Hello. I’m a Russian occupier. It is my profession. Historically, it just happened. I once occupied Siberia… I once occupied the Baltic States … I once occupied Central Asia … I once occupied Ukraine … Yes, I’m an occupier, and I’m tired of apologizing for it! I’m an occupier by birthright, an aggressor and a bloodthirsty monster. Be afraid. … All and sundry came to my house: the Turks, the British, the Poles, the Germans, the French — we’ve got enough land, two and a half meters for each and every one of them! Please, understand. I don’t need your hypocritical “freedom.” I don’t need your rotten “democracy.” Everything that you call “Western values” is alien to me. I have other interests. I politely warn you for the last time: don’t mess with me. I build peace, I love peace, but I know how to fight better than anyone else… Sincerely, your Russian occupier.

You can watch the video for yourself. More than 2.3 million views so far. In Russian. Quite a ride.

Can you imagine the American version?

Hello. I’m an American settler. It is my profession. Historically, it just happened. I once occupied North America… I once occupied Alaska … I once occupied Hawaii … I once occupied Cuba … Yes, I’m an occupier, and I’m tired of apologizing for it! I’m an occupier by birthright, an aggressor and a bloodthirsty monster. Be afraid. … All and sundry came to my house: the Redskins, the British, the Mexicans, the Japanese — we’ve got enough land, two and a half meters for each and every one of them!

Mighty racist, innit?

Hello. I’m a British colonizer. It is my profession. Historically, it just happened. I once occupied India… I once occupied Australia … I once occupied Africa … I once occupied Ireland … Yes, I’m an occupier, and I’m tired of apologizing for it! I’m an occupier by birthright, an aggressor and a bloodthirsty monster. Be afraid. … All and sundry came to my house: the Romans, the Normans, the Vikings, the French, the Germans — we’ve got enough land, two and a half meters for each and every one of them!

I can hear Labour-voters crying in agony.

How did it come to this? Why do Russians celebrate their old conquests and justify them with talk of civilization and glory, but Britons and Americans couldn’t even begin to do the same without being denounced as racists, imperialists, etc.? Come to think of it, why did the latter two stop doing what the first is still doing?

Henry Dampier has commented on the differences between [Novo-] Russian and American propaganda before. Limitless American budgets can nevertheless only focus on the “you-you-you.” Join the American army — you’ll benefit. The closest to an organizing principle they can reach is “diversity.” Token black marine. Token female soldier. Token Asian paratrooper. And so forth. White males with hokey ideas about brothers-in-arms dying for the Honor of the Fatherland need not apply. It’ll be more like gender-non-conforming-individuals-in-arms twisting drone-joysticks for the Justice of the Trayvon. Not so in Russia.

Russian diversity.

Russian propaganda for the fighters in Donbass is focused on Donbass and the people protecting it — grizzly white males who like to shoot, smoke and beseech the Lord Jesus Christ. That typically Western, narcissistic, and solipsistic propaganda trend, where a cast of soft-spoken, diverse characters stand and alternately plead with and browbeat the viewer about this-or-that cause they totally stand united for but are nevertheless hopeless about solving without you, before ending with a hashtag — this particular style of propaganda has been found somewhat wanting by the Russians.

One of these Russian occupiers is worth a hundred thousand teary-eyed liberal actors with hashtags.

It goes without saying that a rejection of narcissistic slave-morality propaganda didn’t arise out of nothing. Judging by the video, the Russian view of the West is markedly dim (and rightly so). Western “democracy” means NATO interventions and Guantanamo Bay. Western “freedom” means rule by the vulgar dykes of Pussy Riot and sermons from the fatuous scatologists of Charlie Hebdo. Western “values” mean “Daddy, Papa, and Me.” Enthusiasm for this societal program is not exactly sky-high. You can tell a lot about a people by their propaganda. Russia and the West may look suspiciously similar at times, were one to take just a surface glance at something like fertility rates. And yet the trend lines couldn’t be farther apart.

