A World in Crisis**

There are several interlinked Crises , extant today: climate change, societal

atrophy, threat of global war , and nuclear catastrophe.

Interestingly, it is the societal atrophy underlying it all that rarely gets any

deep scrutiny

It is my Argument, made for some 3 decades now, that All of these Crises , in

their current form, stem from the same set of systemic causes that I collate

under the rubric of European Modernism or EM .

EM is the specific variant of Modernism imposed on the world, and on itself, by

Europe, in the 17-18th century.

In sum, what we view around us today is the cumulative ‘butterfly effect’ of

bad idea (l)s.

*

Fish in the ocean may not be aware they swim in water.

Neither do most of us in the Modern world know that we inhabit an epistemic

universe crafted for us Post-enlightenment, in the 19 th century.

EM has transformed our world: how we think, how we live, and how we engage

with each other , and with Nature.

So , what constitutes EM Ideology?

*

It has several components.

Firstly , it is premised upon a now Obsolete Philosophy of Materialism

(everything is matter: and all objects are material) , aping classical Newtonian

Physics.

One can think of it as a mild form of Physics Envy.

Btw Latter-day Quantum Physics solidly debunks this notion.

Secondly , it adopts a triumphalist, self-serving, view of ‘Progress’ (expressed

again in vulgar material terms: GDP, etc.).

Worse, it takes it for granted that ‘Progress’ , is wherever Europe happens to

find itself, because Europe is the Gold Standard for the world.

*

Thirdly, it marries Science to the State, thereby risking despotism, substituting it

for Religion, its rival proxy in pre-Modern Europe.

*

Fourthly , it endorses the Statist use of Force, as needed, to ‘force people to be

free’ (JS Mill): another ominous license for aggression, in favor of any ,and all,

Statist Objectives.

*

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Fifthly , it adopts a contractual /instrumentalist view of Society , rejecting its

Organic features.

Whence we get Asocial Individualism – the most toxic notion in human history

– which actually sees Society as but an instrument to be used to achieve

individualist ends (, e.g. Dame Thatcher saying society is just the plural of the

individual)

I.e., The Individual is Sovereign, Society is but a handy Means.

*

Sixthly, it sees ‘Nature’ as external to us ‘Humans’ who stand ‘above’ it.

Btw Women, children, and native peoples, were, all assimilated to being in

German ‘naturvolk‘, to be raised/disciplined/ and tamed (Recall Shakespeare’s

Taming of the Shrew trope).

Nature exists only to serve us: in fact, the economist Solow, it is reported, once

implied, that we can do without Nature.

*

Seventhly, it privileges formal Reason (presumed to be free of anthropic bias)

over Other forms of knowing (insight, intuition, ‘common sense’ , revelation, et.

al).

In Economics , this morphs into ‘rationality’ , where it is , by fiat, rational to be

materialistic (more is better).

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Reason is also privileged far above Human Emotions (again: women, children,

and natives, were all assimilated to being irrational, for being ’emotive’ and

‘childlike’.)

*

Eighthly , it sees us Humans as untouched by Essentialist properties such as

Instincts.

Animals have instincts, Humans don’t (since, the latter , presumably are cast, in

the image of ‘god’:

Darwin’s Great Correction came much later but has not

altered this).

Levi Strauss , famously, wrote that “instincts explain nothing’.

*

Ninthly, it privileges Humans as the ‘Sovereigns of Creation’ (Marx), set above

all other forms of life (Anthropocentrism).

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Tenthly , it sanctions Adversarialism as innate in society (Spencer) , validating

the idea(l) of a brutish struggle for existence ( this is Malthus, who inspired

Darwin).

Mutual Distrust is thereby institutionalized, and intra/internecine-societal

aggression/anger promoted.

*

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Eleventh, it substitutes the gloss of Abstract Idylls (which are rarely or never

realised) , as a decoy away from attending to Real Human Needs (so they offer

you the Chimera of equality and democracy, NOT food and shelter).

*

Twelfth, it endorses perpetual, heroic Struggle as the idyll of life; ‘climb every

mountain, ford every stream’, etc. , and the Reification of Labor , so close to

the Protestant Ethic : you know the arbeit macht frei – trope (where Doing is

endless, Being is seen as passive), placing unbearable stress on vulnerable

flesh and blood humans to ‘achieve’, as per systemic norms and requirements.

That is our given EM Endowment.

________

Now Spencer’s idea of tragedy was a beautiful theory slain by a single ugly fact.

Here are some facts.

We are flesh and blood human beings, animals, mammals, sharing 99% of our

DNA with Chimps.

Instincts -the dog that never barks in EM theory - are built-in to us: and so we

are not infinitely malleable into any and all Engineered states of Being fancied

by either the Left or the Right (whether it is Communism or the Open Society)

All life is Spontaneous, including our own anthropic life.

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It requires NO engineering.

Humans form communities, naturally, like bees build hives, and ants build hills.

It is instinctive.

Family, Community, Clan, and Tribe: those are our natural/social habitats.

Notice, I did not mention State or Nation: those are imposed artefacts.

Real Anthropic values are also what I term the 4 Cs.

Community, Cooperation, Caring, and Conviviality.

They are NOT idylls, or chimeras, like equality and democracy.

They are real and observable.

But they obtain in Gemeinschaft formations, not EM Gesellschaft societies.

That is our Anthropic Essence. Our Species Being.

These features are collectively embedded in us.

The Individual is an EM myth; worse, it is an EM Frankenstein, a threat to itself

,and to others.

So EM severs us from ALL of our innate anthropic traits, perforce.

*

Instead, it builds our Societal Universe on Greed (or Capitalism), and Violence

( or War) , and on the desirability of ‘Growth and Development’ (read that as

the Mantra of Infinite Expansion).

It stresses Competition, Selfishness, and Acquisitive/Possessive behaviors.

Once our ties to the Matrix are broken, and we are individuated, set free from

nurturance and mutual caring , we are transported to the EM world of anomie,

alienation, and angst, which JP Sartre described so very aptly when he said

:’Hell is other people’

EM thereby transforms a warm Band of wannabe Convivials into a lonely,

isolated, Adversarial Company of Strangers.

It gives us all the EM signature themes we live by and in: permanent

discontent, permanent, insecurity, abiding mutual distrust, and permanent war.

It creates a new social form: The Amoral Society, wherein humans, divested of

their moral core, turn into sociopaths and psychopaths.

We are an Affective Species forced into a rationalist EM straitjacket.

And that’s what EM is: An Iron Cage.

Humans stripped of affective, umbilical, ties of community and kindred lose

their compass , and court near-insanity.

All this is evident all around us, and that is where we are today.

Now we should know why.

*

But we can Reclaim it all.

By breaking with grand EM myths and delusions, Revalorizing familial ,

domestic, local, and communal modes of living, instead of trying to adapt to

giant, grandiose , global entities.

All it takes is a Transvaluation of Values, individually and collectively,

returning us to our species-being.

In other words , restoring us to our essential humanity.

*

All Contrived societal institutions, like EM, rest on belief systems which can be

cast off.

Turning us into what we are not, which is the EM Project is difficult, and

hazardous;, but returning us to who really we are, is easy.

Much haste is called for in this, since time is short, lest we hear that last

broadcast on the evening news.

The world ends tonight at 9, details at 11.

**Transcript of Talk , Sept 17, 2024