Surviving the Famine

brianthebard

It cannot be considered genocide! What you are suggesting is nothing more than negationist thinking and you will not find any modern historian to back you up.

Tchocky

There are very clear guidelines on what is genocide and what isn't, for situations like the Sudan you need to be precise.

Potato blight is not genocide. Maintaining an unfair trading practice is not genocide.

Fratton Fred

CrazyPJ wrote:

A boyhood hero of mine Muhammed Ali understood the for the black man to be finally free from his shakles he had to break with the conventions of white political thought. Hence he forsook all that he had learned and embraced Islam. More and more hip young black people are discovering this fact for themselves and facing the full truth about their past and not the palliative one as taught to him by their former masters.

Irish people have been indoctrinated by the media and education system for generations by a government who toadies up and emulates its former oppressor. When I was going to school it was only mentioned almost in passing as a natural disaster. One thing I have discovered that you cant believe everyhing you read especially if its written by British historians or Irish ones for that matter. To get at the truth of things, one must read as much as possible about any given subject and then interpret it and deduce for yourself what the truth might be. As I got older I began to understand the darkness that lies in the heart of man and the nature of Machiavellian political thought.

"The ends justify the means, also known as Consequentialism, is a moral philosophy often attributed to Niccolò Machiavelli in his 1513 book The Prince. This moral philosophy has evolved to encompass ideas from Marxism and Fascism, that the head of state carries out the moral philosophy on a societal or social level. It is a phrase encompassing two beliefs: (1) that morally wrong actions are sometimes necessary to achieve morally right outcomes, and (2) that actions can only be considered morally right or wrong by virtue of the morality of the outcome."

Viewed through such a prism and from the utterances of the great and powerful at the time, I believe as many do that the potato failure was an oppotrunity for the British government to at least, cull the troublesome Irish population. Darwinism as interpreted by the British was the assumption of their own intellectual superiority to sub-humans like the irish and the negro. Check out the Punch magazine cartoons. (this belief is still held by some in the uk)

I spent many saturday afternoons in the National Archives in Hendon reading papers from the time. It made for disturbing reading. For example a Times editorial in 1847 urged the Irish to broaden their diet. Indeed! The most powerful nation on earth at the time with all the resourses it had could not prevent what happened in Ireland? You must decide. The real documented truth lies in some dusty vault in Whitehall that we must never see.

Even if its true that more food was imported than exported why did they make the people work in meaningless jobs before they were given food. Take a trip around the Mamturks in Galway and you will see canal like structures and stone walls going up to the top that serve no useful purpose that the locals were made to work on while they were starving and emaciated.

PJ

I agree with your thinking, but not with you conclusion.

It is very easy to judge people by standards to which we have become accustomed today, but even still, you find young men killing them selves and other in the belief that it is god's (or Allah's) will. There are even those that preach that HIV is god's revenge on homosexuals. It is also very easy to misinterprate words and phrases used by victorians as the language used was different to what we use.

I think you can only call it genocide if the intention of the government at the time was to kill off the Irish and that was very much not the case. Yes there was a feeling that Ireland was over populated and that also that aid would lead the irish to sit on their arses and bread thereby increasing the problem, hence the pointless work (Roosevelt did something similar with great effect).

If you judge the intention rather than the methods then you could argue that the British government had the right idea. The results however...well that we all know about.

Erin Go Brath

Fratton Fred wrote:

Britain taking food from the Starving Irish, or the irish choosing to sell their food to the English because they cared more about profit than their own starving people?

The Irish tenant farmer was little more than a slave in reality.

Britains Free trade policy exported or sold all the corn, wheat, barley, and oats Irish farmers grew, in order that they should pay their rents. All crops became cash crops--and there was nothing left for the farmer and his family to eat. British free trade tolerated no change in this situation while a million Irish starved to death, heavily deploying troops to protect the export ships. Free trade evicted instantly all farmers who stopped paying their rents, and the large landlords, led by British Foreign Minister Lord Palmerston, evicted their tenants more rapidly than before as they were starving in the 1840s, even evicting many who were still paying rent.

Hagar

Never a truer word...

