Posted on 02/23/2006 11:40:15 AM PST by Wombat101
The Closing of Civilization in Europe
From the desk of Paul Belien on Wed, 2006-02-22 22:51
Europe’s current problems are entirely self-inflicted. This does not mean, however, that the result will be less catastrophic. By subverting the roots of its own Judeo-Christian culture – a process that started with the French Enlightenment – a religious and cultural vacuum was created at the heart of European civilization. The collapse of faith in its own values has, not surprisingly, led to a demographic collapse because a civilization that no longer believes in its own future also rejects procreation. Today, a new religion and culture is supplanting the old one. There is little one can do about it, but hope for a miracle.
America’s immigration problems pale in comparison with what confronts Europe. America’s major ethnic minorities – Blacks as well as Hispanics – are Christian, while the meanstream culture is also rooted in Christianity. In Europe a secularized post-Christian culture is facing a Muslim one. The secularized culture is hedonist and values only its present life, because it does not believe in an afterlife. This is why it will surrender when threatened with death because life is the only thing it has to lose. This is why it will accept submission without fighting for its freedom. Nobody fights for the flag of hedonism, not even the hedonists themselves.
One could also put it in a slightly different way: Europe lacks what America still has, namely the so-called “conservative reserves,” or as the German sociologist Arnold Gehlen explained over 30 years ago, “the reserves in national energy and self-confidence, primitiveness and generosity, wealth and potential of every kind.” Every so often I travel to the U.S. to recharge my batteries, and I am not the only European Conservative to do so. From time to time one needs to breathe the air of freedom before submerging again in the stifling atmosphere of Europe.
America’s “conservative reserves” are far stronger than Europe’s, because America, unlike secular Europe, has remained rooted to a larger extent in traditional Christian values. I do not doubt that if these values continue to decline in the U.S., American culture will collapse as European culture and civilisation have collapsed. However, America can learn from the impending European catastrophe, and avoid a similar fate.
The old European civilization – the pre-secular or the pre-post-Christian one – will live on in the U.S. If it perishes there too, mankind will relapse into the dark ages that are now taking hold of Europe, the cradle of Western civilization.
I suppose one could feel sad about all this, but sadness is not what I feel. One can feel compassion for those who die in accidents, fall in battle or get murdered (like the countless unborn children that perish every day) but can one pity those who have killed their own future for the pleasures of the present? Europe’s predicament, I repeat, is entirely self-inflicted. Not Islam is to blame. Secularism is.
The coming decade will witness the war between the values of Islam and the secular “values” of the decadent, hedonistic post-Marxist Left. We have seen the assassinations of Pim Fortuyn and Theo van Gogh, last November’s prelude to the French civil war, the Danish cartoon case. This is just the beginning of the beginning. I do not consider myself a pessimist, merely a realist. It is quite clear who is going to lose – and whose fault that will be.
Not bad for a Belgian (or as I like to call them "French-Light").
"a civilization that no longer believes in its own future also rejects procreation" if this were true secular China would see its population fall. This is not true.
A sober assessment of the situation.
Indeed.
"This is not the beginning of the end. It is, perhaps, the end of the beginning." -- Churchill
Notre Dame cathedral will be a mosque in our lifetimes.
Europe started dying when the killed so many Jews. A race know for its scholarship, hard work, and ingenuity. And replaced it with Muslims.
I doubt any civilisation or culture will last forever. Obituaries can be written for all.
--Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill (1874-1965),_The Gathering Storm,_bk.I ch.19 p.348 (Houghton Mifflin, 1948)
Dude, the Chinese don't even PRETEND to be Communists anymore. They're now embracing capitalism with both hands, or hadn't you noticed?
All that remains left to do for China to become a true "superpower" is for the people to realize that a modicum of economic freedom MUST with a corresponding modicum of political rights.
Once that connection is made, the Chinese "Communist" Party is doomed.
I'd hardly compare the two (Europe's demographic and cultural collapse and China's continuing quest for a system that actually works) in quite that way.
Please. French lite.
Yes, this is an excellent article. And, as it says, America will follow Europe unless we learn from Europe's fate.
But the problem with that is that you cannot become a real Christian for political purposes or because it's a winning strategy. You have to believe in it. For that, we have to rely on God.
The early Englightenment rationalists agreed that, for political purposes it was important that the mass of people should believe in the afterlife, because without that threat of divine reward or punishment, what would make them behave morally? But when belief in the afterlife becomes a method of political control, not a true Christian belief, it is bound to grow feeble and evaporate.
If a miracle were to take place in Europe and reverse their decline and fall, it would have to be a divine miracle. No use saying that it would be expedient if people would act like Christians. Expediency doesn't cut much ice.
With the forced abortions and family size limitations, China's population is not increasing.
as you would expect, Brussels, the seat NATO bureaucrats and of the EU Parliament, is well inside the French side of Belgium.
Clarification on the point:
The One Child Policy is the natural result of a totalitarian government that finds itself unable to cope with the related problems of population growth and food production.
The future of a combined economically- and industrially- liberated China will go much further in INCREASING the population then the Commies ever did in DECREASING it. It's a turism that when people can afford, and support, more people, they do. Two primary steps in creating the conditions under which this can occur are political freedom and a strong economy.
China is beginning to get the former (although the government drastically exagerrates the rate at which economic growth is occurring for political reasons), and it's only a matter of time before the latter occurs.
The chicoms are still murdering thugs. How can anyone not notice that?
Cool. French Lite and Phlegms (old Python joke). Where do the Walloons fit into all of this, btw?
"China would see its population fall"
____________________________________
Their religion is communism. Regardless........wait till the Muslims get to them.
yes they are. But there are several things working against them:
The overall goal of the Communist government is to maintain it's position. It cannot do this without allowing economic freedom, but it must be positioned to control the conditions under which it is granted (they will not repeat the disaster of Glastnost).
However, that loosening of economic conditions has some unforeseen consequences: China now has sattelite television. It has internet access. Cellphones. Legions of younger-generation Chinese educated abroad. China is more connected to the outside world than ever before. With the explosion of all of these communication technologies, and a population that is simply more aware of the world outside their borders, it's only a matter of time before the words "Chinese" and "Communists" no longer appear in the same sentence.
The Government might control who makes the money and where it gets spent, but it cannot totally control the flow of information, nor it's sources, and even more eventfully, it's consequences.
I submit that China is very high on it's future. They along with India will be the next world power. Europe is on the skids and America is slowly choking itself with PC and diversity stuff.
China has strong beliefs in Confucianism, Buddhism, Taoism. I wouldn't call then secular.
Weren't they a high-wire circus act?
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