Was the Irish potato famine an attempt at genocide by the British?

Can we ever recall that famine was a global phenom back in the day and that no one really knew what to do?  Not least because it was all mostly beyond practical help.  Transportation systems were nonexistent or in their infancy during the potato famine in particular.

In retrospect, there were things that could have been done.  The same is true for later famines.  It is the globalisation of all our commodities that now provides protection.

today rising prices quickly shift seconds into the primary market and the trucks roll.  our real food supplies are never reported because they are otherwise named.  and all our stores pack slow selling products ready to move.  Did you buy spam last week?  Or corned beef?

Was the Irish potato famine an attempt at genocide by the British?

Nope. It was what happened when you try to fight against the poor a little too much.

quora.com

Irish potato famine

A genocide is a deliberate attempt to exterminate an undesired populace. The English lords saw their Irish subjects as an inferior people certainly, farmers who were born into poverty, would remain in poverty and would die in poverty and the English hated the idea of doing the darnest thing about it. This was fairly universal among the upper classes, the Irish peasants were ranked below their English peers, but not far below them.

Irish potato famine started when a potato disease struck and destroyed most of the crop. This happened worldwide, with all of Europe being hit. There were food shortages whereever potatoes were grown and that was most the continent by then. However in most places people ate a variety of crops and grains were doing fine. Sure your potatoes were gone and that sucked big time, but you still had perhaps barley, some wheat, maybe corn or oats or whatever you could use to sustain yourself.

Ireland was a special case. The Irish farmers leased their land from English lords and paid a fee in the form of produce. Most of Irish farmland worked fine and produced good crops of grain that were destined to pay rent and the Irish sustained themselves on small plots producing potatoes. When the potato famine struck the grain prices rose considerably, but the rent was paid not in the value of the grain, but the amount of the grain. There was plenty of food in Ireland, but it was sent to England and beyond, just like every year.

This was in part necessary, England was facing a food shortage as well and that grain was needed. But it is also true a just government would have forced the lords to collect less rents temprarily to feed their subjects and spread the pain around to ensure people didn’t starve to death at least. It would also try to arrange shipment of food from abroad, grain from Americas was available and some was eventually sent that way. However there was also the ideological opposition to doing anything at all for the poor. In fact the grain shipments were only allowed in if they didn’t cause expenses to the public purse.

That was the main goal of the British government at the time: protect the government from incurring financial losses when a calamity struck their subjects, protect the rich from the crisis that mainly affected the poor. It hit Ireland the worst due to a unique combination of features on the island, not because the government explicitly wanted to wipe out the Irish.

Whether making sure your rich folks don’t incurr financial losses because people are dying of hunger in droves is better than a deliberate genocide or not is debatable. They seem about the same to be.