How We Can Preserve the West
by Ypp
We all want to preserve the West, which for most people actually means: the way of life they are used to. One commenter, for example, identified her way of life as Judeo-Christian San-Francisco style, which is really nice. But we need a common definition, what we are actually fighting for.Fjordman tried to answer this question in one of his excellent essays. He includes the Judeo-Christian tradition, the Roman-Greek classical heritage, but also Northern-European Celtic-Germanic heritage as well. I can’t but agree with him on that matter: as a person born in Russia I know that Russian official history starts when Swedes conquered what used to be a Khazar Empire and introduced their Greek-type Christianity.
America, which is now the most influential Western country, has all three components. There are some classically-educated intellectuals, who can write long essays resembling those of the ancient Greeks and can interpret laws. There are some Irish-Viking-type gun-bearing white trash, who do not care about education and despise lawyers. And there are some very conservative Christians, who would rather die than have an abortion. In Europe, both the German heritage and Christianity have probably remained only in the form of tourist attractions, like funnily-dressed guards and ancient chapels.
Interestingly, those parts of the world which are missing one of these three components somehow lose their importance. For example, Southeastern Europe, which did not have any Germanic influence, is often perceived as secondary. The Scandinavian countries, which did not experience much of Roman influence, did not play a significant role in history, too (though here Fjordman would probably disagree).
And here comes the tricky part: what about those countries which experienced both Roman and Germanic influence, but ceased being Christian? Actually, most Western countries have long ago separated Church from State, at least officially, and seem to feel pretty well. However, even those who insist on separation know what they have separated from: Christianity. As Ben-Gurion, the first prime-minister of Israel, used to say: “I am not a religious man and don’t go to synagogue, but I know which synagogue I don’t go to”.
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However, the problem is that when you are separated, you cannot preserve affection for too long. Even if you dislike someone, he must be in front of your eyes in order to be in your thoughts. If the church is seen from your window but you don’t go there, it’s fine. But someone still needs to go there and keep that church for you. And when it disappears from your eyes, at some point you will start to look for a substitute.
When one part is completely gone, that means the country ceases to be the part of the West. Currently, we have only Greek-Roman part officially recognized, which consists of laws and the sciences. Two others are fighting their last battle in Europe, and it seems that if they lose, the third one will die too. I mean that the law and science, not based on Christianity and tradition, will collapse as well.
I would not propose here to officially recognize religion in existing states, because it is too radical for secularists, which are the majority among Westerners now. Official religions really did have some problems in the past, as well as unofficial ones. As a matter of fact, any man-made institutions have some problems. But is that a good reason for complete separation?
Separation seems to have won Western minds. Actually, if we’d like to characterize a Western man, I believe the best word for that is “separated”. Separated from his state, traditions, religion, and often family. Some call it “freedom” — freedom to be unaffiliated. One friend of mine in the USSR called himself an “internal emigrant”. Strange, but it seems that most Westerners became such internal emigrants.
What’s more, this sort of immigration is considered by many to be the real Western spirit! Sounds to me like being a “soviet patriot” — a patriot of a country ruled by ideology, which claimed that all countries should be abolished.
As for my friend, he finally found his affiliation when he emigrated to Israel. But to where are we all going to emigrate? To the Moon? I believe we should rather start to find some good place here, on Earth. Like Jews, who finally reunited with their land, their religion, and their state, the Westerners need to reunite, too. And in the same way that Israel is the only guarantee of Jewish survival, that country will be the only guarantee of the Western survival.
45 comments:
The text is quiet good, however I will leave a great number of comments (or try to do so) just because there is so much I do not agree with.
Interesting thoughts, but I think more to the point, what we are fighting for is the right to believe what we want, and not to have to be mindless automatons -- in this case, Islamofascist automatons who can't wait to get to Allah, and who want to take as many infidels and takfir as possible with them.
ypp:
Comrade: I was pumped to see your post had been published under the GoV Marquis. And then I read your words.
I regret to say you have characiturized us common Americans. I thought you knew better. You wrote:
"America, which is now the most influential Western country, has all three components. There are some classically-educated intellectuals, who can write long essays resembling those of the ancient Greeks and can interpret laws. There are some Irish-Viking-type gun-bearing white trash, who do not care about education and despise lawyers. And there are some very conservative Christians, who would rather die than have an abortion. In Europe, both the German heritage and Christianity have probably remained only in the form of tourist attractions, like funnily-dressed guards and ancient chapels."
It sounds like you are mocking us. Well, you have a lot of company. You have the lefties, the Obama worshippers of many stripes. And the adherents of recently planted philosophies might agree with you.
I however, am disappointed. I was ready to be sympathic with a Russian nation pissed about stupid Americans, and their Utopian Obama idiocy.
So... cutting to the chase... you know that expression? Is Putin smart, cunning, evil, expediant, of just sick of arrogant stupidity and open for alliances of mind beyond the Obama disease?
Hmmmm?
"America, which is now the most influential Western country, has all three components. There are some classically-educated intellectuals, who can write long essays resembling those of the ancient Greeks and can interpret laws. There are some Irish-Viking-type gun-bearing white trash, who do not care about education and despise lawyers. And there are some very conservative Christians, who would rather die than have an abortion. In Europe, both the German heritage and Christianity have probably remained only in the form of tourist attractions, like funnily-dressed guards and ancient chapels."
As you said, the History of Russia starts when the Swedes did that... however for that to happen, the Russians must have had already synthethised, they were already a people and many traditions and the "spirit of the Nation" - the core of being Russiam - are certainly from before that period. That period only contributed significantly for the formation of a State in which the people could be united. I believe that the Nations precede the States (except France).
For instance, Portugal and the Spains only exist as states after the moorish invention and... what before that?
You see, only after that the people could be united under a State which would accentuate the peoples's carachter and unity.
You say that America is the most influential country. Is it? Why is that, what is Western?
Since the end of the Cold War and the rise of Putin, I would consider Russia to be the most influential Western country. I mean, look to America, they are about to elect Obama - how does he qualify as Western? - and only give us McDonalds and other poisons.
DON'T LET THE LEFTISTS (or any leftist touch deep inside you) TELL YOU WHAT IS WESTERN. That's why I try not to use Western but European. BECAUSE FOR "WESTERN" (EUROPEAN) TO VALLUE SOMETHING IT MUST BE TIMELESS, IT MUST BE THAT PERENNAL EUROPEAN "SPIRIT" THAT DOES NOT VANISH WITH TIMES - AND IT EXIST - IT CANNOT BE A FASHION.
Another way to qualify easily a country to be Western may be to count the number of Westeners in it, let's say, people of European descent. Yes, America will have some 200 while Russia will have some 100 millions... that way may be, but I do think you did not clarify very well what is "the West".
(continuing)
And then, you also speak as if America was "more Western" than Europe itself:
"In Europe, both the German heritage and Christianity have probably remained only in the form of tourist attractions"
First of all, let's use the same method, people of European descent:
I went check and America is some 70~74% European; Europe is some 90~95% European. In total numbers only the European Union has more than 400 million people...
On the other side, there are countries like Serbia, Italy, your beloved Northern Denmark... European Nationalism is growing and growing and we have seen what happens in Switzerland and Austria. A great part of this new Nationalists are educated and enloghtened people instead of white-trash-neo-nazis. Look Haider. You see, the tendence is for the Nationalists to get more and more educated (like before the 60s)... Samuel Huntington have said that also.
