practiced. During the period of Leopold the practice grew dramatically.

And you can't say that after colonialism was over, things got better. The mercenaries that fought in Congo were often Beligans. The companies that exploited the resources were Belgian as well. When Mobutu was threatened in the 1970s, the paratroopers that deployed were French and Belgian. At it was Belgians fighting that was one of the reasons the UN had to intervene in the Congo crisis. Lumumba was whacked by Belgians.

So the Belgians don't have a great record.

And yes, some of the colonial states did treat their people very bad. But the best countries in Africa have often been British and French colonies. The two best states, Botswana and Mauritius, are former Brit colonies. Kenya has been pretty stable- former Brits. The French have been having trouble in Ivory Coast, but that was pretty much a problem originating in Ivory Coast- for years it was one of the most stable states of West Africa. Senegal and Cameroon have been fairly stable as well.

So yes, colonial countries were generally quite nasty, but some where worse than others. Also the way that the colonial state left their colonies behind might have impacted on the level conflict that followed. In Congo, there was heavy fighting almost as soon as the Belgians granted independence. Why, because the Belgians left quickly under local pressure. Why did they get moved out so quickly, because the Congolese were pretty sick of Belgian rule.

 

[Sander]

I'm not up to date with the mistreatings of Congolese by Belgians, but I will say this:

Everybody knows that colonial powers treated the native populations bad, and every colonial power did. But, strangely, the Belgians (well, more specifically Leopold II) seem to get bashed more severely then any other power. By all means necessary - even blatant lies.

This is simply not true. It only seems that way, because every time something is said about Belgium, you notice it sooner than when something is said about another country. This is so because you live in Belgium.

That said, you seem to have a tendency of not wanting to listen to the atrocities committed by the Belgians, or you constantly deny them. This, it seems, is silly, since I haven't seen you come up with any documentation or fact that might suggest that you're right. You seem to be basing your claims on feeling rather than fact....

Just my opinion.

 

[welsh]

Sander- this is defensiveness.

No one likes to hear that their country does bad shit. And that makes you feel defensive because not only are they attacking your country, but they are attacking you as a person.

This happens to me when I go abroad and people start US bashing. Happens here too.

But it especially happens to the Mainland Chinese if you say, "Hey you know that Taiwan policy is kind of fucked up. Going to war because those people want to be independent? Jeez, you guys are Nazis" Will get Chinese really pissed off.

You can also go after a Chinese person over Tibet, or a French person over nuclear testing or colonialism, or you can get an Australian over why they are really in East Timur, etc..

 

[Jebus]

Ok, so now I finally feel I spent enough time studying this matter to continue this discussion.

Belgians want to walk away from Congo thinking they did great things for the people, left them a great system, and were good colonials. This isn't exactly true. The colonized, especially the Rawandans, need someone to blame for their condition and to a certain extent that blame falls, justifiably, on the colonials.

(Etc.)

You shouldn't underestimate what the Belgians did, or tried to do, for the Congolese. Granted, Leopold II's reign wasn't very... positive for the Congolese population (although I remain that the figures are greatly exaggerated); but the Belgian people really didn't have much of a say in that. After all, Congo Freestate was Leopold II's personal property, where he could do what he please. And he wasn't a very benign ruler, as he has proven in Belgium itself too.

Yet, in the post-WWII era the picture is completely different. You had a completely new wave of colonists then, with completely different goals.
They were mostly young families. People in their twenties or early thirties, who went to Congo to work for the government there. There lies the main difference with the pre-WWII era: then, it was mostly single men, adventurers, who went there to gain personal profit; like in most American colonies in the first colonization era.

And those families didn't come there to exploit the Congolese, by far. They came there to build a nation.

After WWII, Belgium spent a *lot* of money on Congo. Way more than Congo has ever brought up for Belgium, really. About 60 billion Belgian Franks were invested in the period 1950-1960, which would amount to 300 billion franks now, or 7.5 billion euros, or 8 billion dollars. For a country the size of Belgium, especially when recovering from complete destruction, that is a *lot* of money. An enormous amount of money.

In foreign studies of that time, mainly American ones, Belgian Congo was held up as the prime example of how a colony should be. *Every* congolese kid got an education exactly the same as Belgian kids. *Exactly* the same. They even learnt what side rivers the Schelde had, for cryin' out loud. And really *every* kid: even the smallest village in the middle of the jungle had its own school.

The health care system doesn't need much defending. With (child) mortality rates dropping the way they did, it doesn't need much explanation. The fact that Malaria was *almost*, so very nearly, eliminated speaks for itself to. The mass vaccine campaigns were legendary, and my grandfather can personally testament to that. He too spent months travelling through the jungle to vaccine every tribe, how little or remote they might've been.

