Frank wrote on Nov 25
th, 2021 at 6:31pm:
White man's burden...
Take up the White Man's burden—
Send forth the best ye breed—
Go bind your sons to exile
To serve your captives' need;
To wait in heavy harness
On fluttered folk and wild—
Your new-caught, sullen peoples,
Half devil and half child.
Take up the White Man's burden—
In patience to abide,
To veil the threat of terror
And check the show of pride;
By open speech and simple,
An hundred times made plain.
To seek another's profit,
And work another's gain.
Take up the White Man's burden—
The savage wars of peace—
Fill full the mouth of Famine
And bid the sickness cease;
And when your goal is nearest
The end for others sought,
Watch Sloth and heathen Folly
Bring all your hopes to nought.
Take up the White Man's burden—
No tawdry rule of kings,
But toil of serf and sweeper—
The tale of common things.
The ports ye shall not enter,
The roads ye shall not tread,
Go make them with your living,
And mark them with your dead!
Take up the White Man's burden—
And reap his old reward:
The blame of those ye better,
The hate of those ye guard—
The cry of hosts ye humour
(Ah, slowly!) toward the light:—
"Why brought ye us from bondage,
Our loved Egyptian night?"
Take up the White Man's burden—
Ye dare not stoop to less
Nor call too loud on Freedom
To cloak your weariness;
By all ye cry or whisper,
By all ye leave or do,
The silent, sullen peoples
Shall weigh your Gods and you.
Take up the White Man's burden—
Have done with childish days—
The lightly proffered laurel,
The easy, ungrudged praise.
Comes now, to search your manhood
Through all the thankless years,
Cold-edged with dear-bought wisdom,
The judgment of your peers!
Can you IMAGINE Australia asking cannibals - PNG, Solomons, Fiji etc- to assist with rioting by the ACTU?
No; but the Mogul empire, who had built eg the Taj Mahal in India in c.1630, were not cannibals; and when Clive beat the remnants of this empire at Plassey in 1757, the battle might have gone either way. (Apparently Clive covered his cannon with tarpaulins during a rainstorm, while the Indians failed to do so.....).
Hence the beginning of British rule in India. Kipling ignores the fact that the Taj Mahal displays the same technological mastery as St Pauls in London built 40 years later than the Taj.
"your new-caught, sullen peoples",.....not applicable to the Moguls.
"And check the show of pride";....I hope Kipling didn't look in the mirror.....
"Watch Sloth and heathen Folly" but don't look at the workhouses in London and floating prisons on the Thames.....
"The blame of those ye better,
The hate of those ye guard—",
yeh, right, like the East India Company arbitrarily imposing taxes on the locals and offending local customs.
"White man's burden".......acquired by his own greed.
Forum
Pages: 1 