But we still have nazi-monsters to serve us as "loyal soldiers". Look at the Russian neo-nazi machine; When the conflict blowed in the Balkans, there were many white-trash-neo-nazis who went to find their baptism of fire in the Balkans allying themselves to Serbia and, mainly, to Croatia.
Why is that? Because people don't find the "West" difficult to define, nor do they consider the "West" to be "their ways of life" or "what they are used too". Quiet the opposite.
Virtually all members of Nationalistic Parties in Europe have put their lifes/careers at risk and are still loyal Nationalists. They don't mind to suffer the consequences that it is indeed dangerous to be right when the government (system) is wrong.
Because Europe is very palpable and much more palpable than America. We have Celtic-Roman-Germanic-Slavic-Greek cultures which are each a great patrimony for the Humanity. We have centuries of Christianism (I will let the Jews in Palestine) and Nationalism for our Nations which has culminated in the greatest advances of Humanity. European culture is palpable and cannot be resumed in "going to church" or "being a free bird or a free rebel".
A thing you Americans do not have but that we Europeans have plenty: TRADITION. A tradition that must be kept because it has being evolving for centuries, well, for milleniums. That tradition is the core every Nation (even France) and some Traditions even transcend Nations. For instance, take Portugal.
In Portugal we have the Tradition of the different regions, a quiet rich and diverse culture.
Then we have what unites us all, the culture of the West of the Hispanic/Iberian Peninsula in which you could even consider Galiza in North Western Spain.
Then, we are still undoubtedly members of the Hispanic (not of those Indians in America) culture, together with Spain. It is so strong that Iberism has been a constant here and in Spain.
Then we are also undoutedly heirs of Rome and the Latin Tradition and Civilisation. Even today, the core of our (non socialist) laws are Roman, the Roman Code. Our language is Latin; Our spirutuality is closely linked to Rome, we are Catholics with all those saints who represent an every different bit of faith and ocasion which reminds us of a never lost Politeism.
And over all that, we are Europeans, that is our Civilisation. With all this specifiations, we are still as Europeans as all others (well, that is debatable, but we are undoubtedly Europeans, we're just different from Russians or Germans or French).
You see, this Europe is not nihilistic. At best, we were hijacked and brain washed by our "elites" but the spirit maintains the same. At worst, we are being replaced by third worlders in an almost genocidal way, but we still with a smile on our face to them, even if our women are being raped.
America is the one who's nihilistic. And that's because it is a great mix. You are all mongrels! Unlike Portugal, or Spain, or Italy, or Germany who are PURE (and I've showed you the "purity" of Portugal as an example, we could go on and on forever)... unlike Europe which is pure, America is not. America - besides the more or less third worlders blacks and "hispanics" and the growing non European Asian population, you are a mix of English, British-Celts, Germans and Nordics, Italians, (real) Hispanics, Slavs, etc, etc...
And the problem is that all those already cristalised (pure) ethnicities have not crystalised as one in America. That is no good (like the French. Celtic, Germanic, Latin? It couldn't end well, could it?) and you all speak English, are white and promote America as a Nation of idea(l)s to hide your lack of purity.
In the end, your not the Nation of Western Hispania, you're not Hispanic, you are not Latin. You are an orion with only the exterior brown part: You are only Europeans. That's why you have so great dificulties to understand what is the West. Because America only has one or two layers of it...
"There are some Irish-Viking-type gun-bearing white trash, who do not care about education and despise lawyers. And there are some very conservative Christians...."
Ypp, buddy, I thought you had a college education. And had a string of science and education credentials behind your name.
Please come to America and visit the heartland. Forget about the 'so-called' highly educated intellectuals. I'll tell you a secret, 'American intellectuals don't know their axxes from a hole in the ground'. Do you know that expression?
I invite you to visit Sulphur, Louisiana, and dine at the 'Boiling Point'. That is, if it's still there after Hurricane Ike. I recommend the 'Crawfish Pistolettes', and perhaps some Etouffe.
Be nice while you are there. Because while you're there you might meet a So. Louisiana Lady who could kick your axx. Even so, you might like her.
White trash is the rock solid hard core of America.
Get over your academic paper.
us.
you've missed the substance of the message in the form of it, here. ypp's point was that America has all of the elements of western society still intact which is a good thing.
It's amazing how easily we get hung up on silliness. Myself included...
So anyway, this:
One friend of mine in the USSR called himself an “internal immigrant”. Strange, but it seems that most Westerners became such internal immigrants.
... is why I tend not to identify as British any more. I know I am by birth and citizenshhip but before that, I'm English and so before that, northern, lancastrian. Tghe majority of my life has been spent orbiting around Stockport, when I'm not jetting off to South America or Sweden and I've gained a real appreciation for this place I call home and the fact that distant ancestors have probably splashed around in the same river I crossed to pick elderflowers this last spring.
When you think about it, something like that is very powerful in the psyche. The need to belong to place is so powerful that over in the States it's common to see the establishment of "new traditions" like the "first annual something-or-other festival" that closes down mainstreet in Smalltown America every few weeks.. So easy to mock if you don't understand the necessity of place in the human psyche.
Westernism is about place, I think. Property, temporality, the farmstead, stuff like that. Permanence, foundation, structure, hierarchy. It shows up in everything from philosophy to law to attitude to science. Everything has to have a foundation to stand on or it collapses.
Islam, like the internationalisms CS was talking about in another thread, is about migration. It's a nomadic creed, without foundations or permanence and actively thrives on attacking anything fixed in place. It repels foundations as "unfree" because the ownership and defence of property prevents it from taking what it wants, when it wants it.
So, it's about place. When you have location everything else just falls into shape around it.
OK Graham, I'll reread YPP's column at work in the morning. I'm too tired now. And with a patient and open mind.
And I mean that.
@Afonso--
A thing you Americans do not have but that we Europeans have plenty: TRADITION.
My dear young man, you need a serious course of study on Tradition(s) -- how they arise, how long it takes for them to seem "timeless" to the next generation, what needs they fulfill, etc.
America has more traditions than you could know about, not being from here. There are the national ones, the states' traditions (from which the diverse 50 states draw their quite divers identities, and there are the sacred local traditions which one violates at his own risk.
Ypp's reductionist dismissal of Americans into three not-very-attractive types is inaccurate and misleading. None of those types fit me or the people I know.
Yes, I am an intellectual by inclination, but there are gaps in my learning. I am a Jacksonian American rather than a Wilsonian appeaser, I don't own a gun but I hope to...for the simple reason that one should learn things outside of one's normal comfort zone. If my rotator cuff heals enough, I'll be out in the garden shooting the cabbages for fun.
I am passionate about education and even more so about the lack of it in the generation that is presently caught in the school mills in this country. They learn nothing of value and are ignorant of their culture.
So I love education, can write long intellectual screeds, like guns, and I detest lawyers. Into what category do you put me, Ypp?
I am also passionate about the need for tort reform. It *must* happen if this country is going to get back on track. The law in this country -- regular run-of-the-mill legal matters -- is hugely expensive, much more so than our medical care.
I also think lawyers should be banned from running for national office of any kind. That would cure many of our problems right off the bat.
