Cromwell??

[badboy78]

were having an ongoing discussion in my house about who the most evil person in history is, at the moment hitlers winning but cromwells a close second (admitedlly the friends who've argued for him are irish), but surely he cant be more evil than hitler or stalin or mao?

[Quinlad]

Depends on your criteria.

You could argue that Stalin, although ordering the deaths of millions of people, is less evil than someone who rapes a baby but kills no-one.

After all, the latter has no political objective. It's pure malicious deviance.

[jake-the-peg]

Opinions on Cromwell will still often get you in a fight 350 years later!

The thing you have to bear in mind is that unlike Stalin and Hitler, Cromwell lived in a time where people thought very differently.

It was a time when people still believed in witches and an absolute God. Ideas that we have like people's rights to things as basic as life were non existant and the King thought he was personally placed on Earth and given his people to do with as he chose.

You have to consider each in the context of their own times.

You also I think have to examine the motivation of each.

Unlike the others Cromwell did not seek power for his own personal satisfaction.

He was offered and refused the crown, he attempted on a number of occasions to rule the country through parliament and these experiments failed before he became protector.

Of course the Irish have a different perspective, but if you involve yourself in other people's civil wars the consequences of backing the wrong side can be unfortunate.

[badboy78]

yes my irish friends thought of him as im sure jewish people think of adolf eichmann or reinhard heydrich.

[ruby27]

I realise to the Irish Catholic's, Cromwell must be a hated person.

However as a republican he has always been a bit of a hero of mine. Whilst I wouldn't advocate death as the means of dismantling royalty now, he certainly had the stomach and will for political change didn't he?

[badboy78]

thats what i was thinking, hes still a hero to so many people today

[raysparx1]

Lot far worse than Cromwell , what about idi amin, pol pot, over 2 million cambodians died under his regime,

Mugabe, another real nice bloke

so many to pick from, but I don't think cromwell would be in the top 100 even

[matt1e]

I agree with ray just too many to choose from

[Seafarer1966]

Lavrenty Beria must be a runner up at least. He was head of Stalins secret police and was a serial rapist and killer. He would get his employees to go hunting for a nice young woman on the streets of Moscow at night. They would kidnap innocent law-abiding women then deliver them to their boss, Beria. He would rape and torture them to death. He got away with it for years until he was executed in 1953 for poisoning Stalin.

[Buenchico]

Many people regard Cromwell as one of the greatest Englishmen of all time. That's why the most prominent statue in the grounds of the Houses of Parliament is the one of Oliver Cromwell. It's no accident that it's positioned by the entrance which the monarch uses when opening Parliament. It's there to remind the monarch where the real power lies.

Chris

[cazzz1975]

queen mary the first was a bit of a bad un as well

[tiggerblue10]

Vlad the Impaler
Elizabeth Bathory
Caligula
Joseph Mengele
Idi Amin

This list could go on as there are plenty.

[fagidill]

Buenchico , Short & to the point, a good post.

[fagidill]

There Is A commerative plaque on the lane where i live
in Gainsborough Lincs, Re: Cromwell camped on the lane where i live, a bit of useless info.

[tiggerblue10]

I didn't think Cromwell was considered evil at all! He just came to power when people of England temporarily lost faith in the monarchy.

[jake-the-peg]

It was a bit more than loosing faith with the monarchy.

Charles attempted "personal rule" and tried to run the country without parliament and ignored the wishes of the people.

In the resulting war famillys fought and killed each other.

After winning Cromwell made sure that Ireland couldn't act as a staging post for a reinvasion by viciously putting down any resistance. It may not have been quite as lurid as Irish history would have you believe but it was pretty nasty!

In the End the moanarchy was restored but people had learnt and when Charles' son James looked like restoring Catholicism they simply chased him out of the country.

Kings and Queens became the decorations that they are today

[R1Geezer]

Well yer paddies have always had a strange view of things, no doubt they have very subjective reasons to hate Cromwell but also they seem to have taken on his republican model. Conversly the paddies loved Hitler, assisted him where they could and even signed the book of condolence following his death. You see they hated the British fair enough but did they think old Adolf would give them a better deal should he conquer Britain? I don't think they really thought it through did they?

back to the Q though, how do you quantify "evil", Stalin, Hitler, etc certainly are responsible for a lot of deaths but they "knew" what they where doing was "necessary". So is it just most deaths = Evil or is there some other criteria?

[badboy78]

i guess evil maybe subjective i still think theyd vote for cromwell.

[NJGirl]

Prince Yasuhiko Asaka of Japan (responsible for the rapes, mutilation, torture and massacre of the unarmed and unresisting citizens of Nanking)

Pol Pot (leader of the Khmer Rouge)