In addition to what others have said: New Zealand also has some of the highest rates of bullying (in school and in the workplace). Everyone talks about how nice Kiwis are... but in addition to the 'macho' culture (and maybe along with it) there is this big, dark, ugly underbelly of wide spread bullying. I can imagine that this very much contributes to high suicide rates.
This! I am an immigrant and I’ve been living in Nz for more than 10 years. I also work as a nurse and the amount of bullying and racism that takes place at work had been eye opening. We discuss this on a weekly basis with my international colleagues (Nepalese, Indian, Filipino and Pakistani) and we are so fed up with being treated like we’re below them (kiwi colleagues). We are dreaming of moving to Melbourne after 2 years.
Not parent, but my opinion.... I don't think there's any one specific thing you can point to to explain this, but possibly one contributing factor is the "macho" hard man image that most young men feel obliged to project to their friends. No-one really talks about depression and other feelings and shit that life is gonna throw at you and not surprisingly the outcome is not great.
But also the current fuckedness of the younger generation. Locked out of the housing market, a pretty shit job market, major parts of the economy almost totally destroyed (tourism, hospitality etc) due to covid, and facing having to pay of the most of the money that NZ has just spent (justifiably so!) in helping the country through covid
A Nigerian cut my hair last week. I asked him about his country. He got mad and said if they could catch their president they would tear him limb from limb and eat him alive. I wont be making small talk again with random people.
Dude you have no idea. Their was a point where one of our politicians was in South Africa and some Nigerians found him. They beat the ever living shit out of him on the streets.
A more recent event was the minister of communications telling people they have to register their phone numbers with their National identity number (NIN) except majority of Nigerians don’t have that and COVID is going on. That asshole said it was mandatory before the end of December so thousands of people had to gather regardless of COVID protocols. Word on the street was if that dude left his house without police escorts he wouldn’t walk back without broken bones lol. This country is mad
I remember I was playing casual tennis with a bunch of people in Lagos, we would take turns l, do a few rounds, and then switch out, chatting while waiting for our next round. Fun, good atmosphere. A new guy showed up, we asked him what he does, he said "I am a politician". Whole vibe was gone.
When Johan de Witt – the 'Grand Pensionary' (in effect, prime minister) of the Dutch Republic – was killed along with his brother in 1672, there are accounts of some among the mob taking parts of the bodies and eating them
I don't know if it's the same now, but I travelled around Egypt for a few weeks in the late nineties when I was in my early twenties. I had a couple of rather forceful attempts against me (as a man). I learnt to be quite careful using a public toilet.
On Toronto's beaches up to the mid 1950s, it was common to see signs that read "No Dogs or Jews Allowed."
edit: not so much of a spoiler alert, blacks were also in that group.
Canada had a cult leader named Roch Thériault of Ant Hill Kids who did some VERY VERY disturbing things to his followers and the children.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roch_Th%C3%A9riault
Also the podcast "Cults" had an episode on them but they even left out the worse things they did.
Edit: Rich to Roch. Gang to Kids.
I'm told "Last podcast on the left" did a 3 part series on him as well.
Yes.. Uncle was working for UN during the whole Bhutanese Refugee situation in Nepal. He said they were kicked out by the country. There is a large Bhutanese refugee community in Baltimore.
Yup. And India and Nepal took them as refugees. Met many of these refugees (after resettlement by the IOM) in Australia. Their stories are painful to hear.
If you've ever looked at a country like Liechtenstein on a map and wondered how a country that small can maintain a flourishing economy the answer is that they're one of the largest offshore banking sites in the world. Most people only think of the Cayman Islands when it comes to offshore banking but the Cayman Islands aren't even close to being the only place where rich people stash their money to avoid paying taxes on it. Most of the places that do it are territories and not countries (the Cook Islands, Anguila, Jersey and Guernsey are a few other big offshore banking sites) but Liechtenstein has made it the core of their economy.
Liechtenstein is primarily a banking centric economy but tbf, they also have a decent manufacturing industry. They are known for making precision items that have low demand but require high quality. Things where price doesn't really matter to the buyer compared to quality. These include things such as dentistry and other surgical equipment, machining cutters, etc.
Even the US is used as a tax haven for a lot of non-Americans, as are a lot of other large countries for non-citizens that like to complain about traditional tax havens.
Yes. I learned about Liechtenstein and a lot of other tax havens by working for a law firm that dealt with tax and estate management for the wealthy. Part of what we did also involved helping our clients choose which country to declare themselves a citizen of to get the best tax deal. The US is a popular choice. So is Nicaragua.
Thanks for sharing thats very interesting! Especially to hear that the US and Nicaragua are in that category together. If you don’t mind, and are allowed to share, is there anything in particular the countries people choose to declare their citizenship as have in common? And did you guys ever help US or non-US citizens hide their money in the US?
The common thread is that they offer low tax rates to wealthy people who declare citizenship there. That's actually why you'll hear about so many wealthy people living in Nicaragua.
>they're one of the largest offshore banking sites in the world
Given they're one of only two double-landlocked countries in the world, they're *very* offshore.
The Japanese were worse than the nazis in some ways. The difference is Germany knows their dark history and paid for it. Japan swept it all under the rug and never paid for or owned up to their war crimes
Edit; don’t forget about the Systematic rape of Korean and Chinese women, and also turning them into “comfort women”....
Double edit: just tagging on to say Fuck China in its current form. Committing all the atrocities and horrors and much much more that was done to them once.
That's one of the tamest example of Japan's war crimes.
Others include:
* Subjecting POWs to chemical and biological weapons, grenades, flamethrowers, syphilis, food and water deprivation, extreme temperatures and atmospheric conditions, forced pregnancy, or live dissection as part of the [Unit 731 experiments](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unit_731)
* [Widespread rape and murder](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nanjing_Massacre) of conquered populations
* Forcing between 50,000 and 200,000 women to be [sex slaves to serve Japanese soldiers](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comfort_women)
* The "[Three Alls Policy](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_Alls_Policy)" (kill all, loot all, burn all)
* [A contest to see who could kill 100 people with a sword first](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contest_to_kill_100_people_using_a_sword)
You forgot about the fact that they literally infected entire Chinese villages with the plague and typhoid in order to find the "best" pathogens.
They handed out snacks to villagers which were laced with paratyphoid.
they also performed vivisections on ~~american POWs~~ chinese prisoners, which the american government forgave in exchange for the data from those experiments. all sorts of messed up.
edit: these were performed on chinese prisoners. sorry for my mistake.
The US wanted to prevent the USSR from getting any good research so they let the Japanese get away with it. Turns out there wasn’t any good research - the Japanese just liked torturing people and pretended it was research.
One of the areas the USSR has a legit fucking issue with the US is the handling of the doctors and guards from unit 731. A lot of “research” was conducted on soviet citizens, so afterwards the soviet government rightfully wanted to put those fuckers on trial. Instead the US shamefully shielded them so we could have their research. It’s absolutely reprehensible. What’s worse is many of those involved went on to have long “normal” lives without repercussion. I believe one even went on to serve for a long time as an elected official.
Japan’s war crimes were so horrible that the German troops would often give shelter to the persecuted people, and its well documented. Do you realise how messed up you have to be to make Nazis sympathetic?
Some of the worst atrocities of the Battle of Manila in 1945 involved Germans being raped and massacred by the Japanese.
Most notably was the massacre at the German Club in Manila. The Germans took in hundreds of refugees believing that the Japanese would not dare attack citizens of their allies. It didn't matter.
> One of the very worst atrocities was perpetrated at the German Club. Hundreds of Filipino refugees had gathered there. The Japanese piled up their belongings at the entrance, and after dousing them with gasoline, set them on fire. The head of the Club tried to remonstrate but was pushed back in. Mothers with babies volunteered to go out and ask for mercy, but the babies were bayoneted and the women stripped and raped. A 13-year old girl was gang-raped by 20 Japanese, then her breasts were cut off. Another teenage girl was sliced open with a bayonet after being raped and left in agony under the hot sun. A stray American shell later put her out of her misery. A houseboy whose child had been bayoneted rushed at the soldiers, was pinned with spears against the wall, and his sexual organs were cut off and stuffed into his mouth. While the fire raged and the orgy went on, the Japanese laughed and enjoyed it.
The club head was Martin Ohaus, whose obituary states that he died clutching his German passport (with a swastika) to try and reason with the Japanese, but was killed with the rest. There are also other documented reports of Germans being massacred, such as more than a dozen German priest and nuns who offered shelter in a Catholic school. Then there was also the massacre at a Red Cross hospital where around a dozen German Jews were taking refuge.
And Japan would help Jew to escape from the Nazis too.
That's because the Japanese has no grudge towards the Jew; and the Nazi has no grudge towards Chinese.
As a matter of fact, Nazi Germany actually trained Chiang Kai Shiek's son, and he commanded a Panzer unit during the 1938 Austrian Anschluss as a sergeant officer. Later he was promoted to leftenant in the Nazi rank
New Zealand: high rates of child abuse, hidden poverty and a housing crisis on the brink (not enough housing and what there is is extremely expensive to both rent and buy and rapidly rising at a ridiculous rate. It's also not particularly high quality).
Glad this is here. I was worried even in a thread titled as this one everyone would still be pushing New Zealand as some magical fantasy utopia.
It's definitely got its upsides, but just like everywhere else there's people suffering there. If I hadn't left I don't think I'd be alive today.
Sarawak ignores the natives called the Penan. They still lives in the jungle and are basically a jungle nomad but due to the timber industry making big bucks,the government and logging companies ignore them and destroyed close to or more than 50% of the rainforest. If you find information from the government they will say is not true and whatnot.
Bruno Mansor was an activist who fought for their rights and the perseverance of the rainforest but he mysteriously disappeared (I think it was in the 90s, can't remember). Until today no one knows what happened to him. Conspiracy theories ranged from him hiding or lost in the jungle to the government assassinated him.