Sure, there will was a certain 'apartheid'. Yet it was by far not the type of apartheid you had in South-africa. It was more of a 'natural' apartheid, instead of the legal apartheid you had there. People of both races were freely allowed to intermingle, and the only reason they didn't -outside of a few exceptions- were the clear unreconcilable differences between the two cultures.
--> but there lies the point of the whole Belgian colonization system. It was not directed at keeping that segregation intact, but instead it was trying to iron out the differences between the motherland and the colonised, by training them to behave and think like the Belgians did.
And while this is, granted, a very racist point of view, everyone with a little historical perspective will agree that it is a much better point of view than any of the other colonial powers had. They actually *wanted* to bring the Congolese up to the same level the Belgians had. The fact that they didn't calculate in the simple fact that the two cultures are too vastly different for that is because of the reiging 'evolutionary' sociological beliefs of that time.

Very recently, Peter Verlinden, the Belgian reporter for Central africa, came to interview my parents for a book he was writing about the Belgian children who were born in Congo. He spends a lot of time in Congo, has many contacts there, and is considers one of the leading authorities on the Congolese society in Belgium.
Now, he says that if you, as a Belgian, go to Congo, you'll be greeted with nothing but love there. People will fall over themselves welcoming you, especially if you're an old-colonial. Apparently, the Congolese want nothing more than to have the Belgians return. (not that I advocate that, though) That is also the reason why they kicked out the Russians and the Americans in the 1960's, and asked back the Belgians, btw. Many Congolese still consider Fabiola, the widow of King Bouwdewijn, to be their queen. Would that be the case if the Belgians truly exploited them?
A lot of old-colonials I spoke through can tell great stories about that, btw. You see, every three years of working there, they got to go home for 6 months. And when they returned, they had to go trough English and Portugese colonies to get there.

They say that when you traveled through Portugese colonies, the native hid as soon as they saw a white man. They say that when you traveled through British colonies, the natives bowed over for you and called you 'master'.

But when you entered Belgian Congo, the natives came to you dancing, singing and cheering, and they hugged you as if you were their brother.

 

[SuAside]

there is no denying that we fucked up.

we killed many & maimed many more. (cutting off a hand of a black man who didnt want to work for the belgians was a standard practise in the early colonial times).

yes, we did a lot of good as well, Jebus. my grandfather was a headmaster in a school in Congo & my father was raised there until they were evacuated by the belgian armed forces after the riots.

but none of those good things set the cruelties that we did right. you seem to want to divert attention to the good things, which i guess is normal. however, we will have to live with the fact that some wrongs cannot be set straight.

belgium is atm one of the most active benefactors in central africa & we shall do our best to help out where we can. yet nothing will right the wrongs we have commited in the past. this is a burden we shall have to carry forever. the least we can do is honor the victims by not denying or hiding any of it & never commit those same mistakes again.

 

[Sander]

Many Congolese still consider Fabiola, the widow of King Bouwdewijn, to be their queen. Would that be the case if the Belgians truly exploited them?

Yes. People tend to remember the more recent positive things, instead of the more distant negative things.
See, the situation after the second world war may have been better for the Congolese, but that bloody well doesn't mean that it wasn't a situation of segregation and superiority of the Belgian.

Meh, bah, I'm not going to go into this in detail, though, but what you're doing right now is inexcusable: you are mitigating and even ignoring the atrocities committed by Belgians in Congo. What you did after WW2 might've been nice of you, but this in no way excuses anything done before that. And that's more or less the attitude you are taking.

Also, the situation in the COngo 1950-1960 isn't quite as rosy as you think it is. For some weird reason I once read a novel by a Belgian on the subject (the book had been banned by the Belgian government for a while, by the way), it was based on his own experiences and gave a nicely depressing view of segregation and circumstances of living there. Too bad I can't remember the name. Oh, and it was filled with (bad) sex scenes for some reason. That guy had one hell of an active sex life in Congo.

 

[Jebus]

we killed many & maimed many more. (cutting off a hand of a black man who didnt want to work for the belgians was a standard practise in the early colonial times).

I know. I do not deny that, and I have mentioned that in my post too. These sort of things only happened in Kongo Freestate though, and I don't believe Belgians should feel any guilt regarding these actions, since the Belgians simply didn't have a damn thing to do with it. It was all of Leopold II's doing, and he didn't even inform the Belgian government of this. And when the Belgian government eventually found out for certain, protests forced Leopold to hand Congo over in the end.
As I said, I as a Belgian feel absolutely no responsability for the atrocities comitted by Leopold II.

