Colonization lead to exploitation

People usually colonize to support their home country. Many countries in the mid 18th century would send groups of people to travel to less advanced countries and countries that have not been colonized. The colonizing countries would send their colonizers to gain control of countries and collect resources to support their countries. "I believe that the moment is come for us to extend our territories. I think that we must lose no time, under penalty of seeing the few remaining good positions seized upon by more enterprising nations than our own.” Many countries colonized less powerful countries to improve their country’s power, land and resources. There were a lot of powerful countries in Europe like Holland and England that were small but very powerful because they had colonized countries from around the world, so they had a lot of slave labor and resources coming from their colonies.

But other people like king Leopold from Belgium only exploit countries for exclusive benefit. He took over Congo to rule it with total control, only for his personal gain. “He was crowned the king of Belgium in 1865 and spent years buying large areas of land in Africa in what we know today as the Congo. During his reign, Leopold II abused his power and amassed a huge fortune exploiting the Congo.” When he was crowned king he spent a massive fortune to exploit and gain control over Congo. Many people trusted Leopold but once he got so much power he started to abuse his power and forced the native people of Congo to collect rubber and ivory for trade and if they didn’t collect enough Leopold had that slave’s family and village burned while the slave’s hands where cut off, making them useless. He colonized Congo but it also ended in the deaths of millions.

Another incident of colonization leading to exploitation is when the British colonized Australia. At first the Aboriginals got along with the British colonizers but then the British wanted to “help” the Aboriginals. The British truly thought they were helping the aboriginals by taking half-cast aboriginals and “educating” them to be more like the British. Educating the children wasn’t a bad idea, but taking children from their homes and putting them in camps, forcing them to leave their mothers, changing their culture is not helping them, it’s destroying them. These are both instances were colonization was at first a good idea but turned into corruption and exploitation.

Apologies

I believe that apologies play a key role in forgiveness because if you let the anger and turbulence sit and brood, and don’t start to forgive, it will only get worse. Once one party apologizes to the other there will still be hatred and disliking but it’s the start to release all the malice locked up over the generations. A conflict between two nations is a delicate thing to piece back together. The groups have so much bitterness and hostility towards the other because of events that happened long ago. After time of forgiveness and recognition of wrong doing people will start to accept the apology and forget the awful mistakes older generations had made.

Kevin Rudd’s apology shows deep and sincere remorse towards the aboriginals and generation afterwards that were affected in the past. He apologized for all the pain and suffering the aboriginals had to go through in the past. Rudd apologized several time throughout is speech is said sorry to all the people affected by the stolen generation and for breaking up families. He is trying to say that he wants to start anew and forget all the misfortunes that have happened to start the healing process. Rudd says he wants to remove the "stain from the soul of Australia", which means he wants to work together as one nation and to make the aboriginals feel accepted into the community once again. He shows that the Caucasian community recognizes and respects the Aboriginal religion and culture. "The time has come, well and truly come ... for all Australians, those who are indigenous and those who are not to come together, truly reconcile and together build a truly great nation." Stated Kevin Rudd. This proves that he is truly ready to accept the aboriginals into the community and start working together.