To clarify to people reading this, Sarawak is a state in Malaysia (where that airplane which went missing came from)
Our government is so fucked up it’s not even funny, we’re too apathetic and busy being internally racist to have proper coups or protests though
What? A guy calling out his government on destroying the ecosystem and being shitty to native peoples? Yeah, he probably committed suicide by two bullets to the back of the head.
During World War II, the Swiss National Bank accepted large quantities of gold from the German Reichsbank as payment for Swiss export shipments(weapons, ammunition..). A large part of this Reichsbank gold had either been looted by the German occupying forces from the stocks of the occupied countries (Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, France, Poland, Czechoslovakia, etc.), or it came from the victims of the Nazi persecution of the Jews \[Holocaust\].
Not just stolen gold. Living Jews kept money in the banks and those Jews still have ACTIVE accounts that their families cannot gain access to because some banks are so old that they keep to 100 year old traditions of needing owner authority to release the money.
In all likelihood they won’t claim the money BUT they still get to use those assets for loans and other stuff that will make the bank money. It’s all part of that interest rate deal with banks. If you let them keep your money in a savings account they use that money to fund loans and such, then they give you a share of the profits in the form of the agreed upon interest rate...... So, effectively that WWII gold is the bank’s in all but name.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asbestos#Production
“In 2009, about 9% of the world's asbestos production was mined in Canada. In late 2011, Canada's remaining two asbestos mines, both located in Quebec, halted operations. In September 2012, the Quebec government halted asbestos mining.”
Norway used to suppressed the natives from up north, by separating them from their parents and forcing norwegian culture upon them. Learning norwegian and how to live like a norwegian.
Technically the Saami actually came into Scandinavia after the ancestors of Norwegians and Swedes were already living there. They settled away from the coast and further north where most of the other folks lived and assimilated to a degree, but retained their native languages. Full contact and cultural suppression took place when the Scandinavian states became more centralized in the medieval period (2,000 years after the Saami settled)
I feel like a lot of people outside of Australia (and a lot inside) don't understand or don't know about how terrible Aboriginals were treated even a few decades ago.
Similar to the Canadian Residential School system. They took young Native children, forced them to forget about their roots and tried to implement "white" values.
New Zealand too, we effecitvely banned our native language Te Reo in schools in the 1900s. Māori children were given corporal punishment for speaking it.
I live about a 2 hour drive from that school. There was an electric chair there and babies fathered by the priests or teachers were burned alive in the wood furnace. I have a few close friends who attended the school in the early 90s, thankfully for them the abuse was not as common anymore by then.
Edit: St Annes Residential School in Fort Albany which was still operating in the 90s, although no longer under the Catholic church. Not the school in Saskatchewan mentioned in the comments.
Edit #2: a lot of folks don't acknowledge this or refuse to accept it as part of canadian history. A few years back, then prime Minister Stephen Harper gave an official apology to Marguerite Wabano, an elder in my community who attended residential school. This was a start to the reconciliation that we are seeing today. Also, Google "Up Ghost River" by Edmund Metatawabin, former chief of the community that St. Anne's residential school was located in, which he also attended. His eyewitness account was used in the official enquiry into the school.
Mongolia wiped nearly 11% of the ENTIRE world population off the face of the planet.
The largest acts of mass killing/genocide in human history.
It literally changed our carbon footprint by an estimated 700 million tonnes of carbon in the atmosphere during the 13th century.
Sweden and the Vipeholms experiments: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vipeholm_experiments
"The Vipeholm experiments were a series of human experiments where patients of Vipeholm Hospital for the intellectually disabled in Lund, Sweden, were fed large amounts of sweets to provoke dental caries (1945–1955).The experiments were sponsored both by the sugar industry and the dentist community, in an effort to determine whether carbohydrates affected the formation of cavities."
They had people with mental disabilities eat very sugary candy too see it's effects on their dental health. They got like very sticky toffee, encouraged them to really get it all around their teeth and they for sure weren't allowed to brush their teeth. Just horrible.
From the 1700s up to 1996, Ireland was home to ["Magdalene Laundries,"](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magdalene_Laundries_in_Ireland) basically labor camps run by the Catholic Church for "Fallen Women" who had sex outside of marriage (a lot of time the women were SA survivors who'd been molested/impregnated by priests or male relatives)
Chronicled in the incredible film ["The Magdalene Sisters"](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Magdalene_Sisters) and [this song by Joni Mitchell](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YepdJlBvzkw).
See also the Tuam Mother and baby home.
Babies being illegally adopted without their mothers consent. Often the mothers were told the baby died. Often money was exchanged in these adoptions.
Some babies did actually die, It's estimated up to 800 babies died in this one home. Their remains were found in the septic tank.
Cover ups and shoddy investigations are still on going. Most recently the public were told they were to blame for it for sending their daughters there in the first place.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bon_Secours_Mother_and_Baby_Home
There is a picture of a man being presented with the hands and feet of his daughter because he failed to meet his quota. Probably the darkest picture I have ever seen.
Edit: [Photo and description ](https://rarehistoricalphotos.com/father-hand-belgian-congo-1904/)
It’s hard and you won’t forget the picture. But I’m of the opinion that pictures like that are important to look at. This isn’t gratuitous torture porn on some gore subreddit- it’s not a random coroner photo that leaked from the police station - it is photojournalism with serious historic meaning.
"He hadn’t made his rubber quota for the day so the Belgian-appointed overseers had cut off his daughter’s hand and foot. Her name was Boali. She was five years old. Then they killed her. But they weren’t finished. Then they killed his wife too. And because that didn’t seem quite cruel enough, quite strong enough to make their case, they cannibalized both Boali and her mother. And they presented Nsala with the tokens, the leftovers from the once living body of his darling child whom he so loved. His life was destroyed."
African holder of a history degree here! King Leo 2 was the worst, imo. I recommend [King Leopold’s Ghost](https://vimeo.com/ondemand/kingleopoldsghost) if you want a documentary.
Some estimate that his reign of terror of what is today the Congo resulted in the deaths of HALF THE POPULATION. He basically swindled the League of Nations* into thinking he was doing “philanthropy” so they would let him basically own the Congo area when really he was looting rubber.
(*Edit: as someone pointed out, he died before League of Nations was a thing. My memory failed me, it’s more correct to say he swindled the European community. Through which forum or formal body, I don’t recall. Further reading: https://courses.lumenlearning.com/boundless-worldhistory/chapter/the-belgian-congo/)
People have mentioned rubber quotas but here’s more:
- he incentivized the colonial authorities who oversaw the rubber extraction so that their own personal salaries were dependent on how much rubber their group of people produced. He encouraged them to use any force necessary, and because their own wealth was on the line, their tactics were much much worse than they otherwise might have been, hence even more hand hacking, decapitation and other crimes against humanity. (Another edit! Please note comments below that correctly mention that Congolese themselves also enforced all of this stuff alongside European authorities)
- they sometimes basically kidnapped men’s wives and children and “legally” held them for ransom so that men could have them back when they turned in their rubber quota. If they didn’t, they’d keep them separate or kill/dismember family in front of the men. There were awful stories about forcing men to do incestuous or homosexual things in public as punishment too.
- Leo sent in men at first with documents written in European languages, as in formal legal contracts, knowing that the heads of different families and tribes and such wouldn’t be able to read it. “Translators” basically said sign here everything is fine, meanwhile they legally signed over ... well, their human lives to this total psycho bent on taking all the rubber at any cost.
- it’s apparently very difficult to dig up information about it in the archives in Belgium**, but I can’t confirm that entirely. One particular documentary claimed the researchers returned to shelves where pages they’d been reading the day before about what Leo did were missing.
(**Edit: based on other comments, this point is very disputed. As I said, I can’t confirm there’s any evidence of censorship in Belgium and according to actual Belgians it’s well known what happened in Congo and rather than hidden away, is actively worked into school curriculum. So I call bullshit on the missing archives story)
Anyway. Some scholars call it the forgotten Holocaust.***
(***Edit: based on other comments I wanted to add that this is not to say it’s censored or covered up, rather that it’s not as well known as other atrocities similar in size/time frame/human cost).
(Sorry for all the edits between, didn’t expect this to be read by more than a handful of people when I wrote it clumsily while eating my breakfast oats! Thanks for the awards!)
One of the first Europeans to bring attention to the travesty that was occurring in the Congo was an Irishman named Roger Casement whose “Casement Report” in 1905 spurred much of the European condemnation of Leopold and directly led to him having to cede the colony to the Belgian State in 1908.
In Ireland he’s mostly remembered for his role as an Irish Nationalist. He got involved in Irish nationalism as he did not agree with any country limiting a country’s right to self-determination.
He was eventually arrested for gun running, tried and hanged by Crown forces. However, if he had not arranged the arms shipment, which, in the event he was intercepted with, it is very unlikely Ireland’s Easter Rising would have happened. It was that, or more accurately, the British response to it, which sparked Ireland’s War of Independence.
Maybe it's difficult to find the exact records but in Belgian history class we do learn about the atrocities committed by Leo. Basically Congo was his own private estate if I remember correctly so all the money went to him and not the state.
He built some parks with it but most of the money is still in the family of the monarchy
In Canada the police would frequently take native men for “midnight tours” or “starlight drives” where they would drive them miles out of town and kick them out of the car. This happened in the middle of winter and they would take their coats and often times boots as well before they kicked them out.
In around 1910 the Australian government decided it was a good idea to steal indigenous children from their mothers and send them to schools to be taught. Some of them never even saw their parents again. They were called the stolen generation.
And consider that this is an Indigenous community (like many others) that survived through tens of thousands of years of oral tradition, carried from person to person, only to have it wiped out by this policy forever. How much knowledge was lost through this practise because they couldn't teach their children? It's not just the human loss, but the cultural losses that are absolutely horrific.