] this is a burden we shall have to carry forever. the least we can do is honor the victims by not denying or hiding any of it & never commit those same mistakes again.

I am not denying nor hiding those facts. I just do not believe they fell, or fall, into the responsability of the Belgian government & people. Leopold II was an coldhearted, selfish man, as is known by Belgians and Congolese alike.

See, the situation after the second world war may have been better for the Congolese, but that bloody well doesn't mean that it wasn't a situation of segregation and superiority of the Belgians.

Yes, I know, that's what I said. But the point is: it was a form of natural seggregation. The white did indeed live in thier own white districts, and the black in their black districts, but there wasn't any apartheid. The reason why blacks & whites lived seperately was of purely cultural and natural reasons. You see: while colonialism in itself is based on racist foundations, Belgian colonialists were scarcely racist themselves. Many, many times have I been told the story of how my grandmother breastfed many black orphans.
The main difference between the seggregation in BC and the apartheid in South-Afrika, was that the lives of black and white in Congo were not supposed to keep on developing parallel the way they did. In the end, the point was to converge those lives by means of education and 'civilizing work'. Once again, I do not denie the racism in those views, yet they were pretty damn noble beliefs for any colonial power to have throughout history.
So I will repeat all this once more in simple wordings, so there can be no misinterpretations: the point of the colonism in BC was to make the black population completely Belgian citizens, up to the point where the only difference between Belgians and congolese was the difference of skin. And while that may have some racist undertones, it is not segregation nor opression.

That said, it's not like the black neighbourhoods were ghetto's either. The Belges or the neighbourhoods the Belgians built for their black employers (who didn't only do the 'menial' tasks, by the way: the point of the colonial system was also to slowly let the black rise through the ranks of the government system, gaining ranks as they became more familiar with it. The best example for that is the military.) were far from bad. Heck, some houses there were even bigger than mine. Belgians and Congolese were also perfectly allowed to go to the same shops, bars, butchers etc.; and the fact that still most blacks or whites went to seperate stores was simply because they ate, drank and bought different things.

you are mitigating and even ignoring the atrocities committed by Belgians in Congo

I am not mitigating nor ignoring the crimes comitted by Leopold II. Yet, and I repeat: Congo was simply not a Belgian colony then. It was Leopold II's private property.

Also, the situation in the COngo 1950-1960 isn't quite as rosy as you think it is. For some weird reason I once read a novel by a Belgian on the subject (the book had been banned by the Belgian government for a while, by the way), it was based on his own experiences and gave a nicely depressing view of segregation and circumstances of living there. Too bad I can't remember the name. Oh, and it was filled with (bad) sex scenes for some reason. That guy had one hell of an active sex life in Congo.

I know it wasn't all love and peace. I know there were colonials who comitted crimes against the natives, took advantage of their superior position, had their way with African women and had racist views. Yet, these were more exceptions instead of rules, and this was certainly not the view the Belgian government had on the colonial system, and this was certainly not how the colonials were supposed to act by the Belgian government. I believe your book was one by Jef Geraerts, btw. If so, you should read all of his other books about Congo too: I believe you might find the complete picture was quite different. You had your adventures, rapers, criminals and exploiters, but you'd have those everywhere, and they weren't supposed to act that way. All in all, there may have been about 100-200 such character out of 100 000 colonials, so you shouldn't generalise this by any means.

You could mostly find these people in the deep inland of Congo, where they weren't, or barely, subjected to regulation from the Colonial government.

 

[Sander]

You should feel responsible for Leopold II's actions, though. Because you, as a Belgian, are responsible for what your state's leader does and, more importantly, the Belgians allowed him to get to power and hence do what he did in Congo. That's awful, no-one probably wanted it, but that doesn't mean you don't carry any guilt. Sure, he was stopped later on, but that doesn't mean those actions hadn't already been committed. The burden lies with Leopold, but also with the Belgian nation, just like the Dutch nation carries the burden of the atrocities committed by Dutch colonialists (on their own intent) in Indonesia.

Also, the fact that the segregation was natural doesn't actually matter at all. The fact remains that the Belgians, at times, exploited that. Take responsiblity for that, and don't shirk it off with remarks along the lines of 'look at all the great things we did.' Yeah, you did. Good for you. But that doesn't mean those other things didn't happen. Again, you also carry responsibility for what the adventurers, rapists and criminals did, even when it wasn't condoned.
The point of segregation was also one based in superiority, too. The Belgians wanted to make the Congolese Belgians, but in that lies the distinct implication that being a Congolese man is worse than being a Belgian.

