Imperialism Reaction

Reading other people’s impressions of imperialism and its historic significance caused me to wonder about whether it still exists, or will exist in the future. Someone mentioned that the class gap between extremely rich and extremely impoverished is rapidly growing. It’s scary to imagine what the next step in the pattern of imperialism could be when the wealth is already distributed so unevenly. Just look at many third- world, or underdeveloped, countries versus America. But in my opinion imperialism will remain six feet under, mostly because of how global our planet has become. Of course it’s necessary to understand I mean the offensive military actions taken by dominant nations, not the imperialistic attitude, which will exist as long as there are top world powers like the United States. But today justifications for imperialism wouldn’t be tolerated by the rest of the world. If a country tried to oppress another with an unprecedented war there would be a huge backlash. Other nations would come to their aid with their voices and their militaries. We live in a very global world society with a series of networks and allies. Not only would this morally gray behavior be chastised, but many other nations would be affected too. The ripple effect would hurt other nations through trade among other effects. I think we coexist with enough nations that are powerful enough to protect their allies, creating our own method of checks and balances. George Bush’s “war on terror” is an example of military reasoning that many people found to be unsound. Historically many imperialistic powers have acted self-righteous, hiding their true greed behind a façade of democracy or superiority.
Mostly everyone categorized imperialism as an evil force dominating our history textbooks. And while its corrupt nature is undisputable, the point was developed in someone’s paper that there have been benefits like rise of technology, educational programs, and global views that has spread understanding of other cultures. But another glaring negative, besides the killing and suffering of a country’s natives, is the fact that you can’t have imperialism without assimilation. I think this is attributed to the fact that people are afraid of what they don’t understand, including different culture. I wonder, is it possible to conquer another nation without decimating its identity (i.e. religion, dialect, beliefs)? Regardless, I believe the various aspects of imperialism are now a moot point, considering we live in such an interconnected world.