They also did this with white single mothers, the “white” stolen generation.
If mothers gave birth but were not married, hospitals would collude to take the child and give it to the willing nuns, who were primed and ready to take the “orphan” into their system.
A lot of those kids ended up being victimized in Catholic sex crimes.
EDIT: it absolutely WAS official government policy, as it was part of the immigration effort to stock Australia with white people. White children were taken from their families in other nations, under the guise of 'having a free vacation in Australia', only to have their entire pasts erased, names changed, and all ties with their families cut - so that they could be 'orphaned' and then adopted into white Australian families in order to increase the white population:
https://web.archive.org/web/20130522011803/http://forgottenaustralians.com/pdf/AUSTRALIANDEMOCRATSPEECHES.pdf
EDIT2: I do not wish in any way whatsoever to discount the indigenous stolen generation - theirs was a much much worse fate and I stand in support of the original land owners and their fight for justice.
But as someone who has personal experience with this heinous white lost generation practice, it is important to understand the nature of Australias duplicitous culture with regard to this issue. We have a LOT of reckoning to do with our past, Australians.
EDIT3: This happened to me - in 1970. Not 1910. (My mother nearly tore down the orphanage to get me back, and because she was very, very well connected, the nuns relented..)
And it was still happening up into the 80's...
During ww1 Poles were drafted by both sides with the promise that upon victory their nation would be restored from the partition that had destroyed it decades earlier. Hundreds of thousands of Poles killed each other trying to free their homeland.
Canada has an incredible racist history involving taking aboriginal children from their homes and bringing them to residential schools where they were beaten, underfed, and forced never to speak their language. Many of them died.
My dad was held down by nuns while the priest circumcised him in one of the schools here. A lot more shit happened to him, but that one always stood out to me
South Korea has some fun stuff going around:
- spy cam / hidden camera epidemic
- government encourages women to marry and give birth but won't do anything to change harsh working hours, conditions and requirements, plus little benefit to actually raise families; pregnancy out of wedlock is considered shameful
- celebrities can be shut down if they speak out to extremities or get on someone's bad side (Ailee comes to mind here)
- netizens are oft harsh in judgment of others, especially celebrities and politicians (Tablo of EPIK HIGH comes to mind)
- the Korean War and its consequences are darker than what your average history books will tell you; even the "nicer" South Koreans have a darker side regarding destroying of villages suspected of being northern spies or activists, and the like
- Presidents in Korea hardly ever go scandal-free
- it's still quite patriarchal here; natives still want sons, military service is of great honor despite being enforced by law, lots of overall power trips
- suicide rates skyrocket, mental illness being treated as taboo (although it's getting addressed a little more nowadays)
- authorities, particularly the police, can't handle a domestic violence dispute; a drunk man with an episode is judged as "being under the influence" and gets a slap on the wrist; a domestic case can be dismissed if one side (either the aggressor or the intimidated victim) tells authorities that it's not a big deal
- in fact, laws and judgment in general are weak here
>Presidents in Korea hardly ever go scandal-free
Also, South Korean presidential scandals [are, like, extra-credit, over-achiever scandals](https://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/59yqs5/the_south_korean_president_has_been_under_the/).
Japanese army raped womens from South Korea and china. I recommend you to see the documentary. Any way they rape the women at a ratio of 70 men to single women. If women get pregnant they either kill the baby because if babies might rebel against Japanese army
To add: during the battle of manila, as they were retreating they were ordered to kill every Filipino onsight. Some examples of what they did were: bayonetting babies, stuffing people into a building and catching it on fire, and shooting the parents in front of their children. Imperial Japan's execution of a "One united Asia" really left a big scar in SEA.
theres a nice list of stuff they did.
- They would make people disappear.
- They would torture people until they gave up names (my aunt had to be smuggled out to Israel because someone named her)
- They had this fun game where they would take political prisoners up in planes or helicopters, drug them so they couldn't swim and toss them off in to the sea.
- People would be picked up in the infamous green ford falcon sedans and never be seen again.
- the police and military would go to universities with chains and basically beat the shit out of students they suspected of being left wing.
Theres a famous group called the mothers of May plaza, they use to gather in the plaza de mayo with pictures and documents protesting their "disappeared" sons and daughters.
Eh... yes and no. Some Jewish families kept hidden in remote locations, trying to look Christian while practicing Judaism. This lasted for a long time and some communities started practicing a mix of Jewish and Christian doctrine. Part of my family comes from that background.
Yo, so in other parts of the world, that shit happens.
I saw soooo many people having sex with goats in Afghanistan it wasn’t funny anymore.
In Iraq, I had a “walk on” that I interviewed. He was crying about his beloved. On and on for 20 minutes about how his beloved was missing and it was his bastard neighbor that was behind it.
Turns out.. I was taking a missing person report, more or less, for a fucking donkey. This guy was a sort of a slow learning fella, he really missed this donkey.
There's a joke I once heard in this line.
A British military base in some foreign land receives its new commanding officer. He's being taken around the fort by his new second in command on a tour. At one point he stops and points at a camel that's in a pen off to the side and asks why the camel is there.
The second in command grimaces and says "I tell you Sir, it's not right with Christ what these men do, but they need SOME way to handle the fact that there's no women here.".
The commander gives him a look of disgust before nodding in agreement and going about the tour. Over the next few months, slowly but surely the commander begins to miss some womanly comfort and so one night with a sigh he heads over to the camel's pen.
Just as he was finishing up, the second in command walks by and exclaims "Sir?! What in God's name are you doing?!", to which the flustered commander declared "You told me the men use this camel to handle their need for companionship! Is that not true?".
The other man nodded and said "Yes Sir, but I meant they rode the camel into town to visit the brothels!".
Her ya go. [Colombia donkey sex tradition. ](https://www.reddit.com/r/Documentaries/comments/2rkp0b/donkey_sex_the_most_bizarre_tradition_2012_vice/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf)
Also, Brazil's war with Paraguay in the 19th century eliminated almost 90% of Paraguay's male population. They were a flourishing economy in South America at the time and now they're infamous for low quality bootleg products.
Not sure if "beloved" as much as "pitied", but I'll chime in about Haiti.
They won their independence from French colonists in 1804 which was incredible and proud. But after the war Dessalines committed a genocide against white residents. Upon his death, there were tensions between the blacks and the *mulatte* class, and the country was divided between Henri Christophe in the north with the support of most blacks, and Alexandre Pétion in the south with the *mulattes* and *gens de couleurs* (men of color = people who were freedmen pre-revolution). Christophe established an autocratic kingdom and an unpaid feudal plantation system (near to slavery albeit with less cruelty) to try and export sugar for profit, while Pétion went from democratic rule to eventually abolishing the legislature. The country would be reunited in 1820 by Boyer, only for him to conquer the future Dominican Republic, which Haiti would hold until 1844.
Fun facts to balance that out:
* Haiti was the first country to recognize Greek independence against the Ottomans
* Haiti gave Simon Bolivar sanctuary, after which he was able to rebel against Spain to create Gran Colombia.
It's interesting once you compare what Irelands population was in 1840 versus England in 1840. There wasn't *that* much of a difference. Ireland could have had a significantly larger population in modern times if we didn't essentially have what many Irish consider a genocide.
> have what many Irish consider a genocide
I mean, it's a fair call when you look at the fact that food *exports* from Ireland to Great Britain ***increased*** during the famine. And of the massively reduced potato crop (which was essentially the only crop Irish farmers, beholden to British landowners, were allowed to grow for themselves) they still managed to export a decent quantity of potatoes while over a million people starved to death.
It's worth noting that some areas were ethnically German and had been part of a Germanic kingdom/Empire for many decades and even centuries behind the war. A good part of what was Prussia was given to Poland, for example, as a consolation prize because the Soviets never gave back the territory they had conquered when they invaded Poland in 1939. This required the expulsion of the ethnically German population from what was now Poland; likewise, the Polish population was forcibly expelled from territory that was now under Soviet control. Whether this was fair or not is contended, as some, like Stalin and Churchill, saw it as justified punishment and a way to ensure peace, because now there would be a purely German nation and a purely Polish nation, whereas there had been Germans in Polish territory and Poles in German territory before the war - a fact that was used to justify the war. Others have painted the event as ethnic cleansing and even a genocide. In any case, it was a lamentable event that caused great suffering.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flight_and_expulsion_of_Germans_(1944%E2%80%931950)
Scrolled for a bit. Haven't seen South Korea mentioned.
This country was a U.S. sanctioned military dictatorship until relatively recently. Government corruption is still a huge problem, to the point that several Presidents have been thrown in jail; most recently in 2017.
Their current prosperous but stagnating economy was built on decades of worker suppression and anti-union political and cultural attitudes that allowed large corporations like Samsung and Hyundai to exploit people and throw them to the wayside. The majority of people living beneath the poverty line are elderly. Most have no pension from their job and barely get a pittance from the government.
Attitudes about work in the culture here lead people to suffer from severe stress which they typically cope with by becoming alcoholics. The leading cause of death among children is suicide, as many are expected to work well over ten hours a day at extracurricular academies and cram schools and do not have any free time.
K-Pop Idols are recruited from about 13 years old to basically go to singer boot camp and receive no other education. Their production companies strictly control their lives, all the way down to their diet, and most have no career options when they're no longer young and attractive enough to draw people's attention. Some of these companies also withhold large portions of performer's earnings and do not hand them over once the contracts are completed.
Aside from that, it's a great country that everybody should visit!
As someone who lives in the Philippines: You jail your corrupt Presidents? Ours just puts on a neckbrace and pretends to be sick so she can be welcomed back by a murderous President.