 

[Jebus]

You should feel responsible for Leopold II's actions, though. Because you, as a Belgian, are responsible for what your state's leader does and, more importantly, the Belgians allowed him to get to power and hence do what he did in Congo. That's awful, no-one probably wanted it, but that doesn't mean you don't carry any guilt. Sure, he was stopped later on, but that doesn't mean those actions hadn't already been committed. The burden lies with Leopold, but also with the Belgian nation, just like the Dutch nation carries the burden of the atrocities committed by Dutch colonialists (on their own intent) in Indonesia.

Perhaps we should, up to a point - but I believe in Karma. And I believe that whatever wrong Belgians did in failing to stop Leopold earlier, has been righted by the labours Belgians put in Congo later on. They carved a nation out of jungle, united two hundred etnies and built a complete infrastructure, which is actually still *exactly* the same infrastructure the Congolese have today. The difference between Indonesia and Congo is that, in the end, the Congolese were left with a fully functional governments system, health care, education, infrastructure, industry, etc. While the Indonesians were left with... eh...
The fact that they completely blew it afterwards can hardly be blamed on the Belgians. Well, perhaps a bit, since they left so fast - but that mainly because of the Congolese, and perhaps the Americans and Russians too. They were the ones who threw us out.

Also, the fact that the segregation was natural doesn't actually matter at all. The fact remains that the Belgians, at times, exploited that.

How? How did the Belgians exploit the segregation? By trying to lift it?

Take responsiblity for that, and don't shirk it off with remarks along the lines of 'look at all the great things we did.' Yeah, you did. Good for you. But that doesn't mean those other things didn't happen. Again, you also carry responsibility for what the adventurers, rapists and criminals did, even when it wasn't condoned.

Once again: I am not denying that these facts once occured. Yet I believe that the total balance tilts in favor of the Belgians.
The best clue of that could perhaps be the financial side. As we all know, the second colonial wave was a capitalistic one. European nations founded colonies to gain money from it.
... Yet, Belgium put more money in Congo than they ever got out of it.
Doesn't that say enough?

The point of segregation was also one based in superiority, too. The Belgians wanted to make the Congolese Belgians, but in that lies the distinct implication that being a Congolese man is worse than being a Belgian.

I do believe I said that myself three or four times in my previous posts, but anyway -

You have to see this with historical perspective. The reigning sociological belief then was that of the 'human evolution': that every people in the world could be placed on a sort of evolutionary ladder, with the Pigmees, Bushmen, etc. at the bottom and - of course - the Europeans at the top.
Nowadays, this belief is naturally considered racist (since different environments naturally require different civilizations - if the criteria was, instead, 'to be able to survive in the rainforest', the Europeans would be at the very bottom), yet in that time it was accepted by practically all thinkers. It was the basis of the 'civilization works', something all coloniasers claimed to be doing, and only the Belgians did.
So bear this in mind: the Belgian colonialists did not belief the Congolese were inherently inferior, they only believed their culture to be inferior, and that once a Congolese reached the level of 'civilization' a Belgian did, he was in all ways equal. In those times, that was still revolutionary.
The very system of education the Belgians built up in Congo is a testament of that too. Whereas in other colonies they had a 'top-down pyramid' structure, in Belgian Congo you had a pyramid with a very, very broad base. As I said before, each and every Congolese kid got education, and could've gone to college too.
They never quite got to that, though, for obvious reasons. Only a very small part of Congolese children were old enough to go to college by the time of the independance.

 

[Sander]

Perhaps we should, up to a point - but I believe in Karma. And I believe that whatever wrong Belgians did in failing to stop Leopold earlier, has been righted by the labours Belgians put in Congo later on. They carved a nation out of jungle, united two hundred etnies and built a complete infrastructure, which is actually still *exactly* the same infrastructure the Congolese have today. The difference between Indonesia and Congo is that, in the end, the Congolese were left with a fully functional governments system, health care, education, infrastructure, industry, etc. While the Indonesians were left with... eh...
The fact that they completely blew it afterwards can hardly be blamed on the Belgians. Well, perhaps a bit, since they left so fast - but that mainly because of the Congolese, and perhaps the Americans and Russians too. They were the ones who threw us out.

Dutchies were kicked out immediately after the Second World War, and the Indonesians then proceded to, more or less, fuck it up themselves.

So, you're saying that you do feel responsible for Leopold II? Or are you now saying "No, I don't, because we did better things later on."?

How? How did the Belgians exploit the segregation? By trying to lift it?