Finally, I am a Christian. I suppose I'm in the conservative crowd since I don't believe in late term abortions or letting the fetus die on the table just because Momma doesn't want him to live. Again, you're reductionist about Christians, too. The conservative part of my theology is based on tradition and precedent. My theology is both sacramental and kerygmatic. So I am in each camp, Ypp, and comfortable with either.
But Archonix said it all: a sense of place (which the liturgical year gives me) is primary to finding meaning and belonging.
We each travel our own path. The three you have laid out for Americans to traverse are not roads I recognize.
Please try again -- you are wildly off the mark. In fact, I'm not sure you're even facing the target...
And there are some very conservative Christians, who would rather die than have an abortion.
The proper term would be dogmatic Christians.
(Dogmatic and divinely inspired anti-)abortion is an issue that is completely unrelated to how to govern a country, i.e. completely unrelated to the ideology of conservatism.
I know there are words which are used entirely different in an everyday context then in a serious context, such as e.g. positivism. "Oh Clara's emitted such positivism since she woke up this morning!"
But the meaning of positivism in any serious discussion is entirely different. The same with conservative. In an everyday context, honour-killing Muslims and whatnot are considered conservative.
So for goodness sake, do not let this "meaning" of the word enter any serious discussion.
"But aha" someone will say, the issue of abortion do have bearing on demography and therefor on how a country is governed. Well yes. But that's not what we are dealing with with these dogmatic Christians. Their anti-abortion stance is a divine law (from the internationalist/egalitarian religion of Christianity) which applies to all people of all religions all over the world. So this is the mentality behind the population explosion in the third-world. To present it as a solution to the problem, when it is exactly this Christian dogmatism that cause the catastrophic global demography in the first place, is the height of hypocrisy and confusion.
"Pro-life" campaigning has had very little effect in the West, but a huge effect in the third-world (causing as population explosion with Western medicine etc.). This pro-life dogmatism has cause the share of white people in the world to drop from 30% down to 10-15% heading for 5-10% in just a couple of decades. And if you are good with numbers you can calculate the alternative scenario with whites having above replacement level birth rates all the way, and see that these percentages change very little. The third-world population explosion is what is decisive -- quite as the word indicates: explosion!
So this pro-life dogmatism is what is killing us, and our way of life, at a global scale. People today are concerned only about a tiny intersection of this problem, through the prism of their national border; i.e. people coming in and out across the border, a.k.a. immigration. Let's say, for the sake of the argument, that this problem has been solved 20 years from now. Then the Westerners will wake up to the problem of being not much more than 5% of the world population, surrounded by hordes of aggressive aliens in all directions. Then people will realize that what they refer to as the problem of immigration is just the tip of the iceberg of this much bigger problem; it's the same problem again but at a global scale.
OK, so let's not call such Christian pro-life dogmatism "conservative" in any serious discussion. It has nothing to do with the very sound ideas of how to govern a country, expressed by e.g. Burke.
It's zealous and utterly destructive fanaticism.
Ypp,
Currently, we have only Greek-Roman part officially recognized
Hardly. The Roman part was flushed out long before the Christian part. All since WWI. The Greek part is still around though, but in rather confined contexts.
Actually, most Western countries have long ago separated Church from State
Separation of Church and State is an obsession of Americans. In fact it is a defining feature of being an American. Quakers and Puritans fled Europe across the Atlantic, escaping what they perceived as the oppressive state churches.
Americans see history from the narrow prism of their forefathers, and in that view state churches represent "theocracy". How crazy isn't that? The historical significance of state churches was exactly the opposite, to SUBSTANTIALLY DECREASE the influence of the church; to put the church UNDER that state. But try to explain that to an American....
Now in the American Age (since WWI) Europeans have internalized the American view of their state churches as oppressive and illegitimate. And since this was the way Christianity was organized in northern Europe, northern Europeans have consequently left Christianity. And as usually the Americans are left bewildered over the result of their own actions at the global stage: How on Earth did it happen that the Europeans left Christianity?
Ypp,
Regarding your general conclusion. Christianity is fine for Russia, because you didn't have it destroyed by Enlightenment. But for the West the genie has left the bottle and cannot be put back. The viable path for the Germanic North is national religion.
America? America is the Empire of Enlightenment, so I cannot see how they would give up that doctrine. I believe they will fall together with the doctrine.
The dying doctrine is tied to the whole Anglo-franco world. It's the Russians and the Germans that could provide constructive alternatives for the future, but, in my view, each according to very different models.
So Christianity will survive and thrive in the future as the Russian Orthodox Church. People argue that Christianity was a good force for nationalism in Spain during La Reconquista. But that's only true for Christianity which hasn't been destroyed by enlightenment. So for people who are serious about making this point about La Reconquista, they should turn to the Russian Orthodox Church.
Finally a note about "separation". Even though the Germanics need to drop Christianity, it's still part of our history. Enlightenment-infected Christianity needs to be removed entirely from the political sphere. But nevertheless Christianity is an important part of our history, and we do not drop our history. Our churches are memories of that past, and I'm sure we will find good use for them for the future.
Beautifully put, Graham:
Islam, like the internationalisms CS was talking about in another thread, is about migration. It's a nomadic creed, without foundations or permanence and actively thrives on attacking anything fixed in place. It repels foundations as "unfree" because the ownership and defence of property prevents it from taking what it wants, when it wants it.
Sorry, one mistake of mine: I meant "internal emigrant" not "internal immigrant". A person who broke the ties with his country while physically remaining there.
I don't own a gun but I hope to...for the simple reason that one should learn things outside of one's normal comfort zone. If my rotator cuff heals enough, I'll be out in the garden shooting the cabbages for fun.
Dymphna, have you considered starting with an Airsoft BB gun? They're cheap, lightweight, available everywhere, and provide serious hand/eye coordination practice that will put you way ahead when you get a real gun. Plus, there is no noise or recoil. I recommend this for others for whom real guns are inconvenient. I play with my Glock replica in my apartment, and the neighbors have no idea.
Conservative Swede, I think you are confusing potatoes with lizards. Of course abortion has much to do with governing a country, of course being anti abortion has nothing of "fanatical", of course that Christianity is very "bad" but mostly "good", of course that abortion is, above all, a cultural question, a anti-European cultural question that is.
An abortion is immoral. You don't want to have babies? Don't make them, you b***h.
A government that permits, but mainly supports, abortion of their own population, is a government who is actively working to destroy their population. If you are "free" to make an abortion at four months, you are also "free" to abort your child at five, ten or sixteen years old.
I found those statement of you odious. In the way, it may be the cultural protestantism talking... :)
" Christianity is fine for Russia, because you didn't have it destroyed by Enlightenment. "
"Enlightenment-infected Christianity needs to be removed entirely from the political sphere."
This is Orthodoxy. Are you in correspondence with Trifkovic?
In Orthodoxy the Enlightenment is Satanic:
Orthodoxy and the religion of the future
"The centre of the science fiction universe is always man - not usually man as he is now, but man as he will "become" in the future, in accordance with the modern mythology of evolution. Although the heroes of science fiction are usually recognisable humans, the story of "supermen" from "highly evolved" races of the future, or from distant galaxies. The idea of the existence of life on other planets has become very common, and taken for granted among scientists. One popular series of books such as those of Erich Daniken, (Chariots of the Gods?, Gods from Outer Space) finds supposed evidence of the presence of extra-terrestrial beings or gods in ancient history, who are supposedly responsible for the sudden appearance of intelligence in man [i.e. Lucifer, The Enlightener, the fall] difficult to account for by the usual evolutionary theory."
