Blood of Burma

Today is Friday, 28 September 2007.

It is, of course, too tragically late to know how societies such as Burma, the Philippines, Iraq, the Congo, Rwanda, etc. would have developed, had it not been for the violent imposition of European colonialism. What is obvious is that European colonialism so distorted these societies as to make it inevitable that, after independence, they would suffer decades of military oppression and economic disaster.

European colonialism conquered its victims by military means, and then viciously exploited them economically under the threat of further military violence. When the colonial powers withdrew, they left their colonies to the tender mercies of indigenous elites created in the European image, and the result was foregone: the new elites used military means to loot their own peoples.

In Burma, a bloodthirsty British elite was succeeded by a bloodthirsty Burmese elite. Just as the American power elite profited from supporting military dictatorships in Latin America and elsewhere, the Chinese power elite now profits from the uniformed gangsters of Burma.

The Museum of the Bourgeois hopes against hope that the current rebellion in Burma will succeed.