*points to Jef Geraerts*
By using the superiority to their own advantages.
Bah, damnit, I know too little of this to properly go into the facts.

Once again: I am not denying that these facts once occured. Yet I believe that the total balance tilts in favor of the Belgians.
The best clue of that could perhaps be the financial side. As we all know, the second colonial wave was a capitalistic one. European nations founded colonies to gain money from it.
... Yet, Belgium put more money in Congo than they ever got out of it.
Doesn't that say enough?

It says that the Belgians did good things. Duh, I never denied that. But that doesn't mean that the bad things dissappear. You can't just strike off everything to see whether the balance is good or bad, because that means that you are implicitly saying the bad things didn't matter, only the good things that are positive on the balance.

I do believe I said that myself three or four times in my previous posts, but anyway -

You have to see this with historical perspective. The reigning sociological belief then was that of the 'human evolution': that every people in the world could be placed on a sort of evolutionary ladder, with the Pigmees, Bushmen, etc. at the bottom and - of course - the Europeans at the top.
Nowadays, this belief is naturally considered racist (since different environments naturally require different civilizations - if the criteria was, instead, 'to be able to survive in the rainforest', the Europeans would be at the very bottom), yet in that time it was accepted by practically all thinkers. It was the basis of the 'civilization works', something all coloniasers claimed to be doing, and only the Belgians did.
So bear this in mind: the Belgian colonialists did not belief the Congolese were inherently inferior, they only believed their culture to be inferior, and that once a Congolese reached the level of 'civilization' a Belgian did, he was in all ways equal. In those times, that was still revolutionary.
The very system of education the Belgians built up in Congo is a testament of that too. Whereas in other colonies they had a 'top-down pyramid' structure, in Belgian Congo you had a pyramid with a very, very broad base. As I said before, each and every Congolese kid got education, and could've gone to college too.
They never quite got to that, though, for obvious reasons. Only a very small part of Congolese children were old enough to go to college by the time of the independance.

And again i say: it still is segregation. Was it maybe better in comparison to other nations of the time? Sometimes, yes. Sometimes, no. But does that, in itself, make it any better? Hell no. It only means that the other nations were even worse.

 

[Jebus]

So, you're saying that you do feel responsible for Leopold II? Or are you now saying "No, I don't, because we did better things later on."?

Both and neither.

I believe Belgians as a people shouldn't feel guilty for the actions of Leopold II since he happened to be Belgian, and that whatever guilt there may have been/ought to be is lifted by what the Belgians did when Congo became a colony.

You can't just strike off everything to see whether the balance is good or bad, because that means that you are implicitly saying the bad things didn't matter, only the good things that are positive on the balance.

I believe the word 'balance' naturally implies that both sides have its importance - yet this seems to lead into another semantics discussion, and I *really* don't want to go there again.

And again i say: it still is segregation. Was it maybe better in comparison to other nations of the time? Sometimes, yes. Sometimes, no. But does that, in itself, make it any better? Hell no. It only means that the other nations were even worse.

And this is were historical perspective comes in. If no better system was then in existance (hell, legal segregation was still applied in parts of the USA), than that means that Belgian Congo was heaven on earth.
If tomorrow people discover dogs are as intelligent as humans, we aren't bastards and opressors today, since we didn't know that. This might seem a brutal comparison, yet it's the same principle.
*EDIT* the dog comparison is of course related to Congolese culture, not black people themselves.

*EDIT 2* And, once again, it was natural segregation. Most white people simply tended to clit together because they naturally wanted to be in the company of people who spoke their language and understood their culture. If two Dutch people go to a school in Japan, there's a good chance they'll clit together too: not because they believe Japanese are inferior, but because they understand eachother. THIS was the sort of segregation that existed in Belgian Congo: a segregation coming from both sides based on objective factors, as it were. It was not based on beliefs of racial superiority, and perhaps not even cultural superiority, Sander. Like I said before: the point of Belgian colonization was to make the black people exactly like them. Segregation would go completely against that point.

*EDIT 3* Of course, you'll always have your racists. But those were exceptions, not the rule.

Bah, damnit, I know too little of this to properly go into the facts.

Tee-hee!

 

[Sander]

Both and neither.

Brilliant statement.
In other words: what the bloody bloody bloody hell does that mean?