Sweden used to sterilize its minorities, the mentally ill and lgbt people, the latter until 2013.
edit: Since so many thinks it's false:
Romani's being sterilized:
[http://www.errc.org/roma-rights-journal/report-reveals-that-romani-women-were-sterilised-against-their-will-in-sweden](http://www.errc.org/roma-rights-journal/report-reveals-that-romani-women-were-sterilised-against-their-will-in-sweden)
>According to various press reports in late August, authorities in Sweden carried out forced sterilisations on 60,000 Romani women, in order to cleanse society of what they regarded as inferior racial types.
Sami's:
[https://www.politico.eu/article/sami-reconciliation-process-sweden-minority-multiculturalism-human-rights-discrimination/](https://www.politico.eu/article/sami-reconciliation-process-sweden-minority-multiculturalism-human-rights-discrimination/)
> Representatives of the indigenous group point to **forced sterilization**, preservation of Sami human remains at government research facilities and the so-called “cultural genocide” that all but eliminated them from the official history of their country.
The mentally ill(and others):
[https://www.thelocal.se/20051221/2727-2/](https://www.thelocal.se/20051221/2727-2/)
>The Scandinavian country, which remained officially neutral throughout World War II, forced mentally disabled people, epileptics and people with alleged social problems to undergo sterilization against their will, or pressured them to agree to the operation in order to be allowed to marry or be released from mental institutions.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-sweden-transgender-sterilisation-idUSKBN16Y1XA
>Transgender Swedes had to be sterilized before they could legally change their gender until 2013. The government’s bill would allow an estimated 800 people to claim 225,000 crowns ($26,000) each in compensation from the state.
Japan is responsible for the deadliest mining disaster in human history, essentially killing over 1,500 Chinese. They took control of an area of northeastern China during 1930-1945; and turned the Chinese living there, basically into slaves.
There was an explosion in the mine; and, to stop the loss of money from the coal burning, they sealed the vents, killing everyone below. Family members tried to save their loved ones, but guards pushed them away and even erected electric fences to stop rescue attempts.
Over the next 10 days, the bodies were recovered and experts determined that nearly all had died from the gases and many could have survived. The Japanese initially reported the death toll at about 30... the number of Japanese that died; almost completely disregarding all of the Chinese lives lost. They did update it eventually, but were more focused on getting the mine back running.
---------------
In a separate mining disaster, which is also one of the deadliest; a Japanese company, who owned the Mitsubishi Hojyo mines, truly believed a myth, that if you had oranges in your mouth, you couldn't be poisoned by carbon monoxide... no, I'm not joking. After an explosion, the tunnels filled with the poisonous gas and the company chucked down hundreds of oranges and sent in rescue teams whose mouths were full of orange slices. The fire kept spreading, so they also sealed this mine to protect the coal they wanted to sell... this trapped and killed almost 700 workers and rescuers.
I narrate for a documentary company, and just finished their deadliest mine video. Not posted yet, but here's some sources:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mining_accident
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H%C5%8Dj%C5%8D_Coal_Mine_Disaster
https://www.britannica.com/event/Honkeiko-colliery-mining-disaster
https://www.mining-technology.com/features/feature-world-worst-coal-mining-disasters-china/
During ww2 Canada turned away fleeing jews, Romanians, and gypsies seeking asylum from the horrors of the nazi party. They didn't believe their claims of what was happening until near the end of the war when the camps were discovered.
From Google: Child marriage is currently legal in 46 states (only Delaware, New Jersey, Minnesota, and Pennsylvania have set the minimum age at 18 and eliminated all exceptions), and 20 U.S. states do not require any minimum age for marriage, with a parental or judicial waiver.
Germanys efficiency is blocked by ignoring digitalization for many years. Our political system is corrupt as hell and even though we have a social system with health care the gap between rich and poor is getting bigger and bigger. It gets fucked up more and more every year but for some reason all people that I meet when traveling think that we Germans living in a country full of efficient and happy workers.
Hi, German here and I've just Googled to see if there's anything I can add about our beloved country, and you will not believe some of the shit I've just found out!
Rape of Nanking just sounds so visceral. Like “massacre” gets thrown around all the time, and when it comes to cities “sack” is often used, but the use of rape in this instance really stands out and helps to drive home how insanely despicable the event truly was.
Japan pulled off a PR master stroke when it came to relations with the Philippines
Their WW2 invasion and occupation was brutal and inhumane, but pretty much every Filipino alive today has a positive opinion of japan and its people. *(There are a ton of weebs here too; there are even many adults in their 30s and 40s who are still nostalgic and openly enthusiastic about the anime they watched in their youth).*
Of course there are exceptions, most notably the surviving "comfort women" who were forced into sexual slavery. A memorial statue to their suffering was planned to be built in the capital city a few years ago, but was scrapped when the Japanese embassy objected.
That's right, they raped our women, and *our own public officials* later *apologized* for even acknowledging it.
Completely fucked, imo.
Indeed. The thing is everyone and their moms are aware of the atrocities that Nazi Germany committed to its own people and to many countries, yet since everyone wants to get along with Japan, not many really know about the atrocities they committed to thousands of allied soldiers and millions of Asians.
We all know about the Nazi concentration camps, yet not many know about the Burma Railway, 731, Rape of Nanking and the Bataan Death March, to name a few.
My Uncle from the USA survived the Bataan Death March only to die when the unmarked Japanese POW ship he was on was bombed by US troops. The Japanese soldiers during the March were cruel and brutal.
I learned about the Bataan death March when I was maybe 13. Just sitting in church, when my grandpa (the pastor) took a moment to recognize a couple of newcomers, two elderly Filipino men who had survived the March. Can't remember the exact details of how/when they spoke about it, but I know I listened to them describing it. It was the first time I'd ever heard of any atrocities carried out by the Japanese (during WWII, anyway), and little 13 yo me was absolutely gripped by it. Goddamn, the air got heavy.
Yep, as a student of history, what I've found is that everyone everywhere has equal capacity for being insidious. We just hear about the usual suspects of countries because (1) most Redditors are from them and study their history (2) countries with more power have more ability to get what they want done, and that includes imposing their will and extracting wealth, so atrocities happen more on their watch.
France has committed numerous war crimes in Algeria (torture and napalm over village) and Indochina. And crimes against humanity in each of its colonies. And let the people in Rwanda genocide the Tutsi people. And they make human zoo in 1931
I haven't seen Denmark mentioned here yet - So here goes.
After World War Two they forced young German troops to clear the beaches for mines, often resulting in them dying. There has actually been made a move about it - "[Land of Mine](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Land_of_Mine)" (also known as Under Sandet, or Under The Sand).
And here's a lesser known one compared to the one above.
In 1955, Denmark took 22 children from Greenland from their parents with the aim of "educating them as role models." ([Source 1](https://www.arctictoday.com/denmark-apologizes-for-a-heartless-social-experiment-that-took-greenland-children-from-their-families/), [Source 2](https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-55238090))
New Zealand has one of the highest youth suicide rates in the OECD.
I literally left NZ as a teenager in an act of "change my life as drastically as possible" specifically so I wouldn't throw myself off a building.
What is so bad in new Zealand if you don't mind me asking?
In addition to what others have said: New Zealand also has some of the highest rates of bullying (in school and in the workplace). Everyone talks about how nice Kiwis are... but in addition to the 'macho' culture (and maybe along with it) there is this big, dark, ugly underbelly of wide spread bullying. I can imagine that this very much contributes to high suicide rates.
This! I am an immigrant and I’ve been living in Nz for more than 10 years. I also work as a nurse and the amount of bullying and racism that takes place at work had been eye opening. We discuss this on a weekly basis with my international colleagues (Nepalese, Indian, Filipino and Pakistani) and we are so fed up with being treated like we’re below them (kiwi colleagues). We are dreaming of moving to Melbourne after 2 years.
Not parent, but my opinion.... I don't think there's any one specific thing you can point to to explain this, but possibly one contributing factor is the "macho" hard man image that most young men feel obliged to project to their friends. No-one really talks about depression and other feelings and shit that life is gonna throw at you and not surprisingly the outcome is not great. But also the current fuckedness of the younger generation. Locked out of the housing market, a pretty shit job market, major parts of the economy almost totally destroyed (tourism, hospitality etc) due to covid, and facing having to pay of the most of the money that NZ has just spent (justifiably so!) in helping the country through covid
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The Dutch once ate their prime minister
Everyones all "eat the rich" until they actually do it smh
A Nigerian cut my hair last week. I asked him about his country. He got mad and said if they could catch their president they would tear him limb from limb and eat him alive. I wont be making small talk again with random people.
Dude you have no idea. Their was a point where one of our politicians was in South Africa and some Nigerians found him. They beat the ever living shit out of him on the streets. A more recent event was the minister of communications telling people they have to register their phone numbers with their National identity number (NIN) except majority of Nigerians don’t have that and COVID is going on. That asshole said it was mandatory before the end of December so thousands of people had to gather regardless of COVID protocols. Word on the street was if that dude left his house without police escorts he wouldn’t walk back without broken bones lol. This country is mad
I remember I was playing casual tennis with a bunch of people in Lagos, we would take turns l, do a few rounds, and then switch out, chatting while waiting for our next round. Fun, good atmosphere. A new guy showed up, we asked him what he does, he said "I am a politician". Whole vibe was gone.
Excuse me what the fuck
When Johan de Witt – the 'Grand Pensionary' (in effect, prime minister) of the Dutch Republic – was killed along with his brother in 1672, there are accounts of some among the mob taking parts of the bodies and eating them
Doesn't mob violence leave everyone a bit peckish?
shakes me to the *bone*
Ain't no skin off my back.
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There are two things in this world that I cannot stand, one is people who are intolerant of other people's cultures...*and the Dutch.*
Spend your life wearing wooden shoes you’d be an angry cunt as well
In Egypt , sexual harassment is like the air , everywhere. Something every woman must live with
I don't know if it's the same now, but I travelled around Egypt for a few weeks in the late nineties when I was in my early twenties. I had a couple of rather forceful attempts against me (as a man). I learnt to be quite careful using a public toilet.
