Is Western Civilization dying? --II
November 12th 2006 02:04
Call it a divine co-incidence that after writing last post, I should wake up and read this. Thomas Sowell is the most widely read American columnist. t=11/09/2006&page=1" target="_blank">Here he speaks on the death of Western Civilization. Some snippets:
European nations protesting Saddam Hussein's death sentence, as they protested against forcing secrets out of captured terrorists, should tell us all we need to know about the internal degeneration of western society, where so many confuse squeamishness with morality.
Something that I'd wanted to say for a long time:
How many times, in its thousands of years of history, has Europe gone 60 years without a major war, as it has since World War II? That peace has been due to American nuclear weapons, which was all that could deter the Soviet Union's armies from marching right across Europe to the Atlantic Ocean.
This is relevant to my last post:
The achievements of western civilization are buried in histories that portray every human sin
found here as if they were peculiarities of the west.
Sowell makes a valid point:
The classic example is slavery, which existed all over the world for thousands of years and yet is incessantly depicted as if it was a peculiarity of Europeans enslaving Africans. Barbary pirates alone brought twice as many enslaved Europeans to North Africa as there were Africans brought in bondage to the United States and the American colonies from which it was formed.
How many schools and colleges are going to teach that, going against political correctness and undermining white guilt?
About the above, I have read histories and historical fiction in the past weeks and it gave me the same idea too. That slavery was predominant in every society in the ancient world. Sowell writes:
How many people have any inkling that it was precisely western civilization which eventually turned against slavery and began stamping it out when non-western societies still saw nothing wrong with it?
The surviving West?:
Western nations that show any signs of standing up for self-preservation are rare exceptions. The United States and Israel are the only western nations which have no choice but to rely on self-defense -- and both are demonized, not only by our enemies but also by many in other western nations.
He has a good word for Australia too:
Australia recently told its Muslim population that, if they want to live under Islamic law, then they should leave Australia. That makes three western nations that have not yet completely succumbed to the corrosive and suicidal trends of our times.
And now to the conlcusion:
If and when we all succumb, will the epitaph of western civilization say that we had the power to annihilate our enemies but were so paralyzed by confusion that we ended up being annihilated ourselves?
Isn't that the epitaph of evry civilization that dies?
European nations protesting Saddam Hussein's death sentence, as they protested against forcing secrets out of captured terrorists, should tell us all we need to know about the internal degeneration of western society, where so many confuse squeamishness with morality.
Something that I'd wanted to say for a long time:
How many times, in its thousands of years of history, has Europe gone 60 years without a major war, as it has since World War II? That peace has been due to American nuclear weapons, which was all that could deter the Soviet Union's armies from marching right across Europe to the Atlantic Ocean.
This is relevant to my last post:
The achievements of western civilization are buried in histories that portray every human sin
found here as if they were peculiarities of the west.
Sowell makes a valid point:
The classic example is slavery, which existed all over the world for thousands of years and yet is incessantly depicted as if it was a peculiarity of Europeans enslaving Africans. Barbary pirates alone brought twice as many enslaved Europeans to North Africa as there were Africans brought in bondage to the United States and the American colonies from which it was formed.
How many schools and colleges are going to teach that, going against political correctness and undermining white guilt?
About the above, I have read histories and historical fiction in the past weeks and it gave me the same idea too. That slavery was predominant in every society in the ancient world. Sowell writes:
How many people have any inkling that it was precisely western civilization which eventually turned against slavery and began stamping it out when non-western societies still saw nothing wrong with it?
The surviving West?:
Western nations that show any signs of standing up for self-preservation are rare exceptions. The United States and Israel are the only western nations which have no choice but to rely on self-defense -- and both are demonized, not only by our enemies but also by many in other western nations.
He has a good word for Australia too:
Australia recently told its Muslim population that, if they want to live under Islamic law, then they should leave Australia. That makes three western nations that have not yet completely succumbed to the corrosive and suicidal trends of our times.
And now to the conlcusion:
If and when we all succumb, will the epitaph of western civilization say that we had the power to annihilate our enemies but were so paralyzed by confusion that we ended up being annihilated ourselves?
Isn't that the epitaph of evry civilization that dies?
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Comment by spain01
Juan Carlos
spain again
While your'e about it
Viva l'difference
Fire News Blog
Cities dying of thirst.
Comment by nagster
Cenacle
But the number Sowell mentions is the number of African slaves to American colonies and not the whole number of slaves in general. I do know if that will satisfy the huge difference in numbers but there it is.
Comment by Damo
I have to take issue if you are claiming that Western Society led the way to abolishing slavery as Sri Lanka has never had slavery in its 2500 years of history. Exploitation maybe but not the owning of humans as possessions. I wish Australia could make the same claim but saddly that is not the case.
'Confusing squemishness with morality'?
Where do I begin with that one? Thomas Sowell should know better than to make statements that beg the most obvious question. Whose Morailty? In this case I have to conclude that it is his own.
Comment by nagster
Cenacle
Um, there may be many moral codes but not moralities. Morality like reality is only one.
As for Sri Lanka, Western Civilization may have itself introduced slavery to parts where it wasn't thriving before but the point is where did anti-slavery movement take root and flourish?
Comment by Damo
Morality like reality is only one?
Now that just begs further questions.
If you are promoting one morality and I another how do I know that yours is the correct one? What is the overwhelming evidence that you posses this truth so I may too believe? As for reality being one, if the most brilliant philosophers have trouble defining it how can you be certain that your view of reality is absolute?
Western Civilization is bit hard to define as you have made no distictions of where it starts and finishes in time. So I left to make assumtions on what you mean.
This leads me to ask further questions.
Was Moses used by the Bible part of a popular anti slave movement? As a Sematic / Arab how could he be part of Western Civilization? What of Sparticus? The Roman Civilization that he fought against collapsed long ago. Would we include it in parameters of Western Civilization?
I mean no offence by these questions but I have a natural curiosity.
Comment by Adrian
Philosophy Blog
In relation to this para -- "How many times, in its thousands of years of history, has Europe gone 60 years without a major war, as it has since World War II? That peace has been due to American nuclear weapons, which was all that could deter the Soviet Union's armies from marching right across Europe to the Atlantic Ocean."
I'd agree with you regarding American deterrence of Soviet expansion, but would disagree that European peace, in general, is due to America. For instance, what's stopped England going to war with France, or France with Germany, or Germany with Spain, etc? I'm not sure that America has had anything to do with it as much as, for instance, increased economic dependence, stable systems of government, increased cultural mixing, increased connections.
In relation to this quote: "European nations protesting Saddam Hussein's death sentence, as they protested against forcing secrets out of captured terrorists, should tell us all we need to know about the internal degeneration of western society, where so many confuse squeamishness with morality."
I don't have an opinion on Saddam Hussein's sentence (I'm out of the news loop; I didn't realize he'd received one), and I don't know what particular forcings protest was directed to. But I do think that such matters as indefinite detention at Guantanamo, acquiring information by torture in general, and the invasaion of Iraq are by no means clearly justifiable, if Sowell is suggesting that they are.
Would you suggest they are?
Comment by nagster
Cenacle
Well, the climate in which France and England could cooperate with each other was created only American "hegemony" as they would call it. It's not my assertion thought; it was a point made by Sowell.
Owing to time constraints I will answer only this much now. IN Detail later maybe
Comment by nagster
Cenacle
Comment by Anonymous
Is not every idea of morality merely born out of different primal fears. And your fears, may be different than mine. Therefore your concept of morality is different from mine. You make the classic fallacy of assuming that your Modern Western Version of Morality is inherently correct.