Scandinavia and the World
Scandinavia and the World

Comments #9780004:


Xaphan

0
Free Greenland 25 7, 4:42pm

@Tzenker "Denmark tries to take a whole bunch of kids from Greenland"

How the hell do you gloss over 'Denmark took children away from their families' in half a sentence? They weren't even teenagers yet, there was no indication of familial abuse (as far as I know), and reports indicate that the 'consent' the families gave was questionable at best. And as a result they ruind people's lives. That is *horrifying*.

As for the alchohol thing... Denmark may indeed have had good intentions. But so did a lot of the colonial powers. The fact is, when one nation rules another, 'good intentions' don't excuse wrecking the place. Leaving aside how effective the ban actually was, if six years of access to alcohol and tobacco was enough to devastate the country, it is probably as @Draxynnic implies, because there had been almost no exposure to it before that point. Which is absolutely Denmark's fault.

Remember, Denmark didn't ban alcohol and tobacco for it's *own* people. And introducing things slowly is one thing, but a ban lasting more than a century? They just decided to treat the people of Greenland like children - like every other fecking overlord used to. Did the USA make a mistake suddenly introducing those things to a country where they were otherwise unavailable? Absolutely. But it was a pretty understandable one to make during wartime. And they probably had good intentions too.

It was Denmark who set up a situation where such a thing could happen. It was Denmark which was responsible for governing the country at the time. It was Denmark which failed to educate the people of Greenland about the dangers of drugs and tobacco, and Denmark which decided not to give them the same freedoms their own people enjoyed. In short, it was *overwhellmingly* Denmark's fault.