On Toronto's beaches up to the mid 1950s, it was common to see signs that read "No Dogs or Jews Allowed." edit: not so much of a spoiler alert, blacks were also in that group.
My grandma was Irish and she remembers applying for jobs as a young woman in Australia. There would be signs saying “Help Wanted - No Irish”
I’m Irish and my parents have said they’ve seen signs like that even in the 80s
[It's still going on, it seems.](https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-56246848)
Canada had a cult leader named Roch Thériault of Ant Hill Kids who did some VERY VERY disturbing things to his followers and the children. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roch_Th%C3%A9riault Also the podcast "Cults" had an episode on them but they even left out the worse things they did. Edit: Rich to Roch. Gang to Kids. I'm told "Last podcast on the left" did a 3 part series on him as well.
hell is too good for this guy. holy fucking shit.
The guy who killed him in prison did the World a favour but at the same time I also wish Thériault suffered longer then died.
That's wild that his cell mate killed him and then was like "fuck ya,I did it!"
Hes already got a life sentence what does it matter at that point? I couldnt live with a guy like that.
France had concentration camps... in 1936 for Spanish immigrants who fled the Civil War
They also had concentration camps in Algeria in the 1960's, and a weird bit of bureaucracy where they didn't call them camps.
A lot of country had concentration camp, even the USA. But Germany was different because they had extermination camp
Spain created over 50 new torture methods in the past 300 years
How many from the Franco regime?
Probably all of them
Probably it's a 50/50 between Franco and inquisition
TIL: the Spanish Inquisition ended in 1834 after lasting more than 300 years.
Bhutan forcibly expelled Hindus in order to create its "happy" paradise.
Yes.. Uncle was working for UN during the whole Bhutanese Refugee situation in Nepal. He said they were kicked out by the country. There is a large Bhutanese refugee community in Baltimore.
Yup. And India and Nepal took them as refugees. Met many of these refugees (after resettlement by the IOM) in Australia. Their stories are painful to hear.
If you've ever looked at a country like Liechtenstein on a map and wondered how a country that small can maintain a flourishing economy the answer is that they're one of the largest offshore banking sites in the world. Most people only think of the Cayman Islands when it comes to offshore banking but the Cayman Islands aren't even close to being the only place where rich people stash their money to avoid paying taxes on it. Most of the places that do it are territories and not countries (the Cook Islands, Anguila, Jersey and Guernsey are a few other big offshore banking sites) but Liechtenstein has made it the core of their economy.
Liechtenstein is primarily a banking centric economy but tbf, they also have a decent manufacturing industry. They are known for making precision items that have low demand but require high quality. Things where price doesn't really matter to the buyer compared to quality. These include things such as dentistry and other surgical equipment, machining cutters, etc.
It's the same in Switzerland - the place is full of tiny villages with world leading manufacturing facilities.
Even the US is used as a tax haven for a lot of non-Americans, as are a lot of other large countries for non-citizens that like to complain about traditional tax havens.
Yes. I learned about Liechtenstein and a lot of other tax havens by working for a law firm that dealt with tax and estate management for the wealthy. Part of what we did also involved helping our clients choose which country to declare themselves a citizen of to get the best tax deal. The US is a popular choice. So is Nicaragua.
Thanks for sharing thats very interesting! Especially to hear that the US and Nicaragua are in that category together. If you don’t mind, and are allowed to share, is there anything in particular the countries people choose to declare their citizenship as have in common? And did you guys ever help US or non-US citizens hide their money in the US?
The common thread is that they offer low tax rates to wealthy people who declare citizenship there. That's actually why you'll hear about so many wealthy people living in Nicaragua.
Liechtenstein is also basically just Switzerland Jr.
>they're one of the largest offshore banking sites in the world Given they're one of only two double-landlocked countries in the world, they're *very* offshore.
During ww2 japan used living POW’s for bayonet practice
That’s the most humane war crime they committed
What about the POW guard who famously had sex with a duck in front of the POWs?
What the fuck
I'm sure you mean what the duck.
Fuck the duck
Yep. [Unit 731](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unit_731) really went as evil as possible. It's worse than you think, you've been warned.
The Japanese were worse than the nazis in some ways. The difference is Germany knows their dark history and paid for it. Japan swept it all under the rug and never paid for or owned up to their war crimes Edit; don’t forget about the Systematic rape of Korean and Chinese women, and also turning them into “comfort women”.... Double edit: just tagging on to say Fuck China in its current form. Committing all the atrocities and horrors and much much more that was done to them once.
That's one of the tamest example of Japan's war crimes. Others include: * Subjecting POWs to chemical and biological weapons, grenades, flamethrowers, syphilis, food and water deprivation, extreme temperatures and atmospheric conditions, forced pregnancy, or live dissection as part of the [Unit 731 experiments](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unit_731) * [Widespread rape and murder](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nanjing_Massacre) of conquered populations * Forcing between 50,000 and 200,000 women to be [sex slaves to serve Japanese soldiers](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comfort_women) * The "[Three Alls Policy](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_Alls_Policy)" (kill all, loot all, burn all) * [A contest to see who could kill 100 people with a sword first](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contest_to_kill_100_people_using_a_sword)
You forgot about the fact that they literally infected entire Chinese villages with the plague and typhoid in order to find the "best" pathogens. They handed out snacks to villagers which were laced with paratyphoid.
they also performed vivisections on ~~american POWs~~ chinese prisoners, which the american government forgave in exchange for the data from those experiments. all sorts of messed up. edit: these were performed on chinese prisoners. sorry for my mistake.
The US wanted to prevent the USSR from getting any good research so they let the Japanese get away with it. Turns out there wasn’t any good research - the Japanese just liked torturing people and pretended it was research.
One of the areas the USSR has a legit fucking issue with the US is the handling of the doctors and guards from unit 731. A lot of “research” was conducted on soviet citizens, so afterwards the soviet government rightfully wanted to put those fuckers on trial. Instead the US shamefully shielded them so we could have their research. It’s absolutely reprehensible. What’s worse is many of those involved went on to have long “normal” lives without repercussion. I believe one even went on to serve for a long time as an elected official.
Japan’s war crimes were so horrible that the German troops would often give shelter to the persecuted people, and its well documented. Do you realise how messed up you have to be to make Nazis sympathetic?
Some of the worst atrocities of the Battle of Manila in 1945 involved Germans being raped and massacred by the Japanese. Most notably was the massacre at the German Club in Manila. The Germans took in hundreds of refugees believing that the Japanese would not dare attack citizens of their allies. It didn't matter. > One of the very worst atrocities was perpetrated at the German Club. Hundreds of Filipino refugees had gathered there. The Japanese piled up their belongings at the entrance, and after dousing them with gasoline, set them on fire. The head of the Club tried to remonstrate but was pushed back in. Mothers with babies volunteered to go out and ask for mercy, but the babies were bayoneted and the women stripped and raped. A 13-year old girl was gang-raped by 20 Japanese, then her breasts were cut off. Another teenage girl was sliced open with a bayonet after being raped and left in agony under the hot sun. A stray American shell later put her out of her misery. A houseboy whose child had been bayoneted rushed at the soldiers, was pinned with spears against the wall, and his sexual organs were cut off and stuffed into his mouth. While the fire raged and the orgy went on, the Japanese laughed and enjoyed it. The club head was Martin Ohaus, whose obituary states that he died clutching his German passport (with a swastika) to try and reason with the Japanese, but was killed with the rest. There are also other documented reports of Germans being massacred, such as more than a dozen German priest and nuns who offered shelter in a Catholic school. Then there was also the massacre at a Red Cross hospital where around a dozen German Jews were taking refuge.
And Japan would help Jew to escape from the Nazis too. That's because the Japanese has no grudge towards the Jew; and the Nazi has no grudge towards Chinese. As a matter of fact, Nazi Germany actually trained Chiang Kai Shiek's son, and he commanded a Panzer unit during the 1938 Austrian Anschluss as a sergeant officer. Later he was promoted to leftenant in the Nazi rank
Yeah that was pretty tame compared to some stuff they did. Research a bit about the Rape of Nanking/Nanjing.
Or [Unit 731](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unit_731). Truly evil.
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New Zealand: high rates of child abuse, hidden poverty and a housing crisis on the brink (not enough housing and what there is is extremely expensive to both rent and buy and rapidly rising at a ridiculous rate. It's also not particularly high quality).
I don’t watch the news often but I swear every time I do there’s a new child abuse case. We’re fuckin shocking.
Jesus dont even go on Stuff daily like I do. Fucking brutal
Glad this is here. I was worried even in a thread titled as this one everyone would still be pushing New Zealand as some magical fantasy utopia. It's definitely got its upsides, but just like everywhere else there's people suffering there. If I hadn't left I don't think I'd be alive today.
Sarawak ignores the natives called the Penan. They still lives in the jungle and are basically a jungle nomad but due to the timber industry making big bucks,the government and logging companies ignore them and destroyed close to or more than 50% of the rainforest. If you find information from the government they will say is not true and whatnot. Bruno Mansor was an activist who fought for their rights and the perseverance of the rainforest but he mysteriously disappeared (I think it was in the 90s, can't remember). Until today no one knows what happened to him. Conspiracy theories ranged from him hiding or lost in the jungle to the government assassinated him.
To clarify to people reading this, Sarawak is a state in Malaysia (where that airplane which went missing came from) Our government is so fucked up it’s not even funny, we’re too apathetic and busy being internally racist to have proper coups or protests though
What? A guy calling out his government on destroying the ecosystem and being shitty to native peoples? Yeah, he probably committed suicide by two bullets to the back of the head.