It’s worth watching this video about Alexei Mozgovoy, separatist leader in Lugansk, ruling his area like a “fiefdom.” (In the West, apparently, we prefer our lawless chieftains to have titles like “Administrative Chief of the ABCDEFG” instead of “Commander.” So long as it’s a bureaucracy committing the barbarism we can call ourselves civilized, I guess.) Vice is not any less biased than any other Western media outlet, and there is a wrenching juxtaposition between how hard the video-creators want you to hate Mr. Mozgovoy and how much perfect sense he is making. Mozgovoy suggests banning women from nightclubs and cafes, and continues:

Despite their behavior, women remain women and you are not allowed to rape them. At the same time, it’s not a bad idea for a society, and for women in particular, to take some steps to raise their morals.

Simon Ostrovsky asks him what problems they have with morality. The same as you have, he responds.

For instance, those young ladies who are in their childbearing age and need to give birth, so that there is no demographic crisis and so on, instead they are ruining their bodies. What kind of mother can she be after she has ruined her body with alcohol and drugs?

Ostrovsky asks some leading questions, trying to establish Mozgovoy’s “people’s courts” as Medieval barbarisms. Ostrovsky, liberal hipster douche, scarf, glasses and all, apparently doesn’t like democracy when the Russians do it. He apparently also forgot that Mozgovoy’s “people’s courts” are the ones replacing the awful “corrupt Russian courts” Westerners wail about, which Mozgovoy points out immediately. You see, America needs to invade Ukraine (and especially Donbass) to get rid of that corrupt Russian system and replace it with a good American system, for the people! Wait, what’s happening? No, don’t let the people! organize their own courts. Stop it! Democracy is bad! I mean–wait, what?

So did uneducated sexist redneck barbarian bigot on the wrong side of history Mr. Mozgovoy execute the poor man unfairly tried by the Putin’s people’s court? Yes! Bomb Russia now! Nope. What happened to your victim, Mr. Mozgovoy?

Nothing. He is alive, but in prison. […] Even though he was sentenced to death, that does not mean that he will be executed the next day. It’s necessary to allow time for an appeal, isn’t it?

Remember that in the Land of the Free, self-defense against a protected minority will get you publicly tarred and feathered like George Zimmerman or Darren Wilson before a trial has even begun. This will put your family in danger, put a price on your head, alienate you from the ruling powers of your homeland and devastate your livelihood. Even suggesting a protected minority might not be all it’s cracked up to be will turn you into a non-person, everything but flatly murdered. People’s courts come in all shapes and sizes. At least the Russian-run ones are concerned with crime and punishment instead of social justice.

Chalk it up to different mentalities.

The post Different Mentalities appeared first on Social Matter.

“Today, project neurologists confirm this research project’s earlier hypothesis that very early in life perhaps, even in utero, Putin suffered a huge hemispheric event to the left temporal lobe of the prefrontal cortex, which involves both central and peripheral nervous systems, gross motor functioning on his right side (head, rib cage, arm and leg) and his micro facial expression, eye gaze, hearing and voice and general affect,” the report said.

Work by “autism specialists,” apparently, backs up the report’s findings. The news article takes the time to (rightly) dryly note that “researchers can’t prove their theory about Putin and Asperger’s, the report said, because they were not able to perform a brain scan on the Russian president.”

Now, dear readers, I am no psychologist. I am no psychiatrist. I do not fund Pentagon think-tanks, and I can’t say I’ve spent much time studying neurological or developmental disorders, let alone patterns of behavioral tics and their relations to psychological traits. I am, however, a currently still bipedal homo sapiens with an intelligence quotient North of 70 and useful pairs of both functioning hands and functioning testicles, so I think I am qualified to decide whether or not a major world leader who is:

1. “The Most Badass Leader in the World” according to Business Insider.

2. “The World’s Craziest Badass” according to Cracked.com.

3. “Terrific, Triumphant, All Good, Totally Badass” according to Foreign Policy magazine.

4. “The Richest Man On Earth” according to Bloomberg.

5. “The Most Powerful Man in the World” according to Forbes.

…is also in possession of any deep-rooted anti-social mental disorders.

Here are the official United States government National Institutes of Health factsheets on autism and Asperger’s syndrome, which you may peruse to your heart’s content. Let’s take a look at the factsheets and see how they compare to Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin’s very public behavior and history.