That these "alien visitors" are in fact demonic Seraphim Rose make's clear:
"Among the characteristics of the "highly evolved" creatures of the future are: communication by mental telepathy, ability to fly, materialise and dematerialise, transform the appearances of things or create illusionary scenes and creatures by "pure thought, [media savvy demons]" travel faster than light, take possession of the bodies of earth-men; and expounding a "spiritual" philosophy which is "beyond all religions" and holds promise of a state where "advanced intelligence's" will no longer be dependant on matter. All these are the standard practices and claims of sorcerers and demons.
"The scripts of "Star Trek" and other science-fiction stories, with their futuristic "scientific devices", read in parts like excerpts from the lives of ancient Orthodox Saints, where the actions of sorcerers are described at a time when sorcery was still a strong part of pagan life."
"We live near the end of this fearful age [the age of "Enlightenment i.e. a Luciferian age] of demonic triumph and rejoicing, when the eerie "humanoids" or "aliens" [UFO's] have become visible to millions of people and by their absurd encounters take possession of the souls of those people from whom God's grace has departed."
An Orthodox appraisal of the Western Crisis:
The long slow decline of the West can be attributed to the Catholic Church who erroneously taught that the logical syllogism is consistent with divine revelation. The Catholic church, being a Western church, has always contained that special feature of the Western mind: reliance on the logical syllogism. Having divinized human thought the decline was inevitable. In the scholastic Middle Ages, Christian theology became "systematised" and subordinated to logic. Logicalness becomes the first test of truth.
For this reason the Renaissance could only have happened in the West. Logic is a form of measurement performed by man, logically, man becomes the measure of all things, theology becomes "scientific method"; this follows to the "Enlightenment", with its profoundly naive optimism in the unlimited progress of man's reason. This logical "mechanicalness" also fired the ideas of mechanist thinkers like Newton and Descartes. Rationalism reached a dead end with Hume and Kant, who show that "pure reason" cannot exist by itself: all "truth" is subjective. Having dethroned God through the centuries and put reason in his place, Western man is now left with nothing--save himself. An infamous and disastrous attempt to regain order was attempted by Hegel, which Marx took and turned into "Dialectical Materialism" - a last attempt at trying to make the logical syllogism sympathetic with (material) objective reality-the "objective reality" that now serves as a God substitute (the divine true and beautiful higher future of humanity.). The pseudo-religiosity of Marxists, and the popularity of Marxism with lapsed Catholics (and vice versa) is well known and supports the above regard.
Ultimately we arrive at the nihilistic and irrational philosophies that have characterised the end of the 20th century. This subject is large so I shall concentrate only on the aspect of it that applies to the West's most immediate crisis - multiculturalism. Multiculturalism is predicated on a variety of Nihilism called Vitalism first espoused by Nietzsche in Beyond Good and Evil:
4. The falseness of an opinion is not for us any objection to it: it is here, perhaps, that our new language sounds most strangely. The question is, how far an opinion is life-furthering, life-preserving.
Here for the first time truth is eliminated as a criterion of action, and epistemology is reduced to what quite literally merely "feels good", truth is substituted for a new standard: the "life-giving," the "vital"; it is the final divorce of life from truth. This is dangerous because what feels good is not necessarily good. (As is clear to anyone who analyses the nature of Michael Foucaults "Iran Mistake". Michael Foucault did not want to condemn the Khomeinist revolution because he liked the idea of mixing religion with politics. Foucault believed that the religious often contained the "irrational well-spring of life" that the contemporary West did not have.) Vitalism is used a means for understanding man; he is a bundle of sublimated sexuality. This Vitalism is reflected in modern art. New and exotic sources and influences have been found in the art of Africa, the East, the South seas, prehistoric art, children, madmen, and occultism. When one ask's what any of it means one may be told that one should not impose standards on something that is "free" and "creative." The artist is a "creator," a "genius," he is inspired. His "vision" is transforming and sublime So it is with multiculturalism.
The revolt against reason can be attributed to reason itself. The whole crisis could be read, as ConSwede might, as an attempt to reacquire the Christian god, the Amor Dei as Augustine would say.
Homophobic Horse
How do you like the idea that aliens in their suits are the symbols of sterile sex for fun (hint- condoms) ?
H. Horse,
This is Orthodoxy.
It's plain common sense. It just happen to overlap with Orthodoxy.
Are you in correspondence with Trifkovic?
No, actually not.
Afonso,
Conservative Swede, I think you are confusing potatoes with lizards. Of course abortion has much to do with governing a country, of course being anti abortion has nothing of "fanatical"
Bleeding heart activism has NOTHING to do with how to run a country, OK?
So give me now an example of a single so-called "conservative" Christian who is anti-abortion at home but pro-abortion abroad.
Yeah, you know it does not exist. The are all like you with your "abortion is immoral". This is just a divine law / universalist principle mindlessly applied globally. There no single consideration about whether it's good or bad for your country in it.
We look at the world and we see it's been destroyed by this Christian dogma of "pro-life". People of European decent dropping from 30% to 5%. And these so-called "conservatives" will look at the world and say "but we couldn't have acted differently, that would have been immoral". And this is where we see the exact identity between Christianity and liberalism, as vehicles for civilizational suicide. Christian ethics just go deeper and destroys at a more global scale than liberalism.
Christian ethics equals death.
latté island--
Thanks for the armaments advice. I think we have one of those in our son's closet, along with a whole lot of bb's.
___________
@Conservative Swede
Christian ethics equals death
You're entitled to your opinion, but that's all it is: your opinion.
The "dogma" of pro-life didn't have a thing to do with the demographic decline of the Europeans. Christians have more children than adherents of the philosophy of abortion (Paul Belien is a good example of this, as is Robert Spencer)and that is one of the reasons America is not suffering the demographic decline that afflicts Europe. Even our elites have more children.
The post-Christian, secularist and feminist-dominated culture of Europe killed off its future generations. Those millions of abortions can't be undone and now Europe is facing an old age with not very many of its own people left to pick up the traces. Of course, with the growing enthusiasm for euthanasia, old people will not be a long-term problem.
Of course the greenies want even more of us to die in order to save the planet.
Your view of Christian ethics, imo, is skewed. Just how many Christian ethicists have you read or talked to? I mean the mainstream Christian ethicists, not the liberation "theology" Marxists...they are not ethicists that any average Christian would recognize.
Your animus against Christianity is as global and destructive as the claims you make against it.
Religion and politics arise from a ground or position that is a priori to the "reasons" we manage to erect to justify these very basic a prioris.
That is why I say your thesis about Christian ethics is simply your opinion. Your arguments will convince no one who is not already in agreement with your a prioris, any more than mine will.
Our hearts have their reasons that Reason knows not of...
Conservative Swede,
Do you like "American Dad"? It is a great satire to the American society and (mind you!) it criticises both ways, the Right and the Left, but mainly the left and society.
There is an episode where the E.T. gets the boy pregnant and the Republican CIA agent father, Mr. Smith says: "Hmm... abortions, the only way we do not like to kill".
It's kind of the same. We don't need to export abortions to the third World, we can reduce our help, we can teach them that in wealthy societies people have less children, etc, etc. I am against abortions in almost all conditions. I am even against the abortion of the invading hordes of third worlders to Europe - though, to be honest, in that case I care less.
