See Europe's Childless Leaders Sleepwalking Us to Disaster by Giulio Meotti at Gatestone Institute. The bullet points in the teaser:
Read the entire essay HERE. Note that the essay briefly discusses Emmanuel Macron, who was elected President of France on May 7, 2017.
- As Europe's leaders have no children, they seem have no reason to worry about the future of their continent.
- "Europe today has little desire to reproduce itself, fight for itself or even take its own side in an argument". — Douglas Murray, The Times.
- "'Finding ourselves' becomes more important than building a world." — Joshua Mitchell.
Does the author have valid point as to why the West's leaders seem to have to will to ensure the survival of Western Civilization? Are there other factors that contribute to the West's apparent suicide wish?
[other essays by Giulio Meotti, the author of the essay linked in this blog post]
You answered my comment on Monday:
ReplyDeleteWhen I ponder this, I always come back to the question that "they" must know where this will lead. Buried deep in our DNA is the strand that dictates survival of the specie, that being their children. Do they not care or concern themselves with the next generation?
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteJon,
DeleteBeginning in the 1960's, looking out for Number One began to overtake the idea of looking to future generations and preserving some type of legacy for them.
Honestly, I don't believe that not having children is part of the foolish decisions these world leaders are making in finishing off their countries. And they are, that's for sure.
ReplyDeleteYou and I have no kids, AOW, and we adore America and wish we could save our students from the foolish choices their parents are making....destroying self-reliance, pride, patriotism, our economy,...etc etc etc. Right?
On a happier note, some of the students at the high school where I sub know my politics, we talk sometimes outside class, etc....and I'm amazed at how many fall for the leftwing ridiculousness BUT I'm also amazed at how many so badly want to keep America free...free from too many rules the Dems are always making, free to be proud of ourselves, free to feel safe in spite of the unbelievable foolishness of sanctuary cities and broken borders, etc.
Z,
DeleteI think that not having children increases the chances that one doesn't care deeply about the future.
Of course, teachers are parents of sorts -- in loco parentis and all that.
A strong identity as patriot per se is another component of having a stake in the future of one's nation and national culture.
At the root of lack of patriotism may well be the belief that "Western civilization is the root of all the troubles the world has today." I first became aware of that statement as an underlying philosophy of college education back in 1988, when my neighbor's son came home from college for Thanksgiving and began spouting such nonsense at the dinner table. An ugly scene, I tell you!
Well, I disagree because nobody wants the future to go bad, as far as the people I've ever met in my life, but you and this author could be right. I just don't see it.
DeleteImagine WESTERN CIV being so bad when kids are hearing the perils of ISLAM and ORIENTAL CIVILIZATION?
I just heard a Black woman on Tucker Carlson's show stand up for Maxine Waters, never seeing HER racism. The world's such a mess that I don't think parents or non-parents will have a say in if we have a future, I think we don't.
Z,
DeleteI saw the first part of that particular segment of the last night's Tucker Carlson show. I had to mute the sound. I couldn't take the insanity of what the woman was saying. Non sequitur!
The world's such a mess that I don't think parents or non-parents will have a say in if we have a future
I have to agree. Who is pulling the strings?
They must be lovin' the DINK life... ;)
ReplyDeleteSF,
ReplyDeleteI gave up worrying about this because it's not my problem and I can't do anything about it.
I'm with you there in that I no longer worry about the Islamification and resulting demographic changes of Europe. Besides, my health can no longer afford a constant state of worry.
I'm glad that I'm as old as I am and have basically dropped "the baton."
But I admit that I'm sorry that the youngest member of our extended family -- a little girl who just turned four years old last week -- will miss out on understanding and enjoying her European heritage.
SF,
ReplyDeleteUS Bans Laptops on all Flights from Europe
Sheesh.
What about Smart Phones? Will they, too, have to be banned?
"some kind of new, somewhat western-friendly Attaturk-like society emerges on the continent."
ReplyDeleteThe Attaturk who had 1.5 Armenians murdered?
the next step is removing special travel status from Europe. The gates are smashed off the hinges, the walls breached, the foundations sapped.
ReplyDeleteZ: I meant the secular aspect.
ReplyDeletePoland has refused to take in Muslim refugees and has strictly limited any Muslim immigration.
ReplyDeleteMap of terror attacks in Europe since 2012.
Although other groups are terrorist in orientation, the fact remains that Islamic terrorism still prevails over all the other types. Denial of that fact is unhelpful.
Compared to the other security measures in place on flights, banning laptops is fairly sensible. Maybe someone read https://xkcd.com/651/
ReplyDeleteIsn't irreligion growing faster even than Islam in Europe? AFAIK the EU is projected to remain <10% muslim until 2050. It looks to me as if atheists in Europe will have a larger democratic voice than muslims for longer than we can meaningfully project.
