Hacker News Reader

Comment by hinkley | Hacker News Reader

I went to the British Museum when I was in my twenties and it was not an experience I will repeat. That is not a place of honor, and even in a time before I became more aware of the concerns and troubles of indigenous peoples I felt uncomfortable the entire time I was in there.

It wasn’t a celebration of history. It was a dragon’s hoard.

View on HN

All those monuments that happened to find themselves in ISIS and Taliban areas of control say hi.

That doesn’t excuse the actions and behaviors of the invaders who stole these artifacts dozens or hundreds of years before isis was even a thing.

Btw things like isis are a direct consequence of actions taken by the English colonialists when they created artificial boundaries.

Which is why china, vietnam, and korea never recovered. That good old colonialist narrative has its place, but given enough time and counter examples, it just lacks the explenation power it once had. Which is a dangerous gap the left left open, for the racist idiots to settle in.

Regarding the region.

The societal rot had already set in way before that. The whole ottoman empire was on a down trend, ever since the trade went around them. Which is a good indicator how low value was whatever they themselves had to produce and to offer.

To life in the shadow and ruins of the glorious past, it burns all men for what are they but lowcast creatures, fallen from up high..

> Which is why china, vietnam, and korea never recovered.

What does economic performance have to do with the British museums being filled with looted cultural artifacts? You could have thrown in Greece in there (EU member), but Greece also wants it's looted artifacts back.

What has it to do with economics?

China's case was very different as well, the majority of the population (Han Chinese) were ruled by a foreign race (Qing) that were racist towards them in 1800s. Many Han Chinese fought alongside foreign powers and they did loot a lot.

And it doesn't matter anyway, CCP rise to power and smashed everything in the name of Cultural Revolution.

I meant that the economic discussion is off topic concerning the subject in the article as well as the thread on looted cultural artifacts.

> Btw things like isis are a direct consequence of actions taken by the English colonialists when they created artificial boundaries

The Turks were the ones that conquered all those completely unrelated people in the first place. The British inherited their problem after World War I. But go on, I love this game of “brown people can’t have moral agency.”

Yes, the Turks also put their hands in the boiling pot, but only the British were arrogant enough to try to turn these regions into countries with neat, straight borders and also with western style governments. Which destroyed local alliances and created a massive power vacuum when the empire fell. Then, the us and Russia had a go of it, which certainly didn’t calm the situation.

But go on.

great, now do versailles.

or brest-litovsk.

a bad peace treaty is not an excuse for barbarism.

I believe that ancient artifacts belong to all humanity, so whoever is equipped best keep them safe to preserve them for us and posterity should have it.

On the same topic, I don't think that people of modern Turkey or Greece have more valid claim on the remains of Troy or Mycenae just because the people who have left these remains have one occupied the plot of land that now lies within their borders.

https://www.thearchaeologist.org/blog/why-did-people-start-e...

"By the 19th century, people were no longer consuming mummies to cure illness but Victorians were hosting "unwrapping parties" where Egyptian corpses would be unwrapped for entertainment at private parties."

That was callous, to be sure. But remember, mummies were being ground into fertilizer at an industrial scale. Or so I remember. Egyptians were often little more respectful of their history than outsiders.

> I became more aware of the concerns and troubles of indigenous peoples

What a weirdly condescending comment.

Would you rather have Rosetta used as a recycled building material? And half of the artifacts recovered in Mesopotamia later destroyed by radical islamists?

I think they are saying that they would prefer the artifacts to remain in the countries where they were found. Saying that the artifacts would be destroyed if they were not taken to the British Museum seems a bit too much.

I don't think it is "a bit much"

https://www.nationalgeographic.com/history/article/150901-is...

Iraq? From 1958 to 2003 Iraq preserved its cultural heritage fine. Then the UK invaded and the Iraq museum treasures were lost. The UK of course blames this on the Iraqis. The country is thrown into turmoil, to a tut-tut by upper middle class white westerners about how the Arabs aren't preserving their cultural heritage. This is why Arabs fighting against colonialism and imperialism fly planes into the Pentagon.

How about when Isis blew up those buddhist statues?

Assuming you're referring to the Buddhas of Bamiyan, those were blown up by the Taliban, not ISIS.

> Iraq preserved its cultural heritage fine. Then the UK invaded

If only it preserved human rights and lifes of it's citizens as fine. The only thing that US and coalition did wrong with Iraq was not killing off Saddam in '91 and leaving Iraq under his reign of terror for 12 more years.

Unfortunately, it looks like appeasing bloody dictators is a West's thing lately.

Why is the US responsible for Iraq again?

It’s exactly the same sort of paternalism that tore apart the British empire in the first place.

You guys are too stupid to take care of this obelisk so we’re just going to take it. K bye.

Even if you’re 100% right you look like an asshole, and if you don’t repatriate it when the place has a stable government then you’re just proving your rationalization was fully self-serving.

An interesting case is the Pergamon museum in Berlin, which as an aside is an absolutely breathtaking museum to visit. Most of the big exhibits like the Ishtar gate were in place by the 1930s, where they subsequently experienced WW2. The market gate in particular was damaged by bombs and had to be restored after the war. That restoration failed due to improper conservation and more work had to be done in the 2000s.

As far as I'm aware, there's never been serious discussion of the safety of things in Berlin though. Considerations of safety really only go one way.

I will say that my ex was a fan of a particular Spanish artist, and she was very upset to discover only while standing in the Spanish wing of the Louvre that her favorite painting had been repatriated to Spain, and only some small examples of his work remained. Google was only an infant at the time, and learning about art history from a book has its limitations.

I couldn’t blame them for wanting a famous work back for their own museum, but it was a major bummer all the same. But Spain is not iron curtain era Berlin, or a tumultuous Middle East, so it’s hardly a fair comparison. It’s difficult to find a balance, but what we know of peak British Empire, from every emancipated colony, is that they just didn’t care.

People like to complain about how arrogant the US is and I just think of that old anti drug commercial, “I learned it from watching you, Dad.” Parents who do drugs have kids who do drugs.

Looks like the British Empire was proven right when you look at what's happening in Iraq now. The artifacts predate the people in the regions in many cases.

There are, in fact, a very wide range of options between "have the British steal it" and "destroy it".

The most likely option being "the British destroying a lot in order to steal a bit".

Destroyed like the English banning the Irish language in schools in trying to destroy the Irish language?

Insofar as radical Islamists, the English sided with and supported radical Islamists in Iran against Mossadegh and then against the secular left under the Shah. The English supported Mujahideen in Afghanistan. Watch Lawrence of Arabia, they do it and celebrate it. The English saving secular socialist pan-Arab nationalism against radical Islamists? Please.

The real destruction of artifacts was the destruction of Iraq Museum during the UK's unprovoked invasion of that country. Which they of course blamed on Iraqis. These people are transparent.

As a Gaelic speaker (Scot's Gaelic) I feel you on the point about Irish Gaelic in schools. It's pretty shocking how hypocritical and selfish the English government/crown has been throughout history. They can try and cover it up, but at the end of the day, they're really just stealing things and getting away with it cause they're rich, powerful, and militarily dominant compared to their targets.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com