I think these might be my favourite kinds of videos. Applying real-world theory and ideas to fictional worlds. Worldbuilding, in a sense, for me, isn't just an exercise in creating my own world, but an exercise in more deeply understanding the nuances of how our world works today. #freeeducationforall Stay nerdy! ~ Tim
NEED SOME FREEDOM! SXXX COLONIZATION AND COMMUNISM! MURICA FXXX YEAH! Plus please make video of how modern nations on planet Earth can merge with fantasy worlds?
I would like to hear more about your opinion on what I'm about to. I believe that colonialism is it example of where morals and practicality separate because colonization is a objective good (usually) however it is a moral evil (usually) the lives of those who were colonized became better as a whole (living longer having more food knowing that sacrificing people to make the crops grow is bad as well as how to make the crops grow better due to crop rotations and so on) however as you covered quite well in this it often comes at the expense the freedom equality and culture of the colonized. Regardless of intentions the results are that way.
Sozin may have started the war but Azulon carried it to it's zenith. Azulon governed the Fire Nation for 75 years. 3/4ths of the entire war timeline. Azulon and his story doesn't get as much attention as he deserves.
The Pall Ghost Well, I'm not to sure on the official details and whether it's canon or not, but apparaently they've started working on a sort of video comic called the Legend of Genji, which follows the avatar after Korra, so look into that as a possibility.
Ironically, the main reason most of China was never officially colonized between different European powers was because that would mean giving up access to the areas any specific nation did not control.
@@Valencetheshireman927 I believe the idea is that China was too big for any one nation to colonize (at least without having repercussions from the other European nations, which could get extreme... *looks at WWI* ). If they divided it up, each country would only be able to exploit the bit that it got from that dividing up. Allowing a weak but independent Chinese government to remain allowed each country's traders to exploit all of China's resources. In short, they treated China like a communal colony of Europe, rather than a British colony or a Dutch colony, etc (or a combination thereof)
@@rashkavar You make a good point but if the British were able to colonise the vast majority of India then why couldn’t they do the same to China ? Perhaps it wasn’t necessary since they were granted control over Hong Kong which allowed them to dominate trade with China .
What I loved about Zuko becoming Firelord was that he accepted that the Fire Nation had disgraced itself and needed to make amends with the rest of the world. That is a very mature outlook. I like to imagine Zuko and Aang working together to demilitarise the world, create universities and student exchange programmes, plant forests and pave roads. I also like to think that they regularly contact Iroh for advice and guidance.
@@Valencetheshireman927 The Fire Nation had thousands of tanks, ships and zeppelins by the end of the war - no need for a military that big in peacetime.
@Tobi Stein - When there are independent nations those countries need armours to ensure they aren’t invaded or exploited . Internally armies are needed to fight terrorist group like Isis . Armies can be used as a way to keep the peace and if you look at the Coronavirus pandemic they can be used to assist a nation in crisis . I think I can see what you mean. When there are wars larger armies are needed but in peace they can be scaled back so with the end to war there would be a bit of demilitarisation.
15:37 In Mexico City we have a square called "The three cultures square", located in the borough of Tlatelolco. It was in that place, in the year 1521 where the last Aztec emperor Cuautemoc surrendered to the Spanish conquerors. It acquired that name due to the fact that today in that same square you can appreciate buildings from the Aztec era, the colonial era and the modern era all in one place. (amazing place, full of history ). There's also a memorial with an inscription that reads: "Despite the heroic defense carried by emperor Cuautemoc, Tlatelolco unavoidably fell to the seige of Hernán Cortés and his men. It was not a triumph nor a defeat, it was instead the tortuous birth of the Mexican people." Your words here really reminded me to this inscription. It is curious how these kinds of tragic, painful and rather unfair events in history (both fictional and real life ) give place to new realities that surpass the expectations of many. And also that these events happen to take place in many cultures and places that couldn't be more different from one another (Hong Kong, Mexico, the fire nation colonies) and yet they seem to have a similar result.
This type of place would not work in Brazil, even today most people (especially in big cities) see our natives as primitive, they never built pyramids and temples or huge cities, there were never great battles or a direct conquest of them by Portugal (generally less aggressive than Spain in its conquests), this led to an overview that our natives were just unfortunate victims of diseases and the advance of territorial conquest, as if it were "it was unintentionally, we didn't want to kill you"
Hello Future Me, I don’t want to embarrass you but there’s a mistake in your title. It should just be Colonialism and Industrialisation because, as you know... There is no war in Ba Sing Se.
I love that Katara was humbled in the comics. She was a strong character in the show and she makes good points, but she’s arrogant and never sees herself in the wrong. Usually, she is in the right, but she never wondered what if she was wrong. She was a village leader, she was the team mom, she did all the work, and she was doing what’s best for everyone. The comics are asking, “what if Katara was cast in a different light?”
Indeed! Since she had to take on so much responsibility in her life, she might have conditioned herself to believe herself to be always right because she knew she couldn't afford to hesitate. Now that the responsibility is off of her shoulders with the war ending and everyone else maturing, she must allow herself to hesitate and wonder if her stance is wrong even if her intentions are good. Being humbled and realising that she isn't always right is a good character development for her!
There are a couple of problems with comparing Colonialism in TLA vs the European Colonialism in the real world: -In the real world, there were multiple Colonial powers competing against each other, who different ways of doing things. In TLA there was only one colonial power. -In TLA, de-colonization happened through the military defeat of the Fire Nation by a united opposing front. In the real-world, de-colonization happened because the Colonial powers were weakened so severely by two world wars, which also spurred a change in Values and Economic thought within those Colonial Empire's home nations, which in turn changed how they viewed their colonial empires. -In TLA, after De-colonization emerged only one new state: The United Republic of Nations, a stable and properous state. In the Real World, after De-colonization, emerged many new states, most of them either imploded into civil wars or became autoritarian dictatorships.
This series was created by people in the real world, who very likely "modelled" parts of the geopolitical landscape in TLA/TLK, on real world events. Of course there are problems. However comparisons can and should be made, even if just to comment on our past experiences with these systems.
Yeah but that has to do more with how the Avatar´s world is establised, with only 4 main powers and 1 overpowering the rest, so of course it would be different compared to our world, but the theory stills aplies here.
The writers originally got the idea for the series and pitched it to nick in 2001, and they spent 4 years planning and working on it till the first season came out. Hell they even had the animators study the body movements of martial arts masters to use for bending. The amount of attention to detail in this show is basically unparalleled in any other show, especially so for something of it's time.
Typically in worlds like this, the answer is somewhere in the middle. In well constructed worlds the broad strokes are generally well planned out, but room is left for the finer details to allow more flexible storytelling.
A question I've always had about the post war Avatar world is how the southern water tribe modernized so quickly while the earth kingdom has stayed at a low level of technology in spite of have more contact with the fire nation over the hundred years war
The Earth Kingdom is much larger and different places have different standards of living. For example in episode 2x06, the Gaang is in Gaoling, the fairly wealthy city that Toph lives in. In the very next episode, Zuko Alone, he's in an extremely poor village. And like the video says, some people of Northern Tribe went to the South to help rebuild it. In the Earth Kingdom, the focus was on the Fire Nation colonies, not industrializing the rest of the continent.
Imagine trying to pull what Japan did in the Meiji Restoration in America. We are significantly larger, with more people living outside of urban centers. We technically have a centralized government, but a lot of people are far more affected by their local, decentralized government. Telling the entire US to rebuild their buildings would never happen; there are too many cultural and physical gaps. It worked in Japan because at the time everybody basically answered to Meiji, the Emperor. There was literally less ground to cover, fewer people to convince, and a more centralized governmental/cultural structure. The Water Tribe is like Japan in this respect. Fewer people, stronger national identity, denser. The Earth Kingdom, by contrast, is much more like the US. Large land area, spread out towns and cities, huge cultural gaps between regions. Now that I think about it, a better example than the US would be India. Way too big to homogeneously “modernize” in a short period of time.
Like a few have already said, it mostly comes down to size. And the result of size is decentralized government. To look at a real life example though, look at China vs Japan. The Meiji Restoration happened because Japan had one major government that America could outmuscle and this impacted the entirety of the country. Meanwhile, China's size meant that the all-conquering British couldn't make a dent. Even if they had taken the central government, the rest of the country would operate mostly independently. An Opium War later Hong Kong was ceded to the British, which, if China was the size and density of Japan, would have led to the economic and industrial progress of Hong Kong making its way throughout the whole country. But it didn't. 100 years later Japan would crush China in WWII due to their advanced military and technology. The spread and ACCEPTANCE of new technologies is decreased exponentially with size and decentralization. Tim actually talks about something somewhat similar in another context in hiss empire videos.
I think avatar resonated so deeply with me because I’m Filipino and my people have endured centuries of brutal colonialism and the generational trauma that comes with it. In a colonialist society you rarely see colonized people represented. In avatar you do. I couldn’t put my finger on it until now but avatar makes me feel seen in many ways.
To whom does the land belong? Wow, that is a complicated question. Some societies believe that it is impossible to own land. Others believe the opposite. Some, like the Kanien’kéha believed in total assimilation, while other empire builders believed in a more culturally permissive governance method. In other words, COLONIALISM IS COMPLICATED *repeating gif of dancing Vikings*
@@GuyShōtō Ah, many factions and nations that were native to the Americas are not widely known by their true names, to be honest, that name sounds awesome.
@@JMObyx It looks and sounds cool, but to people who aren't familiar with the nations of the Americas, it looks completely foreign to them. It's why I usually just use the names people are familiar with it saves me a solid minute of needing to explain the American lexicon of native peoples to the uninitiated.
@@GuyShōtō True, and the names we have for Native American tribes are often what other tribes called them, which often meant "The Enemy" or something from the same vein in that language.
The issue arises in that attributing a good result to a process that isn’t unique in providing that result is an academically dishonest way to discuss the process. If you have option A which cause benefit X and cost Y, but the benefit can be achieved by other options, then it cannot be used to justify cost Y. At that point, it’s saving the image, not being honest about the effects
@@askolotl Westerners essentially say "yeah we killed half your people and culture but at least you have access to these cool machines." I especially love the bit about Hong Kong now having democracy even though it didn't for most of the time it was under British rule.
@@pacificalliance3782 My question to that is where and which Westeners? Because some did a lot worse on the cost-benefit plan for the areas they controlled then others. In the case of democracy that's isn't really a thing that comes from the top so it taking a very long time to be a thing in HK makes sense to me. The great achievement in the case of HK is that it became the great economic and financial hub we all know. That's the thing one should celebrate.
I actually wanted you to discuss cases where the colonies didn't want independence. I forgot which scene but Zuko briefly discussed some colonies that didn't want to join the Earth kingdom but stay with the fire kingdom. It's similar to how American Samoa refused to reunite with independent Samoa but choose to be under USA rule.
Oh I have seen it a few times. In some cases like Hong Kong people were never even asked and in others like the Falklands the vote against leaving the UK was met by an Argentine invasion. Another example is Gibraltar where it is a democratic government that want the land against legal treaties and the will of the people. It’s almost like history is complicated.
@@erikthomsen4768hong kong are democractic nation they do not want under communist china and falkland mostly populated by english people it not colonized by spanish but british did and argentina is spanish nation so falkland people do not want rule by spanish speaking nation
Perhaps licensing issues with Nickelodeon? Like if they still, to this day, aired reruns on Nickelodeon or Nicktoons and got more money from ad revenue there as opposed to cutting a deal with Netflix? Not sure if Canadian Nick still aired ATLA and that's why they got it on Netflix sooner. Got a bigger return/cut from putting it on Canadian Netflix rather than continuing to air it
I remember reading North and South and thinking "woah, they really went there". It's amazing how this kid's show (...and comics) manage to deal with topics more "mature" shows try and fail to tackle.
My only problem with this so far (7:32) is that cultural transmission is never perfect. In a lot of ways, every new generation is just imitating the culture of the previous ones. That feeling of loss and uncontrollable change exists even in isolated cultures. Trying to preserve a culture is just as harmful as trying to suppress it, because you're shackling, walling it into whatever the people in charge of the efforts think it should be, when the very nature of culture (and by extension language) is change over time. Even the preservation metaphor displays this, in literal cases, you only preserve things that are dead. Now finished, I'm glad you kinda addressed the issue I had earlier. My thoughts as a whole... I'm... I focus very strongly on individual responsibility. I'm a historian by preference, but I don't see the past as having value for being the past. We must learn from the past, but it cannot predict the future with any degree or accuracy. Overall, I cannot abide the concept of people being punished for actions that were not their own, I am not my ancestors, my children will not be me. But I take it a bit further, the collective doesn't exist except as a collection of individuals, I'll acknowledge the ship of Theseus problem when it comes to collective responsibility with my approach, but I don't think there's really any other just way of viewing people. Groups shouldn't be held accountable for the actions of their members, the members should be, if the members who need to be held accountable no longer live, is it just to punish the group? To be clear, accountability is flexible, I'm not going to make the judgement on what actions require punishment. Another problem is what constitutes a collective. Treating all native Americans as one is a very colonial mindset, but treating all European colonists as one group also is. There is no Pan-European culture now, if there ever was one it was millennia ago, and if you want to go that far, you may as well stop half assing it and acknowledge that all humans are equally responsible for all atrocities committed against ourselves, which is sufficiently circular as to be meaningless. I've gone off on a tangent. Overall, good video, got me thinking. Almost too much considering I have work to do... Keep putting out good content.
I share this sense of individual responsibility and I would prefer group punishment (or any punishment) to not be required. But for example, what about war reparations? Say my country committed atrocities on your people. Should my group/country pay for the damage done to your people? If my country would not, wouldn't your country be in an inferior place between nations competing each other? Wouldn't that be unfair on a global cultural system defined by competition? As an idealist in love with mathematical deterministic problem solving, it breaks my heart that humanity has not reached thus far a point of equilibrium with such an answer, where interspecies war is obsolete. One day maybe... A man can hope.