Erin Go Brath

Tchocky wrote:

There are very clear guidelines on what is genocide and what isn't, for situations like the Sudan you need to be precise.

Potato blight is not genocide. Maintaining an unfair trading practice is not genocide.

Maybe it doesnt qualify as genocide on a technicality. However Britains policy towards Ireland at the time amounts to pretty much the same thing.

CrazyPJ wrote:

Queen Victoria's economist, Nassau Senior, expressed his fear that existing policies "will not kill more than one million Irish in 1848 and that will scarcely be enough to do much good."

Thats a pretty damning quote, and smacks of genocidal intent!

CrazyPJ

brianthebard wrote:

It cannot be considered genocide! What you are suggesting is nothing more than negationist thinking and you will not find any modern historian to back you up.

Definitions
negationist
noun

1. Someone who merely denies something without offering any positive assertion.

which is exactly what you are doing, having failed to provide any links or shown any evidence of independent thought to your righteous assumptions. You just assert your blind faith in some textbook education without naming any authors or citing any relevant text. This is a forum on the www and many readers may not know about the "famine" and you just declaring "It cannot be considered genocide!" shows you up as a pompous, close minded individual.

PJ

CrazyPJ

Originally Posted by Fratton Fred

It is very easy to judge people by standards to which we have become accustomed today, but even still, you find young men killing them selves and other in the belief that it is god's (or Allah's) will. There are even those that preach that HIV is god's revenge on homosexuals. It is also very easy to misinterprate words and phrases used by victorians as the language used was different to what we use. (Quote)

Dont know what the hiv bit has to do with it, unless you are suggesting that I am like these deluded people, and if so, I am deeply offended.

As for misintrepreting the language and nuance of the time, please enlighten me as to the original meaning the following quotes from that time.


Nassau Senior

"will not kill more than one million Irish in 1848 and that will scarcely be enough to do much good."

LORD CLARENDON

"I do not think there is another legislature in Europe that would disregard such suffering as now exists in the west of Ireland, or coldly persist in a policy of extermination."

Twisleton:

"the destitution here is so horrible, and the indifference of the House of Commons is so manifest, that it is an unfit agent for a policy that must be one of extermination."

Trevelyan

"We must not complain of what we really want to obtain.

Thomas Carlyle; influential British essayist, wrote;

"Ireland is like a half-starved rat that crosses the path of an elephant. What must the elephant do? Squelch it - by heavens - squelch it."

The Times leader of September 2, 1846

"Total Annihilation;" A Celt will soon be as rare on the banks of the Shannon as the red man on the banks of Manhattan."


and dont forget the million(s) who had no voice at all, I wonder what their verdict would have been.



(quote) I think you can only call it genocide if the intention of the government at the time was to kill off the Irish and that was very much not the case. (quote)

The nazis didnt kill off all the jews but its still called a genocide. This is a matter of semantics. (dont need a weatherman to tell me which way the wind blows)




(quote) Yes there was a feeling that Ireland was over populated and that also that aid would lead the irish to sit on their arses and bread thereby increasing the problem, hence the pointless work (Roosevelt did something similar with great effect). (quote)

Yes, that was another sterotype of the lazy Irish ape but you obviously admire Rooseveldts methods.


(quote) If you judge the intention rather than the methods then you could argue that the British government had the right idea. The results however...well that we all know about. (quote)


This is a sinister statement and I am not sure of its meaning.

brianthebard

CrazyPJ wrote:

Definitions
negationist
noun

1. Someone who merely denies something without offering any positive assertion.

which is exactly what you are doing, having failed to provide any links or shown any evidence of independent thought to your righteous assumptions. You just assert your blind faith in some textbook education without naming any authors or citing any relevant text. This is a forum on the www and many readers may not know about the "famine" and you just declaring "It cannot be considered genocide!" shows you up as a pompous, close minded individual.

PJ

I don't know where you got your definition but this is what I was referring to. I assert what I have learned because it has taught me that a genocide is different from a famine. Where you not in class that day?