There was a time when the Catholic Church was against abortions but was in favour of maintaining the foreigners out of Europe.
Abortion has nothing to do with it.
And, about "bleeding hearts" and governing a Nation, to me, a Nationalist State MUST be a "person of good", that is, must not desire "evil things to happen" to its Nationals...
Conservative Swede, I wanted to highlight some bright observations of yours:
About religion-state-Americans.
By the way, I don't understand the hypocrisy, lacking a better word, of Americans in what this is concerned. Religion is far more intricated with (political) power in America than in any (Western) European Nation. Our politicians are atheistics (not to say nihilistics) free masons who care only about themselves and respond only to the "elections festival".
Man, look to Zapatero in Spain! I am afraid of those lifeless blue eyes whenever they penetrate a TV camera!
"The dying doctrine is tied to the whole Anglo-franco world. It's the Russians and the Germans that could provide constructive alternatives for the future, but, in my view, each according to very different models."
First of all, I must say I think pretty shitty to blame England over the bad actions Americans have commited or by the English paranoya of getting in a war they could not win. Secondly, yes blame the French! The frogs have been no good.
Concerning Americans, you're right. Concerning Russians and Germany, they have already gave us Nazism and Communism. I wouldn't expect nothing from them... You Scandinavians, are insignificant, like us, Hispanics. The Balkans is such a mess... they will bi fighting to survive... the Eastern Europeans - untill they can prove me wrong - will ad aeternum be cought between Germanics and Russian interests, from Finland to Croatia...
The only I can see rising is Italy. Yes, Italy has great potential... I don't know why but... I simply cannot find a con with Italians.
"People argue that Christianity was a good force for nationalism in Spain during La Reconquista. But that's only true for Christianity which hasn't been destroyed by enlightenment."
Indeed. And you can see that in Portugal much better than in Spain because Portugal is (and was) a Nation.
We born as a Catholic State, we were built as a Catholic State, we had Religious orders of any kind to maintain society and it functioned quiet well. Then, in the second half of the XVIII century, enlightment came and the Religious Orders (mainly that which combined the perfect Indo-European age directed by the divine-warrior-Kings - the Ceasers), mainly military were abolished (including the Knights Templars which in Portugal had only their name changed), the limpeza de sangue laws (symbol of Tradition(al) Nobility) were abolished and the power of the church was highly decreased.
What is cerain is that the XIX century was a century of civil wars, foreign intreventions (French, Spanish, Brazilian(!!!) and those good English) and ended up with the... well, you got it.
Of course, in that time no one knew what would happen in France (and in America) and what terrible ideologies would rise from it. So, and taking in acount that the great local enlightened was D. José de Sebastião e Mello, the Marquis of Pombal, so, I am still not viewing the Enlightment as "evil". We have also had Newton, right?
But what I must highlight more than all the rest is this:
"The Roman part was flushed out long before the Christian part."
Exactly. People today parrot Greek-Roman / Christian / this and that without having a clue of what it is. And many times it is oh too painfull to see those who wholehartedly defend the West not knowing what is or how it is manifested the great root of the West. The Roman/Latin heritage. With the hell, sometimes they cannot even say what is "Greek"!
In a way, this imply that those who defend the West defend it's main roots, which are nihilistic once they don't know what they are talking about.
And we get to where we are: The West is nihilistic. We are just a big pile of trash with no culture, nothing... and this is said by those who defend the West!
So, in my view and I consider Portugal, Spain, Italy and Southern France to be the most "Romans", the Roman part was damped even before the WWI.
You see, Catholicism has been the only institution to survive the fall of Rome and it was already a rather great cut from the original "heroic" Pagan Rome. It strived, and it got divided in two main branches: The Hispanic (Portugal and Spain); and the Italic (modern Italy), with the South of France which may be considered a third way.
In Hispania, it gave birth to a society rulled by the nobility, by vallues, by interaction, strenght, duels, swords, Imperiums to be created. In Italy, it revealed itself in arts, in philosophy, in merchants, buisness, in stetics, in the kind but impressive and cult gentleman discovering the unkonwn, not by boats and with swords but in his white horse...
However, both Hispanic and Italic societies got "the whole package", the main difference is that Spain and Italy were organised in a very different way, and Portugal, like Aragon-Catalonia, was just a maritime little Spain with its own distinct carachter.
I have talked much and said very few...
The thing is that, French Revolution was a stab in the back of Romanity. From then on, the European "fashion" elite ceased to be the good Nobel Man, descendent from Romans, a Catholic man and started to be the good burgoise.
It is the beggining. From then on, we have only seen attacks on the Romanity of Europe.
I just want to say one thing. Castillans (Central Spaniards) are the closer we can get to Romans. They usually have vallues, are stupidly proud, and are always looking to create an Imperium... Also, their religion is a bit different from ours. They touch the Semitic on their relation with the divine. We on the West (and I've been told that in the North of Spain it is the same) are more of an Indo-European "pagan" way.
Maybe that is because the Castillans are such a happy and proud people. We are the opposite.
However, and I've been to "romarias" in both Central Portugal and Southern Spain so I know what I am talking about, we are a sad people with low self-esteem. Mainly because "Portugal is still to be completed" but we only have self-esteem in abnormal cases (like, say, a war) whereas the Castillans have it daily; But whenever ther is a "romaria" or another religious celebration, the Portugese people becames happy, the girls became naughty, etcetera, etcetera while among Castillans such celeberations are profound, evolve suffering, are sad and serious. Spanish girls, who daily act in "a very modern way" became like chast pristesses.
As the Portuguese heir to the throne, His Royal Highness D. Duarte Pio de Bragança, has said, you can see how humble are the Portuguese and how proud are the Castillans because:
"when a man kneel in front of a Portuguese, he will extend his hand to the man, but if you kneel to a Castillan, you will be abused for life".
All I wanted to say is that, in the Meseta, in the right-wing Traditionalist Castillans lye what may be closer to Romanity today.
---------------------------------
Attacks aganist Romanity before WWI:
French Revolution which culminated in the rise of the burguoise, that is, money before honour/tradition; Run-a-way from the true Church (of Roman Tradition) by the Protestant reform (Germanic) and the Enlightment (laicisation). That laicisation will slowly lead towards an elimination of higher vallues; the many revolutions of the XIX century (of which the American one was the first) which leaded to the complete destruction of the two main centres of "Romanity":
In Hispania, the XIX century was a century of Civil Wars in which the evil left was victorious up untill the 20s and 30s with fascsim. To ressurect again from the mid 70s onwards. It meant liberalism, republicanism, anti-catholicism masked as laicisation, submission to foreign powers (mainly France), etc. now Socialism, multiculturalism to destroy the Native's culture, and submission towards the European Union.
In Italy, Garibaldi's boys make sure they would destroy Italy's structure pratically since the colapse of the Roman Empire, or at least, after the fall of the Empire of the Eastern Goths (Ostrogoths). But that, was not AT ALL a bad thing. Quiet the contrary, that's why if there is an European Western Nation in which I have faith is Italy.
And reading all this I came to the conclusion that WWI was just the end of it to the least Romanised portions of Europe: The North. But that was only possible after had deconstructed Romanity in Hispania (remember, Spain was neutral and Portugal only sent expeditionary bodies to secure the colonies in Africa) and the Italian system.