I agree with you and I don’t agree with Hegel but the quote of his that says history does not repeat but it rhymes seems poignant now. Human culture as we know it was built at a starting point of suffering, ignorance, and hardship. and Society has been built on the foundation of cultures who did not write their history and instead passed it down. That seed creates the fiber that makes us a collective. The collective is now more than ever spread through the media we share and consume which spans the globe. Passing on that which is valuable while looking back and holding traditional values is what got us here. This idea that human nature has evolved is just progressivism that has to shed traditions to expand. I would argue nutrition and material means have increased the quality of living and that human nature in society is immutable. Humans have an ever increasing neotony that is spurred on by the idea we are evolving in consciousness and psychology.
"Groups shouldn't be held accountable for the actions of their members, the members should be; if the members no longer live, is it just to punish the group?" "Punish" is the loaded term that throws off the argument here. I agree that an individual should not be punished for a crime they didn't commit, regardless of group affiliation. But the ethical basis of reparation doesn't have to be framed in terms of crime and punishment. If you are born into a privileged class, this comes with a responsibility not to use your privilege as leverage to oppress others; to either exercise its power to benefit yourself -and- others who were not so fortunate, or at the very least to do no further harm. Now, if you are freely utilizing the privileges bequeathed to you by your ancestors but take no responsibility for restoring justice to those people who are harmed by the very existence of that power, then you may not have committed the original crime but you are perpetuating its effects for your own gain. A mugger steals someone's wedding ring and sells it to a pawn broker. You buy it fair and square, but the original owner traces it to you and asks for it back. Though you had no connection to the theft, you would look like quite the ass if you did nothing to help rectify the situation. In the same way, when a disadvantaged class asks for equal access to voting rights and representation and you, as privileged member of society, do not exercise your own vote to promote their interest in having a voice, then congratulations -- the crime of disenfranchisement may not have been your doing before, but you've just taken fresh ownership of it now.
Arolema Prarath Pardon, but did you just equate Naruto with the world? While the show has its strong suits, it’s not made with deep and interconnecting world building in the way Avatar is. The depose messages and meanings don’t run as deep in Naruto. It is a more widely talked about show, but that isn’t proof of superiority. Plus, Avatar is gaining mainstream traction again.
This is why I feel like the world-building in LOK and the idea of republic city is actually very accurate and believable. I believe that Republic city is very similar to Hong Kong during the post war era, almost as if the real world parallel to the 100 year war were the World Wars. A lot of people criticised how LOK ruined the idea of the eastern influences of Avatar due to the rapid industrialisation of the United Republic, however looking at Hong Kong as a case study this is simply not the case as the real life parallel, Hong Kong also quickly evolved from a fishing town to a metropolis after the world wars.
The latinos in the USA provide a good example of new cultures arising after colonialism. The culturally dominant groups at either side do not see them totally as their own (the USA, or Mexico and the other latin American countries) Btw, news for US Americans : people actually living in Latin America but not Mexico or Cuba do not consider the Latinos in the USA as representative. There is not even anything close to a Latin American identity, rather, there are some regional identities that don't work as in the USA
I absolutely love and enjoy this video. As someone who's recently been exploring the use of propaganda within the fire nation, this video ties so deeply into their use of propaganda it is such an interesting connection of how the FN used colonisation and propaganda go hand in hand in keeping, what they considered, the status quo of prosperity - brilliant study!
This is some really heavy stuff for a cartoon series aimed at children to deal with. I'm really impressed that the creators of this series and the subsequent comic books did this.
I find it interesting that you don't really touch on any of the information we can glean from Legend of Korra, and how the impact of colonization is still being felt almost 3/4 of a century later (and likely will continue to be for many, many more).
That might be in another examination of the series as a whole. TLA is already a massive beast to tackle, concerning lore, ideology, geopolitics, religion and the rest.
I am DMing my first Avatar Legends Campaign. This video definitly helped. I do all that Campfire do with the free app Obsidian. The free community plugin Leaflet allows me to use a img of a map and drop pins on it linking to other pages in Obsidian. Now, Obsidian is no database tool perse (but it has a plug in for it) it greatly helps with coming up with ideas and connecting ideas, places, people, plots, etc.. The "create a board" option in Obsidian allows you to place frames with differnt info or linked pages to create mindmaps or forked paths/trees.
I love how avatar addresses so many real life complicated issues in ways that make sense for their fantasy world. It’s such a special treat to have a show for all ages talk about things like war, colonialism, industrialisation, cultural changes, class hierarchies, globalisation, and even social justice issues in such a multifaceted way. It’s hard to give justice to such important and complicated issues but I think avatar does a pretty good job at showing how many contradictory but understandable conclusions can be drawn from the situation by having the main characters hold different positions from each other. I found myself at many points struggling to come up with any kind of perfect moral solution which solves all these problems which is so real and interesting. And the best part is I didn’t really notice any of this as a kid, it all fits into the world and characters so naturally that it never really made me think the writers were trying to make a point. They’re telling a story with real world situations and helping kids understand how complicated the world is without it feeling like a history lesson, god I love this show.
Man I really appreciate this video. I'm from the Philippines, which was colonized by Spain for over 300 years. Prior to that, the Philippine islands were a collection of various ununified ethnolinguistic groups and there wasn't really a national identity. When I started reading about precolonial cultures and beliefs, I was saddened by how many of these cultures and practices were wiped out, altered, or diminished, and that a lot of colonial influence replaced these. I am grateful, however, that the indigenous languages still remained albeit having many colonial foreign influences. Even though colonization was a thing of the past and it brought way to a mostly unified, independent nation, I think that the scar is still very visible and that we are still struggling as a post-colonial nation. Some of these include colonial powers leaving a cultural system of exploitation and extortion, people having colonial mentalities (i.e. the appreciation of foreign cultures but diminishing our own), various threats to indigenous groups, and modern colonialism.
Dude, your reasoning and arguments are actually awsome. I love your mind!! You take many of my thoughts and put them beautifully. MORE VIDEOS like this!!
Hey there. I was watching an old show favorite and it occurred to me that it is a great example of establishing a culture with in the first 8 or so minuets so you can get to the rest of the story. Not sure if you have seen it but the show is called "Sliders." It centers on a young inventor who made a device to make a portal to a parallel universe that ranged from loosing ww2 to what if dinosaurs never went extinct. They usually do this within the first two scenes and it never seems out of place or rushed. Take a look.
In the season 3 finale of Avatar the Last Airbender, they imprisoned the fire lord and successfully battled Azula, but the fire nation army was still fully intact, and most other soldiers, generals, officers, etc. were unharmed. Do you think it's realistic world-building for Zuko to simply take the throne and end colonialism without any sort of military coup or power struggle?
I think that personal capabilities mean a lot more in Avatar, Zuko may have had to Agni Kai a couple Generals into line, but after that it should have been relatively easy. Avatar largely seems to work on Bronze age "the leader is the strongest" rules.
Someone: So what will be the effect of coloniali--- Earth Queen Hou-Ting: Not that you care, but what's left of my kingdom is falling to ruin. Me: *_cHiLLs_*
I personally think there is a way to grow/ become modern without sacrificing culture and tradition.😊 I mean, several religions/societies have survived the modernization of their country, including the Native Americans, with their traditions and stuff. (Aside from obvious exceptions)
@@marshmallowvampire8503 What are your criteria of "survival"? We swedes still celebrate the ancient winter festival of Yule, with santa claus and stuff. Most of contemporal Sweden wasn't included in medieval Sweden and about a third of medieval Sweden isnt included in contemporal Sweden. 17th century Sweden was a semi-theocratic absolute monarchy in constant war, where being disobedient to your parents was at least theoretically punishable by death. Contemporary Sweden is another country.
@@TheKarotechia, Also a swede here! Where did you get the information of it being theoretically possible to get executed for disobedience towards your parents?
I remember when I first found you. You had 20K subscribers and I loved ur guides so I subscribed even though I don’t really subscribe often. It’s crazy how you’ve grown so much. I’m so proud
hello, hello future me. i discovered your channel recently and initially i was surprissed at impressed at how detailed your work is. sometimes when im working i on your video and listen to you speak.. it gives me another outlook at Avatar. at someone who is emotionally attached to Avatar, your videos make me feel that the time ive spent loving Avatar hasn't gone to waste. i constantly struggle with whether or not i should still love things that i loved as a child/grew up with. im just starting to become okay with being an 'adult' and still loving those things. those things make me who i am and it was time well spent. just wanted to express my appreciation. also it gives me a lot of joy and pride seeing a kiwi doing so well in this superficial world of youtube.
After reading the comics multiple times (I thought they were pretty cool), I do have a critique about it in regards to the imbalance comic when they are talking about the factory in cranefish town. The previous comic talked about how benders and non benders were working together in a factory and how benders were using their abilities to work the machines while non benders were working like normal. That’s all good. However, in imbalance, you have the factory just get rid of all the benders because their machines got better without them. They basically painted the benders in the comic as Luddites which isn’t fair. The luddites in real life didn’t hate technology when it helped make their job easier. They hated the fact that the distribution of the profit of the better technology went to the owner of the factory instead of the wages of the workers. They just fired all of them. Even worse, when the Avatar comes in, he basically represents the British army that came in to crush the real luddites. It just seems off. Why didn’t the owner of the factory just teach the benders how to use new machines? They are people too and don’t have to use bending. It didn’t sit right with me when I re read it like that.
I don't believe there are any historical examples that justify colonialism, but I am curious since we will eventually establish off-world colonies if there are any examples of ways we could "do it right next time" or are we doomed to the interplanetary conflicts we see in sci-fi? (I doubt armada's of spaceships duking-it-out in CQB would ever be practical) Should we hold off on establishing bases on the Moon, Venus and Mars until we have an agency that is truly representative of humanity? Or do we accept that those with the deepest pockets will continue to guide our course?
Not colonialism but mutual benefit, is like what many organizations are trying to do in África right now, instead of, you know, taking the whole country and forcé them to take goverments and policies that maybe they don't want and will posibly rebel themselves against instead what many NGOs and organizations like the united nations between others are doing is helping then develop on their own accords, they help build and mantain important infrastructure like roads and trains to help connect secluded places and allow ease of transportation to help the economy grow, schools to educate the population in science and history and other important matters, build airports, wells, pacify the countries reducing the influence of para military groups and guerrillas on the populations, in escence don't forcé them to change, but give them the proper tools to make the change themselves on their own accords, and it's kinda working, yeah África still has a long and dificult road ahead of them before their standards of living are similar to the ones found on the rest of the world, but things have changed and there are more than a couple of countries that have had a very positive evolution thanks to this efforts Of course we can't know how this will all end and there are many questions still in the air if this is the right thing to do, but hey it's better than colonialism, only history will tell if this is the right way or we are just as mistaken as our ancestors
These are great point. In the red mars series of books they talk about some of these issues in colonizing mars. Some scientists in the book worry that be colonizing before they could study the planet they destroyed any chance of learning about its geology or alien life, there’s a point where the scientist says that they found some “possibly” alien life but can’t be sure because it was contaminated by earth life. At the same time the colonization become controlled by giant companies from the first world cutting out the less wealthy countries from contributing
I just hope we learn from the US, how the whole point of us rebelling from Britain in the first place because communication took a long time, travel took a long time, and we didn't want to be told what to do from a power so far away that didn't know what was best for us. I see the same happening for colonies on other worlds, even Mars, the closest to us, communication will take 20 minutes, travel 3 months at best, and unless scifi tech can be created, it will probably always be around that. So when it eventually gains self sufficient it will want self governance and instead of fighting it we should allow them, because if we don't, it will prove we never did learn.
The biggest problem I have is the fact that most public schooling ignores that all races and people have been "colonizers" as well as been the master and have been the slave. Our ignoring and choosing to point the finger in this situation is a key point that will lead to the repetition of past events
Really awesome video. Gonna be teaching a virtual class this summer about "games as literature" and my students will be playing "The Quiet Year," which is a map/community--making game where players dictate the life and complications of a community after a calamity. This would be a really good follow up for my students.
I think that you broke the topic down quite nicely. I like that you left room for the fact that there is no clear right and wrong within this field and that our characters need to carve out their own way within such a situation and surrounding. Thank you for making this video!
For most of human history the answer to "Who does land belong to?" has been "by right of conquest". The first king of England claimed that land through right of conquest, not by some byzantine dynastic law. The Iroquois Confederacy invaded the Ohio River Valley by right of conquest. The United States invaded the Iroquois Confederacy by right of conquest and Pontiac and Tecumseh tried to take their land back from the US by right of conquest but failed. Continue this all the way till today where Israel has taken the West Bank by right of conquest. Many lay people believe that "right of conquest" is an archiac and outdated way of justifying the ownership of land but from Russia conquering Crimea in 2014 to China conquering Tibet in 1951, most land that is claimed today is claimed by right of conquest.
In Israel's case there is no serious competing claim, though. The previous rulers also conquered that area, the last being Jordan who were the ones to rename it from Judea and Samaria after ethnically cleansing and defiling it.
It's different in israels case because a militia or empirical group didn't outright invade. They used the hospitality of the natives to establish themselves and slowly encroach on the land and use the destability that was caused due to the breakup of the Ottoman empire and the funding they got from a guilty west to militarize and get an upper hand over the natives. They established their so called state with nabkas and ethnic cleansing, in archaic terms conquest but quite colonial settlerism. And we need to remember that this happens in the last century a few decades ago when the so called first world calls itself a champion of human rights. It's STILL happening now, Palestinians are under constant oppression and their land is being seized from them not under the pretense of conquest like Russia and Crimea but under the false claim that the land originally belongs to them (the 'originally' that favors them) even tho they are very clearly European and the world is silent over it. The greatest example of this is the war in Ukraine where we see universal coverage and so much concern from the US but when it comes to Palestinians they support the oppressors. Lines from news reporters like 'this is not the middle east, these are Europeans with blue eyes and blond hair' really speak volume on the racism and hypocritical advocacy of human rights. #freepalestine
The Fire Nation is so obviously Chinese in all its culture, visuals, architecture... there's nothing japanese in it. Heck there's even more Korean and Thai elements to be honest But their "first to industrialize+colonial superpower" has obvious hints of what the British did. With the Earth Kingdom being closer to the several Indian kingdoms (stitched together as the Raj by British rule), then China, which was a "fallen empire" of its own; a history of martial conquest and empires older than anything on the West, but went through horrible times (and terrible leadership) during the Qing. The Earth Kingdom was never as united or seemingly powerful together. It resembled the Holy Roman empire in it's decentralized and "king in name only" Imperial (feudal, I mean) Japan was actually shanked by the Americans and they learned the hard way that modernizing and copying Europe was the way of not becoming a second Qing. Which eventually got them into doing what everybody else was doing; colonizing. First Korea then getting Taiwan etc etc. There's no parallel to that in the series, but it it was, it would be Kuvira. That screams of Showa era militarism, if only they kept respect for their divine (as Long Feng said) king.
