[dogma1138]

The archipelago was first settled in the 19th century, only about 1500 people were displaced, yes the British government mistreated these people by not properly compensating them because the US and NATO needed a military base in the region.

However there are urban restructuring projects every day in western countries that displace more people without proper compensation than this incident.

And while i understand that some people might feel they've been stripped of their homeland, but considering that the Islands were populated for the 1st time in modern history less than 200 years ago and remained populated for a period of only about a 100 years it's not exactly the strongest backing for a claim to a nation.

[wpietri]

I'm very uncomfortable with this line of argument:

> However there are urban restructuring projects every day in western countries that displace more people without proper compensation than this incident.

I suspect it's factually untrue, but I'm more concerned with the moral implication that if we can find a wrong Y that is worse than wrong X, we shouldn't care about X.

There is a legitimate version of the argument, one where we triage resource usage. But our ability to recognize and acknowledge wrongs is not a limited resource. Indeed, this style of argument expends far more energy in denying the recognition of wrongs that it would take to say, "Why yes, that is wrong."

[pdpi]

> but I'm more concerned with the moral implication that if we can find a wrong Y that is worse than wrong X, we shouldn't care about X.

Definitely not "shouldn't care". But you should ask yourself "if there's a ton of materially similar things I'm ok with, why should I feel outraged about this one in particular?"

Sometimes the answer is that you shouldn't feel outraged at all, other times the answer will be that you should be outraged at all similar things. It's only rarely that the outrage should be focused on the one particular incident.

[JoeAltmaier]

Utilitarian arguments lead you strange places. You can end up eating children or burning hobos for fuel. Be very careful.

[roarkjs]

All arguments can lean you strange places. They're inconsequential if they don't.

Luckily, the modern pragmatist is also socially aware.

[pc2g4d]

You seem to be judging the worth of an argument by the "strangeness" of its implications. That's a curious standard.

[voteforchange]

I think we would all agree that persuasiveness is an axis upon which to judge arguments. "Strangeness" is far out there on the persuasive axis.

Maybe so far out there that Richard Dawkins and Neil Degrasse Tyson are arguing in the other room... but its on the axis somewhere.

[shawn-furyan]

Disclaimer: read the note at the end.

> But our ability to recognize and acknowledge wrongs is not a limited resource.

I just happen to be re-reading Daniel Kahneman's Thinking Fast and Slow at the moment, so this is very fresh on my mind. In fact, this does seem to be a limited resource, and the bias that overwhelming the resource creates is called the availability bias. Essentially, in cases where the media covers matters of lesser significance while ignoring matters of greater significance predictably leads people to weight the more heavily covered issue more highly despite its relative unimportance.

I don't know about the specific claim by the gp, but in general, I think it's socially useful to point out situations where a less covered related issue is not getting the appropriate amount of attention relative to a particular sensationalized issue in question.

Note: I'm interpreting 'recognize and acknowledge wrongs' as our ability to concert attention and restorative actions toward addressing issues, because this is where the rubber meets the road in addressing wrongs. So I'm responding more to a projection of wpietri's comment that I think is a bit more toward the consequential rather than a strict reading of her/his comment. This is clearly responding to a somewhat different argument than the one wpietri is making, so it shouldn't be construed as an argument against her/his statement so much as an argument inspired by her/his statement.

[wpietri]

Thanks for the clarity. By saying "recognize and acknowledge wrongs" I am specifically excluding action, so yes, you're talking about something else.

[xtrumanx]

That was pretty weak arguments against the case of the Chagossians people. I had to try really hard not to downvote because I disagree with your position.

It doesn't matter if western countries mistreat their people sometimes, that doesn't justify mistreating the Chagossians or anyone else for that matter.

Even if you think 200 years isn't a strong claim to a nation, that doesn't change the fact those people lived there and were forceably removed from the islands.

I'm also curious, what is your cut-off point for a "strong" claim to a nation? 250 years? 500 years? 1 AD?

[dogma1138]

I would say more than 1500 people forcibly relocated to the Island in the first place to work in the plantation and stayed there for hardly a century.

While there are plenty of arguments on what actually defines a nation from both historic cultural perspectives this one is a far stretch for any acceptable "litmus" test for a nation, even if it's simple because they never had the political legitimacy to being a nation state, not to mention ever had the capabilities of forming one.

Where they've mistreated? yes, do they deserve a compensation? yes, are they a nation? well not really if we are frank about it.