Meanwhile, I wanted to add a bit of Catholic mysticism. Our Lady Mary, the Mother of God, apeared in Fatima, Portugal, in 1917 to three sheperd children. She said that Russia would be converted.
The mytich interpretation is that it will be converted to the one true Church of God (or is it Christ?), the Roman Apostolic Catholic Church of Rome. An intrepertation among the Traditionaist (anti Vatican II) priests is that it will end the cism of 1054 and the two churches will unite and discredit the Council Vatican II. Europe would then convert en mass to the new Catholicism.
Dymphna,
"you need a serious course of study on Tradition(s) -- how they arise, how long it takes for them to seem "timeless" to the next generation, what needs they fulfill"
First, sorry to have apearenty ignored your comment. I did not.
I know I have an uncomplete vision of American's Traditions. I don't doubt you have some Traditions or many for that matter. I don't even know one tenth of the Traditions of this region where I have lived all my life...
But my point stands, you do not have "American roots". Besides the fourth July, the stars and stripes and idea(l)s you have very few as American. My point is: The United States of America is not an organic Nation.
Afonso, how little you know about us! We do indeed have long-standing traditions, ones that go deep into European history, extending back into the ancient culture of the English yeoman freeholders.
This may not be conscious or well-understood by by the people who hold these traditions, but it is true nonetheless. We hold them fiercely.
Truly, Europeans fail to understand us. I understand you better than you understand me, because I realize my ignorance. But you are caught in the deeper ignorance of thinking that you understand us, when you do not.
Baron,
I don't think I know all...
Of course there are deep Traditions in America that "go deep into European and English History". That is why you people are Europeans and mainly of English origin. But that is as much "yours" as it is of white South Africans or Australians... you see. And it is not "American" per se, it is European and English.
And no, I don't want you to came out with some Native American Traditions...
I am talking of proper "American" (in both senses, of the land and the people, conditioned by History, that's how culture is formed) Traditions, like, say, Thanks Given...
I do know I know little about you and I do know that I will never see you with American eyes - I may try but I'd say something like this: Americans see this and do this because they think... - that is part of my foreigner condition.
However I think you failed to understand what I meant... I was not "understanding you", I was not "looking to see trough American eyes", I was simply, and in all-European way :) :) :+ ... judging you.
It's about the many shades of belonging. I am European, Latin ("Roman"), Hispanic, Western Hispanic (Portuguese). Everything has a different meaning, and one thing is a subset of the other like those Russian dolls... That's when I said America is a orion with only the exterior layer.
Let's just say that it apears that everybody has deeper Traditions than the Americans which, in my view is a problem to American unity. I am too tired to make more (if I've been making some) sense
Dymphna,
You're entitled to your opinion, but that's all it is: your opinion.
Well, it's not as much an opinion as it is a logical conclusion based on solid premises. You can criticize it and try to find a hole in the chain of reasoning, but in order to do so you have to understand my proposition first. And you haven't yet. In your answer you focus entirely on what I already explained is insignificant and therefore irrelevant, and you do not even mention what I stressed were the important factors.
Let's take an example. Fredrik has a mosquito on his head. Daniel wants to kill the mosquito for Fredrik. He uses his spade and bangs it right in Fredrik's head. The mosquito dies, but so does Fredrik. The law of unintended consequences...
In Africa, in the Middle East, and in many parts of the third world the natural order of things has always been that women given birth to a lot of children but that only few of them survive. Into this the Western Christian man, as in so many other places, has entered and destroyed the natural equilibrium. And since then the population explosion is running amok. THIS IS THE PROBLEM.
The EXPONENTIAL population EXPLOSION in the third-world is such that even if we had maintained above replacement level birth rates in the West it wouldn't change the general picture.
The anti-abortion stance is just an instance of the more general pro-life dogma of Christian ethics, which is embraced equally by seculars as believers. The problem with the Western Christian civilization and its Christian ethics is that they apply this pro-life dogmatism INDISCRIMINATELY.
Christian ethics is ONE AND THE SAME among Protestants, Catholics AND Atheists. There are some variation about minor issues such as e.g. condoms . The most forceful aspects of this Christian ethics of our Western Christian civilization is however what they all commonly embrace. Such as handing Western medicine etc. to the third world in order to destroy the natural equilibrium of before so that all children survive, leading to a population explosion.
There is a general awareness among people here how liberals destroy our countries, and how they will eventually be left surprised of the result of their actions. But the Western Christian civilization destroy THE WHOLE WORLD in the very same way. But the Westerners do not see it, and probably won't see it until the destruction is done.
People can see how a country, e.g. Holland, is destroyed when the Dutch people have been replaced by third world people. How come then nobody can see the problem when this happens at a global scale? People of European descent are being replaced at a global scale! We have dropped from 30% in the world and are heading for 5%.
How does Christian pro-life dogmatism (God loves every single human soul equally much) enter into this? (the abortion issue is just one expression of this attitude)
Well since Christian pro-life dogmatism is always applied indiscriminately, swing that spade harder and you might get that mosquito, but it will just as sure kill us in the process. Instead, as I have shown, Christin ethics is exactly what is behind the suicide of our civilization and our replacement at a global scale.
Now there will come commenters who will say that we cannot let children die in the third-world. That it's immoral and that we must do everything we can to save their lives. And this proves my point exactly. This is exactly the attitude that leads to our replacement at a global level. The Chinese do not act like this, nor the Russians etc., only the enlightenment-infected Westerners.
People need to grow up, and let nature have it course. Western children are bleeding hearts over how animals kill other animals, and other things like that, which they learn to accept as grown ups. So Westerners just have to learn to grow up a little more, and stop feeding the third world population explosion.
Obviously the indiscriminate anti-abortion stance represents a very dogmatic clinging to these destructive ways. They day a "conservative" Christian says: forbid abortion in the West, but have it mandatory after the first child in Africa. That day could also take them seriously. But I am not holding my breath.
Swede:
Come on over. We can find you a spot in Minnesota. Never mind the burka babes hanging around the airport. The Minnesotans invited them here recently, and Minnesotans are do-gooders, don't you know? Just like Swedes (and Norwegians.)
Get over your animus! Man! What is the problem?
You'd look good with a So. Louisiana Mama on your arm to keep you straight.
@Conservative Swede -
Well, it's not as much an opinion as it is a logical conclusion based on solid premises.
Oh. Of course. How silly of me.
But how come your premisses and conslusions sound like a modern day version of St. Anselm and his "proofs" for the existence of God?
IOW, in order to buy your conclusions, I first have to accept your premisses, but since I don't, then your conclusions fail to convince.
This pas de deux reminds me of the Wallace Stevens' poem:
that strange flower, the sun,
is just what you say.
have it your way.
the world is ugly,
and the people are sad.
that tuft of jungle feathers,
that animal eye,
is just what you say.
that savage of fire,
that seed,
have it your way.
the world is ugly,
and the people are sad.
Dymphna,
You are not even listening.
in order to buy your conclusions, I first have to accept your premisses
Yes, and even before that you have to understand my premises. But everything you have written so far shows us that you haven't even understood my premises. Why don't you give it a try? Why dismissing it before even processing the information?
Let me ask you a straight-forward question. Are you concerned about how we are being replaced in our respective countries? Why aren't you concerned about how we are being replaced at a global level then? I find it naive how people think that this is an issue simply about "immigration".
Why do people have such a problem with logic...?