Anyway, I'll just answer these points generally:

Again, I say that Belgians should feel guilty about what happened in Belgian Congo, but at the same time they can be 'proud' or 'happy' about what they did to help the Congolese people. But you must always keep both in mind, and the problem with striking good and bad things off against eachother, is that you end up with a surplus of good here, and then look at that
surplus (which you already did, by claiming that the good outweighs the bad), instead of the entire picture. The problem I have with this is that you then don't think about the bad things, but only the good, and as SuAside remarked (anmd you agrreed) many of the atrocities can never be repaid. So you're also contradicting yourself.
This is also my problem with your historical perspective, yes, from the perspective of the day this may have been good, but that doesn't mean it is actually good. By this reasoning things as slave-trading were good, since hell, everyone else did it. Bullshit. Everyone else did it only makes everyone else 'bad' too, it doesn't make your actions any better, just those of others worse.

As for segregation, the fact that it was a natural segregation doesn't make it any better. It wasn't based on beliefs of racial superiority (though it was in part based on beliefs of cultural superiority, because that was the point of making the Congolese Belgians), but it was still segregation. This doesn't make it that bad as other forms of segregation, but it also shows that the Congolese were not on an equal footing with the Belgians, because if they were, they'd 'mix'.

PS: What is your problem with semantics? Semantics is the meaning of words, and since words are the things we use to communicate, it's very important to get those meanings right, and not just vaguely .

 

[Jebus]

Both and neither.

Brilliant statement.
In other words: what the bloody bloody bloody hell does that mean?

I believe Belgians as a people shouldn't feel guilty for the actions of Leopold II since he happened to be Belgian, and that whatever guilt there may have been/ought to be is lifted by what the Belgians did when Congo became a colony.

Again, I say that Belgians should feel guilty about what happened in Belgian Congo, but at the same time they can be 'proud' or 'happy' about what they did to help the Congolese people. But you must always keep both in mind, and the problem with striking good and bad things off against eachother, is that you end up with a surplus of good here, and then look at that
surplus (which you already did, by claiming that the good outweighs the bad), instead of the entire picture. The problem I have with this is that you then don't think about the bad things, but only the good, and as SuAside remarked (anmd you agrreed) many of the atrocities can never be repaid. So you're also contradicting yourself.

Well, as I said: I believe in some sort of Karma. I believe that you can unmake evils you have comitted in the past by repaying the debt you owe, and more. And since a large part of the debt the Belgians supposedly owed was held by Leopold II and some opportunists, not by the Belgians as a nation; I believe that in the end, the Belgians were the best thing that ever happened to the Congolese.

This is also my problem with your historical perspective, yes, from the perspective of the day this may have been good, but that doesn't mean it is actually good. By this reasoning things as slave-trading were good, since hell, everyone else did it. Bullshit. Everyone else did it only makes everyone else 'bad' too, it doesn't make your actions any better, just those of others worse.

Yet, historical perspective is very important in considering history. Different times have different moralities, and one can not go past that.
It's very easy now, looking back, to take the moral high ground. In a hundred years, people will look back at us and judge us by their morals too. We too will be considered bastards, for several reasons we may not even grasp now.

To give a similar example of the one I've already given:
If tomorrow, people decide that clapping your hands is considered immoral, are you then an evil person now, for clapping your hands? You can not judge people by standards that have been instated in times after them.

As for segregation, the fact that it was a natural segregation doesn't make it any better. It wasn't based on beliefs of racial superiority (though it was in part based on beliefs of cultural superiority, because that was the point of making the Congolese Belgians), but it was still segregation. This doesn't make it that bad as other forms of segregation, but it also shows that the Congolese were not on an equal footing with the Belgians, because if they were, they'd 'mix'.

Sander, are you trolling me? I've already elaborated on that point several times now, and I am growing incredibly weary of it.

PS: What is your problem with semantics? Semantics is the meaning of words, and since words are the things we use to communicate, it's very important to get those meanings right, and not just vaguely .

Perhaps, but discussions about semantics irritate me enormously. IMHO, it's just an easy way of attacking someone on reasons besides the point.

 

[Sander]

Well, as I said: I believe in some sort of Karma. I believe that you can unmake evils you have comitted in the past by repaying the debt you owe, and more. And since a large part of the debt the Belgians supposedly owed was held by Leopold II and some opportunists, not by the Belgians as a nation; I believe that in the end, the Belgians were the best thing that ever happened to the Congolese.

Since I don't have the facts, I can't really argure your 'best thing ever', but I have strong feelings that this is bullshit.
Meh, but besides that, you now immediately show the danger of striking things off against eachother: you've completely gone by the atrocities committed against the Congolese, and have declared the Belgians to be the best thing to ever happen to the Congolese. Let's see, first SuAside says that things have been done that no-one can make up for, and then you say you agree, and now you say that the Belgians are the best thing to ever happen to the Congolese. Excuse me if that seems odd and somehow reinforcing of my point.
Note that saying 'I believe in Karma' isn't the same as giving counter-arguments, it's just giving your opinion. Nice that you think that way, now show me why I'm possibly wrong here.