The Fire Lord is closer to an ideal Chinese emperor/ruler by Qin Legalist thought (later incorporated and softened up by humanistic Confucian and nowadays socialism/communist thought), while a Japanese emperor was usually a ceremonial-religious role, with true power left with the warrior clan (Bushi, later Samurai). Back on the British parallel, the whole "colonies turn into democratic nation etc" mirrors the 13 colonies. While Hong Kong was a relevant outpost, most of its prosperity wasn't built by scratch by the colonists/locals, but through trade in one of the world's largest commercial regions, the pearl river Delta. (Guangdong/Canton). The history of a former colony becoming independent, turning into a melting pot of immigrants etc seems far closer to the US, hence the "westernized" styles chosen for TLOK. If anything I hope our sinitic Fire Nation has its Hong Kong, or at least Shanghai should it be shown hehe.
@@有希長門-n5c The Earth Kingdom is clearly China though, it's a fallen Empire with a distant and failing emperor and a history of military conquest (see Chin the Conqueror.) Also the Fire Nation's motivations for colonialism were closer both in stated and actual intent to the Imperial Japanese than they were to the British. The British main moral drive for colonialism wasn't the sharing of wealth or anything like that, it was the countering of Other European Empires (Spain and then France) and later the eradication of the institution of slavery.
IM SO GLAD YOU USED THAT SCENE FROM “HISTORY OF THE ENTIRE WORLD I GUESS”! It kept playing at the back of my head every time you talked about the US pouring “efforts” into Japan!
Hong Kong is industrialised thanks to Britain but the increase in prosperity and wealth will continue because technological innovation leaders to more wealth and under the British Hong Kong become a global financial centre so for now it’s unlikely Hong Kong will get poorer compared to being with the British.
That deducts nothing from his point i think. 23 years have passed since the turn-over, so i guess new dynamics are now driving hong kong and the environs to new socio-political changes 😁
Well Hong Kong is currently fighting for it's independence from China and there making a good attempt at it. I woudnt be surprised if in the next few years HK and the other provinces around it declare complete independence and become even more weathly from the democratic influence.
Reading Avatar: North and South literally frustrated me, with how the story fails to give justice to the conflict, Team Avatar siding with the wrong side, and how Aang just fails to be... well, the Avatar! Starting off with Galik, he and the movement have a very solid point to make and the only way the writers were able to make sure that the villains weren't too "right" was to make Galik an extremist. Secondly, to force upon the Southern Water Tribe that globalization is what's best is just too wrong of a side for Team Avatar to take. It was nothing short of defending the IMF, WTO, and World Bank from further exploiting developing states. In addition, you cannot expect a state who suffered only second to the Air Nomads (who were literally wiped out) in the Hundred Years War, to collaborate for develoment with the very nation that started the war and nearly wiped out their civilization, the kingdom who believes in its infallibility and superiority, and the sister tribe that "literally" sees them as no more than savages eithin such a short recovery time. People who claim to "better" the SWT, shoddy monarchies planning to teach one of the world's first few democracies, an egalitarian one to add, how to develop. If the SWT were to truly develop in such a way that it can match the rest of the world, it must take development in its own hands, similar to that of the Meiji Restoration. It is only by proving to the rest of the world that is indeed just as capable as the rest of them to recover from the war, that they become their equals. A restoration founded and reliant on collaboration, will only lead to the SWT being nothing short of a state in debt to others, forever a snow rat taught by humans how to live like one, just as US-recovered failed states are naturally US allies... and assets, to the point where culture and civilization are mimicked and indigency a forgotten myth. Lastly, the avatar had every right and responsibility to mediate between state and rebel forces, as the peace broker of the world. Aang, on a personal scale, should know the gravity of development and innovation and better understand Galik and Katara's point more than anyone else. Not to mention, while the conflict in the Rift ended with a happy note, Aang failed to resolve the greater conflict, finding a balance between spirit spaces and human innovation, and such an experience should have made him better equipped to handle the situation, in spite of not being the main protagonist of the story. And just for icing on top of the cake, I DO NOT UNDERSTAND WHY THEY COULD NOT SAVE GALIK! Dear Hello Future Me, I love your vids, carry on. I don't expect you to see this, let alone expand on the idea, but thank you still for everything.
Japan's reforms in the Meiji Restoration came from hiring in a lot of foreign experts, and importing a lot of foreign technology. They didn't just suddenly develop an industrial society by eyeballing Europeans. And the people they hired and bought from were - surprise surprise - the English, French and Americans.
TBF China's industrialisation was largely based off of American corporations coming to exploit cheap Chinese labour. The Chinese government very skillfully used this foreign investment to rapidly develop China into an industrial juggernaut and an emerging superpower. For China, globalisation is the reason that Chinese Gen-Z's have a standard of living far above what Chinese Gen-X's had, with millions being lifted out of poverty. Even the Meiji restoration had large elements of westernisation, with Western thinkers, businessmen, generals, and politicians being a huge part of Japan's industrialisation. The SWT may be able to reap tremendous rewards from globalisation, using foreign ideas and businesses to grow its economy and power. On the other hand it may become like Latin America, the Middle East, Central Asia, or Africa, where a small, corrupt, local elite use foreign influence to secure their own power and wealth, over using it to help the people. Whether the SWT becomes another China or becomes another Brazil would be a very interesting question to answer, and it would cut to the heart of what kind of society the SWT is. It seems very decentralised, perhaps a better name for the region would be the Southern Water Tribe*s*. Would the SWT centralise under foreign pressure, or would it remain a loose confederation? If the first case is true, would this come alongside the destruction and repression of smaller sub-cultures in the SWT? How would the region ideologically react to this? Would the people of the SWT embrace this unifying nationalism like Japan, or would it reject this cultural mixing, identifying more with their local sub-cultures, like Spain? If the second case is true, would certain tribes be better off than others? Would this cause resentment within the SWT, further atomising it? Would the tribes with oil money become wealthy egalitarian societies like Norway or brutal autocracies like Saudi Arabia? I wish that LOK answered some of these questions, but it was more concerned with Republic City and its cultural identity, more than it was with the four nations.
You know what, I always getting really excited over this explanation and essay about the avatar world and how to make sense of it, and I always amaze by how good you describe and explain these things. Great work as always! Can't wait for another vid!
I'm so happy you're still doing these videos. I think you understand the nuances of this world, real and fictional better than literally any other UA-camr that does Avatar videos.
to correct some historical errors here, british rule did not bring western style democracy to hong kong, it brought a system where britain appointed a governor to hong kong, no elections were held, and speaking mandarin in the halls of government buildings was illegal. The first election in post colonial hong kong was held after chinese rule was re-established.
I truly appreciate Avatar for its willingness to address complex and nuanced realities, both of our world and of its own world. I realize how tensely charged this would be so I'm refraining from diving in head first. Lord knows the complex and nuanced realities of 2022 and (soon) 2023 are more than enough to tackle.
There's incompleteness in the analogy in that there's only ever one imperial power in play in Avatar. In history, numerous local, regional, continental, and intercontinental powers competed for empire. The idea that the local strongman would make a better ruler than a foreign one is a half truth on a good day. If a crop failure left a poor peasant unable to pay his taxes, it did much matter if they were owed to local nobles or a foreign nabobs. The precious few times in history when altruistic action was undertaken were only possible when the demands of imperial competition were low, such as when slavery was abolished in the British Empire. I haven't read any of the Avatar comics, but I think it would be interesting to see the history behind the Fire Nation's industrial revolution. Like, what was the first problem these machines were used to solve? What was the balance of power like before? How did they relate to mainland powers before? Was there a change in social structure caused by the new technology, and how was the change received? Who was the dominant power before the Fire Nation, and how long ago were they relevant? These questions are well outside the scope of the story Avatar's makers wanted to tell, but their answers have implications for anyone attempting to draw a measure of applicability from the series. As far as justifications for colonialism, just remember that empire is nothing more than tribal conflict on a bigger stage. The justification is that you can better your standing with the people you care about at the expense of people you don't care about. It's that same pernicious little thought that you would have such a better time of it if you could just stop respecting (or at least do so less) the humanity of this weird other creature that doesn't use the same words, eat the same foods, or enjoy the same shows as you. The fact that they disagree with you makes them wrong, and the best thing for the both of you would be for you to force them to do what you say. You should take over their affairs an manage their life in the correct way, and after they see how much better off they are, they will thank you. The property of theirs you take ownership of is just fair compensation for their imposition on you, and maybe the loss will make them think twice before transgressing again next time. It's good sometimes to take a long hard look at the wretchedness of our species and the harm it does us. Accurate bookkeeping is important.
I mean the only flaw in the benefits of colonization is that colonization only benefits the colonizers and the rich. Rome conquering Britain is a giant myth about the benefits of colonization. In reality, the average life expectancy of the British citizen went down significantly after Rome. Africa is a living example of recent colonization. Their resources and people were consistently exploited leaving once flourishing nations into indebted and impoverished countries.
@@blitzkriegdragon013 as a British person I very much appreciate that we were conquered by the Romans. The technologies and philosophies we gained because of it are what led us to be so prosperous later on. There are two ways to go about things after being colonised. You can either get over it and move on, accepting the good that has been gained from it and letting go of the animosity stemming from the atrocities. Most pre-modern colonial nations went this route, probably because they were more used to atrocity to begin with, but more modern examples include Botswana. Or you can reject everything about the colonialisation, blame all of your nations ills on the colonising people, and offload any responsibility over your own future. See Zimbabwe and Mugabe begging for white people to return if you want to know what happens when you do that. Basically it's the same as everything else. Accept the good, move on from the bad, take responsibility for your future and don't waste your time blaming others for your ills.
@@scotcheggable Archeological evidence suggests that British life under Rome was categorically worse than before. People were more malnourished, diseased, and wealth inequality skyrocketed. Nothing had been done under Roman colonization that couldn't have been done through trade. Rome was needlessly brutal and authoritarian. Part of "getting over it" as you say, is acknowledging that Rome's colonization made the life of the average Roman worse.
@@blitzkriegdragon013 That's really not true in the long term though, the Romano Britain's achieved a thriving society that completely collapsed following the Roman abandonment in the fifth century. One only needs to look at Western Europe in the dark ages to see how beneficial Rome truly was.
@@GonnaDieNever Archeological records show the average Britain was more malnourished and shorter than they were before Rome. Only people who benefited were the rich.
When I was younger and began watching this series, I had a fanfic idea that was closer to how they solve the question of the colonies and actually happened in Korra be it slightly differently. In my fanfic, the backstory was the colonies were more progressive than the home island. Over 100 years, they managed to blend a near equal environment between those of Fire Nation and Earth Kingdom, eventually everyone being recognized as a citizen of the colonies therefore a citizen of the Fire Nation. The colonies felt the war was unfair to them as resources and man power were being taxed by the "motherland" for the expensive war. The colonies demanded true representation in the government of the Fire Nation but the capital feels since the colonies are already part of the Fire Nation, they already had representation. You see where I'm going with this? Frustrated with with demands being refused, the Colonies banded together to declare themselves independent. I had to invent several different colonies and this was before the comics and Korra came about. The now independent colonies don't want to return to the Earth Kingdom and they see themselves different from the Fire Nation so I called this new state simply The Union as more parallels to the USA and that it is a nation that united 2 different people.
Kind of of topic, just wanted to mention that one of the things that made ATLA so good was the overall simplicity of bending. Bender twirling around elements in cool moves etc is just the most fun to watch. Bending should‘ve stayed that simple, with the simpke exceptions like lightning, healing and metalbending. Things like bloodbending is too picky in my opinion (I know it was in TLA, but it wasn‘t embraced). An airbender could theoretically bloodbend too because water and H2O cells contain Oxygen. Fire too needs oxygen to survive, so airbenders can simply eliminate all firebending? As already mentioned I think going too in-depth on the specific aspects of bending, besides moves etc, is maybe interesting, but kind of ridiculous...
I often like to explore how aliens would justify doing things that violate their species’ own morality. In this case, I think human morality revolves around altruism: help people, don’t hurt people. There are all kinds of questions that stem from that: “What is a person exactly? Which people do you prioritize over others? Is it ever okay to hurt someone? If so, when?” Just as well, whenever a human wants to hurt someone, they often come up with justifications that frame their unaltruistic action as altruistic, like “spreading prosperity through conquest” as you said. The aliens in my story have morality that revolves around making the world more interesting and not making it less interesting. And sometimes one of them wants to conquer someone else, which is often seen as needless destruction of an interesting and unique nation to spread more of another nation that already exists. As such, the conquer era of this alien species justify it to themselves by saying that the struggle of war brings glory and great stories of battle that will inspire future generations. I think one reason a being might have to justify certain actions to themself is because deep down, they know what they’re doing is against their “species wide moral Center” as I like to call it, but they don’t want to accept it and are resisting that fact. If you encountered an alien species whose morality revolved around war for instance, they probably wouldn’t need to justify their own wars to themselves. They would just be upfront about their true reasons and proud of them, fight their wars and celebrate having “done good.” They may or may not even judge their enemies for fighting them, because they may see that as good as well, depending on their level of reciprocity vs myopia. In fact, they would probably end up having to justify peaceful acts to themselves by saying, “These new allies will be a great resource for fighting someone else.” As to whether or not they follow through with fighting someone else: it could vary. I think using aliens with weird morality and psychology to explore philosophy, culture and world building can be a pretty interesting concept. I know that’s not what this video is about, but the fact that you brought up justifications for war got me thinking about that, and I felt like sharing. Good video.