Autistic children have difficulties with social interaction, display problems with verbal and nonverbal communication, and exhibit repetitive behaviors or narrow, obsessive interests.

Asperger syndrome (AS) is a developmental disorder.  It is an autism spectrum disorder (ASD), one of a distinct group of neurological conditions characterized by a greater or lesser degree of impairment in language and communication skills, as well as repetitive or restrictive patterns of thought and behavior. 

You can click on Link #1 above for 39 photos of Vladimir Putin displaying highly un-obsessive and un-narrow interests, ranging from motorbiking to piano. The same set of pictures makes me doubt whether President Putin has any inherent difficulties with communication or social interaction, considering he can be seen successfully interacting with little boys in martial arts costume, little girls in tea-party costume, other world leaders in very serious grown-up costume, Russian outlaw biker gang leaders, sleeping tigers, horses, baby birds, giant fish and polar bears. In fact, judging by the amount of wild animals Putin is seen hunting, comforting, riding, putting down or knowingly glaring at, it might be inferred that he actually possesses better social skills than the rest of us, confined as we are to mere human-to-human social interactions. By the way, for reference, here’s a picture of the Russian outlaw biker gang leader smiling at Putin like a virginal maiden might smile at her deflowerer:

Wonder what Heartiste would have to say about this.

Speaking of deflowering, Vladimir Putin also happens to be the father of two daughters with his ex-wife, who has by now long ceded the spotlight to Putin’s rumored younger conquests. I will spare the details, since you can easily Google “putin luv life.” Putin also happens to be — as if it actually bears repeating — the three-term President and (by progressive standards) tyrannical dictator of the biggest country and largest nuclear power on the planet. This power, by the way, is currently flouting the established unipolar geopolitical world order with the United States government at the helm, to the great chagrin of pale bespectacled hermaphrodites all over the West. To add insult to injury, this power is succeeding at it too, in no small part thanks to President Putin’s wily statesmanship. I am doubtful that it is possible to reach and maintain this position of Putin’s, especially after surviving a career in the brutal Soviet security services (the KGB), without possessing social skills that are — at a minimum — not fundamentally crippled.

Here’s a video of that old dog Vladimir singing ‘Blueberry Hill’ to a live television audience. I would question deeply how many of the researchers mysteriously discovering new mental disorders in Putin would be able to imitate Putin’s performance, from the singing-in-a-foreign-language part to the singing-publicly-on-television-in-front-of-millions-of-judging-people part.

But of course, the point was never about whether or not Vladimir Putin is actually mentally disordered or not. Taken at face value, it would be a damning fact that the defense apparatus of the United States government doled out money to hucksters claiming that the most ruthless, calculating, successful and powerful men on the planet are in fact secretly shivering nerds incapable of communicating with other human beings. The characterization of President Putin as a sufferer of Asperger’s syndrome is the final proof yours truly needs that the Western government-psychiatric complex — and I include the government- part because the institutions have become practically inseparable at this point — is full of charlatans spewing complete and utter hogwash for easy government grants. If their mad prescriptions will result in a populace addicted to anti-depressant chemicals, blatantly false assessments of dangerous foreign leaders, and self-mutilating leftists standing as examples of health and normalcy to the populace at large — so be it! So much the worse for society: the God of Science(tm) has spoken, through his archangel Psychology(tm). The joke, in the end, is that the real mentally disordered are not in the Kremlin, but in the Pentagon and its think-tanks itself.

Gary Brecher, the War Nerd, writes an excruciating column on the American defense industry’s transparent focus on expensive power fantasies to the detriment of actual national defense. His examples primarily stem from the air defense industry, but the situation in intelligence and psychological warfare is undoubtedly similar. There is little incentive for cosmopolitan psychologists and psychiatrists receiving multi-million dollar grants from cosmopolitan careerists at the Pentagon to study foreign leaders to actually develop truthful and applicable recommendations and conclusions — this would just reduce the need for more “studies,” for more multi-million dollar grants. Because, you see, “…this is all about money, and [has] nothing to do with defense.” To the undoubted eventual horror of the cosmopolitans, the same just might not be true for the Autist in the Kremlin.

The post Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin: Autist appeared first on Social Matter.