Yet, historical perspective is very important in considering history. Different times have different moralities, and one can not go past that.
It's very easy now, looking back, to take the moral high ground. In a hundred years, people will look back at us and judge us by their morals too. We too will be considered bastards, for several reasons we may not even grasp now.

To give a similar example of the one I've already given:
If tomorrow, people decide that clapping your hands is considered immoral, are you then an evil person now, for clapping your hands? You can not judge people by standards that have been instated in times after them.

Well, you are obviously right, but the interesting fact here was that I never talked about you being bastards, I merely talked about what has been done being bad. There's a big difference.

Sander, are you trolling me? I've already elaborated on that point several times now, and I am growing incredibly weary of it.

No, you haven't. You've gone into segregation being natural, goodie, I still take that for granted, and I incorporated that into my argument. The revised argument has now addressed all of your previous arguments. Now answer it.

Perhaps, but discussions about semantics irritate me enormously. IMHO, it's just an easy way of attacking someone on reasons besides the point.

That depends entirely on the case at hand, for one, and it's usually pertinent the issue (if not just the issue in itself). The point is that using ambiguous terms leads to confusion and bad understanding of eachother, which is the worst possible thing for any discussion really.

 

[Jebus]

Sander, one's got to love you.

You have to love the moral high ground you're taking, really.
OMG Belgishish colomiwation un segregaatjon wus b4d cuz we no do dat shit no more!

Yeah, you've really got some historical perspective there, sonny. I bet you're one of those positivists, or whatever, who believe that mankind is constantly progressing towards a better civilization, and therefore all previous forms of civilization are to be considered backward and 'evil'. And actually, that puts you into the same boat of the colonists themselves. Go you.

You cannot define past events as 'bad' or 'good' by the standards of today, dutchie.
Like you did here:

Well, you are obviously right, but the interesting fact here was that I never talked about you being bastards, I merely talked about what has been done being bad. There's a big difference.

That's not even what I meant, Sander. Sjeesh.

It's easy, o so very goddamn easy to condemn 19th century imperialism, early 20th century economical and social 'unfairness' and mid-20th century paternalism and evolutionism by today's standards. So very easy to put yourself on the moral high ground, by applying morals and standards taught to you by others, developed in later times, to distanciate yourself from your predecessors who didn't have the political correct finesse we have, and are therefore cruel, vile scum of the earth. You're so much better, Sander. Sooo bloody morally superiour. If you would've been born eighty years ago, those kind of things would've never happened, right?


Wrong, bitch. They would've, because you would have believed in the same ideals and standards as those people did. Why? Because you simply wouldn't be aware of what you are aware of today. Seggregation in Belgian Congo? Shit boy, I don't even think the word 'seggregation' was invented then yet (instead perhaps in the USA, where there actually was seggregation).

Historical perspective is an important thing, son. Even when talking about events as recent as that. If you *really* want to define historical events as 'good' or 'bad', at least have the bloody decency to measure these events up to other events or doctrins of THEIR age. And then where do the Belgians end up? Exactly, right on top.
I never said any form of seggregation is a good thing, Sander. And I'm not saying seggregation in present day times would in any way be excusable - beit natural, forced or whatever. What I AM saying, and pay carefull attention this time:

"The Congolese were better off than any other African colonial system at that time"

Still with me? K.

"BELGIAN CONGO was the best thing that ever happened to the congolese"

Noticed the big print? K.

"Leopold's Congo Free State and Belgian Congo have in absolutely no bloody fucking way anything to do with eachother."

Noticed the 'no bloody fucking way'? K.

Read it again just to be sure.

And finally:

"The Belgian people/government had absolutely no way to control/know what went on in Congo Free State."

And when they did find out, the government took over Congo Free State and made it Belgian Congo.

K?

Now, Sander, are you going to continue this war of attrition by jumping up and down like a doped-up, semi-retarded cheerleader shouting 'seggregation! seggregation!' until I out of absolute and complete revolt against your disgusting lack of any sort of perspective, and you sickening stubbornness, permantently tire from this topic alltogether, or are you finally going to come up with a decent bloody argument in this whole matter?

 

[Jebus]

PS


In the unlikely event I come off as a tad harsh, you should know I've quit smoking two days ago.

 

[Sander]

Congratulations on quitting smoking. Double posting for that seems a bit silly, though, but whatever.