CrazyPJ

brianthebard wrote:

I don't know where you got your definition but this is what I was referring to. I assert what I have learned because it has taught me that a genocide is different from a famine. Where you not in class that day?

As I said, no capacity for independent thought. Ask your masters to explain those above quotes because I missed that class.

PJ

brianthebard

I have no idea what you are talking about in terms of independent thought but here's what I think about the subject: when the Ottoman empire destroyed almost a million Armenian people that was genocide. When the British government tried to help the Irish people but were unable to do so to the level needed, that was not genocide, that was the Victorian idea of self betterment showing its limitations. Its called the great famine and not the great genocide for a reason and all the independent thought you want to put into it won't change that. That's what I think, if that's not independent for you I'm sorry.

brianthebard

CrazyPJ wrote:

The nazis didnt kill off all the jews but its still called a genocide. This is a matter of semantics. (dont need a weatherman to tell me which way the wind blows)

Just because the nazis didn't succeed in killing all the jews does not mean that it should not be considered a genocide. It was.

CrazyPJ

brianthebard wrote:

Just because the nazis didn't succeed in killing all the jews does not mean that it should not be considered a genocide. It was.

Just because the british didn't succeed in killing all the Irish does not mean that it should not be considered a genocide. It was.[/

CrazyPJ

brianthebard wrote:

I have no idea what you are talking about in terms of independent thought but here's what I think about the subject: when the Ottoman empire destroyed almost a million Armenian people that was genocide. When the British government tried to help the Irish people but were unable to do so to the level needed, that was not genocide, that was the Victorian idea of self betterment showing its limitations. Its called the great famine and not the great genocide for a reason and all the independent thought you want to put into it won't change that. That's what I think, if that's not independent for you I'm sorry.

Just had a look at your profile and you describe yourself as an intellectual but I cant see much evidence of this from this naive ramble.

Tchocky

OK anything to do with genocide is not a matter of semantics. Does anyone care what words mean anymore?

Saying it "amounts to the same thing" is rubbish. Call it neglect, callous disregard, whatever.

Just don't call a fork a bleedin spoon

CrazyPJ - Cool! You went for the personal attack in response to the reasoned post!

PHB

It cannot be considered genocide! What you are suggesting is nothing more than negationist thinking and you will not find any modern historian to back you up.

Actually, you will,
Joe Lee compared it to the Holocaust, Joe Lee writing the seminal history book of his generation.
F.S.L. Lyons, who is basically one of the best Irish historians ever, called it a genocide.

This isn't a crackpot republican theory, it's one widely discussed in historical studies.

brianthebard

Comparing it to genocide does not mean it was genocide. Yes its comparable on a scale of death but it is in no way comparable in that it was not a premeditated attack by one society on another!

WindSock

Does Genocide have to contain a degree of ethnic cleansing?

WiredMan

I've read the posts here and done some research of my own, this link is a great source of information:
http://www.ucc.ie/famine/Ireland's Famine/bibliography.htm

The quotes below are taken from the above website.


It seems clear to me that what lead to the famine wasn't genocide (the purposeful culling of the Irish population) but exploitation (British policies lead to the "gradual transition away from milk and grains to a diet based primarily on the potato"). We had what Britian needed (food - "The rapid rate of British industrialisation and militarization required a corresponding expansion and commercialisation of Irish agriculture to feed the growing workforce.") and without consideration for the long-term effects (the countless lives lost).


I believe the question to ask here is does exploitation equal genocide?


Let me conclude this post by stating that the above quotes are based on arguments by other (more learned) persons.

Erin Go Brath

Tchocky wrote:

There are very clear guidelines on what is genocide and what isn't, for situations like the Sudan you need to be precise.

Potato blight is not genocide. Maintaining an unfair trading practice is not genocide.

Tchocky wrote:

OK anything to do with genocide is not a matter of semantics. Does anyone care what words mean anymore?

Saying it "amounts to the same thing" is rubbish. Call it neglect, callous disregard, whatever.

Just don't call a fork a bleedin spoon

OK tchocky, I'll call a spade, a spade. It was by definition, genocide! Your first quote above dosent accurately reflect the 1845-1850 period in Irish history.

