Saturday, March 19, 2022

Empire-Building More Than a Whitey Thing

OLI Snippets

(from my short posts on social media)

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Right now, we're hearing a lot of talk about "empire-building". But here's the thing about "empire-building": It's not just White Europeans who did it (and are doing it today in Ukraine).

Aztec and especially Inca peoples here in the Western Hemisphere were brutal empire-builders before Europeans ever arrived. Some Native American tribes in what are now the United States and Canada did it. The African continent continues to be roiled by indigenous tribal empire-building, which the mainstream media flatly ignores. China and Japan were voracious empire-builders across Asia, and Hong Kong remains an infamous victim of it. Religions have engaged in empire-building as well, such as Christianity and Islam.

Some empires were smaller than others, some lasted longer than others, but it's all what makes our human history, both globally, and in our communities and neighborhoods no matter where we live. It's complicated, hardly pretty, and rarely humane. Not to excuse what's currently happening in Ukraine, of course. In fact, quite the opposite: Putin and Russia should know from history that respecting the rule of law enacted by a relatively democratic society is a reciprocal duty of sovereign nations. Barbarism no longer is acceptable. By the way, this applies not just in the former Soviet Union, but also here among American political extremists.