However, that doesn't mean you can just go around shouting lots of insults at me and expect me to somehow think that's all okay, okay? I don't much care for your having stopped smoking and maybe being bitchy because of it, because you admit and realise yourself that you're being an ass. So that's no excuse, you could just as well have left out all that bullshit. Please try to do so next time.

As for the rest of your post: what a load of text saying so very little. All you said in the first part of that huge post of yours was 'we weren't bastards because we didn't know any better.' Yes, indeed. I already agreed to that, in that piece of text you quoted. What the hell is your point? I don't give a shit about the Belgians being good or bad, I only asserted that the actions that were committed were bad from today's perspective. That's all, and if you'd look back, you'll see that that was my point in the previous post as well. Your rant in the first part thus doesn't mean shit, because you don't give any reasons whatsoever why this is wrong to do: I know about historical perspective, but I also know about shifting morals and not judging people who really don't know better. YOu fail to see the difference between judging actions and people, while I was doing the former.
I'll give you a historical parallel: slavery. At the times of slavery, it generally wasn't considered bad. Because, hey, they were inferior human beings anyway, right? Well, whatever, if they really thought so, they may not be morally wrong, but that doesn't make their actions any better, nor the repercussions of those actions any less grave. This has jack shit to do with judging the people who committed those acts, if you assume that they were only acting in the best interest of others (which I believe the Belgians may very well have done, or at least some of them may very well have done).
I'll say it again so that you know for sure what I am saying: I am not judging the Belgian people, merely their actions, by modern standards.

As for the second part, where you so kindly point out yet again that Leopold's Congo was not the same as Belgian Congo, which I again have assented to in lack of any better information on my side, I yet again say that that doesn't matter: you, as a people, gave Leopold the power and position to do these things, and as such you are partly responsible for this. Perhaps reading some Machiavelli might clear this up, whatever.
Also note that I've gone into this before in this thread, and you haven't been able to give any counter-argument but 'Karma'.

 

[Paladin Solo]

Riiight Jebus, Belgian Congo is teh cooles because it's BELGIAN.

Don't blame the Belgians for problems in Belgian Congo, blame America and Russia, everyone seems too.

Oh yeah, and the Belgians are teh cooles, and angels.

So, I guess the problem in Iraq is ok because it's Bush's Iraq, not American Iraq. And don't forget, in American/Bush Iraq, the Iraqis not only hide from us, bow to us, hug us, but they also fight us...HA beat that Mr. "the Belgians are the best because we roxxors!"

 

[billcd]

You people need to get some shit straight here.

First, Belgium did have no control over Leopold's Congo, as it was his personal property, as in, he bought it himself. And Leopold's reign in the Congo was the most horriffic of perhaps any imperialist endeavor. Figures of millions dying are very accurate.

Second, Belgium did nothing about the atrocities committed by Leopold's government, they tried to get some of the profits that he was making and keeping away from the Belgian people. They didn't take control of the Congo until after Leopold died, when he left it entrusted to the Belgian government in his will. The Belgians, in turn, were in no hurry to right the wrongs committed against the Congolese. WWII brought an immense demand for rubber, the Congo's primary export. Slave labor continues. The Belgian government ultimately lost interest when demand for rubber slid after other methods of getting rubber were established.

After the Belgians left there were piecemeal nods towards democracy, but these moves were crushed when Mobutu came to power with US backing as an anti-communist dictator. More massacres, oppression, etc. You get the picure. Hence, the lack of population growth from the end of Leopold's reign til now is explained- years of dictatorship have made the Congo one of the most impovershed nations in the world. In the end, the blame of the Congo's ills on imperialist forces is justified. After years of toiling under the Belgian yoke, the Congo was subjected to good old American oppression.

Those of you who defend Belgium simply because you are Belgian are sick- you are not responsible for the crimes committed by your country before your birth. You have a choice of saying "what was Belgian done wrong, what can we do right," or engaging in an erotic sort of patriotic obsession to defend your country even in the face of the harshest facts. You chose the latter. Take it from an American- my country has committed some of the worst acts of this century (and continues to do so). While I consider myself patriotic, I reject the actions my country has taken. I understand George W. Bush represents me, and accept that, but still oppose his politics vehemently. Why can't you accept the crimes of your nation? They will not be laid on your shoulders, after all. People like you are no different than flag-waving Americans who demand "four more wars" and defend actions such as Vietnam or the modern war on terror. You just have the advantage of coming from a nation that has had little power to do evil in its history.

Oh, and Belgium actively tried to cover up the atrocities of Leopold's Congo. I believe it wasn't until the mid-80s that the Belgian government finally released thousands of documents, and not without a fight either, spelling out the extent of the horrors that were seen in the Congo.