[JoeAltmaier]

You're a nation if you have a military. These folks clearly failed that test.

[xtrumanx]

Not sure if you're being facetious but Iceland, Costa Rica and Mauritius all fail that test and are commonly accepted as nations.

[cesarbs]

By that line of reasoning, I should be legally allowed to invade my unarmed neighbor's house, kick him out and claim it for myself.

[antsar]

Your unarmed neighbor's house happens to be on the land of an existing nation, so you would have to deal with their military before claiming rights to said house.

[eyko]

Refer to xtrumanx's comment above.

[antsar]

The one about Iceland, Costa Rica and Mauritius? Certainly those countries have allies who would come to their aid if their land was being invaded by foreigners. I'm not claiming that every nation has their own military, just that they must be prepared to defend their interests in one way or another.

The question of "legally" invading someone's house is odd anyway, because legality implies some authority having deemed it appropriate. In the case of a neighbor's house, it is the government of the country containing the house. I can't think of an entity that establishes the "legal" way of creating/invading a country.

[runarberg]

No! you can't compare these two scenarios. When urban population is resettled, first, it's also really unfair and shouldn't happen. Second, they're not nearly as dependent on the land as the Chaigos islanders. Third the resettlement is most often to a similar environment.

Also, the argument about the late first population is silly. You wouldn't do this to any person. These are people, who's lifes have been ruined, and you can't do that to anybody. No matter if they are indigenous, 2nd generation immigrants, descendants of slave trade, or what ever. You don't do this to any people.

[creshal]

> However there are urban restructuring projects every day in western countries that displace more people without proper compensation

Such as? Most western legal systems require compensation in such cases… at least in theory.

[talmand]

I think the key is in who gets to define what is "proper" compensation.

[teknologist]

There's no number high enough- at the end of the day people will just cry out "amagad but our homes!" and claim that that's priceless and forever want money and sympathy from everyone. A line must be drawn somewhere.

[talmand]

As long as the line is more on the side of the majority feeling it fair as opposed to a certain minority feeling it advantageous, then I'm fine with that.

[tajen]

If the price were enough, they would sell it. While I understand that this logic is not helpful when we try to develop the nation's infrastructure, we must not forget that we're imposing the desires of a more important mass of people at the depends of a tiny number of victims.

[vollmond]

Plus there's the fact that in at least some US cases, the displacement is to allow space for a large business which will provide more tax revenue than the displaced could.

[gkya]

I do not believe that anything can compensate for loss of one's home. I do not know what's going on in the Occident but here in Istanbul on every flipping square metre they build a glass tower where they stuff people, and everyday neighbourhoods are killed and the city is resembling more and more those stock videos of Chinese urban areas. This cannot be compensated anyhow, regardless of where-ever it happens.

/rant

[sokoloff]

Would $1 billion in cash per household compensate? I believe for most people, the answer is "Yes, of course!" Is $1 enough? Of course not.

To me, that means the "right price" is somewhere in that bounded range and makes eminent domain conflicts amenable to financial analysis.

[Symbiote]

A possible example is the people living in ~500 houses in Camden (London). The houses are to be demolished to make way for a new railway, and they're not happy with the level of compensation offered.

[dogma1138]

If you go for London then you can look at all the council houses restructuring projects that pretty much kick all the non-(extremely)wealthy residents out of London by offering them well below real market value for their properties and then developing the council estates into luxury apartment projects.

[7952]

This even happens with private properties that are bought under compulsory purchase for "regeneration". Owners are offered the value of the property as it stands, not the value of the land (which is much higher considering the development oppurtunities).

[chagosuk]

For us the argument is fairly simple. Resettlement of the Islands by Chagossians is possible, even maintaining the military base, and there is still will amongst the Chagossian people to do so.

Certainly internal forced replacement still happens and often has terrible consequences for people but internationally the Chagos situation is pretty unique, and what is especially unique is that something can be done about it.

(Link to a now slightly outdated page on our website on Return 2015 campaign)

http://www.chagossupport.org.uk/return-in-2015

[rmc]

How old is the USA again? When was (say) Utah settled by Americans? Can we have that?

[oldmanjay]

like all things in realpolitik, you can certainly try!

[MichaelGG]

And is there any reason to think that the British Government would be giving these people the proceeds of the British Indian Oceans TLD?

If they had their land and own government called Chagos, it seems unlikely they'd have .io.

[ankitml]

Justifying one injustice with another?