Explanation: The Congo Free State run by the Belgian monarchy was… horrific in its pursuit of atrocities, even by the extremely low standards of 19th century European imperialists. Imagine how bad you would have to be to shock a bunch of “White Man’s Burden” types who thought nothing of burning and looting their way across the African continent, and you will still probably arrive short of the kind of lunacy the Congo Free State hosted.
Most relevantly to the meme, native workers were given rubber quotas to meet, so that the Belgian monarch, Leopold II, could make a profit off of his colony. If they failed to meet these quotas, their hands - or the hands of their family members - would be amputated and given to colonial officials, as proof the punishment had been carried out.
The photos documenting that era and the brutality of Belgium make me sick in the same way photos of holocaust mass graves do. There’s a famous one of a man who didn’t meet the rubber quota contemplating a pile of severed hands taken from his children that I don’t think I’ll ever be able to forget. (I chose not to post that photo deliberately. You are welcome to look it up based on my description if you want to see, but don’t say I didn’t warn you afterwards)
RetroFed
PugJesus
Share on Mastodon
Share on Reddit
Share on WhatsApp
Explanation: The Congo Free State run by the Belgian monarchy was… horrific in its pursuit of atrocities, even by the extremely low standards of 19th century European imperialists. Imagine how bad you would have to be to shock a bunch of “White Man’s Burden” types who thought nothing of burning and looting their way across the African continent, and you will still probably arrive short of the kind of lunacy the Congo Free State hosted.
Most relevantly to the meme, native workers were given rubber quotas to meet, so that the Belgian monarch, Leopold II, could make a profit off of his colony. If they failed to meet these quotas, their hands - or the hands of their family members - would be amputated and given to colonial officials, as proof the punishment had been carried out.
The photos documenting that era and the brutality of Belgium make me sick in the same way photos of holocaust mass graves do. There’s a famous one of a man who didn’t meet the rubber quota contemplating a pile of severed hands taken from his children that I don’t think I’ll ever be able to forget. (I chose not to post that photo deliberately. You are welcome to look it up based on my description if you want to see, but don’t say I didn’t warn you afterwards)
Thank you, that ones a deep cut
All colonization is a crime against humanity. But the Belgians looked at what Columbus did and went “Hold my beer. No, the other hand”
I like my memes like I like my soul
Dark as fuck