Europeans should count their blessings and be proud of their continent!
The top 10% of Europeans own roughly 56% to 75% of total wealth (depending on the specific region), while the bottom half of the population holds as little as 2% to 5%.
Proud of extorting the whole world for centuries for our wealth? No, thank you
If you think that what people living here 500 years ago did is a reason for us to feel bad, then you need therapy. This shows our strength: we think, adapt, and change what is wrong, slowly but surely. This is extraordinary in our world. We have achieved so much and done so many positive things also in the past that what you are saying is insane. I hope you are just rage baiting here…
If you think we have stopped extracting wealth from other countries you are the insane one
If you had read my comment, you would have seen that I never said we had stopped anything.
I said that we made huge progress — you can’t deny it — and did a huge amount of good in the meantime.Compare us to any other continent or country and not some ideal, imagined perfection. The UAE, China, Russia, the USA…
If you think we’re bad and exploit people, I suppose we should replicate the approach of one of those countries, right? Then we will stop exploitation, wars, everything bad in general and become better people! Is that what you believe?
The EU is the most successful multilateral group on the planet and the height of civilization.
It was, but the power monkeys always want more power. And centralising power in Europe has failed every time in history.
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To win the cultural and intellectual battle, Europe must staunchly defend its model,
There is no argument in the article for why this should work in the future.
Europe profited from post colonial structures.
Redistribution is a political decision and possible to continue forever. But was redistribution the source of our prospetity, or just a bribe to buy our silence so that the elite could keep plundering the world?
With competition from China, we can’t keep selling our technology above fair prices. Without those profits will people stay willing to share? Will we be able to maintain culture and education?
…“thanks to centuries of pillaging the rest of the world”
That’s really not true and you should know it. Portugal and Spain are two of the main colonial powers in European history and they were both shit poor in the 70’s. Portugal more than Spain PRECISELY because it still had colonies, that were costing it blood and money for centuries by then.
I’m not victimizing Portugal, just reminding you, and anyone else who might need to learn this, that colonization was profitable only for short periods into few pockets. Portugal had 3rd world child mortality and alphabetization rates right before joining the EU. Joining an open trade area was the secret to change that.
Also, another important reminder, most EU member states never had colonies.
