Cartman celebrates xenophobia, and Queen Victoria becomes a drug kingpin! : The tragedy of the "Opium Wars."

Hey, Dear Reader, did you ever watch the original "Miami Vice" with Don Johnson? It was a show about vice cops in Miami (obviously), and was one of the more popular shows in the 80s and 90s.  The reason I mention it, is because this show had some really cool, stylish drug lords.

Queen Victoria, Prince Albert, and every f&*king prime minister who served Great Britain between the 1830s and the 1890s were drug lords.

Which places ole Vicki in a sticky position, historically speaking.

But, I suppose lots of world leaders feel they're above common law.  They must belong to the super-terrestrial twilight with other narcissists.  One characteristic that these people share, however, is typically xenophobia.  In other words:  WE'RE THE GREATEST;  THE MOST PURE; THE MOST GODLY.  Any resistance from 'inferior beings' must be crushed, because we (i.e. TOTAL XENOPHOBES)  English know what's best.

UMMM.  Cough.  Gagging reflex.  Wait, is this a dual reality? In that case:

I think ole Donald would agree.  I don't know, do you like him as a street punk?

So! Let's begin.

We're going to talk about nineteenth century drug lords today, as intimated above.  Let's stop a bit and consider which drugs were used by regular Jane and John Does during the Victorian Era:

Now, most if not all of the following "medicines" (gag) were OVER THE COUNTER DRUGS.

Don't believe me? Ha! Take a look:

Laudanum (pure grain alcohol mixed with opium)

Cocaine

Ah, Eric.  No introductions needed, eh?

(Growing kids need a little 'boost' right?)

Heroine

Sigh.  Ye Olumpian gods, 19th century 'doctors' were insane.

Arsenic

(women used to use this on their skin, to make it translucent and white.)

Uh, arsenic is a POISON???

Would you believe it if I told you that Queen Victoria regularly used drugs? Well, she did:  cocaine, chloroform, "snuff", weed and opium (usually laudanum).  Hey, let’s…

Ah, don't believe me, Dear Reader? Here, take a look at these thingies:

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/videos/did-this-beloved-queen-of-britain-use-drugs/

https://www.chicagotribune.com/1994/04/10/royal-medicine-victorias-secret/

https://www.amazon.com/Emperors-Dreams-Drugs-Nineteenth-Century/dp/1873982488

Actually, use of opioids and other narcotic substances was common among all classes of English society in the nineteenth century.  Remember that Dr. Freud hadn't yet identified or diagnosed the disease of addiction, so people were blithely ignorant about the problem.  For example, the condition of alcoholism was known as "dipsomania."

Don't ask me how dipsomania became known as alcoholism, Dear Reader, I don’t know 

But, we were speaking of…

And the opium pods:

Oh my, the opium trade poured a ton of cash into British coffers.  Oh well, it was important for England to protect its' economy, right? Empire, Ho!...NOT:

Before we learn about the horrors of the Opium Trade, we have to first consider TEA.

Yes, there were other items that caused a trade deficit for England (mainly because they really didn't have anything the Chinese people wanted...until FINE SILVER and tragically, opium), but by the early nineteenth century, the British people were suddenly obsessed with drinking tea--and China was a major producer of tea--the largest in the world at that time.  

India was one of the largest colonies (i.e. crushed and conquered nation) in the British empire, during the 19th century, and early twentieth centuries.  And, can we guess what was India's largest cash crop? Ah come on...guess Dear Reader!!

Yup, you're right:  Opium was India's agricultural eureka, and therefore the 'solution' to Britain's trade deficit with the Chinese (I mean, the English people could've switched to coffee, yes?).  I guess the question for leaders in the English government (those paragons of equanimity and compassion) at the time was: 'how do we find something the Chinese people need/want, and will buy from us?'  

How indeed.

Shall we entertain a slight fantasy for a moment?

'But, wait kind sirs!' says the Imaginary British Prime Minister, 'How about India's neato little crop of opium? After all,' he continues, 'Let's get a million Chinese men, women, and kids addicted to the drug, so that our banks will be stuffed with money!!' He smiles. 'Yes, that's it--think of it, gentlemen.  Think of the possibilities.  The profit.'

'Wonderful policy, sir, we fully support it!' shout The Commons.

OK.  So I wasn't in England during the 1830s.  And no, I' ve never met a Prime Minister.  However, the spirit of the fantastic conversation is meant to be indicative of racial attitudes at the time.  Quite simply, the British had no laws to alleviate racism in the nineteenth century, so very few English people were bothered by the fact that their government was in the process of making raw opium available to most of China's citizens, and they did nothing about it.

