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How the West conquered the world, then spent the next hundred years apologizing for it
American Thinker ^ | 06/26/2026 | George P Brooks

Posted on 06/26/2026 7:47:22 AM PDT by SeekAndFind

Today, the word colonialism is treated almost like a curse word. Mention it in a classroom, on social media, or in many political circles, and you’ll immediately hear words like exploitation, racism, oppression, genocide, and theft. For many people—especially younger generations—colonialism has become history’s ultimate villain, the so-called “original sin” from which nearly every modern problem supposedly springs.

As a conservative, I’ve always thought this view was far too simplistic.

Now, before anyone starts sharpening their pitchforks, let me be clear: colonial powers absolutely committed injustices. Wars were fought. Peoples were conquered. Resources were taken. Some populations were devastated. These are historical facts, and serious people should acknowledge them honestly.

But history is rarely a Disney movie with obvious heroes and villains. The uncomfortable truth is that conquest, expansion, and empire are as old as humanity itself. Long before Europeans sailed across oceans, empires were rising and falling all over the world. African kingdoms conquered neighboring tribes. Arab empires expanded across North Africa and the Middle East. The Mongols swept across Asia and Europe. The Aztecs ruled over subject peoples through military force and tribute. The Romans practically turned conquest into an art form.

Human beings have always expanded when they had the power to do so. What makes Western colonialism different is not simply that it conquered territory.

What makes it unique is that the very civilization responsible for much of modern colonialism also produced the ideas that eventually challenged and condemned it: individual rights, constitutional government, abolitionism, freedom of speech, and the belief that all people possess inherent dignity.

That irony is almost never discussed.

In modern culture, colonialism is often presented as though it produced nothing except suffering. But history is more complicated than that.

Alongside exploitation came institutions and systems …

(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...


TOPICS: History; Society
KEYWORDS: apology; colonialism; conquest
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1 posted on 06/26/2026 7:47:22 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
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To: SeekAndFind

Islam’s central goal is to expand everywhere, control all under their ideas.

The Caliphate has no borders. Just ever expanding “frontiers”.

That, my friends, is the Colonialism of which you should be wary.


2 posted on 06/26/2026 7:55:49 AM PDT by Macoozie (Roll MAGA, roll!)
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To: SeekAndFind

Colonialism has not vanished.

It’s just that no one pays attention unless the European powers are doing it.


3 posted on 06/26/2026 8:01:02 AM PDT by Bratch
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To: SeekAndFind

“Stolen land”. I’m not sure I can think of any land that was not taken over by force at one time or another. But the difference is, was it for the better or not? The American natives were not always native and fought and “stole” as much as anyone and did not really make anything better for those they conquered. Torture was rampant, slavery was common. Although some say Europeans “stole” America and may even be partially true to some respect, we have learned to become more civilized in our ways. Well, most of us, libtards excluded.


4 posted on 06/26/2026 8:03:04 AM PDT by Omnivore-Dan (have to )
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To: Omnivore-Dan

Think of purebred dogs. People want them but they die younger.

Captain Cook felt Hawaiians would have been better off if he never arrived. Polynesians were cannibals-ate brains. They practiced sacrificial killings by rowing across oceans to capture their prey. Commodore Perry opened up Japan, an island nation that couldn’t leave their neighbors alone.
Gunboat diplomacy kept China from coming together as a nation. Let’s not forget the missionaries.


5 posted on 06/26/2026 8:13:48 AM PDT by DIRTYSECRET
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To: Macoozie

“Where Muslims stand is Muslim land.”

Radical Muslims believe that.
Moderate Muslims believe that.
Liberal Muslims believe that.

Unfortunately, the rest of the world hasn’t woken up to this fact yet.


6 posted on 06/26/2026 8:23:28 AM PDT by Leaning Right
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To: SeekAndFind

Ever been to a former colony? Most of the best of what they have are the decaying features built by the colonizers. Everything else is just another third world shit-hole.

The citizens only thought they were oppressed by the colonizers until they have become even more oppressed by their dictators and corruption.


7 posted on 06/26/2026 8:26:01 AM PDT by Sequoyah101 (Opinions and belly buttons, everybody has one and they get to show them if they want to.)
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To: SeekAndFind; Macoozie; Bratch; Omnivore-Dan; DIRTYSECRET; Leaning Right; Sequoyah101

The West - namely Europe- invited its own demise by self-destructing at the height of its scientific prowess and nationalism with World Wars 1 & 2. The fall of the empires was self-inflicted and 100% due to the West’s infighting and pride.

You can argue the Civil War did more damage to the US (self-inflicted) than any foreign threat. But I suppose the Vietnam War and the painful lessons of misguided misadventures abroad cemented the modern Left/Right divide, and the overseas fallout from the “endless” War on Terror has dividing the Right alone.

The fallout from the traumas of catastrophic bloodshed and division remains.


8 posted on 06/26/2026 8:28:32 AM PDT by CondoleezzaProtege (🩰🎬)
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To: Sequoyah101

Ever been to a former colony? Most of the best of what they have are the decaying features built by the colonizers. Everything else is just another third world shit-hole.


Case in point, India.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IFUIdcrgW6M

India had the keys to the kingdom, if they just maintained what the Brits left behind.


