I have been watching and thoroughly enjoying Simon Schama’s 17 episode “A History of Britain”, first broadcast in 2000-2002 and produced in part by our wonderfully impartial BBC.
Although every episode is quite fascinating, and Schama’s conversational style certainly has a gripping quality that pisses all over the tedious history lessons I had back in the day at school, there does appear to be a common thread running though each episode – class conflict!
Kings, queens and emperors have ruled this country over the last 2000 years. Most of them coming from rich and powerful dynasties, and therefore use the instruments of money, influence and obedience through fear to keep the Little People in their place.
All through the centuries the poor have always been poor, have never had a voice, were treated like scum, forced to fight wars with little reward, and were exploited and abused for the sake of social standing and monetary profit by their so-called betters.
Men, women and children suffered horrendous and inhuman treatment during their miserable existence. Moreover, the landowners, the gentry, the politicians and the factory bosses were more concerned about maximising profits rather than worrying about the appalling treatment & living conditions of the lower orders.
But another key aspect of this history lesson in class division, which still exists today, is that 99% of the poor were white!
And as for the British Empire – well that was just a repeat of what was going on in Britain but further away! Travel to India or the West Indies, exploit the poor, force them to work for peanuts, treat them like shit but make sure you make enough profit out of them before they die! And in that scenario 99% of the poor were non-white!
In summary, therefore, it was the poor of all colours that suffered the most under centuries of British monarchical rule, and not just a carefully selected period of time when the rich exploited Africa, the West Indies and India. Which is something modern teaching methods is trying to revise into a far more shameful episode in our history rather than looking at the bigger picture!
White people suffered
Black people suffered
The common factor being that both ethnicities were gut-wrenchingly poor!
And yet this would appear to be pretty low on the list of priorities for the “caring/sharing” Woke Generation, who seem to think poverty, slavery and hardship have always been the exclusive domain of the BAMEs
Nominated by: Technocunt