During the years 1845 to 1850, the British government pursued a policy of mass starvation in Ireland with intent to destroy in substantial part the national, ethnic and racial group commonly known as the Irish People.... Therefore, during the years 1845 to 1850 the British government knowingly pursued a policy of mass starvation in Ireland that constituted acts of genocide against the Irish people within the meaning of Article II (c) of the 1948 [Hague] Genocide Convention

brianthebard

What evidence have you to show that the British government purposely tried to starve the Irish people?

DublinWriter

Erin Go Brath wrote:

During the years 1845 to 1850, the British government pursued a policy of mass starvation in Ireland with intent to destroy in substantial part the national, ethnic and racial group commonly known as the Irish People....

Oh really.

Let me just re-examine the Zapruder film again, ah yes, you're right! In frames 340 to 378 you can clearly make out the figure of Lord John Russell manufacturing a potato-blight WMD behind the Grassy Knoll.

Tchocky

Nah, it was a reflection of the planet Venus

Were overpopulation and subdivision deliberate policies from Westminster? not genocide, but criminal negligence and mismanagement. "Calling a spade a spade" usually prefaces rubbish, I've found.

Erin Go Brath - if you're going to quote Francis Boyle, please let us know.

During the years 1845 to 1850, the British government pursued a policy of mass starvation in Ireland with intent to destroy in substantial part the national, ethnic and racial group commonly known as the Irish People.... Therefore, during the years 1845 to 1850 the British government knowingly pursued a policy of mass starvation in Ireland that constituted acts of genocide against the Irish people within the meaning of Article II (c) of the 1948 [Hague] Genocide Convention

Fratton Fred

Erin Go Brath wrote:

The Irish tenant farmer was little more than a slave in reality.

Britains Free trade policy exported or sold all the corn, wheat, barley, and oats Irish farmers grew, in order that they should pay their rents. All crops became cash crops--and there was nothing left for the farmer and his family to eat. British free trade tolerated no change in this situation while a million Irish starved to death, heavily deploying troops to protect the export ships. Free trade evicted instantly all farmers who stopped paying their rents, and the large landlords, led by British Foreign Minister Lord Palmerston, evicted their tenants more rapidly than before as they were starving in the 1840s, even evicting many who were still paying rent.

I know what happened, but I don;t see how that answers my question. If the market had not been England, it would have been france, or Spain, or America. This is more a social issue than a race one as far as I see it.

Fratton Fred

CrazyPJ wrote:

Originally Posted by Fratton Fred

It is very easy to judge people by standards to which we have become accustomed today, but even still, you find young men killing them selves and other in the belief that it is god's (or Allah's) will. There are even those that preach that HIV is god's revenge on homosexuals. It is also very easy to misinterprate words and phrases used by victorians as the language used was different to what we use. (Quote)

Dont know what the hiv bit has to do with it, unless you are suggesting that I am like these deluded people, and if so, I am deeply offended.

Don't be. I was pointing out that the Voctorians believed the famine to be God's devine intervention, a bit like there are people today who think the same about HIV.

CrazyPJ wrote:

As for misintrepreting the language and nuance of the time, please enlighten me as to the original meaning the following quotes from that time.


Nassau Senior

"will not kill more than one million Irish in 1848 and that will scarcely be enough to do much good."

LORD CLARENDON

"I do not think there is another legislature in Europe that would disregard such suffering as now exists in the west of Ireland, or coldly persist in a policy of extermination."

Twisleton:

"the destitution here is so horrible, and the indifference of the House of Commons is so manifest, that it is an unfit agent for a policy that must be one of extermination."

Trevelyan

"We must not complain of what we really want to obtain.

Thomas Carlyle; influential British essayist, wrote;

"Ireland is like a half-starved rat that crosses the path of an elephant. What must the elephant do? Squelch it - by heavens - squelch it."

The Times leader of September 2, 1846

"Total Annihilation;" A Celt will soon be as rare on the banks of the Shannon as the red man on the banks of Manhattan."


and dont forget the million(s) who had no voice at all, I wonder what their verdict would have been.

