© Reuters / Eddie Keogh; Global Look Press / Khalil Dawood
We live in strange times. Ordinary people are being encouraged, some would say gaslighted, to feel guilty over bad things done by Western powers hundreds of years ago, over which not even their great grandparents had any control. Yet at the same time they are expected to ignore or forget about equally awful things which happened in living memory.
The dominant hegemonic narrative has it that exploitative 'imperialism' - and the attitudes of racial superiority that went with it - ended with the demise of the old European empires. But that is absurd. Arguably an even worse form of it has emerged in recent decades, one which has caused an enormous amount of death and destruction around the world.
Yet while the 'old' imperialism and anyone associated with it is completely beyond the pale, the new turbo-charged, 'politically correct' imperialism, which often masquerades under a 'progressive' or 'humanitarian' banner, gets off very lightly. Consider what has happened these past 30 years.
Comment: It's notable that even before this crisis countries have been touting a reduced work week, as well as Universal Basic Income: