January 08, 2006
Revealing reaction...
There's been lots of people commenting on Mark Steyn's piece on the decline of Europe and its ongoing demographic collapse. But Scott Chaffin pointed out one reaction that seems really weird, from Thomas PM Barnett, author of The Pentagon's New Map:
...Wow! Somebody get a lynching party together. We better hang some of them dark-skinned pagans before they start screwing our women! You there–start having some babies for Der Fatherland!...
I think Barnett is one of the smartest guys around, with a lot of good thoughts. He's right many things, especially on how the world works as a whole, and where it's going. But he's a liberal.
He's not a ranting left-winger, and he's a supporter of the WoT, which is why this comment seems odd. (Well actually it is literally insane; it doesn't even vaguely connect with what Steyn is writing.) But it's also very revealing, just because there aren't a lot of liberals supporting the war, and no others (that I know of) supporting it as part of a thought-out plan for transforming the world for the better. Barnett's spent a couple of decades as a thinker on military matters and foreign affairs. His perspective is especially valuable to a conservative like myself, because there aren't many liberals thinking clearly about, well... anything.
But I've been watching him for a while now, and it seems to me that, because he's a liberal, there are certain places he just can't go. In particular, he looks at nations exactly like liberals look at a community of individuals. To liberals, it is forbidden to say or think that people of some groups or ethnicities are more able than other people, either culturally or genetically. You mustn't say, or think, that individuals from certain minority groups are not doing as well as others because they lack a culture that values education and hard work and family values, or even more verboten, because their IQ scores are lower. Any differences must be attributed to outside forces.
Barnett views nations and major ethnic groups the same way. For instance he puts a lot of emphasis on the flows of information that characterize those parts of the world that are flourishing (The Functioning Core, in his lingo. The poor and dysfunctional parts of the globe are The Gap). But Barnett always assumes that if a country is opened up to those "flows," and if certain other problems are solved, then that place will tend to flourish just like the others, and move into the Core. He never suggests that some group might fail to prosper despite advantages because their culture is dysfunctional.
(Actually some of the world's worst violence occurs where one ethnic group within a country works harder and smarter and gets rich, and arouses other groups to punitive violence. Think Nigeria, or Sri Lanka, or "Palestine." Think Jews in many lands. And, leaving aside the question of actual genetics, it is clear that some cultures have deep-rooted traits in their 'genes" that lead to success or failure. Just look at the different fates of former British colonies and former French or Spanish colonies...)
But Barnett never goes there. And especially, he can't go where Steyn is leading, to the conclusion that Europe is circling the drain. Barnett's writings always assume that the EU is roughly equivalent to the US, and that they could be equal partners in the world's affairs if only they wanted to, if only we did a better job of drawing them in.
Barnett's hysterical reaction (...Those frickin' Muslims are breeding like rabbits and infiltrating us like crazy. Europe will be lost within a short historical timeframe. Hell, it may be too far gone already. Like Corn, Steyn pushes for an aggressive sort of re-education campaign, where, apparently, we outdo the House of Saud in brainwashing...) is exactly like the reaction you would get if you suggested that certain minority groups are not represented at elite colleges in sufficient numbers because they are lazier or less intelligent than others. Screams of racism. Virulent attacks on you, and accusations that you are advocating euthanasia or "ethnic cleansing" or "white supremacy," even if you never mentioned those things.
Steyn's point is not that Muslims are breeding too much, but that Europeans are NOT breeding. Spain's birthrate is such that its population is going to halve every generation! That's a fact. And Steyn never mentions any "re-education campaign," or suggests any sort of remedy. That's purely Barnett's fantasy. And I think these are fantasies invented because seriously considering or debating these questions would endanger his liberal worldview...He literally can't go there.
Posted by John Weidner at January 8, 2006 10:16 AMThe problem is, why won't Spaniards (and other Europeans) have kids? Everyone can't be like me -- never wanted to be married (except for one mercifully brief interlude), never wanted to have kids. From what I hear most women want marriage and children. What's stopping them?
Posted by: Andrea Harris at January 8, 2006 11:01 AMI suspect that one reason is a sense of hopelessness. I think back to the message my peers and I got from the culture of the times (the 1970s) when we were in high school, and it was all doom and gloom, the world's running out of resources, global starvation will surely be upon us by 1990, etc., etc. (Damn Carter and his "moral equivalent of war" rhetoric.)
