Why did we leave England?

[Deja Q]

Oppression and greed from the country's rulers.

King George.

226 years later?

Oppression and greed from the country's rulers.

And I don't mean *, though he supports it.

I mean King George Inc.

98% of politicians are shills to the corporate dollar to some level. If it were just donations where they didn't expect anything in return, fine. But they do expect, and get, lots of things in return. From both parties, like it or not. Ergo, the corporations hold the power. By, of, and for the corporation. And we've seen what they've done since gaining more power in the 1980s.

America is not bad. We just lost it. To those akin to the ones we fought to get away from.

We became those we hated.

Thoughts on this, anyone?

Or is it really oppression and greed?

[tigereye]

1. uh it was Ireland for us

not enough to eat as I recall

[greatauntoftriplets]

20. And we Irish had been trying to leave England a long time by then.

Hundreds of years.

[Screaming Lord Byron]

21. Latecomers! Us Scots had been fighting England since the 9th century!

Three centuries before you lot!

:evilgrin:

[Nihil]

23. Yeah ...

... took you a long time to learn, didn't it?

:evilgrin:

[greatauntoftriplets]

24. Ireland is surrounded by water!

It was a strategic advantage.

[grannylib]

2. And some left England to practice religious freedom, which they promptly

denied to others who did not share their beliefs...
Parallels indeed....

[tjwash]

10. They were the church of England.

And were so freakin' uptight ENGLAND couldn't stand them. They came here for their own religious freedom, no one elses. They actually sound like good libertarians to me...

[bobbieinok]

25. church of England in VA, dissenters in MA, quakers in PA,

Roman Catholics in MD, Baptists leave persecution in MA for RI

[Roaming]

3. Initially it was religious freedom, then later it was over-taxation

without representation.

[sir_captain]

6. Heh...that works nicely

considering how unrespresentative our representation is

[NC_Nurse]

4. Don't forget the debtors and prisoners

that's who settled Georgia with Oglethorpe. At least we don't have debtor's prison here. Just corporate slavery. eh?;)

[Zinfandel]

5. For freedom of ALL religions to keep religion and politics SEPERATE...

Yet these fucking republicans and the religious right, are trying to tell us we started as a Christian nation, BULLSHIT...it was supposed to be for all religions not ONLY the WASP, southern Baptist and Chrisianity they are now shoving down our throats. Freedom for all religions is what this country was founded on. Busdist, Christians, Judism, Atheist, Methodist, Quakers, Mormons, Agnostics, etc.. to accept other people’s rights and ideas as freedom, to show tolerance of others…that’s all but gone now.

Intermixing morality, politics and right-wing religion, as the way we are suppose to be and live...NO tolerance for any other thoughts and lifestyles...the Christian religious right believes their way is the ONLY way to live your life.

We broke from England to have freedom of speech and at best under God, for those who believe...but not this lie of Chriatanity...as if we are all suppose to be good little Christian soldiers and go fight wars when our lying, pretend, greedy, leaders say they are Christians. And do what Jesus says...DO NOT QUESTION AUTHORITY---AND WE SHOULD ALL CONFORM!!!!

[prodigal_green]

8. Christians initially settled parts of the "new world"

But most came for trade. Even if pilgrims did come for religious freedom, they did NOT establish this nation. The founding fathers: Washington, Franklin, Jefferson et. al did. They were the ones that decided it was time to break with the colonial power and they were all FREEMASONS. They were libertines and freethinkers. They made Freedom of Speech and Freedom of/from Religion the FIRST amendment for a reason. Christians would have been perfectly happy to stay under mother England's boot.

[Snow]

7. Off to seek our fortunes -

half my family were lowland scots, not too high on the old family totem pole, so off to the new world, seek our fortunes. Likewise my other half, except they were from Essex - place called Brentwood, which is now almost part of London.

I like the ironic tone of your post, but I really don't think the traditional teaching of escaping tyrants and looking for religious freedom applies in very many cases. The pilgrims in particular were a very small proportion of the early emigrants to the US, and oppression? - that was mostly an issue during the revolution, and mostly an issue then of the colonial wealthy not wanting to pay taxes back to the mother country. I'd be willing to bet most of it was looking for free land, improvement of one's monetary position in life, etc. Lot of third sons and so on.

