this post was submitted on 17 Jul 2023
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Fuck... I never thought about indigenous Europeans. Does this mean Brexit was technically an anti-colonism movement?
Great Britain's a particularly bad example because most of the people living there today are descended from invaders and colonizers. It's telling that the areas that have more natives there (Scotland, Wales) voted not to leave.
Wales voted for Brexit though.
Oh, oops! Forgot that they're like the US South of England!
eh, when only [former] colonial powers are fighting it's just called fighting.
However, I've seen people unironically say that the Irish were colonized by the Brits, we just don't call it that because Irish people are white.
IDK whether or not I agree, but it's certainly an interesting parallel as British rule over Ireland really did not differ that much from British rule over other overseas territories.
I don’t see how that’s in any way controversial. The colonization of Ireland by the English using the Scots-Irish as the primary Settler class is pretty well documented.
The facts of English rule over Ireland is well-documented. The particular framing of it as colonization is something that stands out to me is all.
Wikipedia only uses that terminology Sparingly. Again, not because it's not colonization, but because I think most people think of colonization as a thing that white people do to brown people.
The choice of framing is interesting because when you think about it colonization is just invading a place and imposing your citizens as a ruling class and your culture as superior (etc.). There are LOTS of instances of that throughout history that we don't usually call "colonization" (say, the Normans colonizing England), because in practice that word evokes the very specific kind of colonization that was practiced by Europeans from the 1400s onward. So I see insisting on saying that "Ireland was colonized" instead of "Ireland was invaded/oppressed" (both of which are correct) as a way to emphasize the harshness of British rule by appealing to colonial remorse. I don't say that judgmentally, I just find the linguistic aspect interesting.
Sometimes i forget that not everyone has an oversized interest in colonization, and things that seem obvious to me may not be so to others or widely held as popular opinion. Thanks for your perspective, I appreciate it. Cheers!