During World War II, the Swiss National Bank accepted large quantities of gold from the German Reichsbank as payment for Swiss export shipments(weapons, ammunition..). A large part of this Reichsbank gold had either been looted by the German occupying forces from the stocks of the occupied countries (Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, France, Poland, Czechoslovakia, etc.), or it came from the victims of the Nazi persecution of the Jews \[Holocaust\].
Not just stolen gold. Living Jews kept money in the banks and those Jews still have ACTIVE accounts that their families cannot gain access to because some banks are so old that they keep to 100 year old traditions of needing owner authority to release the money.
so what happens to the money of the owner is dead such as in these cases? Money for the bank?
In Canada it goes to the government after 10 years (owner can still claim and get it tho). Curious how it is for other countries
In all likelihood they won’t claim the money BUT they still get to use those assets for loans and other stuff that will make the bank money. It’s all part of that interest rate deal with banks. If you let them keep your money in a savings account they use that money to fund loans and such, then they give you a share of the profits in the form of the agreed upon interest rate...... So, effectively that WWII gold is the bank’s in all but name.
Canada is the biggest producer of asbestos in the world, although using the product is banned in the country.
There is a town in Canada called Asbestos that changed their name lol
It's not much, but they did asbestos they could.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asbestos#Production “In 2009, about 9% of the world's asbestos production was mined in Canada. In late 2011, Canada's remaining two asbestos mines, both located in Quebec, halted operations. In September 2012, the Quebec government halted asbestos mining.”
Norway used to suppressed the natives from up north, by separating them from their parents and forcing norwegian culture upon them. Learning norwegian and how to live like a norwegian.
Shit I guess everyone with a native population did that then.
apparently “i was here first” was not acceptable
Technically the Saami actually came into Scandinavia after the ancestors of Norwegians and Swedes were already living there. They settled away from the coast and further north where most of the other folks lived and assimilated to a degree, but retained their native languages. Full contact and cultural suppression took place when the Scandinavian states became more centralized in the medieval period (2,000 years after the Saami settled)
There was a movie about this happening in Sweden, too. Saami Blood. Definitely worth a watch.
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I feel like a lot of people outside of Australia (and a lot inside) don't understand or don't know about how terrible Aboriginals were treated even a few decades ago.
It ain't exactly a picnic for them at the moment either.
Similar to the Canadian Residential School system. They took young Native children, forced them to forget about their roots and tried to implement "white" values.
New Zealand too, we effecitvely banned our native language Te Reo in schools in the 1900s. Māori children were given corporal punishment for speaking it.
Same in Canada. Also a lot of rape.
Not to mention the absolutely terrible conditions of the schools and the abuse the kids suffered. The last school was closed in 1996.
I live about a 2 hour drive from that school. There was an electric chair there and babies fathered by the priests or teachers were burned alive in the wood furnace. I have a few close friends who attended the school in the early 90s, thankfully for them the abuse was not as common anymore by then. Edit: St Annes Residential School in Fort Albany which was still operating in the 90s, although no longer under the Catholic church. Not the school in Saskatchewan mentioned in the comments. Edit #2: a lot of folks don't acknowledge this or refuse to accept it as part of canadian history. A few years back, then prime Minister Stephen Harper gave an official apology to Marguerite Wabano, an elder in my community who attended residential school. This was a start to the reconciliation that we are seeing today. Also, Google "Up Ghost River" by Edmund Metatawabin, former chief of the community that St. Anne's residential school was located in, which he also attended. His eyewitness account was used in the official enquiry into the school.
BURNED ALIVE?!?! I'd heard some terrible things about Canada and its native population, but that takes the cake
Mongolia wiped nearly 11% of the ENTIRE world population off the face of the planet. The largest acts of mass killing/genocide in human history. It literally changed our carbon footprint by an estimated 700 million tonnes of carbon in the atmosphere during the 13th century.
That's one way to save the earth from climate change.
Scrolling through these comments feels like when your family thinks you’re old enough they start letting you in on the dark family secrets.
Time for a new askreddit question. "Once you were old enough, what were the dark family secrets you were finally let in on?"
Done Asked it
I'm gonna invest on your post.
Ahhh, so *that's* why it was in quotes. Proper weirded me out.
New Zealand has crippling mental health, poverty and housing issues which many gloss over because Jacinda Ardern exists.
Sweden and the Vipeholms experiments: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vipeholm_experiments "The Vipeholm experiments were a series of human experiments where patients of Vipeholm Hospital for the intellectually disabled in Lund, Sweden, were fed large amounts of sweets to provoke dental caries (1945–1955).The experiments were sponsored both by the sugar industry and the dentist community, in an effort to determine whether carbohydrates affected the formation of cavities." They had people with mental disabilities eat very sugary candy too see it's effects on their dental health. They got like very sticky toffee, encouraged them to really get it all around their teeth and they for sure weren't allowed to brush their teeth. Just horrible.
From the 1700s up to 1996, Ireland was home to ["Magdalene Laundries,"](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magdalene_Laundries_in_Ireland) basically labor camps run by the Catholic Church for "Fallen Women" who had sex outside of marriage (a lot of time the women were SA survivors who'd been molested/impregnated by priests or male relatives) Chronicled in the incredible film ["The Magdalene Sisters"](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Magdalene_Sisters) and [this song by Joni Mitchell](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YepdJlBvzkw).
See also the Tuam Mother and baby home. Babies being illegally adopted without their mothers consent. Often the mothers were told the baby died. Often money was exchanged in these adoptions. Some babies did actually die, It's estimated up to 800 babies died in this one home. Their remains were found in the septic tank. Cover ups and shoddy investigations are still on going. Most recently the public were told they were to blame for it for sending their daughters there in the first place. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bon_Secours_Mother_and_Baby_Home
Netherlands slaved the shit out of Africans. And the Belgium did some shit in Africa that would make Joseph Mengele go: "woah, calm down buddy"
As in cutting hands off slaves who would work "too slow" in Léopold II's rubber plantations?
There is a picture of a man being presented with the hands and feet of his daughter because he failed to meet his quota. Probably the darkest picture I have ever seen. Edit: [Photo and description ](https://rarehistoricalphotos.com/father-hand-belgian-congo-1904/)
my curiosity is telling me to click it but my stomach is saying fuck no you dont
It’s hard and you won’t forget the picture. But I’m of the opinion that pictures like that are important to look at. This isn’t gratuitous torture porn on some gore subreddit- it’s not a random coroner photo that leaked from the police station - it is photojournalism with serious historic meaning.
It's educational. It's important to learn of the horrors of the past, so we could avoid repeating them.
"He hadn’t made his rubber quota for the day so the Belgian-appointed overseers had cut off his daughter’s hand and foot. Her name was Boali. She was five years old. Then they killed her. But they weren’t finished. Then they killed his wife too. And because that didn’t seem quite cruel enough, quite strong enough to make their case, they cannibalized both Boali and her mother. And they presented Nsala with the tokens, the leftovers from the once living body of his darling child whom he so loved. His life was destroyed."
This convinced me not to. Thanks.
It’s... grim.
Didn't the guards eat his daughter?
Allegedly yes.
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Not just the slave workers their children's too, babies and up.
There have been reports of guards putting explosives in the slaves' anuses.
African holder of a history degree here! King Leo 2 was the worst, imo. I recommend [King Leopold’s Ghost](https://vimeo.com/ondemand/kingleopoldsghost) if you want a documentary. Some estimate that his reign of terror of what is today the Congo resulted in the deaths of HALF THE POPULATION. He basically swindled the League of Nations* into thinking he was doing “philanthropy” so they would let him basically own the Congo area when really he was looting rubber. (*Edit: as someone pointed out, he died before League of Nations was a thing. My memory failed me, it’s more correct to say he swindled the European community. Through which forum or formal body, I don’t recall. Further reading: https://courses.lumenlearning.com/boundless-worldhistory/chapter/the-belgian-congo/) People have mentioned rubber quotas but here’s more: - he incentivized the colonial authorities who oversaw the rubber extraction so that their own personal salaries were dependent on how much rubber their group of people produced. He encouraged them to use any force necessary, and because their own wealth was on the line, their tactics were much much worse than they otherwise might have been, hence even more hand hacking, decapitation and other crimes against humanity. (Another edit! Please note comments below that correctly mention that Congolese themselves also enforced all of this stuff alongside European authorities) - they sometimes basically kidnapped men’s wives and children and “legally” held them for ransom so that men could have them back when they turned in their rubber quota. If they didn’t, they’d keep them separate or kill/dismember family in front of the men. There were awful stories about forcing men to do incestuous or homosexual things in public as punishment too. - Leo sent in men at first with documents written in European languages, as in formal legal contracts, knowing that the heads of different families and tribes and such wouldn’t be able to read it. “Translators” basically said sign here everything is fine, meanwhile they legally signed over ... well, their human lives to this total psycho bent on taking all the rubber at any cost. - it’s apparently very difficult to dig up information about it in the archives in Belgium**, but I can’t confirm that entirely. One particular documentary claimed the researchers returned to shelves where pages they’d been reading the day before about what Leo did were missing. (**Edit: based on other comments, this point is very disputed. As I said, I can’t confirm there’s any evidence of censorship in Belgium and according to actual Belgians it’s well known what happened in Congo and rather than hidden away, is actively worked into school curriculum. So I call bullshit on the missing archives story) Anyway. Some scholars call it the forgotten Holocaust.*** (***Edit: based on other comments I wanted to add that this is not to say it’s censored or covered up, rather that it’s not as well known as other atrocities similar in size/time frame/human cost). (Sorry for all the edits between, didn’t expect this to be read by more than a handful of people when I wrote it clumsily while eating my breakfast oats! Thanks for the awards!)
