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King Leopolds Soliloquy
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A 1905 political satire by Mark Twain about the then-ongoing scandal over the atrocities committed by King Leopold II of Belgium in the Congo Free State. The pamphlet takes the form of a monologue by Leopold where he tries to justify the atrocities and argues that, as a king, he is Above Good and Evil and cannot be criticized without blaspheming. The pamphlet is notable for containing several real-life photos of the atrocities and incorporating massive amounts of verbatim text from the contemporary reports that brought them to public attention, which Leopold reads off and dismisses. | |
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Card-Carrying Villain | |
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Card-Carrying Villain: Even most cartoon supervillains would think Leopold is too extreme. | |
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Wants a Prize for Basic Decency | |
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Wants a Prize for Basic Decency: While most would argue that Leopold is lacking even in basic decency, one of his excuses is that the miniscule remuneration he pays to the Congolese in return for giving up one tonne of food ("just short of a penny a week per nigger") is better than giving them nothing in return. He also apparently expects people to forgive him for slaughtering the Congolese because he sometimes allows them to kiss the image of the Saviour just before they die. | |
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What the Romans Have Done for Us | |
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What the Romans Have Done for Us: Leopold tries to invoke this by talking about the good works he has supposedly done in the Congo, but it falls flat because what he's supposedly done for the Congolese is so out of proportion with all the shocking things he's doing to them that it's almost laughable. | |
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Humans Are Bastards | |
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Humans Are Bastards: Leopold is actually right when he says that he alone is not responsible. After all, if his soldiers did not obey his orders to kill and mutilate the natives, and if Western society did not consider Africans to be subhuman, none of this would have happened even with him on the throne. | |
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Bait the Dog | |
| King Leopolds Soliloquy / int_4783acfa | comment |
Bait the Dog: On a couple of occasions Leopold appears to come close to feeling remorse for his actions after reading of a particularly brutal episode in the report, only to immediately convince himself that he's done nothing wrong and it was necessary for business to continue (for example, ruminating at length on how much the children who died of hunger must have suffered before deciding "it can't be helped", or saying he regrets having sixty women crucified before specifying that he means because he could have flayed them just as easily without getting as much negative attention). | |
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Would Hurt a Child | |
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Would Hurt a Child: Many of the accounts of atrocities Leopold reads mention children being killed or mutilated. | |
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Lack of Empathy | |
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Lack of Empathy: Leopold doesn’t give one iota for anyone who is not a king, and not even his own family is safe from his depredations. (It’s implied that he raped his wife and his daughter.) And those outside his race and social class have it even worse. | |
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Villain Has a Point | |
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Villain Has a Point: Whilst it comes in the middle of his hypocritical and self-serving ramblings, Leopold does occasionally make a good point about the hypocrisy of countries like the United States condemning him for his activities in the Congo when they were the ones who allowed him to take over in the first place and were perfectly happy to take his money and ignore his atrocities until the press got ahold of the story. | |
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Politically Incorrect Villain | |
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Politically Incorrect Villain: As with most colonial leaders, Leopold views the native Congolese as practically subhuman and not worthy of moral consideration, although he takes it further than most in terms of what he thinks it's okay to do to them. | |
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Above Good and Evil | |
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Above Good and Evil: Leopold's main argument. Even if his crimes were not necessary for him to maintain order, he cannot be judged for them because he is the king and the king is not accountable before mere mortals for anything he does. | |
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Protagonist-Centered Morality | |
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Protagonist-Centered Morality: Belgium's King Leopold II argues that he's brought prosperity, peace, and dignity to the Belgian Congo. By enslaving the populace and forcing them to work on rubber plantations, and chopping off the hands of women and children as a warning. | |
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| King Leopolds Soliloquy / int_954ad71c | type |
Evil Colonialist | |
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Evil Colonialist: Leopold epitomizes this trope, which is Truth in Television as his Real Life reign in the Congo Free State was so brutal that even the other colonial powers demanded he be made to stop. | |
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Aristocrats Are Evil | |
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Aristocrats Are Evil: Not only does Léopold himself revel in his evil, but he also praises Tsar Nicholas for being equally brutal and small-minded. The narrative implies that it is the very nature of monarchy to amplify the very worst of human nature and crush every good tendency of the human race. | |
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Never My Fault | |
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Never My Fault: He is able to find justifications for any of the atrocities he has committed or allowed, putting the blame on the people who denounce them as he considers they are nothing more than shameless spies who have no right to criticize anything a king appointed by God does. Or even blaming the helpless victims, such as when he says widows must be overtaxed and overworked to death too as "there is nothing much left, now, but widows" and "business is business". | |
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Moral Myopia | |
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Moral Myopia: Leopold is willing to oppress, exploit, mutilate and slaughter the Congolese and dismiss it as a mere price of doing business, but anyone who criticizes him for it is a craven villain who dares to attack God's representative on Earth. He also appears to be deathly afraid of going to hell, but thinks his main problem in that regard is his tendency to occasionally blaspheme while cursing his opponents rather than any of his myriad crimes. | |
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Take That! | |
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Take That!: Not only are King Leopold and Tsar Nicholas portrayed as utter monsters, but all of contemporary society, including each individual reader, is condemned, because such atrocities and the unjust social order that enables them could only come into being through popular consent. | |
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Insane Troll Logic | |
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Insane Troll Logic: Used repeatedly when he wants to justify everything he has done or put the blame in others, including the victims themselves if needed. | |
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An Arm and a Leg | |
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An Arm and a Leg: As in Real Life, one of the most infamous cruelties Leopold is accused of is cutting off the hands of Congolese who fail to meet their quotas. | |
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People's Republic of Tyranny | |
| King Leopolds Soliloquy / int_eef85d73 | comment |
People's Republic of Tyranny: A variation in the "Congo Free State", which is anything but free, being in reality Leopold's personal fiefdom where the entire population are effectively slaves. | |
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You Bastard! | |
| King Leopolds Soliloquy / int_f642b1f9 | comment |
You Bastard!: The pamphlet ends with Leopold directly thanking the reader for being complicit in his crimes; after all, if the public did not turn a blind eye to colonial atrocities he would have had to stop long ago. | |
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Evil Cannot Comprehend Good | |
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Evil Cannot Comprehend Good: At times Leopold seems to genuinely not understand why so many people oppose what he's doing in the Congo and is baffled and outraged that they continue to criticize him even though he's a king and therefore Above Good and Evil. He also claims at one point that the missionaries who initially exposed him only did so to get revenge on him for not allowing them to trade in the Congo; the possibility that they might genuinely believe what he's doing is wrong seems to be at best secondary in Leopold's mind. | |
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Evil Is Petty | |
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Evil Is Petty: Leopold repeatedly plans to use his immense wealth for acts of petty vindictiveness against his critics such as buying a dinosaur fossil named after him as a insult towards his reign just so he can destroy it out of spite. | |
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King Leopolds Soliloquy |
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