I had an English friend once, very nice chap, well-to-do, a product of an expensive private education and a typical hand-wringing, apologetic liberal. One day we were having a chat and he asked me did I not think that after all the wealth and comfort we enjoyed today was based on the terrible crimes of slavery and imperialism and would it not be too much to ask for us to pay some form of retribution.
I said to him that given that my ancestors spent most of the 19th century half-starved living on a diet of rotten potatoes on a wind and rain-swept hillside in Donegal I felt no obligation to compensate anyone, however if he had any skeletons in his family’s closet that he felt the need to atone for then feel free to hand over whatever sum of his own cash he felt like but he better keep his hands off my stash.
He didn’t pursue the line of argument with me again.
Even imperialism brought some progress to the good. They’re complaining based on the comparison of some imaginary and probably unattainable outcome to what took place.