h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Entry: King Leopold II and the Belgian Congo - A2504684
Author: Twophlag Gargleblap - NWO NOW - U109577

Part of my "mass-murderers of Europe" interest, Leopold killed more people than Hitler and Stalin combined, yet noone seems to bother remembering.

People tend to try and forget bad memories.

I have just given it a quick scan over and it seems ok, but I did find the lack of sections made it a bit tricky to read. You might want to think of try and see ways you can sectionalise it.

Researcher PSG

Agree with PSG, also a couple of typos (should be tyranny and garrison)(haven't the energy for a detailed nitpick tonight but didn't spot much anyway). A map would be helpful although I've no idea if this is technically possible.

Where you refer to similar 20th century European excesses, you've put something like "from Hitler's holocaust to Stalin's collectivisation of the 1930s" (apologies for not having the exact text handy). For chronological reasons these two would be better swapped around; but you could extend the comparison to the Balkans in the 1990s, I think.

My knowledge of the political structure of Belgium in the early 20th century is not great - what was the relationship between Leopold and the government? Was it a constitutional monarchy?

Interesting (tho appalling) episode in history, good entry

Mol

Perhaps a mention of the Rwandan genocide ten years ago might be in order. The groundwork for the genocide was laid during the Belgian colonial period and Western (i.e. European) governments aided the genocide with their indifference. Leopold is not far from us today.

Good entry on an important subject

I think that this would be greatly benefitted by GuideML. Subheaders (although some rejigging might be needed to make the text neatly fit into sections) and the tag for the long quotations would be useful.

It's a shame that this hasn't been that well noticed in PR, it has a great deal of potential.

Indeed.

I had heard that Léopold's rule over Congo was considered barbaric even by the standards of the time. To the extent that there was some pressure from the European powers on him to cede control to the Belgian state.

If you want to bring the modern parallels in, you could note the 1950s implication of the Belgian gvmt and the CIA in the assasination of Patrick Lub... (darn it - can't remember how to spell his name any more - the first leader of the Congo post-independence)

sprout

Patrice Lumbaba

Is this entry still being worked on? It would get into the Edited Guide quite easily, I think.

"Is this entry still being worked on?" -- I'm afraid it doesn't look like that . I got lost somewhere below para 10 (or was it 12?)


Bossel

The author has been absent for two months now. I suggest we move this along to the Flea Market.

Seconded

Researcher PSG

added to current email.