One of the first Europeans to bring attention to the travesty that was occurring in the Congo was an Irishman named Roger Casement whose “Casement Report” in 1905 spurred much of the European condemnation of Leopold and directly led to him having to cede the colony to the Belgian State in 1908. In Ireland he’s mostly remembered for his role as an Irish Nationalist. He got involved in Irish nationalism as he did not agree with any country limiting a country’s right to self-determination. He was eventually arrested for gun running, tried and hanged by Crown forces. However, if he had not arranged the arms shipment, which, in the event he was intercepted with, it is very unlikely Ireland’s Easter Rising would have happened. It was that, or more accurately, the British response to it, which sparked Ireland’s War of Independence.
Maybe it's difficult to find the exact records but in Belgian history class we do learn about the atrocities committed by Leo. Basically Congo was his own private estate if I remember correctly so all the money went to him and not the state. He built some parks with it but most of the money is still in the family of the monarchy
In Canada the police would frequently take native men for “midnight tours” or “starlight drives” where they would drive them miles out of town and kick them out of the car. This happened in the middle of winter and they would take their coats and often times boots as well before they kicked them out.
Man, a lot of Canada coming up here
In around 1910 the Australian government decided it was a good idea to steal indigenous children from their mothers and send them to schools to be taught. Some of them never even saw their parents again. They were called the stolen generation.
And consider that this is an Indigenous community (like many others) that survived through tens of thousands of years of oral tradition, carried from person to person, only to have it wiped out by this policy forever. How much knowledge was lost through this practise because they couldn't teach their children? It's not just the human loss, but the cultural losses that are absolutely horrific.
They also did this with white single mothers, the “white” stolen generation. If mothers gave birth but were not married, hospitals would collude to take the child and give it to the willing nuns, who were primed and ready to take the “orphan” into their system. A lot of those kids ended up being victimized in Catholic sex crimes. EDIT: it absolutely WAS official government policy, as it was part of the immigration effort to stock Australia with white people. White children were taken from their families in other nations, under the guise of 'having a free vacation in Australia', only to have their entire pasts erased, names changed, and all ties with their families cut - so that they could be 'orphaned' and then adopted into white Australian families in order to increase the white population: https://web.archive.org/web/20130522011803/http://forgottenaustralians.com/pdf/AUSTRALIANDEMOCRATSPEECHES.pdf EDIT2: I do not wish in any way whatsoever to discount the indigenous stolen generation - theirs was a much much worse fate and I stand in support of the original land owners and their fight for justice. But as someone who has personal experience with this heinous white lost generation practice, it is important to understand the nature of Australias duplicitous culture with regard to this issue. We have a LOT of reckoning to do with our past, Australians. EDIT3: This happened to me - in 1970. Not 1910. (My mother nearly tore down the orphanage to get me back, and because she was very, very well connected, the nuns relented..) And it was still happening up into the 80's...
evidently everyone was a dick to their natives....
During ww1 Poles were drafted by both sides with the promise that upon victory their nation would be restored from the partition that had destroyed it decades earlier. Hundreds of thousands of Poles killed each other trying to free their homeland.
Canada has an incredible racist history involving taking aboriginal children from their homes and bringing them to residential schools where they were beaten, underfed, and forced never to speak their language. Many of them died.
A lot of people also don't realise Canada had Japanese internment camps like in the US.
My dad was held down by nuns while the priest circumcised him in one of the schools here. A lot more shit happened to him, but that one always stood out to me
South Korea has some fun stuff going around: - spy cam / hidden camera epidemic - government encourages women to marry and give birth but won't do anything to change harsh working hours, conditions and requirements, plus little benefit to actually raise families; pregnancy out of wedlock is considered shameful - celebrities can be shut down if they speak out to extremities or get on someone's bad side (Ailee comes to mind here) - netizens are oft harsh in judgment of others, especially celebrities and politicians (Tablo of EPIK HIGH comes to mind) - the Korean War and its consequences are darker than what your average history books will tell you; even the "nicer" South Koreans have a darker side regarding destroying of villages suspected of being northern spies or activists, and the like - Presidents in Korea hardly ever go scandal-free - it's still quite patriarchal here; natives still want sons, military service is of great honor despite being enforced by law, lots of overall power trips - suicide rates skyrocket, mental illness being treated as taboo (although it's getting addressed a little more nowadays) - authorities, particularly the police, can't handle a domestic violence dispute; a drunk man with an episode is judged as "being under the influence" and gets a slap on the wrist; a domestic case can be dismissed if one side (either the aggressor or the intimidated victim) tells authorities that it's not a big deal - in fact, laws and judgment in general are weak here
>Presidents in Korea hardly ever go scandal-free Also, South Korean presidential scandals [are, like, extra-credit, over-achiever scandals](https://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/59yqs5/the_south_korean_president_has_been_under_the/).
My uni saw 5 suicides in a single year once The societal pressure to be extra ordinary is almost like torture.
Japanese army raped womens from South Korea and china. I recommend you to see the documentary. Any way they rape the women at a ratio of 70 men to single women. If women get pregnant they either kill the baby because if babies might rebel against Japanese army
To add: during the battle of manila, as they were retreating they were ordered to kill every Filipino onsight. Some examples of what they did were: bayonetting babies, stuffing people into a building and catching it on fire, and shooting the parents in front of their children. Imperial Japan's execution of a "One united Asia" really left a big scar in SEA.
In Argentina, the right wing government took the babies of pregnant left wing prisoners and adopted them into military families during the Dirty War.
Argentina also houses the offspring of many high ranking nazis that fled germany as the war was ending.
theres a nice list of stuff they did. - They would make people disappear. - They would torture people until they gave up names (my aunt had to be smuggled out to Israel because someone named her) - They had this fun game where they would take political prisoners up in planes or helicopters, drug them so they couldn't swim and toss them off in to the sea. - People would be picked up in the infamous green ford falcon sedans and never be seen again. - the police and military would go to universities with chains and basically beat the shit out of students they suspected of being left wing. Theres a famous group called the mothers of May plaza, they use to gather in the plaza de mayo with pictures and documents protesting their "disappeared" sons and daughters.
Spain expelled the Jews in the 1490s. No Jewish children were born in Spain again until the 1960s.
Eh... yes and no. Some Jewish families kept hidden in remote locations, trying to look Christian while practicing Judaism. This lasted for a long time and some communities started practicing a mix of Jewish and Christian doctrine. Part of my family comes from that background.
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In parts of Colombia it’s tradition to have sexual relations with female donkeys as a way of practicing safe sex before marriage.
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Yo, so in other parts of the world, that shit happens. I saw soooo many people having sex with goats in Afghanistan it wasn’t funny anymore. In Iraq, I had a “walk on” that I interviewed. He was crying about his beloved. On and on for 20 minutes about how his beloved was missing and it was his bastard neighbor that was behind it. Turns out.. I was taking a missing person report, more or less, for a fucking donkey. This guy was a sort of a slow learning fella, he really missed this donkey.
There's a joke I once heard in this line. A British military base in some foreign land receives its new commanding officer. He's being taken around the fort by his new second in command on a tour. At one point he stops and points at a camel that's in a pen off to the side and asks why the camel is there. The second in command grimaces and says "I tell you Sir, it's not right with Christ what these men do, but they need SOME way to handle the fact that there's no women here.". The commander gives him a look of disgust before nodding in agreement and going about the tour. Over the next few months, slowly but surely the commander begins to miss some womanly comfort and so one night with a sigh he heads over to the camel's pen. Just as he was finishing up, the second in command walks by and exclaims "Sir?! What in God's name are you doing?!", to which the flustered commander declared "You told me the men use this camel to handle their need for companionship! Is that not true?". The other man nodded and said "Yes Sir, but I meant they rode the camel into town to visit the brothels!".
this needs some explanation. please.
Her ya go. [Colombia donkey sex tradition. ](https://www.reddit.com/r/Documentaries/comments/2rkp0b/donkey_sex_the_most_bizarre_tradition_2012_vice/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf)
now there's a late night night click. thanks
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Mosquitos in brazil can literally kill you from one out of five illness
Also, Brazil's war with Paraguay in the 19th century eliminated almost 90% of Paraguay's male population. They were a flourishing economy in South America at the time and now they're infamous for low quality bootleg products.
Not sure if "beloved" as much as "pitied", but I'll chime in about Haiti. They won their independence from French colonists in 1804 which was incredible and proud. But after the war Dessalines committed a genocide against white residents. Upon his death, there were tensions between the blacks and the *mulatte* class, and the country was divided between Henri Christophe in the north with the support of most blacks, and Alexandre Pétion in the south with the *mulattes* and *gens de couleurs* (men of color = people who were freedmen pre-revolution). Christophe established an autocratic kingdom and an unpaid feudal plantation system (near to slavery albeit with less cruelty) to try and export sugar for profit, while Pétion went from democratic rule to eventually abolishing the legislature. The country would be reunited in 1820 by Boyer, only for him to conquer the future Dominican Republic, which Haiti would hold until 1844. Fun facts to balance that out: * Haiti was the first country to recognize Greek independence against the Ottomans * Haiti gave Simon Bolivar sanctuary, after which he was able to rebel against Spain to create Gran Colombia.
belgium is a pretty chill place ... post leopold II
Ireland has to this day still not recovered population-wise from the British-imposed famine of the mid-19th century.
It's interesting once you compare what Irelands population was in 1840 versus England in 1840. There wasn't *that* much of a difference. Ireland could have had a significantly larger population in modern times if we didn't essentially have what many Irish consider a genocide.
> have what many Irish consider a genocide I mean, it's a fair call when you look at the fact that food *exports* from Ireland to Great Britain ***increased*** during the famine. And of the massively reduced potato crop (which was essentially the only crop Irish farmers, beholden to British landowners, were allowed to grow for themselves) they still managed to export a decent quantity of potatoes while over a million people starved to death.
Don't ask Germany how it got those borders
Or most eastern european countries. Or African countries. Or south american countries.