Simple. Ingroup/outgroup The communists claim that all people should receive everything they need because all people are deserving of a good life, then demand that people who disagree with them be tortured to death for having the audacity to have a differing opinion, because if you aren't the ingroup, then you aren't human.
12:25 the answer is not that simple, no a generation of colonists living there simply returning back to the fire nation that they don't have as many ties to unlike the land they lived in all of their lives? The more obvious answer would be to live autonomously as part of the earth kingdom imo
This was one of my favorite videos of yours and it reminds me of Mapazan. The theme of this video is part of why I love Malazan. It challenges the way we think about empires. It forces us to think about the good and the bad (which can be very bad) and doesn't make something very complicated and try to make it simple.
wow! what a great video! i loved this break down and analysis. It makes me really want to read the avatar comics now! impeccable work as usual! thanks for sharing!
I think the main flaw with your analysis is that the whole show is an explicit metaphor for the Japanese pan-asian co-operation sphere and the japanese invasion of china, although japanese imperialism was a response to western imperialism it has different trappings and reasoning.
I have what I think is a new theory: Korra herself is evidence to suggest why the fire nation killed/captured southern water benders during the 100 year war.
Why did the fire nation go to such great lengths to kill the last southern waterbender (Katara) and capture/kill all the previous southern waterbenders? During the very first episode Zuko says while drilling his basics set with Iroh that “the sages tell us that the avatar is the last airbender”. How could the sages have divined this information about the avatar? It’s not even common sense. We would expect that at least a handful of all of the airbenders, seeking to evade as was their style of combat, would be able to escape from the fire nation attack even on the day of Sozin’s comet. These air nomads would likely either flee to the earth kingdom or one of the water tribes. Even if the majority or all of the air benders besides Aang were hunted down by fire nation assassins; how would the sages know this and state it as a fact? I therefore conclude that the fire sages are able to ascertain/divine some information about the present and future lives of the avatar. This is where it gets interesting, Sozin’s genocide of the air nomads was cruel and evil but it was a calculated act to possibly end the avatar cycle/give Sozin more time in order to not have a fully trained avatar making his war more difficult. Additionally it made conquering some areas just easier. However, what if he didn’t want to kill all of the air nomads for conquering purposes? What if he only killed all the air nomads because their culture was so pure in spirit that everyone born an air nomad was a bender? We know that over time the fire sages became loyal purely to the firelord. What if they used the same discerning powers to determine that the last airbender was the avatar, to also divine that the next avatar (eventually Korra) would be born a waterbender of the southern water tribe? Therefore the plan to end the avatar cycle was two-fold. Kill the air nomads to continue the avatar cycle, and capture/kill all southern waterbenders to stop the reincarnation of the avatar into its destined next life.
@Hello Future Me I noticed at 17:23 you said that four seats in the New Zealand Parliament are reserved for Mäori. While the Mäori seats did start out at four, it seems the number is now seven seats and has been since 2008. Minor detail, great video, great channel.
I want to thank you for those videos. I was learning drawing over two years ago but gave up feeling terrible with it, constantly thinking of it as i wanted back then and ever since elementary school to make a web comic. Those videos help me a lot with at least feeling like i'm sort of learning towards it, learning how to create my world while i struggle towards starting over again. I don't know if i will ever manage to do it but this helps at least a little.
I think many soldiers must have been pissed after the war. They fought for years against the other nations many men died for the glory of the fire nation and had to give all the land up. I don’t say it was right but they must be really angry generations of conquest and sacrifice undone in one day. Fathers and later sons died for nothing.
Sozin actually succeeded in spreading the prosperity of the Fire nation overseas ( Though I don’t think entirely as intended) because the war led to the spreading of Fire nation expertise and technology in other countries which made those lands more prosperous as a result so in a way those soldiers didn’t die for nothing .
Hey I really appreciate all the effort you put into your Campfire segment. Its not that often I feel actually informed on a product from an addvertisement/sponser. The way you presented it in this video shows you used it and have thought critically about what you wanted and how it suited you. It also shows consideration for the viewers.
Niiiice. This was a pleasantly nuanced take on the dynamics of colonialism and mainly in the fallout of these policies. I've also never looked at the post-war books, but they seem very interesting thematically, as they try to answer some natural questions as to what would go on after the war!
This channel is awesome, I’ve thought about many of the topics you’ve covered in many of the same ways and it’s awesome to find a channel to at least expand on them. Great content, even a year after this one was made.
I got into a car accident two years ago while listening to one of your videos, and I've associated you with that car crash for a long time. I feel like I've finally healed enough to be able to get back to watching and enjoying your content. Hope you're enjoying your re-watch of ATLA on Netflix for the billionth time! Have a good day, been a fan for a long time. Excellent and poignant content.
While watching this video, I really did feel the theme resonate with me. As a masters student in history and an amateur writer living in South Africa, the intricate difficulties that are inherent with colonisation and decolonisation are things I've had to grapple with on a regular basis. Coming from a context where not only are there two distinct and often conflicting European colonial cultures, but similarly, factitious indigenous cultures, the issue of how colonisation ends is one that really becomes a messy and complicated endeavour. Living in a state where the borders are defined not by the people living in them, but by historical European divisions, and where the post-colonial history was as if not messier than the colonial and pre-colonial history, the intricacy of the context really becomes a tough thing to deal with. Few colonial histories include as many aspects as that of South Africa. Canada has an example of two distinct colonial cultures which have to reside within it. India has the example of an indigenous population that was immensely fractious, but remained far more numerous than the colonial population. Israel poses the example of the newer population imposing themselves as the architects of society and state once overt colonial power has exited the frame. However, to combine all of these elements? In my studies, few places come close to the nightmare of factors that is South Africa. I can see all of the elements mentioned here in ATLA within my own national context, and just how haphazardly they can play out. The desire to industrialise and the resistance of culture and tradition, the amalgamation of new cultures amidst severe inequality, and the insurmountably difficult task of forging a way forward that includes all denizens of the state. I'm not sure that this comment serves a purpose necessarily other than to state that, as Tim says so often, history is complicated. However someone does go about worldbuilding a colonial and post-colonial setting, the history of and design of that setting will inevitably make the result so much more complicated. It was just really awesome to experience a discussion on worldbuilding that really just had as much resonance with my own experience of the real world as this did.
As someone that comes from a country that was colonised I can agree a lot to this analysis. I’m also no expert but I can see a lot of what you say, in some ways is complicated because we are not the Europeans who came to this lands, but we are not the indigenous people either. The mixtures both cultures is what creates our identity, but even with that we don’t treat with the same respect the multiple indigenous cultures that are still a life nowadays in the territory, and we don’t appear to have the mindset to become more like the European (or American, for that matter) that have a huge impact on us. Maybe the best way to balance this is creating a cultural and political society that tries to see for the best interests of all its habitants, but God knows is something incredibly complicated.
I wouldn't say that Sozins motives were not altruistic. Why would he be lying to his best friend? How I understand this scene is that even with hood intentions you can cause horrible things. Each next Firelord was wors than the previous one. Sozins had good intentions but used immoral methodes. Azulon wanted to expand his empire and was cruel but cared about his family. Ozai cared only for power and wanted to dominate everyone and Azula was a total psycho. I think that what history of Firenation's royal family teaches us is that using immoral means to achive the even the most noble goals will eventually lead to our demisse.
Fun Fact? I hear! For the legend of Korra I also heard another idea the team had also based on another scenario. What if the Song Dynasty was able to enter the Industrial Age by the 1100s? If the Nomads didn't attack or interfere with China. In our timeline? China had the ability to enter their industrialization, since in the 1000s China already knew the concept and discover of Steam power on their own. And? Had big plans to build steam power engines in the 1100s, but the Mongols aka the Nomads attacked China, Before? It had the chance to enter and gear up for their industrialization. During the time of the Song Dynasty? It was China's critical key moment of propelling from an agriculture society into an Industrial society. Song Dynasty science and technology was very advance. And had many conditions similair to that of England more then 900 years ago. Prior to the Nomadic invasions! China's industrialization was imminent and unavoidable, had it not been for the Nomadic invasions. If you think about? The creators were inspired by Kung Fu and watching Kung Fu movies. And? Mostly based it on Chinese culture. Who's to say? They didn't explore this idea. Also to add in Avatar the last Airbender it still had a medieval setting but with a few industrial machinery and tech.
@@YonIon996 Because White people who live in USA aren't in Europe. North America is not part of the European continent. That's why they don't call themselves European. White people in USA may have originated from Europe. But? USA is still mostly White majority nation.
![Avatar: A Study in Worldbuilding - the Fire Nation [ The Last Airbender ]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/Pa2BD13VzxY/mqdefault.jpg)
![Avatar: A Study in Worldbuilding — the Fire Nation [ The Last Airbender ]](/img/tr.png)
![Avatar: A Study in Worldbuilding - the Earth Kingdom [ The Last Airbender l Legend of Korra ]](/img/n.gif)
I think these might be my favourite kinds of videos. Applying real-world theory and ideas to fictional worlds. Worldbuilding, in a sense, for me, isn't just an exercise in creating my own world, but an exercise in more deeply understanding the nuances of how our world works today. #freeeducationforall Stay nerdy!
~ Tim
NEED SOME FREEDOM! SXXX COLONIZATION AND COMMUNISM! MURICA FXXX YEAH! Plus please make video of how modern nations on planet Earth can merge with fantasy worlds?
Finally an avatar video I made one myself. Avatar truly thrives in worldbuilding
@Ilias which one?
The multicultural council in Udau sounds a lot like the peace process in Northern Ireland
I would like to hear more about your opinion on what I'm about to. I believe that colonialism is it example of where morals and practicality separate because colonization is a objective good (usually) however it is a moral evil (usually) the lives of those who were colonized became better as a whole (living longer having more food knowing that sacrificing people to make the crops grow is bad as well as how to make the crops grow better due to crop rotations and so on) however as you covered quite well in this it often comes at the expense the freedom equality and culture of the colonized. Regardless of intentions the results are that way.
Sozin may have started the war but Azulon carried it to it's zenith.
Azulon governed the Fire Nation for 75 years. 3/4ths of the entire war timeline.
Azulon and his story doesn't get as much attention as he deserves.
French Bryan unrelated but are they still planning to do more comics?
Cause I didn’t like Imbalance
Azulon ruled for 23 years not 75.
@French Bryan ua-cam.com/video/2DKYWtKh5lc/v-deo.html actuall show much more credible than wiki.
@French Bryan Kyoshi lived 300 or so.
Everything about Avatar, to me is just well-executed. Especially its narrative and portrayal of the story.
Yes better than most animes
@@royalflush5228 all*
@@arolemaprarath6615 i watch one piece dude, im talking about most not all
its true ART !
@@arolemaprarath6615 For a shonen series, One Piece is legendary (not DB level but still). Also popular doesn't equate to well executed.
Man, I wish that they did another incarnation of the Avatar. They could explore the earth republic and what not.
The Pall Ghost Well, I'm not to sure on the official details and whether it's canon or not, but apparaently they've started working on a sort of video comic called the Legend of Genji, which follows the avatar after Korra, so look into that as a possibility.
I'm more curious about fire nation. They never show us fire nation during Korra
@@herosmith5662 Legend Of Genji is a fan project. One quick search of Legend of Genji tells you that.
@The Pall Ghost It would be nice, but korra's the avatar and we gotta deal with it
Hero Smith I also hope they go before Aang, and even Yangchen. It would be interesting to see what the world was like before the 100 Year War.
"I dont think ive seen that many red flags since a ussr military parade"
That just cracked me up
Ironically, the main reason most of China was never officially colonized between different European powers was because that would mean giving up access to the areas any specific nation did not control.
@Chris Owens -Could you explain that further please because I’m not sure I entirely understand that .
I just got this while reading the comments
@@Valencetheshireman927 I believe the idea is that China was too big for any one nation to colonize (at least without having repercussions from the other European nations, which could get extreme... *looks at WWI* ). If they divided it up, each country would only be able to exploit the bit that it got from that dividing up. Allowing a weak but independent Chinese government to remain allowed each country's traders to exploit all of China's resources.
In short, they treated China like a communal colony of Europe, rather than a British colony or a Dutch colony, etc (or a combination thereof)
@@rashkavar You make a good point but if the British were able to colonise the vast majority of India then why couldn’t they do the same to China ?
Perhaps it wasn’t necessary since they were granted control over Hong Kong which allowed them to dominate trade with China .
So what you're saying is, HISTORY IS COMPLICATED!
Deus Vult!
Deus Vult!
Was waiting for that joke to come up
@@bakthihapuarachchi3447 Infidel
Not really, history is just a record of events. Governing is what's complicated.
What I loved about Zuko becoming Firelord was that he accepted that the Fire Nation had disgraced itself and needed to make amends with the rest of the world. That is a very mature outlook.
I like to imagine Zuko and Aang working together to demilitarise the world, create universities and student exchange programmes, plant forests and pave roads. I also like to think that they regularly contact Iroh for advice and guidance.
Yes, because Iroh is the wisest of them all.
Demilitarise? The armed forces have a role in peace time just as much as they do in war .
J 19 I’m curious what you mean by that. Do you mean it’s useful as a deterrent to war? Mutually assured destruction?
@@Valencetheshireman927 The Fire Nation had thousands of tanks, ships and zeppelins by the end of the war - no need for a military that big in peacetime.
@Tobi Stein - When there are independent nations those countries need armours to ensure they aren’t invaded or exploited . Internally armies are needed to fight terrorist group like Isis .