ReplyDeletesorry, meant to link an article: http://www.pewforum.org/2015/04/02/religious-projections-2010-2050/
ReplyDeleteGood one! Point is, if someone is determined to do harm, they can.
ReplyDeleteI can't stand Alex Jones, but the term "Prison Planet" sums it up.
Who makes the most noise?
ReplyDeleteAnyway, if Europeans are good with it, who am I to criticize?
What religion does Rupert Murdoch belong to?
ReplyDeleteSilverfiddle...yes, the secular aspect was better than today, even...but this man clearly didn't respect Western ethics and religions if he could do THAT.
ReplyDeleteKid,
ReplyDeleteIt really is astounding what some humans choose to believe -- even in the face of enormous evidence to the contrary.
Singing kumbaya with rattlesnakes does not work. Period. Well, except for the propagation of more rattlesnakes.
Jez,
ReplyDeletesorry, meant to link an article: http://www.pewforum.org/2015/04/02/religious-projections-2010-2050/
Broken link.
From the Gatestone Institute's essay "Emmanuel Macron, Useful Idiot of Islamism" by Yves Mamou, who worked for two decades as a journalist for Le Monde:
ReplyDelete...[Macron] does not consider Islamism a national threat because the French nation, or, as he has said, French culture, does not really exist.
Read the entire essay HERE.
You'd have thought some of our superior ethics and religion would have rubbed off on him, perhaps during the campaign at Gallipoli where he had an opportunity to observe our wisdom at close quarters.
ReplyDeleteNo excuse for genocide, but don't imagine the rest of Europe at the time was "too good" for the senseless mechanised slaughter of an entire generation of young men on a dubious pretext.
The link works for me (copy pasted). Here's something you can click on, does that work? religious demographic projections 2010-2050
Jez,
ReplyDeleteI must not have grabbed the entire link. Maybe I wasn't wearing my glasses. Anyway, I can get there now.
Projections are not set in stone. That said, based on what I have concluded on my own (without a statistical study), the trends and projections at the link seem reasonable. Thank you for the link.
You'd have thought some of our superior ethics and religion would have rubbed off on him
Often, Muslims are zealous and fatalistic -- and believe that it is their duty to execute the will of Allah. The concept of the will of Allah is much stronger than the Judeo-Christian concept of God's will. So I was told by Dr. Tawfik Hamid when I had a face-to-face meeting with him about 10 years ago.
From this essay at the Gatestone Institute:
ReplyDelete"But, as regards the reward and blessing, there is one deed which is very great in comparison to all the acts of worship and all the good deed[s] -- and that is Jihad!" — Saudi publisher's prefatory note, Jihad in the Qu'ran and Sunnah by Sheikh 'Abdullah bin Muhammad bin Humaid.
The rewards of Paradise are also promised to the observant Muslim, but the highest grades of Paradise, of which there are 100, are reserved only for those who perform jihad.
Jihad is, by all appearances, first and foremost an act of religious devotion and only secondarily an act of economic and political rebellion.
About four decades have passed since Sheikh 'Abdullah bin Muhammad bin Humaid (1908-1981), ex-Chief Justice of Saudi Arabia, published his lengthy, impassioned, essay on jihad.[1] This essay, still available on the Internet, is the only one that Saudi religious scholars chose to include with the Noble Quran -- a modern, nine volume, English translation of the Quran, which includes ancient commentary.[2]
A cursory reading of Sheikh bin Humaid's essay should forever silence any fantasies regarding traditional Islam's peaceful disposition toward the non-Muslim world.[3] As the Saudi publisher says in his prefatory note...
Read the rest at the link.
Grim.
I get all that, but citing such things is ultimately futile. You end up with people engaging in ear-bleed-inducing arguments over what the koor-ahn really says...
DeleteBy their fruits shall ye know them. Are they building up or tearing down? Adding to the society or subtracting from it? Joining in or keeping apart?
Making people feel more at ease, or causing everyone to watch their words and actions?
Assimilating and learning the culture, or forcing the hosts to learn about the newcomers' culture?
My very simple argument is that we simply should not be importing people who are offended by our culture and whose own culture is very different and often incompatible with our western liberal democracy and values.
As much as secularists and God-haters hint darkly about Christians wanting to impose a theocracy, I think we've demonstrated quite well we can handle a culture hostile to our values and blasphemous towards our God.
If people cannot, they don't belong here.
SF,
DeleteYes, it really is as simple as your argument puts forth.
:p
ReplyDelete