Dissent of British Colonists

The word 'dissent' is an excellent word to describe the colonists from the British Empire in the 18th century. First off, the reason many of the colonists were in America in the first place was due to religious dissent. In England, the Anglican church was believed by many to be too Catholic, causing many separatists to leave England all together in search of a land free of religious persecution. These religious dissenters landed in America and established their own communities.

Many years after these first settlements, England started sending ships and people over to the colonies in America. Once in America, England established a triangular trade route with included the Americas, England, and Africa. This triangle was created to benefit England by allowing them to gain the raw materials from America and sell them for gold and other things. This angered the colonists because they did not acquire much besides slaves from this trade route.

Later in the 18th century conflict between the colonists and Britain were increasing and the idea of dissenting from England was more popular. A large problem was the high taxes that England was imposing on the colonists in order to gain more revenue to pay for the 7 years war and other things. Some of these taxes included ones on sugar, tea, beaver fur, and stamps. Later taxes included ones on glass, paper, tea, lead and paint. These were the Stamp and Townshend Acts (Stamp Act...). These taxes were very high and angered many colonists, eventually causing large boycotts of these products.

Another huge problem in the colonies was the fact that they were not represented in Parliament. The colonists found this infuriating because the British still continued to heavily tax them and they had no say in the government. The colonists believed that only their own elected legislature could tax them, not Parliament who were thousands of miles away and had no idea how the colonists lived. This problem also caused many ideas of dissent in the colonies, eventually leading to the American Revolution (The Issue...).

Feelings of dissent and conflict are being felt now in the country of Iraq. After the United States Army sent troops into the country and removed Saddam Hussein, the country went into complete anarchy. Now, the Sunni minority is fighting the Shiite majority in an undeclared civil war (Undeclared...). The Shiite majority felt oppressed, like the colonists, under the tyrannical reign of Saddam Hussein. This relates to America in the 1700's because the majority of the colonists felt oppressed by the minority ruling America, which were the British. This feeling of dissent, like in Iraq, caused a major war between the two groups.

Works Cited

"Is Iraq in a Civil War? :: Middle East Quarterly." Middle East Forum.