I have a very simple solution to the problem of 3d world overpopulation that doesn't involve abortion or renouncing the Enlightenment.Tie food aid to birth control or sterilization.
This way, no one has to argue about whether abortion is wrong or not. Since this question can never be answered, why not just do something else?
FWIW, I'm sort of an Enlightenment person, but I don't think primitive 3d worlders should be allowed to breed like cats. So when I see people here arguing over whether abortion is wrong, or whether the Enlightenment was good for us, I see it as not solving the real problem.
We have to agree that the 3d world population explosion is bad, that arguing about theology will never have the slightest effect on this problem, and therefore we have to solve the problem by finding common ground outside of theology.
Can we agree that some forms of sterilization and birth control can be acceptable to religious people? Can we agree that starving people can take responsibility in working with the people who feed them, to voluntarily control their fertility if they want to eat?
For the record, I'm reluctantly pro-choice with respect to the first world, but this is completely beside the point. My personal morality can't be forced on pro-life people, whose views I respect, so I downplay this abortion business, because there are other, less problematic ways to control 3d world population.
I recently joined The England Society. It's a good example of trying to preserve culture without a focus on race.
Sorry, left out the url.
http://www.englandsociety.org.uk
Conservative Swede,
"The EXPONENTIAL population EXPLOSION in the third-world is such that even if we had maintained above replacement level birth rates in the West it wouldn't change the general picture."
Well, who cares? Europe is easily defended if Russia wants to be our Eastern Guardion. That is a greater problem in the Americas such as Mexico who have come from 40% European to 10% European in few more than half a century. That is a drop of 75%. Like... the Icelandic crash...
What you say is true to... Mexico. For instance when Europeans were 40%, the "pure Indians" were few. Nowadays, they triple the European Mexicans.
In Europe we have nothing of the like. In fact, if we had maintained the "generation renovation", we would have not had imported a tenth of this thirld worlders we have now (at least I don't know a better excuse for what the lefties have done). And abortion and "female liberation" has much to do with that.
As I said, Europe can be deffended from the outside if we want to do so. Who will atack us? Nobody. The Chinese would have to dominate all Asia first (like the Japs before Pearl Harbor), the muslims would have to create the caliphate and I will not even talk about those great Civilisations of America and Sub-Saharan Africa...
"The problem with the Western Christian civilization and its Christian ethics is that they apply this pro-life dogmatism INDISCRIMINATELY."
That's not a problem. We are not attacking China because they kill their little girls, are we?
And that is a Universal vallue, transcends Civilisation, is available to all Humans, so, the problem is not really anti-abortion stances...
"Such as handing Western medicine etc. to the third world in order to destroy the natural equilibrium of before so that all children survive, leading to a population explosion."
Yes, but this is a whole different thing. That is more a reflex of the we're all one dogma. That is a problem however. It does not legitimate abortion.
"But the Western Christian civilization destroy THE WHOLE WORLD"
Drama Queen. Well, you do have a point but... who cares? Don't they embrace Christianism? Don't they create there very own versions of Christianism? Why do I feel that the Germanic Protestantism of Sweden is very different from the African Protestantism of Zimbabwe... That is not my problem nor any Westerner's problem.
"come then nobody can see the problem when this happens at a global scale? People of European descent are being replaced at a global scale! We have dropped from 30% in the world and are heading for 5%."
As I've said, Europe is defensible. So, the problem is Multiculturalism. Once we get rid of multiculturalism, the worst that can happen is that we will not able to travel for joy in the blue waters of the Mediterranean.
"God loves every single human soul equally much"
That's not the Traditional Catholic dogma. According to it, God loves every single human soul equally at birth. Then, it depends on your actions and your sincere regrets... I am not against killing people, I am against killing innocent people without any serious reason, out of selfishness.
"Now there will come commenters who will say..."
I didn't and whoever says it is an hypocrite.
"They day a "conservative" Christian says: forbid abortion in the West, but have it mandatory after the first child in Africa."
That is too extreme. There are other ways, you know.
Well, why can't we play eugenics?
Abortion makes mind and body strong
Make abortion and you will live long
Abortions make nation wealthy
And you will die safe and healthy
Congratulations Latte Island,
for being the first one who understood my argument. And for lifting your eyes from the national/border prism to the truly global level.
Tie food aid to birth control or sterilization.
I agree completely with this practical approach, and I have suggested the very same myself before.
However, my argument here has been focusing on another thing. Namely of finding the essence of things. What's the essence of the anti-abortion stance? of the Enlightenment? of Christian ethics? etc.
Christian ethics is pro-life (I use this concept in its most general sense). The original core doctrine is how God loves every human soul (including the other, our enemies etc.) equally much. But as everything in Western Christianity (such as e.g. the many forms of egalitarianism) it's a protean attitude. It manifests itself in many shapes and in many different levels. Anti-abortion stance is one, and as all the others this one is indiscriminate and include the other, our enemies etc. Catholics take it one step further and consider even wasting a sperm as sin, so they ban the use of condoms (once again indiscriminately). In spite of ignoring the theological aspects, this principle of life is still fully vivid among secular Westerners. Secular and believing Western Christians equally believe it's a moral obligation to feed the third world population explosion. More and more extend this principle of life to include animals, so that they should not be eaten.
The common factor, in spite of its protean nature and many different incarnations, is how the principle is applied indiscriminately (i.e. including our enemies etc.) And the important lesson from that is that the principle can never (in its fully enlightened version) be used as a force for the interests of our nations/civilization.
Why am I looking for the essence of things? For one, it's important to see where things came from in the first place. Leftism is a descendant of Christian ethics. The Enlightenment - what was it really we were enlightened about? Christian ethics! The full conclusion of Christian ethics was revealed. But Christianity can only work if the full consequences of Christian ethics are mostly hidden from the general population. If the genie is released from the bottle, it takes a life of its own.
Most leftists will say once the ongoing population replacement has been completed in their countries, that we could not have acted differently. The receiving all these "refugees" was the only moral way to act. Even after having lost their homeland they will stick to this. They will consider it inevitable, since it was in their eyes the only moral way to act.
In the same way, and at a more general level, virtually all people of Western Christianity (seculars as well as believers, i.e. all the "enlightened" ones) will, even after we have been effectively replaced at a global level, stick to how feeding this 3rd world population explosion was the only more way to act. Even in retrospect they will consider their actions as correct and inevitable, since they consider it the only moral way to act.
We see here how Western Christians in general manages to undermine the very goals they are working for precisely as the leftists. E.g. feminists do not manage to achieve a better society for women. Maybe up to a certain point, but today women are worse off thanks to feminism. The same with Western Christians in general, their concerted effort to feed the population explosion of the 3rd world, leading to our replacement at a planetary level, once accomplished, will effectively mean the end of Western Christian influence in the world, the end of our way of life, the end of Western Christian goodness, etc., etc. So quite as for the feminists, we have to ask: What was it really that they wanted in the first place?
So this has to be born in mind when discussing practical solutions. By revealing the essence of people's attitudes we can also assess how they are likely to react to such practical solutions (we should expect aggressive activism, street wars etc.). I would say that this essence also points to why such practical measures have not been carried out already. Since it's the obviously responsible thing to do. And I'd say that it's not in the character of our civilization to do such things. Well, it could have been once, but during the last century Christian ethics has been more unfettered than ever (we have maximum enlightenment), and other balancing cultural components (such as Roman and Pagan) have almost faded completely.