Armies can be used as a way to keep the peace and if you look at the Coronavirus pandemic they can be used to assist a nation in crisis .
I think I can see what you mean. When there are wars larger armies are needed but in peace they can be scaled back so with the end to war there would be a bit of demilitarisation.
15:37 In Mexico City we have a square called "The three cultures square", located in the borough of Tlatelolco. It was in that place, in the year 1521 where the last Aztec emperor Cuautemoc surrendered to the Spanish conquerors. It acquired that name due to the fact that today in that same square you can appreciate buildings from the Aztec era, the colonial era and the modern era all in one place. (amazing place, full of history ). There's also a memorial with an inscription that reads:
"Despite the heroic defense carried by emperor Cuautemoc, Tlatelolco unavoidably fell to the seige of Hernán Cortés and his men. It was not a triumph nor a defeat, it was instead the tortuous birth of the Mexican people."
Your words here really reminded me to this inscription. It is curious how these kinds of tragic, painful and rather unfair events in history (both fictional and real life ) give place to new realities that surpass the expectations of many. And also that these events happen to take place in many cultures and places that couldn't be more different from one another (Hong Kong, Mexico, the fire nation colonies) and yet they seem to have a similar result.
¿Are you from México
Eric Gabriel Bautista Jaimes yes
This type of place would not work in Brazil, even today most people (especially in big cities) see our natives as primitive, they never built pyramids and temples or huge cities, there were never great battles or a direct conquest of them by Portugal (generally less aggressive than Spain in its conquests), this led to an overview that our natives were just unfortunate victims of diseases and the advance of territorial conquest, as if it were "it was unintentionally, we didn't want to kill you"
Damn that’s pretty cool
Thank you for sharing that, my grandparents are from Mexico and I appreciate learning new things about it
Hello Future Me, I don’t want to embarrass you but there’s a mistake in your title. It should just be Colonialism and Industrialisation because, as you know...
There is no war in Ba Sing Se.
Here we are safe; here we are free.
The Earth King has invited Hello Future Me to Lake Laogai
@@rhian6459 No he's invited him to watch his pet bear - ya know it's just a bear.
Cabolt44 platus bear?
Cabolt44 skunk bear?
I love that Katara was humbled in the comics. She was a strong character in the show and she makes good points, but she’s arrogant and never sees herself in the wrong. Usually, she is in the right, but she never wondered what if she was wrong. She was a village leader, she was the team mom, she did all the work, and she was doing what’s best for everyone. The comics are asking, “what if Katara was cast in a different light?”
Indeed! Since she had to take on so much responsibility in her life, she might have conditioned herself to believe herself to be always right because she knew she couldn't afford to hesitate. Now that the responsibility is off of her shoulders with the war ending and everyone else maturing, she must allow herself to hesitate and wonder if her stance is wrong even if her intentions are good. Being humbled and realising that she isn't always right is a good character development for her!
There are a couple of problems with comparing Colonialism in TLA vs the European Colonialism in the real world:
-In the real world, there were multiple Colonial powers competing against each other, who different ways of doing things. In TLA there was only one colonial power.
-In TLA, de-colonization happened through the military defeat of the Fire Nation by a united opposing front. In the real-world, de-colonization happened because the Colonial powers were weakened so severely by two world wars, which also spurred a change in Values and Economic thought within those Colonial Empire's home nations, which in turn changed how they viewed their colonial empires.
-In TLA, after De-colonization emerged only one new state: The United Republic of Nations, a stable and properous state. In the Real World, after De-colonization, emerged many new states, most of them either imploded into civil wars or became autoritarian dictatorships.
yuuuuuup
I guess the Vietnam conflict(s) 1946-1975 are an exception then.
This series was created by people in the real world, who very likely "modelled" parts of the geopolitical landscape in TLA/TLK, on real world events. Of course there are problems. However comparisons can and should be made, even if just to comment on our past experiences with these systems.
Not true, NWT did colonize SWT, half of the vid was about that, watch it again
Yeah but that has to do more with how the Avatar´s world is establised, with only 4 main powers and 1 overpowering the rest, so of course it would be different compared to our world, but the theory stills aplies here.
Did the Avatar creators meticulously plan all of this world? Or did they add a lot of detail and wound up making sense by chance?
@Mike Li they're probably the kind of people who read almanacs and history textbooks for fun
According to the Avatar documentary they did do quite a lot of research for years before they even got the green light on the show.
The writers originally got the idea for the series and pitched it to nick in 2001, and they spent 4 years planning and working on it till the first season came out. Hell they even had the animators study the body movements of martial arts masters to use for bending. The amount of attention to detail in this show is basically unparalleled in any other show, especially so for something of it's time.
Typically in worlds like this, the answer is somewhere in the middle. In well constructed worlds the broad strokes are generally well planned out, but room is left for the finer details to allow more flexible storytelling.
Nah they did their hw
A question I've always had about the post war Avatar world is how the southern water tribe modernized so quickly while the earth kingdom has stayed at a low level of technology in spite of have more contact with the fire nation over the hundred years war
The Earth Kingdom is full of stubborn people.
The Earth Kingdom is much larger and different places have different standards of living. For example in episode 2x06, the Gaang is in Gaoling, the fairly wealthy city that Toph lives in. In the very next episode, Zuko Alone, he's in an extremely poor village. And like the video says, some people of Northern Tribe went to the South to help rebuild it. In the Earth Kingdom, the focus was on the Fire Nation colonies, not industrializing the rest of the continent.
Imagine trying to pull what Japan did in the Meiji Restoration in America. We are significantly larger, with more people living outside of urban centers. We technically have a centralized government, but a lot of people are far more affected by their local, decentralized government. Telling the entire US to rebuild their buildings would never happen; there are too many cultural and physical gaps.
It worked in Japan because at the time everybody basically answered to Meiji, the Emperor. There was literally less ground to cover, fewer people to convince, and a more centralized governmental/cultural structure.
The Water Tribe is like Japan in this respect. Fewer people, stronger national identity, denser.
The Earth Kingdom, by contrast, is much more like the US. Large land area, spread out towns and cities, huge cultural gaps between regions.
Now that I think about it, a better example than the US would be India. Way too big to homogeneously “modernize” in a short period of time.
Have you watched Korra? The earth kingdom advanced more than everyone else
Like a few have already said, it mostly comes down to size. And the result of size is decentralized government. To look at a real life example though, look at China vs Japan. The Meiji Restoration happened because Japan had one major government that America could outmuscle and this impacted the entirety of the country. Meanwhile, China's size meant that the all-conquering British couldn't make a dent. Even if they had taken the central government, the rest of the country would operate mostly independently. An Opium War later Hong Kong was ceded to the British, which, if China was the size and density of Japan, would have led to the economic and industrial progress of Hong Kong making its way throughout the whole country. But it didn't. 100 years later Japan would crush China in WWII due to their advanced military and technology. The spread and ACCEPTANCE of new technologies is decreased exponentially with size and decentralization. Tim actually talks about something somewhat similar in another context in hiss empire videos.
I think avatar resonated so deeply with me because I’m Filipino and my people have endured centuries of brutal colonialism and the generational trauma that comes with it. In a colonialist society you rarely see colonized people represented. In avatar you do. I couldn’t put my finger on it until now but avatar makes me feel seen in many ways.
Irish, I actually understand, man
"The way we help can be oppressive too." I really enjoy your real-world history essays that parallel the world-building of the Avatar universe.
To whom does the land belong? Wow, that is a complicated question. Some societies believe that it is impossible to own land. Others believe the opposite. Some, like the Kanien’kéha believed in total assimilation, while other empire builders believed in a more culturally permissive governance method. In other words, COLONIALISM IS COMPLICATED *repeating gif of dancing Vikings*
Who were the Kanien’kéha?
@@JMObyx He's using the native name for the Mohawk tribe.
@@GuyShōtō Ah, many factions and nations that were native to the Americas are not widely known by their true names, to be honest, that name sounds awesome.
@@JMObyx It looks and sounds cool, but to people who aren't familiar with the nations of the Americas, it looks completely foreign to them. It's why I usually just use the names people are familiar with it saves me a solid minute of needing to explain the American lexicon of native peoples to the uninitiated.
@@GuyShōtō True, and the names we have for Native American tribes are often what other tribes called them, which often meant "The Enemy" or something from the same vein in that language.
Using the last Airbender for elite social commentary and teach geopolitics, a concept!
...no sense of "HONOUR"
Okay Zuko, calm down
Edit: wow thanks guys
Wasn't it the other guy that said that though?
M Armyeater
Which other guy? General Yao?
HONOOOOOR
honour!!
@@aisha5156 No, the boy he was talking to that was from the place.
I think the message is not that “colonialism is good” but “good things can still come out from something as bad as colonialism.”
Indeed
The issue arises in that attributing a good result to a process that isn’t unique in providing that result is an academically dishonest way to discuss the process. If you have option A which cause benefit X and cost Y, but the benefit can be achieved by other options, then it cannot be used to justify cost Y. At that point, it’s saving the image, not being honest about the effects
@@askolotl Westerners essentially say "yeah we killed half your people and culture but at least you have access to these cool machines." I especially love the bit about Hong Kong now having democracy even though it didn't for most of the time it was under British rule.
Pacific Alliance Hong Kong won’t have democracy for very long, China wants to annex them into the mainland
@@pacificalliance3782 My question to that is where and which Westeners? Because some did a lot worse on the cost-benefit plan for the areas they controlled then others.
In the case of democracy that's isn't really a thing that comes from the top so it taking a very long time to be a thing in HK makes sense to me. The great achievement in the case of HK is that it became the great economic and financial hub we all know. That's the thing one should celebrate.
I actually wanted you to discuss cases where the colonies didn't want independence. I forgot which scene but Zuko briefly discussed some colonies that didn't want to join the Earth kingdom but stay with the fire kingdom. It's similar to how American Samoa refused to reunite with independent Samoa but choose to be under USA rule.
Yeah, I wish that was a topic that was discussed alongside the rest, it is a very real factor that should be considered.
Oh I have seen it a few times. In some cases like Hong Kong people were never even asked and in others like the Falklands the vote against leaving the UK was met by an Argentine invasion.
Another example is Gibraltar where it is a democratic government that want the land against legal treaties and the will of the people.
It’s almost like history is complicated.
@@erikthomsen4768hong kong are democractic nation they do not want under communist china and falkland mostly populated by english people it not colonized by spanish but british did and argentina is spanish nation so falkland people do not want rule by spanish speaking nation
Zuko saying "Honour" at 1:43 is just what i need
Never clicked so fast, this is a topic my friends and I can speculate for, for hours.
Lol. I was watching ATLA with my mom again, too many times.
This is a pretty timely video as ATLA just got got released on American Netflix
We’ve had it in the Uk for ages!!
Thx Merc. I had no idea until you said something
Dude Canadian Netflix had it for years what took you guys so long?
Perhaps licensing issues with Nickelodeon? Like if they still, to this day, aired reruns on Nickelodeon or Nicktoons and got more money from ad revenue there as opposed to cutting a deal with Netflix? Not sure if Canadian Nick still aired ATLA and that's why they got it on Netflix sooner. Got a bigger return/cut from putting it on Canadian Netflix rather than continuing to air it
I still have ATLA on DVD so I don't have to deal with Netflix's nonsense to watch it.
always felt the comparisons between the sino japanese war and avatar were pretty accurate
I remember reading North and South and thinking "woah, they really went there". It's amazing how this kid's show (...and comics) manage to deal with topics more "mature" shows try and fail to tackle.
My only problem with this so far (7:32) is that cultural transmission is never perfect. In a lot of ways, every new generation is just imitating the culture of the previous ones. That feeling of loss and uncontrollable change exists even in isolated cultures. Trying to preserve a culture is just as harmful as trying to suppress it, because you're shackling, walling it into whatever the people in charge of the efforts think it should be, when the very nature of culture (and by extension language) is change over time. Even the preservation metaphor displays this, in literal cases, you only preserve things that are dead.
Now finished, I'm glad you kinda addressed the issue I had earlier. My thoughts as a whole... I'm... I focus very strongly on individual responsibility. I'm a historian by preference, but I don't see the past as having value for being the past. We must learn from the past, but it cannot predict the future with any degree or accuracy. Overall, I cannot abide the concept of people being punished for actions that were not their own, I am not my ancestors, my children will not be me. But I take it a bit further, the collective doesn't exist except as a collection of individuals, I'll acknowledge the ship of Theseus problem when it comes to collective responsibility with my approach, but I don't think there's really any other just way of viewing people. Groups shouldn't be held accountable for the actions of their members, the members should be, if the members who need to be held accountable no longer live, is it just to punish the group? To be clear, accountability is flexible, I'm not going to make the judgement on what actions require punishment.
Another problem is what constitutes a collective. Treating all native Americans as one is a very colonial mindset, but treating all European colonists as one group also is. There is no Pan-European culture now, if there ever was one it was millennia ago, and if you want to go that far, you may as well stop half assing it and acknowledge that all humans are equally responsible for all atrocities committed against ourselves, which is sufficiently circular as to be meaningless.
I've gone off on a tangent. Overall, good video, got me thinking. Almost too much considering I have work to do... Keep putting out good content.
I share this sense of individual responsibility and I would prefer group punishment (or any punishment) to not be required. But for example, what about war reparations? Say my country committed atrocities on your people. Should my group/country pay for the damage done to your people? If my country would not, wouldn't your country be in an inferior place between nations competing each other? Wouldn't that be unfair on a global cultural system defined by competition? As an idealist in love with mathematical deterministic problem solving, it breaks my heart that humanity has not reached thus far a point of equilibrium with such an answer, where interspecies war is obsolete. One day maybe... A man can hope.
I agree with you and I don’t agree with Hegel but the quote of his that says history does not repeat but it rhymes seems poignant now. Human culture as we know it was built at a starting point of suffering, ignorance, and hardship. and Society has been built on the foundation of cultures who did not write their history and instead passed it down. That seed creates the fiber that makes us a collective. The collective is now more than ever spread through the media we share and consume which spans the globe. Passing on that which is valuable while looking back and holding traditional values is what got us here. This idea that human nature has evolved is just progressivism that has to shed traditions to expand. I would argue nutrition and material means have increased the quality of living and that human nature in society is immutable. Humans have an ever increasing neotony that is spurred on by the idea we are evolving in consciousness and psychology.