9 posted on 06/26/2026 8:28:35 AM PDT by dfwgator ("I am Charlie Kirk!")
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To: SeekAndFind

I recommend The Last Imperialist.

The book does a good job of explaining the positive side of British Colonialism, and explains many of the tragedies of the rush to condemn colonialism, which was primarily a Marxist push.

https://www.amazon.com/Last-Imperialist-Defense-British-Empire/dp/1684515203/ref=sr_1_4?crid=1ZZ4VWXBCUT5Q&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.0M2uA1qpxylgCi0tdE9pbgpzHSSQew6YV2eGM36wkssbuPEttupQXJX1lNw8ccjoC9iK_NqYPV5_Eh4icRpH23k39yy47M1NAzeRBx_osH1CfPAFEcU8F4W4C1tsjsMuIQ0fea7nxytJUtWktmrIKpu9F4Cm6hTc3bVcOnnMrLFADJWmymCe6Voj4FFemxVsS3sRB141tFdFU148YKjB71WT5hOQaVoE8yLNdDwPAV8.FfOOLSXUAq3pMgq2n20YtQQcOaPIDpZwXvzW4OoYdpM&dib_tag=se&keywords=in+defense+of+colonialism&qid=1782487594&sprefix=defense+of+coloniali%2Caps%2C224&sr=8-4


10 posted on 06/26/2026 8:28:44 AM PDT by marktwain (----------------------)
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To: SeekAndFind

“What makes it unique is that the very civilization responsible for much of modern colonialism also produced the ideas that eventually challenged and condemned it: individual rights, constitutional government, abolitionism, freedom of speech, and the belief that all people possess inherent dignity.”

Gosh, sounds almost like our own Constitution that has been used to destroy us. How? We let rot and filth invade our society and we quit training good citizens in our schools and instead gave them their “rights” for self-determination then somebody else trained them for something else.

Proverbs 22:6 comes to mind from time-to-time:

“Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it.”

We’re screwed.


11 posted on 06/26/2026 8:31:20 AM PDT by Sequoyah101 (Opinions and belly buttons, everybody has one and they get to show them if they want to.)
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To: dfwgator

Ever wondered how so few Brits maintained order in India?

It was not perfect but it was a lot better than the Raj and the hard caste system. They did it by uniformity of law.


12 posted on 06/26/2026 8:33:16 AM PDT by Sequoyah101 (Opinions and belly buttons, everybody has one and they get to show them if they want to.)
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To: SeekAndFind
The West conquered the world and yes, it was quite brutal sometimes. Then again, they also ended a LOT of utterly barbaric practices by the natives in many of these countries (like Sattee in India whereby they would burn widows to death).

They also brought roads, bridges, modern hospitals, universities, electricity, railroads, the telephone, a modern civil service, the internal combustion engine, light bulbs, antibiotics, airplanes, radio, television, cars, sewer systems, and much much more with them. Basically Westerners invented the entire modern world and gifted it to their colonies.

13 posted on 06/26/2026 8:35:43 AM PDT by FLT-bird
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To: FLT-bird

They also brought roads, bridges, modern hospitals, universities, electricity, railroads, the telephone, a modern civil service, the internal combustion engine, light bulbs, antibiotics, airplanes, radio, television, cars, sewer systems, and much much more with them.


Alright, but apart from that, what has The West ever done for us?


14 posted on 06/26/2026 8:37:02 AM PDT by dfwgator ("I am Charlie Kirk!")
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To: dfwgator

The confrontation with colonial legacies abroad wouldn’t have occurred without the self-inflicted Western destruction of World Wars 1 & 2 to emerge from first. That was what ultimately broke the British Empire and Gandhi was able to posture himself in light of that.


15 posted on 06/26/2026 8:39:44 AM PDT by CondoleezzaProtege (🩰🎬)
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To: FLT-bird

The West also had the Holocaust and produced Marxism and communism. It invited its own demise.


16 posted on 06/26/2026 8:42:24 AM PDT by CondoleezzaProtege (🩰🎬)
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To: CondoleezzaProtege

And of course Gandhi really wasn’t “Indian” as his formative years were spent in Britain and South Africa, where his views were formed.


17 posted on 06/26/2026 8:44:41 AM PDT by dfwgator ("I am Charlie Kirk!")
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To: CondoleezzaProtege
The West also had the Holocaust and produced Marxism and communism. It invited its own demise.

Asia had Mao's famines, the Kims murderous regime in North Korea, Pol Pot and the Cambodian killing fields, etc. Africa had Idi Amin, the Rwandan genocide, etc.

18 posted on 06/26/2026 8:46:27 AM PDT by FLT-bird
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To: dfwgator

Yes there were other Europeans in the 13 Colonies but maybe the American Revolution was just a skirmish between Brits after all. ;)


19 posted on 06/26/2026 8:47:09 AM PDT by CondoleezzaProtege (🩰🎬)
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To: FLT-bird

Yes but the West unleashed it…Karl Marx was German.

His ideas went West and wreaked havoc (Spanish Civil War etc..) and East but first cemented East on the continent landing in Russia, then from there overseas…etc…


20 posted on 06/26/2026 8:49:28 AM PDT by CondoleezzaProtege (🩰🎬)
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