Colonization

[Comrade Shmoo]

If Britain hadn't established colonies in North America, do you think society would still be better off today?

Eventually we'll have to go back to agriculture vs. hunting and gathering.

[Yelnoc]

If Britain hadn't established colonies in North America, do you think society would still be better off today?

which society?

Eventually we'll have to go back to agriculture vs. hunting and gathering.

What?  Why?

[SPC]

No, but they should not discourage those who wish to settle there.

[Lief]

This thread is strange. I like it.

[Redalgo]

No. And the New World should not have been colonized.

[True Federalist]

Yes.  They'll give us a place we can send the Scots, Irish, and Welsh so they won't be so bothersome.

[Old Europe]

If Britain hadn't established colonies in North America, do you think society would still be better off today?

You mean the Native American society? They surely would.

[Comrade Shmoo]

By 'society' I meant both North American and British.

[I Can't Get That Sound You Make, Out Of My Head]

Yeah,  living in England.

[Platypus]

The colonies were nothing but a money pit. Defending them and the shipping costs is outrageous.

That said, if we don't the French will. Furthermore, it would be better to have loyal reserves across the seas than for the frogs to have them. Who knows, we might even discover GOLD!

[dead0man]

If Britain hadn't established colonies in North America, do you think society would still be better off today?

You mean the Native American society? They surely would.

Only if there was a magic force field that kept everybody and everything from the Eastern Hemisphere from coming over here, but since there wasn't I think it's a little hard to say that they would "surely" be better off today if the British hadn't come over.  And even with a magic force field it would only be better if you swallow hook, line and sinker the myth of the Noble Savage.

[ChairmanSanchez]

I think the world is a better place due to colonization in the 16th-19th centuries, though it must come to an end at some point.

[Ghyl Tarvoke]

You* would probably be speaking French - or possibly Dutch - or possibly even more radically Mohawk Dutch or Cherokee French creole.

* - Of course I know 'you' as an individual would not exist, I'm using you in a collective sense to mean 'you' Americans. Of course, the real question to ask in this thread is why, in this alternative history reality, did the British - or rather I should say, the English - not get involved in colonizing the Americas. For this to happen in RL you would have a way in which the British Isles political and socioeconomic history turns out radically but plausibly different from actually happened in RL. One way might be a(n) EnglishHouse of Plantagenet victory in the Hundred Years War, another would be that the Norman Invasion of Ireland never happened and England eventually had another rival to it, this time just across Irish sea which prevented it from being hegemonic over the North West Atlantic. Perhaps you would be speaking Irish after all.

[Yelnoc]

You* would probably be speaking French - or possibly Dutch - or possibly even more radically Mohawk Dutch or Cherokee French creole.

* - Of course I know 'you' as an individual would not exist, I'm using you in a collective sense to mean 'you' Americans. Of course, the real question to ask in this thread is why, in this alternative history reality, did the British - or rather I should say, the English - not get involved in colonizing the Americas. For this to happen in RL you would have a way in which the British Isles political and socioeconomic history turns out radically but plausibly different from actually happened in RL. One way might be a(n) EnglishHouse of Plantagenet victory in the Hundred Years War, another would be that the Norman Invasion of Ireland never happened and England eventually had another rival to it, this time just across Irish sea which prevented it from being hegemonic over the North West Atlantic. Perhaps you would be speaking Irish after all.

Well, the OP only specifies North America.  If Columbus was not able to get anyone to fund his voyage then John Cabot, sailing for England, might have been the first man* to discover the New World.  Have the English discover the spoils of the Mesoamerican and Andean empires first and they won't have a reason to go digging for gold in Virginia.

*By which I mean the first European man, excluding Vinland and the possibilities of adventurous Basque fishermen.

[Ghyl Tarvoke]

You* would probably be speaking French - or possibly Dutch - or possibly even more radically Mohawk Dutch or Cherokee French creole.