[Catholic Sensation]

9. Communists ruined any chances for betterment in my parents' countries

so they came here.

[Nihil]

11. Maybe ...

... a prophet foretold the arrival of GWB?

We didn't want him in Britain so herded the antecedents off you across
the ocean ...

(If only they'd done the same with Blair's ancestors)

[Dead_Parrot]

12. If it's any consolation:

Those who stayed behind got a pretty bum deal, too.

[Piperay]

13. My grandfather left

Norway because he didn't want to end up in the military, goooo Gramps. :) ;-)

[sweetheart]

14. "we" didn't

"we", most of us here, are the ones who did not leave england, the
ones who stayed at home and read about a different life on the internet but did not actually go anywhere.

The huge immigrations to the US were brought about by the policies
of the industrial revolution, shifting people off the land to the
cities by using criminal government policies, like the highland clearances of scotland.

We did not go "to" somewhere, as much as away from somewhere. This
meme of the neoliberal globalism and the white mans justice has been
doing its disenfranchisement and enslavement of people thing for
centuries now, and they still don't get that wherever you go, there
you are, if you carry the white mans burden with you.

Hannah Arendt:

"The fact that the 'white man's burden' is either hypocrisy or racism
has not prevented a few of the best Englishmen from shouldering the
burden in earnest and making themselves the tragic and quixotic fools
of imperialism."

[REP]

15. Wales and Scotland

Because we fucking hate(d) the bloody English.

[Spentastic]

16. Still current I note, how enlightned

I fucking hate niggers, kikes and wops.:eyes:

You fucking bigot.

Now I realise this will get me in trouble as I've run into this before. The English are not a protected group on DU as many moderators have explained to me. I however am English (with Welsh ancestry) and wonder what I have done to warrant such hatred. I'm as liberal as they come and I do the best I can to help other people. I try not to hate but GW sure makes it difficult.

Don't get me wrong, I don't take offence at specific criticisms of the English or their historic policiy of colonialism. I do take offence at bigots of all stripes.

[Screaming Lord Byron]

22. You bury history, or it buries you.

And I'm Scottish, of Irish and Welsh descent. I have no hate for any other race. For those of us who grew up in the shadow of Northern Ireland, we have a strong imperative to avoid attributing the crimes of history to the descendents of our former enemies. Anyway, as a socialist, I can certainly distinguish between people and the state who ruled them.
Don't blame the English, blame the Empire, if you have to blame something.

[sweetheart]

17. I think Hanna arendt

was describing "Englishmen" in her day, a proposition that would
likely mean what "CEO" means today. America is the new "Englishmen"
i was referring to, and how we take the racism and the patriarchal
repression with us by our system of destructive economic liberalism.

The London school of economics and "the economist" are at loggerheads
with the results... that perhaps, for all their "enlightenment" that
perhaps they might have been better off staying back on the farm
and milking the cow.

This capitalistic demon we complain about was borne in England first
and we reincarnated from it, being a colony and all. Now we are all
English. My family is English ancestry from early American colonials.
We took our demons of racism and puritan patriarchy with
us across the Atlantic and ethnically cleansed the native peoples.

Our mindset was very similar to that of Israel today regarding
the denigration and disenfranchisement of Palestinian peoples.
Today, the Israeli's are the new "english"... not to be confused
with people from England.

[dbt]

18. Oliver Cromwell

For some odd reason, my Dad's ancestors couldn't stand being told how to think "properly" and what actions were "correct." Now, Dad's descendants are putting up with the same shite over here.

:freak:
dbt

[chemp]

19. whaddaya mean "we" white man!

I can trace my heritage in this continent back as far as the early 1400's. This is MY HOUSE. Wipe your feet, dammitt!

[Cleita]

26. Taxation without representation. Money flowing out to

the Crown and none flowing back. We have the same situation today wherein our tax dollars flow out to benefit corporations and none comes back to benefit the people who pay them in the form of social programs and infrastructure.