Me reading all of this with no input.
@@JamesSarantidis yes you should help until the country reaches modern standards.
"Groups shouldn't be held accountable for the actions of their members, the members should be; if the members no longer live, is it just to punish the group?"
"Punish" is the loaded term that throws off the argument here. I agree that an individual should not be punished for a crime they didn't commit, regardless of group affiliation. But the ethical basis of reparation doesn't have to be framed in terms of crime and punishment.
If you are born into a privileged class, this comes with a responsibility not to use your privilege as leverage to oppress others; to either exercise its power to benefit yourself -and- others who were not so fortunate, or at the very least to do no further harm. Now, if you are freely utilizing the privileges bequeathed to you by your ancestors but take no responsibility for restoring justice to those people who are harmed by the very existence of that power, then you may not have committed the original crime but you are perpetuating its effects for your own gain.
A mugger steals someone's wedding ring and sells it to a pawn broker. You buy it fair and square, but the original owner traces it to you and asks for it back. Though you had no connection to the theft, you would look like quite the ass if you did nothing to help rectify the situation. In the same way, when a disadvantaged class asks for equal access to voting rights and representation and you, as privileged member of society, do not exercise your own vote to promote their interest in having a voice, then congratulations -- the crime of disenfranchisement may not have been your doing before, but you've just taken fresh ownership of it now.
Why is Avatar so good? Its just unfair
@@arolemaprarath6615 Please go away with your Shounen series plugs, it's not needed.
@@arolemaprarath6615 I have, doesnt get close to Avatar.
@@arolemaprarath6615 tried it many times and it can't hold a candle to ATLA
@@arolemaprarath6615 no, watch Evangelion.
Arolema Prarath
Pardon, but did you just equate Naruto with the world? While the show has its strong suits, it’s not made with deep and interconnecting world building in the way Avatar is. The depose messages and meanings don’t run as deep in Naruto. It is a more widely talked about show, but that isn’t proof of superiority. Plus, Avatar is gaining mainstream traction again.
I've been waiting for this video ever since I saw your "What happened to Katara after The Last Airbender?" video and I'm so happy you finally made it!
And it's finally here!
~ Tim
This is why I feel like the world-building in LOK and the idea of republic city is actually very accurate and believable. I believe that Republic city is very similar to Hong Kong during the post war era, almost as if the real world parallel to the 100 year war were the World Wars. A lot of people criticised how LOK ruined the idea of the eastern influences of Avatar due to the rapid industrialisation of the United Republic, however looking at Hong Kong as a case study this is simply not the case as the real life parallel, Hong Kong also quickly evolved from a fishing town to a metropolis after the world wars.
The latinos in the USA provide a good example of new cultures arising after colonialism.
The culturally dominant groups at either side do not see them totally as their own (the USA, or Mexico and the other latin American countries)
Btw, news for US Americans : people actually living in Latin America but not Mexico or Cuba do not consider the Latinos in the USA as representative. There is not even anything close to a Latin American identity, rather, there are some regional identities that don't work as in the USA
Everyone does watch Mexican soaps though
it's the same with black Americans Africans call us "Akata"
@@berjoxhn5142 we use too 🤷🏾♂️
@@kb.brandyn6798what?
@@kb.brandyn6798stop
I absolutely love and enjoy this video. As someone who's recently been exploring the use of propaganda within the fire nation, this video ties so deeply into their use of propaganda it is such an interesting connection of how the FN used colonisation and propaganda go hand in hand in keeping, what they considered, the status quo of prosperity - brilliant study!
This is some really heavy stuff for a cartoon series aimed at children to deal with. I'm really impressed that the creators of this series and the subsequent comic books did this.
I find it interesting that you don't really touch on any of the information we can glean from Legend of Korra, and how the impact of colonization is still being felt almost 3/4 of a century later (and likely will continue to be for many, many more).
I think he more so wanted to talk about things prior to that.
That might be in another examination of the series as a whole. TLA is already a massive beast to tackle, concerning lore, ideology, geopolitics, religion and the rest.
And then he has to make an analysis about Kuvira’s conquest of the earth empire
@@Msalazar2011 which was directly caused BY Fire Nation colonialism. I really think this video needs a part 2...
I am DMing my first Avatar Legends Campaign. This video definitly helped.
I do all that Campfire do with the free app Obsidian.
The free community plugin Leaflet allows me to use a img of a map and drop pins on it linking to other pages in Obsidian.
Now, Obsidian is no database tool perse (but it has a plug in for it) it greatly helps with coming up with ideas and connecting ideas, places, people, plots, etc..
The "create a board" option in Obsidian allows you to place frames with differnt info or linked pages to create mindmaps or forked paths/trees.
I love your in depth reviews on the parallels between the Avatar World and our World. As kind of a history nerd, it fascinates me.
And here we have even more reasons as to why Avatar is so amazing. Thanks for a great video
I love how avatar addresses so many real life complicated issues in ways that make sense for their fantasy world. It’s such a special treat to have a show for all ages talk about things like war, colonialism, industrialisation, cultural changes, class hierarchies, globalisation, and even social justice issues in such a multifaceted way. It’s hard to give justice to such important and complicated issues but I think avatar does a pretty good job at showing how many contradictory but understandable conclusions can be drawn from the situation by having the main characters hold different positions from each other. I found myself at many points struggling to come up with any kind of perfect moral solution which solves all these problems which is so real and interesting.
And the best part is I didn’t really notice any of this as a kid, it all fits into the world and characters so naturally that it never really made me think the writers were trying to make a point. They’re telling a story with real world situations and helping kids understand how complicated the world is without it feeling like a history lesson, god I love this show.
Man I really appreciate this video. I'm from the Philippines, which was colonized by Spain for over 300 years. Prior to that, the Philippine islands were a collection of various ununified ethnolinguistic groups and there wasn't really a national identity. When I started reading about precolonial cultures and beliefs, I was saddened by how many of these cultures and practices were wiped out, altered, or diminished, and that a lot of colonial influence replaced these. I am grateful, however, that the indigenous languages still remained albeit having many colonial foreign influences. Even though colonization was a thing of the past and it brought way to a mostly unified, independent nation, I think that the scar is still very visible and that we are still struggling as a post-colonial nation. Some of these include colonial powers leaving a cultural system of exploitation and extortion, people having colonial mentalities (i.e. the appreciation of foreign cultures but diminishing our own), various threats to indigenous groups, and modern colonialism.
Dude, your reasoning and arguments are actually awsome. I love your mind!! You take many of my thoughts and put them beautifully. MORE VIDEOS like this!!
Hey there. I was watching an old show favorite and it occurred to me that it is a great example of establishing a culture with in the first 8 or so minuets so you can get to the rest of the story. Not sure if you have seen it but the show is called "Sliders." It centers on a young inventor who made a device to make a portal to a parallel universe that ranged from loosing ww2 to what if dinosaurs never went extinct. They usually do this within the first two scenes and it never seems out of place or rushed. Take a look.
Sliders - classic sci-fi, with John Rhys-Davies (Gimli of Gloin and many others)
In the season 3 finale of Avatar the Last Airbender, they imprisoned the fire lord and successfully battled Azula, but the fire nation army was still fully intact, and most other soldiers, generals, officers, etc. were unharmed. Do you think it's realistic world-building for Zuko to simply take the throne and end colonialism without any sort of military coup or power struggle?
I think that personal capabilities mean a lot more in Avatar, Zuko may have had to Agni Kai a couple Generals into line, but after that it should have been relatively easy.
Avatar largely seems to work on Bronze age "the leader is the strongest" rules.
I remember one of the comics discussing assassination attempts on zuko.
I've never been this early to one of your videos. I love your ATLA commentary. I always gain a new perspective on my favorite series.
Someone: So what will be the effect of coloniali---
Earth Queen Hou-Ting: Not that you care, but what's left of my kingdom is falling to ruin.
Me: *_cHiLLs_*
Her being a tyrant and horrible corrupt leader also helps in the deterioration.
I personally think there is a way to grow/ become modern without sacrificing culture and tradition.😊 I mean, several religions/societies have survived the modernization of their country, including the Native Americans, with their traditions and stuff. (Aside from obvious exceptions)
@@marshmallowvampire8503 What are your criteria of "survival"? We swedes still celebrate the ancient winter festival of Yule, with santa claus and stuff. Most of contemporal Sweden wasn't included in medieval Sweden and about a third of medieval Sweden isnt included in contemporal Sweden. 17th century Sweden was a semi-theocratic absolute monarchy in constant war, where being disobedient to your parents was at least theoretically punishable by death. Contemporary Sweden is another country.
@@TheKarotechia, Also a swede here! Where did you get the information of it being theoretically possible to get executed for disobedience towards your parents?
@@wrathofkorven It is part of the laws of 1608. Search for "Dömd till döden" by Kristina Becker. It explains some of this stuff.
I remember when I first found you. You had 20K subscribers and I loved ur guides so I subscribed even though I don’t really subscribe often. It’s crazy how you’ve grown so much. I’m so proud
hello, hello future me. i discovered your channel recently and initially i was surprissed at impressed at how detailed your work is. sometimes when im working i on your video and listen to you speak.. it gives me another outlook at Avatar. at someone who is emotionally attached to Avatar, your videos make me feel that the time ive spent loving Avatar hasn't gone to waste. i constantly struggle with whether or not i should still love things that i loved as a child/grew up with. im just starting to become okay with being an 'adult' and still loving those things. those things make me who i am and it was time well spent. just wanted to express my appreciation. also it gives me a lot of joy and pride seeing a kiwi doing so well in this superficial world of youtube.
After reading the comics multiple times (I thought they were pretty cool), I do have a critique about it in regards to the imbalance comic when they are talking about the factory in cranefish town. The previous comic talked about how benders and non benders were working together in a factory and how benders were using their abilities to work the machines while non benders were working like normal. That’s all good. However, in imbalance, you have the factory just get rid of all the benders because their machines got better without them. They basically painted the benders in the comic as Luddites which isn’t fair. The luddites in real life didn’t hate technology when it helped make their job easier. They hated the fact that the distribution of the profit of the better technology went to the owner of the factory instead of the wages of the workers. They just fired all of them. Even worse, when the Avatar comes in, he basically represents the British army that came in to crush the real luddites. It just seems off. Why didn’t the owner of the factory just teach the benders how to use new machines? They are people too and don’t have to use bending. It didn’t sit right with me when I re read it like that.
It's because DiMartino is a libertarian and doesn't believe in any Marxist values.
I don't believe there are any historical examples that justify colonialism, but I am curious since we will eventually establish off-world colonies if there are any examples of ways we could "do it right next time" or are we doomed to the interplanetary conflicts we see in sci-fi? (I doubt armada's of spaceships duking-it-out in CQB would ever be practical) Should we hold off on establishing bases on the Moon, Venus and Mars until we have an agency that is truly representative of humanity? Or do we accept that those with the deepest pockets will continue to guide our course?
Hopefully when we colonise space we won't be taking the bits that already belong to people.
Not colonialism but mutual benefit, is like what many organizations are trying to do in África right now, instead of, you know, taking the whole country and forcé them to take goverments and policies that maybe they don't want and will posibly rebel themselves against instead what many NGOs and organizations like the united nations between others are doing is helping then develop on their own accords, they help build and mantain important infrastructure like roads and trains to help connect secluded places and allow ease of transportation to help the economy grow, schools to educate the population in science and history and other important matters, build airports, wells, pacify the countries reducing the influence of para military groups and guerrillas on the populations, in escence don't forcé them to change, but give them the proper tools to make the change themselves on their own accords, and it's kinda working, yeah África still has a long and dificult road ahead of them before their standards of living are similar to the ones found on the rest of the world, but things have changed and there are more than a couple of countries that have had a very positive evolution thanks to this efforts
Of course we can't know how this will all end and there are many questions still in the air if this is the right thing to do, but hey it's better than colonialism, only history will tell if this is the right way or we are just as mistaken as our ancestors
These are great point. In the red mars series of books they talk about some of these issues in colonizing mars. Some scientists in the book worry that be colonizing before they could study the planet they destroyed any chance of learning about its geology or alien life, there’s a point where the scientist says that they found some “possibly” alien life but can’t be sure because it was contaminated by earth life. At the same time the colonization become controlled by giant companies from the first world cutting out the less wealthy countries from contributing
I just hope we learn from the US, how the whole point of us rebelling from Britain in the first place because communication took a long time, travel took a long time, and we didn't want to be told what to do from a power so far away that didn't know what was best for us. I see the same happening for colonies on other worlds, even Mars, the closest to us, communication will take 20 minutes, travel 3 months at best, and unless scifi tech can be created, it will probably always be around that. So when it eventually gains self sufficient it will want self governance and instead of fighting it we should allow them, because if we don't, it will prove we never did learn.
The biggest problem I have is the fact that most public schooling ignores that all races and people have been "colonizers" as well as been the master and have been the slave. Our ignoring and choosing to point the finger in this situation is a key point that will lead to the repetition of past events
The livestream just cut out, but I'd love to see your entire commentary from the three of you some time!
Really awesome video.
Gonna be teaching a virtual class this summer about "games as literature" and my students will be playing "The Quiet Year," which is a map/community--making game where players dictate the life and complications of a community after a calamity. This would be a really good follow up for my students.
I think that you broke the topic down quite nicely. I like that you left room for the fact that there is no clear right and wrong within this field and that our characters need to carve out their own way within such a situation and surrounding.
Thank you for making this video!
For most of human history the answer to "Who does land belong to?" has been "by right of conquest". The first king of England claimed that land through right of conquest, not by some byzantine dynastic law. The Iroquois Confederacy invaded the Ohio River Valley by right of conquest. The United States invaded the Iroquois Confederacy by right of conquest and Pontiac and Tecumseh tried to take their land back from the US by right of conquest but failed.
