the Doctor [From Doctor Who (new series), S1E9 or 10, “The Empty Child” / “The Doctor Dances” -Q]
I would just like to add:
That is England’s empire during WWII. It covered about a fourth of the world, and England’s severe exploitation of all those countries was what allowed it to survive the war. So: not a tiny island. Certainly not a tiny island saving the world. Modern nationalism is dangerous and I don’t like it and I don’t like seeing this quote so here. Just look at that map for a while.
Except that the Nazis weren’t directly besieging all of those countries in 1941. It was because of them (and the US) that Britain was able to defy the Nazis until the Japanese pissed off the US enough to actually be involved in the party. That the ‘damp little island’ could get such an empire in the first place is pretty awesome, let alone being the sole power aside Russia to tell Hitler to GTFO.
You are missing the point of the commentary, but I really take issue with the empire bit. As someone whose country was part of that empire, whose country fought for that empire in WWII, and whose country — region — was let down by that empire, no. No, it is not ‘awesome’ that that damp little country got themselves an empire in the first place because it put itself in charge, exploiting our society in the process (because the Japanese weren’t the first to covet — there isn’t even a name for what is now Malaysia that isn’t steeped in our colonial history, so for want of a better word — our natural resources), and then shirked its responsibility to defend its empire. I learnt about this shit in primary school — the deprivation of basic necessities, the destruction of the local economy, the horror of living in a police state. People survived on sweet potato porridge because they were too poor to buy anything else. There are people who refuse to wear Japanese kitchen clogs because of the Japanese Occupation. It was a let down for Britain and a three year nightmare for us.
(You should also look up Neville Chamberlain and Appeasement.)
Wait you learned this shit in primary school? That’s a decent start; I didn’t get that shit until Form 3.
Keep in mind the damp little fucking island committed atrocities too, god damn. Awesome, my foot.
I was always interested by this quote because my experience as a student in public schools in the United States was that I was taught that the USA was the “hero” of WWII and that the Allies were losing until Pearl Harbor provoked the US to war, and then we went in and saved all the Allied butts. I did not have a more complex understanding of this taught to me until my junior year in high school, and I was very lucky to have the teacher I had who mostly ditched the textbook and had us all reading Zinn. Anyway, so when I heard this, I immediately recognized basically the same patriotic narrative about the essential character of the “good” nation being what wins the war, except with Britons positioned as the heroes instead of US Americans.
And in 1941, the government took an opinion poll and found that the majority of Britons surveyed wanted to surrender. When the royal family visited the East End of London, the people, after being bombed nightly for weeks while the royals were most likely in a bunker, if they were even in London, were spat at. When the Nazis took control of the channel islands, the people didn’t fight back, they let them stay, they even informed on their neighbors and handed in their Jews. Many war historians believe that if the mainland had been invaded we would have lasted a few weeks at best.
Well, at least Thursday’s history lesson came in handy.
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