* - Of course I know 'you' as an individual would not exist, I'm using you in a collective sense to mean 'you' Americans. Of course, the real question to ask in this thread is why, in this alternative history reality, did the British - or rather I should say, the English - not get involved in colonizing the Americas. For this to happen in RL you would have a way in which the British Isles political and socioeconomic history turns out radically but plausibly different from actually happened in RL. One way might be a(n) EnglishHouse of Plantagenet victory in the Hundred Years War, another would be that the Norman Invasion of Ireland never happened and England eventually had another rival to it, this time just across Irish sea which prevented it from being hegemonic over the North West Atlantic. Perhaps you would be speaking Irish after all.

Well, the OP only specifies North America.  If Columbus was not able to get anyone to fund his voyage then John Cabot, sailing for England, might have been the first man* to discover the New World.  Have the English discover the spoils of the Mesoamerican and Andean empires first and they won't have a reason to go digging for gold in Virginia.

*By which I mean the first European man, excluding Vinland and the possibilities of adventurous Basque fishermen.

No, because that would have meant a very different New World and different treaty of Tordesillas. It was not Colombus after all who conquered (or even claimed) the mainland of what is now "Latin America". That was Cortes, Pizarro and other conquistadors and that was more than 20-25 years after Colombus' final voyage. So there was no guarantee of that happening had Cabot been the 'first'.

(And besides if Cabot's discoveries did land England a claim on most of the territories of the New world a la Spain in RL (a treaty of Southampton, perhaps?) then what comes around when the treaty is torn up after the act of Supremacy and the Protestant Reformation in England? Assuming, that is, that those events happen in this scenario as they did in RL).

[The Mikado]

*By which I mean the first European man, excluding Vinland and the possibilities of adventurous Basque fishermen.

Or Moroccan fishermen, for that matter.

[Ghyl Tarvoke]

*By which I mean the first European man, excluding Vinland and the possibilities of adventurous Basque fishermen.

Or Moroccan fishermen, for that matter.

Quite possible that British and Icelandic fishermen knew about Newfoundland well before Cabot 'discovered' it.

[Platypus]

I've played a helluva lot of EU 1, 2, and 3, and I know that if you don't settle Santee, someone else will. Usually the dastardly Portuguese.

[politicus]

If Britain hadn't established colonies in North America, do you think society would still be better off today?

You mean the Native American society? They surely would.

Only if there was a magic force field that kept everybody and everything from the Eastern Hemisphere from coming over here, but since there wasn't I think it's a little hard to say that they would "surely" be better off today if the British hadn't come over.  And even with a magic force field it would only be better if you swallow hook, line and sinker the myth of the Noble Savage.

You don't have to live in an idyllic world of Noble Savages to be better off than most Native Americans are in the US today.

[dead0man]

More than 3/4s of NAs are living above the poverty level.  Indeed, it does suck to live on many of the Reservations (especially the biggest ones), but nobody is keeping them there.

[Ghyl Tarvoke]

More than 3/4s of NAs are living above the poverty level.  Indeed, it does suck to live on many of the Reservations (especially the biggest ones), but nobody is keeping them there.

But how many can actually afford to... you know... move?

[dead0man]

Barking up the wrong tree on that one, I'm firmly in the mind that one* can't be too poor to move.  Sure, it might be hard....sometimes really really hard..and scary too.  But if the option is barely surviving surrounded by other hangers on by a thread types or the hard and scary that comes with chasing opportunity, I'll take the latter.


*with some extreme exceptions involving health (mental or physical) and such

[Ghyl Tarvoke]

Barking up the wrong tree on that one, I'm firmly in the mind that one* can't be too poor to move.  Sure, it might be hard....sometimes really really hard..and scary too.  But if the option is barely surviving surrounded by other hangers on by a thread types or the hard and scary that comes with chasing opportunity, I'll take the latter.


*with some extreme exceptions involving health (mental or physical) and such

Yes, but assuming that they can move, where would they move to and what would they do? Even  if you ignore substance abuse issues (which I believe are very common on Rezes) what skills, from the perspective of a modern economy, does the average, say, 20-year-old Sioux who lives in Pine Ridge reservation actually have? He would be starting at the bottom of the food chain, probably in a big city where he knows nobody and quite possibly will meet nobody who speaks his native language (this wouldn't apply now to the Sioux but it would to other groups). While it is certainly possible to rise through the ranks, I can understand it's lack of appeal.

[dead0man]

Sure, it's easier to stay on the Res.