Continue this all the way till today where Israel has taken the West Bank by right of conquest. Many lay people believe that "right of conquest" is an archiac and outdated way of justifying the ownership of land but from Russia conquering Crimea in 2014 to China conquering Tibet in 1951, most land that is claimed today is claimed by right of conquest.
Force is the supreme authority from which all other authorities are derived after all.
In Israel's case there is no serious competing claim, though. The previous rulers also conquered that area, the last being Jordan who were the ones to rename it from Judea and Samaria after ethnically cleansing and defiling it.
It's different in israels case because a militia or empirical group didn't outright invade. They used the hospitality of the natives to establish themselves and slowly encroach on the land and use the destability that was caused due to the breakup of the Ottoman empire and the funding they got from a guilty west to militarize and get an upper hand over the natives. They established their so called state with nabkas and ethnic cleansing, in archaic terms conquest but quite colonial settlerism. And we need to remember that this happens in the last century a few decades ago when the so called first world calls itself a champion of human rights. It's STILL happening now, Palestinians are under constant oppression and their land is being seized from them not under the pretense of conquest like Russia and Crimea but under the false claim that the land originally belongs to them (the 'originally' that favors them) even tho they are very clearly European and the world is silent over it. The greatest example of this is the war in Ukraine where we see universal coverage and so much concern from the US but when it comes to Palestinians they support the oppressors. Lines from news reporters like 'this is not the middle east, these are Europeans with blue eyes and blond hair' really speak volume on the racism and hypocritical advocacy of human rights. #freepalestine
Noooooooooooooo! You made the cardinal sin of public 'Merica-related ornithology, using a Red-tailed hawk call for a Bald eagle.
That earns a "dishonor on you and dishonor on your scorpion-cow!" from another fandom dealing with haughty "saviors". ;;)
ua-cam.com/video/PQ2uMauyBow/v-deo.html
ua-cam.com/video/Q501d29mOv8/v-deo.html
The fire nation sound very similar to Imperial Japan . 🇯🇵
Yeah, that's what the fire nation was based on.
The Fire Nation is so obviously Chinese in all its culture, visuals, architecture... there's nothing japanese in it. Heck there's even more Korean and Thai elements to be honest
But their "first to industrialize+colonial superpower" has obvious hints of what the British did. With the Earth Kingdom being closer to the several Indian kingdoms (stitched together as the Raj by British rule), then China, which was a "fallen empire" of its own; a history of martial conquest and empires older than anything on the West, but went through horrible times (and terrible leadership) during the Qing. The Earth Kingdom was never as united or seemingly powerful together. It resembled the Holy Roman empire in it's decentralized and "king in name only"
Imperial (feudal, I mean) Japan was actually shanked by the Americans and they learned the hard way that modernizing and copying Europe was the way of not becoming a second Qing. Which eventually got them into doing what everybody else was doing; colonizing. First Korea then getting Taiwan etc etc.
There's no parallel to that in the series, but it it was, it would be Kuvira. That screams of Showa era militarism, if only they kept respect for their divine (as Long Feng said) king.
The Fire Lord is closer to an ideal Chinese emperor/ruler by Qin Legalist thought (later incorporated and softened up by humanistic Confucian and nowadays socialism/communist thought), while a Japanese emperor was usually a ceremonial-religious role, with true power left with the warrior clan (Bushi, later Samurai).
Back on the British parallel, the whole "colonies turn into democratic nation etc" mirrors the 13 colonies. While Hong Kong was a relevant outpost, most of its prosperity wasn't built by scratch by the colonists/locals, but through trade in one of the world's largest commercial regions, the pearl river Delta. (Guangdong/Canton). The history of a former colony becoming independent, turning into a melting pot of immigrants etc seems far closer to the US, hence the "westernized" styles chosen for TLOK. If anything I hope our sinitic Fire Nation has its Hong Kong, or at least Shanghai should it be shown hehe.
@@有希長門-n5c The Earth Kingdom is clearly China though, it's a fallen Empire with a distant and failing emperor and a history of military conquest (see Chin the Conqueror.)
Also the Fire Nation's motivations for colonialism were closer both in stated and actual intent to the Imperial Japanese than they were to the British. The British main moral drive for colonialism wasn't the sharing of wealth or anything like that, it was the countering of Other European Empires (Spain and then France) and later the eradication of the institution of slavery.
Mate this is one of your best videos yet. The comparison to real world examples really took it to another level. Please make more like it.
IM SO GLAD YOU USED THAT SCENE FROM “HISTORY OF THE ENTIRE WORLD I GUESS”! It kept playing at the back of my head every time you talked about the US pouring “efforts” into Japan!
So how do I get "History is COMPLICATED!" on a T-shirt?
step 1: buy a tshirt. Step 2: write 'history is complicated' on it. :D or, you could try googling one of the many 'create your own tshirt' stores. ;)
Actually, the cities around hong kong are current;y becoming wealthier now in the last few years or so.
Hong Kong is industrialised thanks to Britain but the increase in prosperity and wealth will continue because technological innovation leaders to more wealth and under the British Hong Kong become a global financial centre so for now it’s unlikely Hong Kong will get poorer compared to being with the British.
@@Valencetheshireman927 AKA "You need money to make money"
Indeed
That deducts nothing from his point i think.
23 years have passed since the turn-over, so i guess new dynamics are now driving hong kong and the environs to new socio-political changes 😁
Well Hong Kong is currently fighting for it's independence from China and there making a good attempt at it. I woudnt be surprised if in the next few years HK and the other provinces around it declare complete independence and become even more weathly from the democratic influence.
Reading Avatar: North and South literally frustrated me, with how the story fails to give justice to the conflict, Team Avatar siding with the wrong side, and how Aang just fails to be... well, the Avatar! Starting off with Galik, he and the movement have a very solid point to make and the only way the writers were able to make sure that the villains weren't too "right" was to make Galik an extremist. Secondly, to force upon the Southern Water Tribe that globalization is what's best is just too wrong of a side for Team Avatar to take. It was nothing short of defending the IMF, WTO, and World Bank from further exploiting developing states. In addition, you cannot expect a state who suffered only second to the Air Nomads (who were literally wiped out) in the Hundred Years War, to collaborate for develoment with the very nation that started the war and nearly wiped out their civilization, the kingdom who believes in its infallibility and superiority, and the sister tribe that "literally" sees them as no more than savages eithin such a short recovery time. People who claim to "better" the SWT, shoddy monarchies planning to teach one of the world's first few democracies, an egalitarian one to add, how to develop. If the SWT were to truly develop in such a way that it can match the rest of the world, it must take development in its own hands, similar to that of the Meiji Restoration. It is only by proving to the rest of the world that is indeed just as capable as the rest of them to recover from the war, that they become their equals. A restoration founded and reliant on collaboration, will only lead to the SWT being nothing short of a state in debt to others, forever a snow rat taught by humans how to live like one, just as US-recovered failed states are naturally US allies... and assets, to the point where culture and civilization are mimicked and indigency a forgotten myth. Lastly, the avatar had every right and responsibility to mediate between state and rebel forces, as the peace broker of the world. Aang, on a personal scale, should know the gravity of development and innovation and better understand Galik and Katara's point more than anyone else. Not to mention, while the conflict in the Rift ended with a happy note, Aang failed to resolve the greater conflict, finding a balance between spirit spaces and human innovation, and such an experience should have made him better equipped to handle the situation, in spite of not being the main protagonist of the story. And just for icing on top of the cake, I DO NOT UNDERSTAND WHY THEY COULD NOT SAVE GALIK!
Dear Hello Future Me,
I love your vids, carry on. I don't expect you to see this, let alone expand on the idea, but thank you still for everything.
Japan's reforms in the Meiji Restoration came from hiring in a lot of foreign experts, and importing a lot of foreign technology. They didn't just suddenly develop an industrial society by eyeballing Europeans. And the people they hired and bought from were - surprise surprise - the English, French and Americans.
TBF China's industrialisation was largely based off of American corporations coming to exploit cheap Chinese labour. The Chinese government very skillfully used this foreign investment to rapidly develop China into an industrial juggernaut and an emerging superpower. For China, globalisation is the reason that Chinese Gen-Z's have a standard of living far above what Chinese Gen-X's had, with millions being lifted out of poverty. Even the Meiji restoration had large elements of westernisation, with Western thinkers, businessmen, generals, and politicians being a huge part of Japan's industrialisation.
The SWT may be able to reap tremendous rewards from globalisation, using foreign ideas and businesses to grow its economy and power. On the other hand it may become like Latin America, the Middle East, Central Asia, or Africa, where a small, corrupt, local elite use foreign influence to secure their own power and wealth, over using it to help the people.
Whether the SWT becomes another China or becomes another Brazil would be a very interesting question to answer, and it would cut to the heart of what kind of society the SWT is. It seems very decentralised, perhaps a better name for the region would be the Southern Water Tribe*s*. Would the SWT centralise under foreign pressure, or would it remain a loose confederation?
If the first case is true, would this come alongside the destruction and repression of smaller sub-cultures in the SWT? How would the region ideologically react to this? Would the people of the SWT embrace this unifying nationalism like Japan, or would it reject this cultural mixing, identifying more with their local sub-cultures, like Spain? If the second case is true, would certain tribes be better off than others? Would this cause resentment within the SWT, further atomising it? Would the tribes with oil money become wealthy egalitarian societies like Norway or brutal autocracies like Saudi Arabia?
I wish that LOK answered some of these questions, but it was more concerned with Republic City and its cultural identity, more than it was with the four nations.
You know what, I always getting really excited over this explanation and essay about the avatar world and how to make sense of it, and I always amaze by how good you describe and explain these things. Great work as always! Can't wait for another vid!
I'm so happy you're still doing these videos.
I think you understand the nuances of this world, real and fictional better than literally any other UA-camr that does Avatar videos.
to correct some historical errors here, british rule did not bring western style democracy to hong kong, it brought a system where britain appointed a governor to hong kong, no elections were held, and speaking mandarin in the halls of government buildings was illegal. The first election in post colonial hong kong was held after chinese rule was re-established.
Just how many videos do you have of Zuko saying "honor"? :')
Such an insightful piece of content!
But wasn't it the other guy saying honor?
"Cultures evolve with technology." Very true. The Japanese went from putting tentacle porn on woodblocks to 4K images.
sooo...
4k tentacle porn
Um they only started that after the *nuclear radiation*
I truly appreciate Avatar for its willingness to address complex and nuanced realities, both of our world and of its own world.
I realize how tensely charged this would be so I'm refraining from diving in head first.
Lord knows the complex and nuanced realities of 2022 and (soon) 2023 are more than enough to tackle.
Man. Your videos are really awesome. Your ability to look at the bigger picture and multiple ideas is great.
There's incompleteness in the analogy in that there's only ever one imperial power in play in Avatar. In history, numerous local, regional, continental, and intercontinental powers competed for empire. The idea that the local strongman would make a better ruler than a foreign one is a half truth on a good day. If a crop failure left a poor peasant unable to pay his taxes, it did much matter if they were owed to local nobles or a foreign nabobs. The precious few times in history when altruistic action was undertaken were only possible when the demands of imperial competition were low, such as when slavery was abolished in the British Empire.
I haven't read any of the Avatar comics, but I think it would be interesting to see the history behind the Fire Nation's industrial revolution. Like, what was the first problem these machines were used to solve? What was the balance of power like before? How did they relate to mainland powers before? Was there a change in social structure caused by the new technology, and how was the change received? Who was the dominant power before the Fire Nation, and how long ago were they relevant? These questions are well outside the scope of the story Avatar's makers wanted to tell, but their answers have implications for anyone attempting to draw a measure of applicability from the series.
As far as justifications for colonialism, just remember that empire is nothing more than tribal conflict on a bigger stage. The justification is that you can better your standing with the people you care about at the expense of people you don't care about. It's that same pernicious little thought that you would have such a better time of it if you could just stop respecting (or at least do so less) the humanity of this weird other creature that doesn't use the same words, eat the same foods, or enjoy the same shows as you. The fact that they disagree with you makes them wrong, and the best thing for the both of you would be for you to force them to do what you say. You should take over their affairs an manage their life in the correct way, and after they see how much better off they are, they will thank you. The property of theirs you take ownership of is just fair compensation for their imposition on you, and maybe the loss will make them think twice before transgressing again next time. It's good sometimes to take a long hard look at the wretchedness of our species and the harm it does us. Accurate bookkeeping is important.
I mean the only flaw in the benefits of colonization is that colonization only benefits the colonizers and the rich. Rome conquering Britain is a giant myth about the benefits of colonization. In reality, the average life expectancy of the British citizen went down significantly after Rome. Africa is a living example of recent colonization. Their resources and people were consistently exploited leaving once flourishing nations into indebted and impoverished countries.
@@blitzkriegdragon013 as a British person I very much appreciate that we were conquered by the Romans. The technologies and philosophies we gained because of it are what led us to be so prosperous later on.
There are two ways to go about things after being colonised.
You can either get over it and move on, accepting the good that has been gained from it and letting go of the animosity stemming from the atrocities. Most pre-modern colonial nations went this route, probably because they were more used to atrocity to begin with, but more modern examples include Botswana.
Or you can reject everything about the colonialisation, blame all of your nations ills on the colonising people, and offload any responsibility over your own future. See Zimbabwe and Mugabe begging for white people to return if you want to know what happens when you do that.
Basically it's the same as everything else. Accept the good, move on from the bad, take responsibility for your future and don't waste your time blaming others for your ills.
@@scotcheggable Archeological evidence suggests that British life under Rome was categorically worse than before. People were more malnourished, diseased, and wealth inequality skyrocketed. Nothing had been done under Roman colonization that couldn't have been done through trade. Rome was needlessly brutal and authoritarian. Part of "getting over it" as you say, is acknowledging that Rome's colonization made the life of the average Roman worse.