Ah "Blazing Saddles."  Mel Brooks is fit for all occasions.

 

And thus, England entered the opium drug trade  (more correctly called "the China trade"), making Vicki into a drug kingpin.  Below is a map detailing the trading mechanisms:

As you can see, Dear Reader, tea, silk, and porcelain were exported from China to England, and lots and lots and lots of opium was shipped from India to Canton.  Opium was incredibly cheap for the British to grow, and preliminary 'evidence' indicated that the Chinese were extremely susceptible to opium.  I'll just bet we know what the English exclaimed at this point, right? Bonus!!!

Mein Got! The entire British government must've been full of schmucks in the nineteenth century!

So! We were discussing opium, right Dear Reader? As the above map demonstrated, this 'China Trade' was pretty damned one sided:  addicted victims on one side, rich English assholes on the other.  The Opium Wars were understandably, a complicated subject, especially if you're trying to make sense of the British political process, as it conflicted with China's government.  So, let's see if we can boil down the process a little bit, and don't worry, Dear Reader, I'll get you a list of books to look at before I end this week.

Alas, the first Opium War broke out in 1839, lasting until 1842 (Prince Albert was still alive, by the way).  The was was precipitated by China's leadership, when they began to impose severe restrictions on opium imports--these guys weren't stupid, and they had ample evidence of what opium addiction was doing to thousands of their people.  The trouble really began, when the Chinese destroyed a whole bunch of newly imported opium, enraging the English dicks who'd imported it.  Unfortunately, some of that opium was owned by the British East India Company

.Indeed, Dr. Degrasse Tyson, we certainly do.  The British sent their navy over to enforce continuation of the opium trade.  China's military was hopelessly out-gunned, so they had to comply.  The opium business was open for customers, and the British didn't give a sh*t about how many Chinese men, women, and children would suffer from addiction.

So, just how addictive is opium?  Of course, it's hard to say,  because individual biology varies.  Some say just after one use, while the Mayo Clinic says 4 days.  There's no wise rule of thumb here--clearly opium interacts differently with each user.  Whatever the chemistry, thousands of Chinese people quickly got addicted to the pernicious substance.  Raw opium is VERY habit forming.

But, the British could care less:  they had their f*&king money, and their 'customers' who were helpless.  Can you imagine how Chinese government officials felt? Crap, I don't even want to go there.

I hate to tell you this, Dear Reader, but that was not the end of the confrontations.  The Second Opium War was waged by France and Britain (in a rare partnership) from 1856 to 1860.  Well, you know what happened:  the Chinese military was obliterated again, and the Chinese were forced to completely open up the Opium trade, making the drug legal inside China (uh, the Europeans didn't view the drug in that way--they knew it was dangerous).

Oh, but the Brits' hellish fun wasn't done, and nor were other European countries.  I also have to include the good ole U S of A in the following events.  With China helpless, and the age of Imperialism at its' height, the carving up of 'Cathay' began.

They were called the "Unequal Treaties,' documents that allowed insane 'treaties' between individual western nations, and the Chinese 'government' (holy crap, what government was left after England got involved? China had completely lost its' autonomy, only to become a colony of whatever nation that controlled a port).

Yeah, everyone wanted their cut of this juicy new property.  This is so depressing.

This map is fanciful, I agree with you Dear Reader, but it's excellent because it shows just how many nations were vying for their piece of the freshly killed tiger (i.e. China).  Below is a more academically correct map:

The treaty ports and other towns were called "spheres of influence"--where foreign countries created little colonies that they controlled.  The Chinese had no say about what happened inside of these spheres.

Chinese historians (and a few other history guys and gals) refer to the 19th century as the "century of humiliation."  

Do you know what else Britain got out of these embarrassingly unequal deals? Yeah, we know already:  a nation of life-time opium customers, but I mean the island of Hong Kong.

Yeah, it's a really pretty city, but remember,  the Brits controlled Hong Kong until 2000.  Are you  beginning to understand just how influential the Opium Wars were?

The map also shows us that the US had their claws in China, but what they really wanted were the Philippines.  They got 'em.  The murder and intrigue of the American occupation of the philippines we'll cover at another time.

If you'd like to read a bit more, you can try these:

Narcotic Culture. by Frank Dikotter, Lars Laamann and Zhou Xun.
Opium, Empire and the Global Political Economy. by Carl Trocki.
The Opium War. by Peter Ward Fay.
The Inner Opium War. by James Polachek.
Britain's Gulag. by Caroline Elkins.

Meanwhile...same bat time, same bat channel, Dear Reader.