There is a fair old mix there, but it is impossible to make anything out of two line quotes. Also, I am not an expert on Voctorian vocabulary.

CrazyPJ wrote:

(quote) I think you can only call it genocide if the intention of the government at the time was to kill off the Irish and that was very much not the case. (quote)

The nazis didnt kill off all the jews but its still called a genocide. This is a matter of semantics. (dont need a weatherman to tell me which way the wind blows)

slight difference I think.

CrazyPJ wrote:

(quote) Yes there was a feeling that Ireland was over populated and that also that aid would lead the irish to sit on their arses and bread thereby increasing the problem, hence the pointless work (Roosevelt did something similar with great effect). (quote)

Yes, that was another sterotype of the lazy Irish ape but you obviously admire Rooseveldts methods.

they worked. The New deals started pulling the US out of recession.

CrazyPJ wrote:

(quote) If you judge the intention rather than the methods then you could argue that the British government had the right idea. The results however...well that we all know about. (quote)


This is a sinister statement and I am not sure of its meaning.

No, it's not sinister at all. The intention of the British government at the time was to provide aid. That is a good intention. They were however totally misguided in the way they went about it.

Tchocky

re nazis/Jews comparison - semantics me hole. Observe the word "intention"

Erin Go Brath

DublinWriter wrote:

Oh really.

Let me just re-examine the Zapruder film again, ah yes, you're right! In frames 340 to 378 you can clearly make out the figure of Lord John Russell manufacturing a potato-blight WMD behind the Grassy Knoll.

Tchocky wrote:

Nah, it was a reflection of the planet Venus

Lay off the hallucinogenics lads

brianthebard wrote:

What evidence have you to show that the British government purposely tried to starve the Irish people?

Article II of the Genocide Convention provides as follows:
>
> Article II
>
> In the present Convention, genocide means any of the
> following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or
> in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as
> such:
> (a) Killing members of the group;
> (b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of
> the group;
> (c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of
> life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in
> whole or in part;
> (d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within
> the group;
> (e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to
> another group.

Francis Boyle wrote:

Clearly, during the years 1845 to 1850, the British government
> pursued a policy of mass starvation in Ireland with intent to
> destroy in substantial part the national, ethnical, and racial
> group commonly known as the Irish People, as such. In addition,
> this British policy of mass starvation in Ireland clearly caused
> serious bodily and mental harm to members of the Irish People
> within the meaning of Genocide Convention Article II(b).
> Furthermore, this British policy of mass starvation in Ireland
> deliberately inflicted on the Irish People conditions of life
> calculated to bring about their physical destruction in substantial
> part within the meaning of Article II(c) of the 1948 Genocide
> Convention. Therefore, during the years 1845 to 1850 the British
> government knowingly pursued a policy of mass starvation in Ireland
> that constituted acts of genocide against the Irish People within
> the meaning of Article II(b) and Article II(c) of the 1948 Genocide
> Convention.

This is proof of Genocide as defined by the Genocide Convention. Don't know why you're in denial

Fratton Fred

Erin Go Brath wrote:

Article II of the Genocide Convention provides as follows:
>
> Article II
>
> In the present Convention, genocide means any of the
> following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or
> in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as
> such:
> (a) Killing members of the group;
> (b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of
> the group;
> (c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of
> life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in
> whole or in part;
> (d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within
> the group;
> (e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to
> another group.




This is proof of Genocide as defined by the Genocide Convention. Don't know why you're in denial

Is this the same Prof Francis Boyle that is campaigning for the restoration of a Hawaii independent state? The one that wants to ban the St Patricks day pub crawl because it is insulting to the Irish?

why, exactly, does his opinion "Prove" genocide?

Erin Go Brath

Fratton Fred wrote:

Is this the same Prof Francis Boyle that is campaigning for the restoration of a Hawaii independent state? The one that wants to ban the St Patricks day pub crawl because it is insulting to the Irish?

why, exactly, does his opinion "Prove" genocide?

His opinion doesn't prove genocide.

What constitutes genocide is clearly laid out in the Genocide convention for all to see!

Tchocky

I suppose the blight was coincidental then?