@@blitzkriegdragon013 That's really not true in the long term though, the Romano Britain's achieved a thriving society that completely collapsed following the Roman abandonment in the fifth century.
One only needs to look at Western Europe in the dark ages to see how beneficial Rome truly was.
@@GonnaDieNever Archeological records show the average Britain was more malnourished and shorter than they were before Rome. Only people who benefited were the rich.
When I was younger and began watching this series, I had a fanfic idea that was closer to how they solve the question of the colonies and actually happened in Korra be it slightly differently. In my fanfic, the backstory was the colonies were more progressive than the home island. Over 100 years, they managed to blend a near equal environment between those of Fire Nation and Earth Kingdom, eventually everyone being recognized as a citizen of the colonies therefore a citizen of the Fire Nation. The colonies felt the war was unfair to them as resources and man power were being taxed by the "motherland" for the expensive war. The colonies demanded true representation in the government of the Fire Nation but the capital feels since the colonies are already part of the Fire Nation, they already had representation. You see where I'm going with this?
Frustrated with with demands being refused, the Colonies banded together to declare themselves independent. I had to invent several different colonies and this was before the comics and Korra came about. The now independent colonies don't want to return to the Earth Kingdom and they see themselves different from the Fire Nation so I called this new state simply The Union as more parallels to the USA and that it is a nation that united 2 different people.
AMERICA FUCK YEAH
Kind of of topic, just wanted to mention that one of the things that made ATLA so good was the overall simplicity of bending. Bender twirling around elements in cool moves etc is just the most fun to watch.
Bending should‘ve stayed that simple, with the simpke exceptions like lightning, healing and metalbending. Things like bloodbending is too picky in my opinion (I know it was in TLA, but it wasn‘t embraced). An airbender could theoretically bloodbend too because water and H2O cells contain Oxygen. Fire too needs oxygen to survive, so airbenders can simply eliminate all firebending? As already mentioned I think going too in-depth on the specific aspects of bending, besides moves etc, is maybe interesting, but kind of ridiculous...
the quality of this analysis is just through the roof. awesome job
thank you so much for this video
I often like to explore how aliens would justify doing things that violate their species’ own morality. In this case, I think human morality revolves around altruism: help people, don’t hurt people. There are all kinds of questions that stem from that: “What is a person exactly? Which people do you prioritize over others? Is it ever okay to hurt someone? If so, when?” Just as well, whenever a human wants to hurt someone, they often come up with justifications that frame their unaltruistic action as altruistic, like “spreading prosperity through conquest” as you said. The aliens in my story have morality that revolves around making the world more interesting and not making it less interesting. And sometimes one of them wants to conquer someone else, which is often seen as needless destruction of an interesting and unique nation to spread more of another nation that already exists. As such, the conquer era of this alien species justify it to themselves by saying that the struggle of war brings glory and great stories of battle that will inspire future generations. I think one reason a being might have to justify certain actions to themself is because deep down, they know what they’re doing is against their “species wide moral Center” as I like to call it, but they don’t want to accept it and are resisting that fact. If you encountered an alien species whose morality revolved around war for instance, they probably wouldn’t need to justify their own wars to themselves. They would just be upfront about their true reasons and proud of them, fight their wars and celebrate having “done good.” They may or may not even judge their enemies for fighting them, because they may see that as good as well, depending on their level of reciprocity vs myopia. In fact, they would probably end up having to justify peaceful acts to themselves by saying, “These new allies will be a great resource for fighting someone else.” As to whether or not they follow through with fighting someone else: it could vary. I think using aliens with weird morality and psychology to explore philosophy, culture and world building can be a pretty interesting concept. I know that’s not what this video is about, but the fact that you brought up justifications for war got me thinking about that, and I felt like sharing. Good video.
AWESOME COMMENT
Simple.
Ingroup/outgroup
The communists claim that all people should receive everything they need because all people are deserving of a good life, then demand that people who disagree with them be tortured to death for having the audacity to have a differing opinion, because if you aren't the ingroup, then you aren't human.
12:25
the answer is not that simple, no
a generation of colonists living there simply returning back to the fire nation that they don't have as many ties to unlike the land they lived in all of their lives? The more obvious answer would be to live autonomously as part of the earth kingdom imo
Dude this is genius, as a brazilian I can understand the impact of colonialism and neo colonialism
This was one of my favorite videos of yours and it reminds me of Mapazan. The theme of this video is part of why I love Malazan. It challenges the way we think about empires. It forces us to think about the good and the bad (which can be very bad) and doesn't make something very complicated and try to make it simple.
wow! what a great video! i loved this break down and analysis. It makes me really want to read the avatar comics now! impeccable work as usual! thanks for sharing!
I think the main flaw with your analysis is that the whole show is an explicit metaphor for the Japanese pan-asian co-operation sphere and the japanese invasion of china, although japanese imperialism was a response to western imperialism it has different trappings and reasoning.
I have what I think is a new theory: Korra herself is evidence to suggest why the fire nation killed/captured southern water benders during the 100 year war.
Why did the fire nation go to such great lengths to kill the last southern waterbender (Katara) and capture/kill all the previous southern waterbenders? During the very first episode Zuko says while drilling his basics set with Iroh that “the sages tell us that the avatar is the last airbender”. How could the sages have divined this information about the avatar? It’s not even common sense. We would expect that at least a handful of all of the airbenders, seeking to evade as was their style of combat, would be able to escape from the fire nation attack even on the day of Sozin’s comet. These air nomads would likely either flee to the earth kingdom or one of the water tribes. Even if the majority or all of the air benders besides Aang were hunted down by fire nation assassins; how would the sages know this and state it as a fact? I therefore conclude that the fire sages are able to ascertain/divine some information about the present and future lives of the avatar.
This is where it gets interesting, Sozin’s genocide of the air nomads was cruel and evil but it was a calculated act to possibly end the avatar cycle/give Sozin more time in order to not have a fully trained avatar making his war more difficult. Additionally it made conquering some areas just easier. However, what if he didn’t want to kill all of the air nomads for conquering purposes? What if he only killed all the air nomads because their culture was so pure in spirit that everyone born an air nomad was a bender?
We know that over time the fire sages became loyal purely to the firelord. What if they used the same discerning powers to determine that the last airbender was the avatar, to also divine that the next avatar (eventually Korra) would be born a waterbender of the southern water tribe? Therefore the plan to end the avatar cycle was two-fold. Kill the air nomads to continue the avatar cycle, and capture/kill all southern waterbenders to stop the reincarnation of the avatar into its destined next life.
As someone who just finished Ap Euro, the colonialism joke made me very happy.
Lol same for me in AP world
@Hello Future Me I noticed at 17:23 you said that four seats in the New Zealand Parliament are reserved for Mäori. While the Mäori seats did start out at four, it seems the number is now seven seats and has been since 2008.
Minor detail, great video, great channel.
I want to thank you for those videos. I was learning drawing over two years ago but gave up feeling terrible with it, constantly thinking of it as i wanted back then and ever since elementary school to make a web comic.
Those videos help me a lot with at least feeling like i'm sort of learning towards it, learning how to create my world while i struggle towards starting over again. I don't know if i will ever manage to do it but this helps at least a little.
"I'm escaping to the ONE place that hasn't been corrupted by Fire Nation's colonialism.. SPAACE!"
- Princess Yue
I think many soldiers must have been pissed after the war. They fought for years against the other nations many men died for the glory of the fire nation and had to give all the land up. I don’t say it was right but they must be really angry generations of conquest and sacrifice undone in one day. Fathers and later sons died for nothing.
Sozin actually succeeded in spreading the prosperity of the Fire nation overseas ( Though I don’t think entirely as intended) because the war led to the spreading of Fire nation expertise and technology in other countries which made those lands more prosperous as a result so in a way those soldiers didn’t die for nothing .
It's why in the comics, group of rebels against Zuko appears.
J 19 I’m not going to die to benefit some foreigner. I would die to benefit my people not yours
@@alvinlin8140 Can't you just live for your people?
@Alvin Lin - Ok
The way he talks about America is insultingly true
😂 forreal
I really like how you constantly relate in your videos to slightly obvious real-world examples and not just blabbing about a fictional story...
Hey I really appreciate all the effort you put into your Campfire segment. Its not that often I feel actually informed on a product from an addvertisement/sponser. The way you presented it in this video shows you used it and have thought critically about what you wanted and how it suited you. It also shows consideration for the viewers.
I think the Fire nation represented imperial Japan as well as the European empires
PSA: Avatar is finally on Netflix
Side Note: Avatar is on Netflix in the US (took too long), but everywhere else (like in NZ where HelloFutureMe is from), has had it for months.
*Thank you!*
In the netherlands it was out on Netflix like two months ago I believe or even longer
As soon as a saw this, I clicked....
We like Tim
We like Avatar
We staan both together
Niiiice.
This was a pleasantly nuanced take on the dynamics of colonialism and mainly in the fallout of these policies.
I've also never looked at the post-war books, but they seem very interesting thematically, as they try to answer some natural questions as to what would go on after the war!
This channel is awesome, I’ve thought about many of the topics you’ve covered in many of the same ways and it’s awesome to find a channel to at least expand on them. Great content, even a year after this one was made.
Your stream is down in germany.... sad....but also happy that the torture ended with that thin Irro
Stream get taken down?
I think it was more Japanese Imperialism than European colonialism, conquest was the driver, not trade. Among other details
Are you saying the Fire Nation is like Imperial Japan.
@@robertisham5279 yes
I got into a car accident two years ago while listening to one of your videos, and I've associated you with that car crash for a long time. I feel like I've finally healed enough to be able to get back to watching and enjoying your content. Hope you're enjoying your re-watch of ATLA on Netflix for the billionth time! Have a good day, been a fan for a long time. Excellent and poignant content.
I hope things are better today, dear stranger
While watching this video, I really did feel the theme resonate with me. As a masters student in history and an amateur writer living in South Africa, the intricate difficulties that are inherent with colonisation and decolonisation are things I've had to grapple with on a regular basis. Coming from a context where not only are there two distinct and often conflicting European colonial cultures, but similarly, factitious indigenous cultures, the issue of how colonisation ends is one that really becomes a messy and complicated endeavour. Living in a state where the borders are defined not by the people living in them, but by historical European divisions, and where the post-colonial history was as if not messier than the colonial and pre-colonial history, the intricacy of the context really becomes a tough thing to deal with.
Few colonial histories include as many aspects as that of South Africa. Canada has an example of two distinct colonial cultures which have to reside within it. India has the example of an indigenous population that was immensely fractious, but remained far more numerous than the colonial population. Israel poses the example of the newer population imposing themselves as the architects of society and state once overt colonial power has exited the frame. However, to combine all of these elements? In my studies, few places come close to the nightmare of factors that is South Africa. I can see all of the elements mentioned here in ATLA within my own national context, and just how haphazardly they can play out. The desire to industrialise and the resistance of culture and tradition, the amalgamation of new cultures amidst severe inequality, and the insurmountably difficult task of forging a way forward that includes all denizens of the state.
I'm not sure that this comment serves a purpose necessarily other than to state that, as Tim says so often, history is complicated. However someone does go about worldbuilding a colonial and post-colonial setting, the history of and design of that setting will inevitably make the result so much more complicated. It was just really awesome to experience a discussion on worldbuilding that really just had as much resonance with my own experience of the real world as this did.
It's likely that the Fire Nation Colonies would've rebelled at some point.
As someone that comes from a country that was colonised I can agree a lot to this analysis. I’m also no expert but I can see a lot of what you say, in some ways is complicated because we are not the Europeans who came to this lands, but we are not the indigenous people either. The mixtures both cultures is what creates our identity, but even with that we don’t treat with the same respect the multiple indigenous cultures that are still a life nowadays in the territory, and we don’t appear to have the mindset to become more like the European (or American, for that matter) that have a huge impact on us. Maybe the best way to balance this is creating a cultural and political society that tries to see for the best interests of all its habitants, but God knows is something incredibly complicated.
I wouldn't say that Sozins motives were not altruistic. Why would he be lying to his best friend? How I understand this scene is that even with hood intentions you can cause horrible things. Each next Firelord was wors than the previous one. Sozins had good intentions but used immoral methodes. Azulon wanted to expand his empire and was cruel but cared about his family. Ozai cared only for power and wanted to dominate everyone and Azula was a total psycho. I think that what history of Firenation's royal family teaches us is that using immoral means to achive the even the most noble goals will eventually lead to our demisse.
Fun Fact?
I hear! For the legend of Korra I also heard another idea the team had also based on another scenario. What if the Song Dynasty was able to enter the Industrial Age by the 1100s? If the Nomads didn't attack or interfere with China. In our timeline? China had the ability to enter their industrialization, since in the 1000s China already knew the concept and discover of Steam power on their own. And? Had big plans to build steam power engines in the 1100s, but the Mongols aka the Nomads attacked China, Before? It had the chance to enter and gear up for their industrialization.
During the time of the Song Dynasty? It was China's critical key moment of propelling from an agriculture society into an Industrial society. Song Dynasty science and technology was very advance. And had many conditions similair to that of England more then 900 years ago. Prior to the Nomadic invasions! China's industrialization was imminent and unavoidable, had it not been for the Nomadic invasions.
If you think about? The creators were inspired by Kung Fu and watching Kung Fu movies. And? Mostly based it on Chinese culture. Who's to say? They didn't explore this idea. Also to add in Avatar the last Airbender it still had a medieval setting but with a few industrial machinery and tech.
@@YonIon996 Nope Kung Fu Movies are from China dude. That's like saying Superhero movies is from USA and dancing and singing movies is from India.
@@YonIon996 And Last I checked Hong Kongers looked more Chinese rather than White.
@@YonIon996 Because White people who live in USA aren't in Europe. North America is not part of the European continent. That's why they don't call themselves European. White people in USA may have originated from Europe. But? USA is still mostly White majority nation.
Thanks for all your great work and thoughts. I'm leading a Avatar legends campaign now and your videos helping a lot to create a immersive experience
I’m so greatful to people like you who still talk about the show