Times are more optimistic today, of course, at least here in the U.S. But I think the "bad old days" persist in Europe, with not just people my age (44) but even the younger people (20-ish) being brought up to believe that the world they know will end soon, to spiral downward into hunger, misery, and mass death in the fashion predicted by the Club of Rome back in '72.
"Why bring children into such a world?" is the unspoken question on their minds.
Posted by: Hale Adams at January 8, 2006 01:51 PMI think there are lots of reasons or excuses. Many people used to have children because it was just expected, or because children could help with farm or business, or because contraception was poor. Some of those will chose not to once children become a choice.
Lots of people still do want children, but think one is enough, thank you! Or maybe two. There were lots of people in the past who chose not to get married or have children (It used to be quite common for women to make nursing or teaching a sort of celibate life. Or being the secretary or assistant to some important man) but they were balanced by siblings who had 6 or 8 or 10 children! That's what we no longer have.
Myself, I want to have children because I feel connected to both the past and the future. I'm very aware of all that my ancestors have done, and how hard they struggled. They endured much to produce me and the amazing world I live in, and am I to say now, "Ho hum, why bother to go on?" My grandmother's grandmother grew up deep in a forest in Sweden, where her father carved wooden shoes to make a meager living. She was terribly poor, but lived a life of faith and hard work and optimism. and passed her story down to us. How could I chicken out?
And the future. Dizzying and terrifying and thrilling if you are clued in to what's going on. I won't get to walk on Mars, but my grandchildren may. I want to know how the story turns out...I won't, but my descendents may, and I'll be part of the story in a way.
Posted by: John Weidner at January 8, 2006 05:15 PMAs for Europe, well, having children means living with risk and danger. You have, as Bacon put it, given "hostages to fortune." Your happiness or your peace of mind can be destroyed in an instant. You worry about them forever.
And I challenge you to name ANY bold and risky initiative that's characteristic of Old Europe today. Europe has faced the age-old choice between freedom and safety, and come down hard on the side of safety. There's little interest in taking risks, and risk-takers tend to move to America...
Posted by: John Weidner at January 8, 2006 05:47 PM'...risk-takers tend to move to America...'
We often hear about a temporary 'brain drain' in one direction or another, but for two centuries America has been draining Europe of its bravest, boldest, most enterprising, and most visionary.
How could such a process result in anything but a culture of whiners, losers, and ineffectual excuse-makers?
Posted by: lyle at January 8, 2006 09:03 PMHeads up... Zoomie's back! (See your previous posts starting here.) I missed the old hippy. Oh wait -- no I didn't.
Posted by: Andrea Harris at January 9, 2006 06:19 AMAnd here in SF the rains have stopped, and I wake up to Hay Fever...and Zoomie. Connected? A conspiracy?
Posted by: John Weidner at January 9, 2006 08:43 AMMs. Harris;
Having children is in many ways a big sacrifice. Back in the day, people regularly made sacrifices in daily life that we can barely comprehend now. Now, however, most people (and I would guess an even larger percentage of Europeans) don't expect to ever have to sacrifice anything for any reason. This makes sacrificing for the sake of one's children right out. Why, it could impact your life! Cut down on your ability to go clubbing! It's not so much that people expect more out of life, but that they expect to pay so much less for it.
P.S. In the interests of helping you understand this topic, I would be willing drop off a loaner set of kids for you the next time I am in Florida visiting friends. They're so well behaved that some babysitters have come back.
No thanks, Old Guy. The reason I didn't have kids had nothing to do with wanting to be able to dance all night at clubs. And I don't need to "understand" the topic.
Posted by: Andrea Harris at January 9, 2006 07:47 PMBut this has gone off topic. What about Barnett? His reaction is so emotional, so excessive. I wonder what drives it. Perhaps it's the Darwinist's angst about social Darwinism.
Posted by: Alan Sullivan at January 16, 2006 02:10 PMThere's a lot that's odd about Barnett. I may have forgotten things, since it's been a year since I read his book, but I don't remember any appreciation of how messy and "experimental" the changes he hopes for will be.
To me it seems an obvious point that anyone attempting to transform nations and regions must be flexible and willing to try different things and see what works. And be prepared for setbacks, and unexpected opportunities. I don't think he's comfortable with that, and it may be a liberal thing.
He's also conspicuously uninterested in the nitty-gritty details of the very transformations he's in favor of. Of course we need broad-picture theorists, but he seems to take it to an odd extreme...
Posted by: John Weidner at January 16, 2006 04:52 PM