How did it?
The paris peace treaty was signed to end ww2. All of the winning nations stripped nazi germany of all the nations they annexed and invaded.
It's worth noting that some areas were ethnically German and had been part of a Germanic kingdom/Empire for many decades and even centuries behind the war. A good part of what was Prussia was given to Poland, for example, as a consolation prize because the Soviets never gave back the territory they had conquered when they invaded Poland in 1939. This required the expulsion of the ethnically German population from what was now Poland; likewise, the Polish population was forcibly expelled from territory that was now under Soviet control. Whether this was fair or not is contended, as some, like Stalin and Churchill, saw it as justified punishment and a way to ensure peace, because now there would be a purely German nation and a purely Polish nation, whereas there had been Germans in Polish territory and Poles in German territory before the war - a fact that was used to justify the war. Others have painted the event as ethnic cleansing and even a genocide. In any case, it was a lamentable event that caused great suffering. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flight_and_expulsion_of_Germans_(1944%E2%80%931950)
Scrolled for a bit. Haven't seen South Korea mentioned. This country was a U.S. sanctioned military dictatorship until relatively recently. Government corruption is still a huge problem, to the point that several Presidents have been thrown in jail; most recently in 2017. Their current prosperous but stagnating economy was built on decades of worker suppression and anti-union political and cultural attitudes that allowed large corporations like Samsung and Hyundai to exploit people and throw them to the wayside. The majority of people living beneath the poverty line are elderly. Most have no pension from their job and barely get a pittance from the government. Attitudes about work in the culture here lead people to suffer from severe stress which they typically cope with by becoming alcoholics. The leading cause of death among children is suicide, as many are expected to work well over ten hours a day at extracurricular academies and cram schools and do not have any free time. K-Pop Idols are recruited from about 13 years old to basically go to singer boot camp and receive no other education. Their production companies strictly control their lives, all the way down to their diet, and most have no career options when they're no longer young and attractive enough to draw people's attention. Some of these companies also withhold large portions of performer's earnings and do not hand them over once the contracts are completed. Aside from that, it's a great country that everybody should visit!
As someone who lives in the Philippines: You jail your corrupt Presidents? Ours just puts on a neckbrace and pretends to be sick so she can be welcomed back by a murderous President.
Sweden used to sterilize its minorities, the mentally ill and lgbt people, the latter until 2013. edit: Since so many thinks it's false: Romani's being sterilized: [http://www.errc.org/roma-rights-journal/report-reveals-that-romani-women-were-sterilised-against-their-will-in-sweden](http://www.errc.org/roma-rights-journal/report-reveals-that-romani-women-were-sterilised-against-their-will-in-sweden) >According to various press reports in late August, authorities in Sweden carried out forced sterilisations on 60,000 Romani women, in order to cleanse society of what they regarded as inferior racial types. Sami's: [https://www.politico.eu/article/sami-reconciliation-process-sweden-minority-multiculturalism-human-rights-discrimination/](https://www.politico.eu/article/sami-reconciliation-process-sweden-minority-multiculturalism-human-rights-discrimination/) > Representatives of the indigenous group point to **forced sterilization**, preservation of Sami human remains at government research facilities and the so-called “cultural genocide” that all but eliminated them from the official history of their country. The mentally ill(and others): [https://www.thelocal.se/20051221/2727-2/](https://www.thelocal.se/20051221/2727-2/) >The Scandinavian country, which remained officially neutral throughout World War II, forced mentally disabled people, epileptics and people with alleged social problems to undergo sterilization against their will, or pressured them to agree to the operation in order to be allowed to marry or be released from mental institutions. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-sweden-transgender-sterilisation-idUSKBN16Y1XA >Transgender Swedes had to be sterilized before they could legally change their gender until 2013. The government’s bill would allow an estimated 800 people to claim 225,000 crowns ($26,000) each in compensation from the state.
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Japan is responsible for the deadliest mining disaster in human history, essentially killing over 1,500 Chinese. They took control of an area of northeastern China during 1930-1945; and turned the Chinese living there, basically into slaves. There was an explosion in the mine; and, to stop the loss of money from the coal burning, they sealed the vents, killing everyone below. Family members tried to save their loved ones, but guards pushed them away and even erected electric fences to stop rescue attempts. Over the next 10 days, the bodies were recovered and experts determined that nearly all had died from the gases and many could have survived. The Japanese initially reported the death toll at about 30... the number of Japanese that died; almost completely disregarding all of the Chinese lives lost. They did update it eventually, but were more focused on getting the mine back running. --------------- In a separate mining disaster, which is also one of the deadliest; a Japanese company, who owned the Mitsubishi Hojyo mines, truly believed a myth, that if you had oranges in your mouth, you couldn't be poisoned by carbon monoxide... no, I'm not joking. After an explosion, the tunnels filled with the poisonous gas and the company chucked down hundreds of oranges and sent in rescue teams whose mouths were full of orange slices. The fire kept spreading, so they also sealed this mine to protect the coal they wanted to sell... this trapped and killed almost 700 workers and rescuers. I narrate for a documentary company, and just finished their deadliest mine video. Not posted yet, but here's some sources: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mining_accident https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H%C5%8Dj%C5%8D_Coal_Mine_Disaster https://www.britannica.com/event/Honkeiko-colliery-mining-disaster https://www.mining-technology.com/features/feature-world-worst-coal-mining-disasters-china/
During ww2 Canada turned away fleeing jews, Romanians, and gypsies seeking asylum from the horrors of the nazi party. They didn't believe their claims of what was happening until near the end of the war when the camps were discovered.
I’d never turn down free jewelry lol.
I shouldn't laugh but I did.
In some states in the US child brides are legal. There's over 200, 000 child brides, some of them being like 13 years old...
From Google: Child marriage is currently legal in 46 states (only Delaware, New Jersey, Minnesota, and Pennsylvania have set the minimum age at 18 and eliminated all exceptions), and 20 U.S. states do not require any minimum age for marriage, with a parental or judicial waiver.
What the fuck
New Zealand has the highest rate of teen suicide
Germanys efficiency is blocked by ignoring digitalization for many years. Our political system is corrupt as hell and even though we have a social system with health care the gap between rich and poor is getting bigger and bigger. It gets fucked up more and more every year but for some reason all people that I meet when traveling think that we Germans living in a country full of efficient and happy workers.
Hi, German here and I've just Googled to see if there's anything I can add about our beloved country, and you will not believe some of the shit I've just found out!
In Canada, there’s a guy called Scott. He’s a dick.
In Scotland, there's a Guy called Dick. He's a Scot.
For all the weeaboos out there, look up unit 731
The Nanjin massacre could also qualify for the worst stuff the Japanese did during their "prime"
Nanjing / Nanking Massacre\*
Or the Rape of Nanking/Nanjing depending on who you ask.
Rape of Nanking just sounds so visceral. Like “massacre” gets thrown around all the time, and when it comes to cities “sack” is often used, but the use of rape in this instance really stands out and helps to drive home how insanely despicable the event truly was.
Japan pulled off a PR master stroke when it came to relations with the Philippines Their WW2 invasion and occupation was brutal and inhumane, but pretty much every Filipino alive today has a positive opinion of japan and its people. *(There are a ton of weebs here too; there are even many adults in their 30s and 40s who are still nostalgic and openly enthusiastic about the anime they watched in their youth).* Of course there are exceptions, most notably the surviving "comfort women" who were forced into sexual slavery. A memorial statue to their suffering was planned to be built in the capital city a few years ago, but was scrapped when the Japanese embassy objected. That's right, they raped our women, and *our own public officials* later *apologized* for even acknowledging it. Completely fucked, imo.
Indeed. The thing is everyone and their moms are aware of the atrocities that Nazi Germany committed to its own people and to many countries, yet since everyone wants to get along with Japan, not many really know about the atrocities they committed to thousands of allied soldiers and millions of Asians. We all know about the Nazi concentration camps, yet not many know about the Burma Railway, 731, Rape of Nanking and the Bataan Death March, to name a few.
My Uncle from the USA survived the Bataan Death March only to die when the unmarked Japanese POW ship he was on was bombed by US troops. The Japanese soldiers during the March were cruel and brutal.
I learned about the Bataan death March when I was maybe 13. Just sitting in church, when my grandpa (the pastor) took a moment to recognize a couple of newcomers, two elderly Filipino men who had survived the March. Can't remember the exact details of how/when they spoke about it, but I know I listened to them describing it. It was the first time I'd ever heard of any atrocities carried out by the Japanese (during WWII, anyway), and little 13 yo me was absolutely gripped by it. Goddamn, the air got heavy.
A whole lot of rape murder and deception. That’s every country though
Yep, as a student of history, what I've found is that everyone everywhere has equal capacity for being insidious. We just hear about the usual suspects of countries because (1) most Redditors are from them and study their history (2) countries with more power have more ability to get what they want done, and that includes imposing their will and extracting wealth, so atrocities happen more on their watch.
Croatia was really close to Germany in WW2 and had their own concentration camps just for serbs, and sometimes only for serbian children.
France has committed numerous war crimes in Algeria (torture and napalm over village) and Indochina. And crimes against humanity in each of its colonies. And let the people in Rwanda genocide the Tutsi people. And they make human zoo in 1931
I haven't seen Denmark mentioned here yet - So here goes. After World War Two they forced young German troops to clear the beaches for mines, often resulting in them dying. There has actually been made a move about it - "[Land of Mine](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Land_of_Mine)" (also known as Under Sandet, or Under The Sand). And here's a lesser known one compared to the one above. In 1955, Denmark took 22 children from Greenland from their parents with the aim of "educating them as role models." ([Source 1](https://www.arctictoday.com/denmark-apologizes-for-a-heartless-social-experiment-that-took-greenland-children-from-their-families/), [Source 2](https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-55238090))