"for being the first one who understood my argument."
I have already "understood" it, I only fail to agree... and I've been giving you alternatives. Meanwhile, I do agree with Latte Island though I think sterilization is too extreme (some Mozambicans have claimed the Portuguese authorities wanted to exterminate blacks because they offered aid against AIDS in terms of condoms). If you want to sterilize someone, sterilize some of the ethnic minorities who are living in the West. They need help as badly.
But Latté Island's aproach is "moral" and does not envolve killing the most unprotected Human beings out of selfishness.
"my argument here has been focusing on another thing. Namely of finding the essence of things."
Can't we seriously advocate that the stance in anti-abortion derives from a instinct of survival, mamely: "don't do to others, what you don't like to be done to you"? For instance, behind anti abortion is our desire of surviving, because we "would not like" to have been aborted? Because we do not want a women to abort our children or grandchildren?
So, I've prooved you it transcends Christianity.
"Catholics take it one step further and consider even wasting a sperm as sin"
It is metaphysical. And it is must deeper than I thought. It's not to be ridiculed. I've told you I have been drinking inspiration from some Traditionalist old school (discontents with Vatican the Second. Those who prefer to follow the Holy Spirit instead of society or the church) Catholic priests and I have an article which I can partially translate. You see, it is VERY usefull to society. You may not make fun of it. The Catholic Church has many many flaws, but this simply is not one of them.
All the rest, I quiet agree.
The aforementioned article:
An intreview by "O Independente" (The Independent, a newspaper) (I'll calll it TI) to the Catholic Priest "Padre" (Father) Nuno Serras Pereira:
TI - Three months ago, you were deemed guilty of difamation due to a text you wrote, entitled "Os Abortófilos" (The Abortion-philes). Between other things, you called the Association to the Planing of Family (APF) of "organização 'serial killer'" (serial killer organisation) and defended that that the organisation promotes murder. Will you affirm the same again, or do you admit that maybe you have gone a little too far?
NSP - I confirm what I wrote. It's all truth and correct. A 'serial killer' is someone who has killed various people. That organisation belongs to the International Planned Parenthood Federation, which prmotes abortion in the whole world. Only in the United States it killed milions of people not borned yet.
TI - A women that aborts shall be arrested?
NSP - The goal is not to encarcerate women. The law has a dissuasing function. Each case must be avaluated to apurate the culpability. Most times the judges come to the conclusion that there is no reason to punish with jail time.
TI - If, as you say, someone makes an abortion and kills a child, a woman who does it should be arrested?
NSP - A democratic State has the obligation to defend and guard the dignity of all, independently of the fase of their existence. A Human Being in the fase of the conception has so much vallue as three or nine months later. A State that does not defend the dignity of all is totalitarian and tiranic State. It may use the formal mechanisms of democracy, but is colaborating actively in the slaughter of innocents.
TI - A women who abort shall be arrested?
NSP - It depends on the circumstances.
TI - Do you also defend that abortion is worst than pedophilia. Is it worst to end a pregnancy before the three months uma than to abuse and rape a child with little time of living?
NSP - Both crimes are abominable.
TI - But you wrote that one was worst than the other.
NSP - Yes. To kill a child is worst than abusing.
TI - Is it worst to end a pregnancy before the three months uma than to abuse and rape a child with little time of living?
NSP - It is always worst to kill an innocent Human Being than to abuse it.
TI - This week, the minister of Education, Maria de Lurdes Rodrigues, informed that high schools will be able to offer condoms to the students, as long as the parents consent it. How do you comment?
NSP - To promote the utilisation of the condom is of an enormous iresponsability. The only examples of success in the battle against AIDS recognised by the World Health Organisation are that of Uganda and the Philipines. In both countries absinence was promoted first, then fidelity (loyalty)and only in last case the condom. From the moment that, in the Philipines, this strategy was abandoned and the condom become the bet, the number of infected people rose. In good conditions, the condom has an eficacy rate between the 85 to the 90 per cent. It's like playing the Russian roulette. I will not catch a plane to Paris if you tell me that only 80 per cent of the planes will land safely. On the other hand, that percentage of eficacy is calculated in a frame of one year. As time goes by, as the roulette spins, the probability lowers to considerabily inferior vallues, on the order of 15 per cent after ten years. It is wrong to speak of safe sex. On the other hand, the State does not have the right to intrefere on the sexuality of children nor educate them at that level. That is an undenyable right of the parents.
TI - We are talking of the permission of parents...
NSP - But there will be mandatory sexual education classes and supporting groups which mentality is dominated by the APF. We know what they will do to children.
TI - What?
NSP - They will prevert them.
TI - How?
NSP - Any sexual relation that is not directed towards procriation is a preversion.
TI - Men and women should abstain of having sexual relations if they do not want a child?
NSP - The relationship between a man and a women is a relationship of love. If a person gives itself to another in all the totality of their being it is implied that it is offering the capability of being father or the capability of being mother. A children may surge or not, but nothing must be done to manipulate and falsify that language of love.
TI - What is the problem of having sexual relations, taking the right precautions, to prevent an undesirable pregnancy?
NSP - If taking precautions means to recur to the unfertile periods of the wife, there is no problem.
TI - Which is an unfailable method, is it not?
NSP - No. The World Health Organisation atributes it an eficacy of 99,8%.
IT - And what's the drama of using the condom or the pill?
NSP - You falsify the relation. It ceases to exist a total delivery.
IT - When you published that article (in which he said he could not accept those who practice abortion and such consciently as Catholics), many priests condemned your position and affirmed that you had made an abusive intrepertation of the Canonic Law Code. How do you comment?
NSP - We have to count and forgive the ignorance of others.
I am only publishing here the abortion and condom parts, the rest would however be usefull to understand it more.
COnservative Swede, if you are still reading this, I would like to show you the deturpation to which the Catholic Church has been victim. Compare the statements of the Father Nuno Serra Pereira presented above in the intreview and this excert from the Portuguese blog "The Reactionary" (http://o-reaccionario.blogspot.com/):
Note: I will use the word "father" to refer to the Catholic priests which are refered in Portuguese as "Padres", a derivation from the Latin "Pater" meaning Father. "Padre" derives from the time the Peninsula was speaking Latin and when the modern languages were not spoken yet (Portuguese, Castillan, Catalan). In Portuguese, the word "father" evolved to "Pai" while in Castillan it maintained the more pure form "Padre". However, as a matter of respect and title, the "Religious fathers of the church" were to be called the formal and learned "Padre" instead of the biological term, "Pai".
"Last Sunday, SIC – television broadcaster owed by the permanent member of the Bilderberg club, Francisco Pinto Balsemão – broadcasted a report named "Political Fathers", in which, sadly it got more evident how far from the Path, the Truth and Life some "Catholic" Fathers are to be found.
I focused particularly in the declarations of two fathers. One, an ex-deputy of the Communist Party in the island of Madeira, who have stated that in politics, he could only be on the left, once the left had a greater preocupation with the problems of Humanity, in contrast with the right which standed too grabed to the norms of the past, forgeting that the the norms may be harming the Humanity in the present. Another one, also linked to the Communist party, went even further, even as far to affirm that Marxism and Christianity shared the same spirit of social transformation and conquest of the common well being."
You see, the Vatican the Second is the problem. If the church wants to have a say in Europe, or better, among the European peoples, it will have to change quickly.
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