These days, I am far more skeptical.

A once great nation, undone by decadence and burgers.

To be clear, the data points which these predictions are based on put America in a pretty bad place. Yes, the debt is out of control. Expansion of welfare and warfare have destroyed America’s finances and reputation alike. Its governors govern badly. Its weary military “advises” even wearier troops against ISIS members with fire in their hearts and suicide vests over them. Despite this, Iran still gets held at arms length. At the same time it is getting challenged by Russia politically and China economically. Over-regulation at home, overextension abroad, and badly managed spending in all spheres.

But here’s the other side of the story. Whatever the ultimate fate of the USD and its global status, the United States still has tremendous wealth in its borders. Its population is over three hundred million, compared to China and India with over a billion each, but its economy is still among the biggest in the world and for now second only to China. Within its borders lie both natural resource wealth and technical specialization. New York’s economy is the size of Australia’s, and even poor, ruinous Detroit stands alongside Ireland. That sort of wealth doesn’t vanish in a puff of smoke if the USD collapses entirely. Even in a global economy where business can be outsourced across countries, the USA makes up a huge fraction of both production and consumption. It’s also a hub for service industries like consulting, marketing, advertising, finance, and law.

Abroad, the idea that America is in an across-the-board decline is also untrue. The disastrous Middle Eastern conflicts have drawn a lot of the world’s attention. Doubtless, the idea that you could overthrow a couple of dictators and eventually turn the region into Massachusetts plus minarets was an insane one. The American consensus is also being challenged in Ukraine by Russia and in the Asian and African spheres by China. But there is another side to this story. The countries which make up China’s backyard are not pleased to see its shadow falling over them. Some of Asia’s other growing economies would prefer America to have their backs. The US recently renewed its military commitments to the Philippines and Japan and is increasing its presence in the former. Other affected countries include Vietnam, Malaysia, and of course Taiwan.

This situation is very different from the Middle East. We are looking at political back and forth between growing economies with fairly stable states. There could be unforeseen circumstances: perhaps a demagogue will feed the flames of war following some crisis. For the time being, a full scale war between powers in the Asian region seems unlikely. That being so, America has an interest is maintaining close relations with those countries which will increasingly become its economic partners in the Asia-Pacific region. India’s alignment is still undetermined, but everyone has a stake in its future development. That’s why Prime Minister Modi is getting superstar treatment.

The rise of China may also cause other countries to reconsider their position. As China increases its African investments, the honeymoon will begin to fade and the realities of clashing cultures and interests will set in. While it is doubtless that China will become a political force on the continent, it may well be that some countries will play a double game or even favour American and Western investors who give them a better deal. From Asia to Africa, Brand America will remain a strong one.

All in all, I expect to see three major trends:

First, many Americans will find themselves interacting less with the US Federal Government (USG) on a regular basis. This will occur as the USG is finally forced to restructure failed programs like urban renewal and likely the current social security model. The private sector will continue moving in to repair government failures in areas from transport to education. Bankrupt Detroit is a prime example. Businesses are coming to its downtown core, the population of which is economically and demographically distinct from the rest of the city. The gentrifiers follow with their demands for security, good schools, and better governance, and with the means and willpower to make it happen. Many USG programs may return to state and even local levels after a long trend of federalization. Colorado and co are taking action on marijuana laws, and the South is attracting investment capital and domestic migrants sick of blue state taxes and regulation. Cities in said blue states may find creating their own charters to be a way to attract domestic migrants with initiative, brains, and ambition. As competition intensifies, it will make less sense to apply large programs across the whole country.

Second, the frontiers of American influence abroad will indeed morph and shrink. The world will become more multipolar as China and Russia try to stake out their own spheres of influence. Iran may act as a game changer for Shia Muslims in the Middle East. America and other Western countries will need to give resource-rich countries better deals. On this, the narrative of decline does have many of its facts straight, if not all of its derived predictions.

However (and thirdly), America may find itself actually exercising greater influence in those countries which choose to remain in its sphere. With the reality of China right next door, the US may be able to act more unilaterally to secure trade deals, military contracts, and political favours in Japan or the Philippines. This relationship will be especially important in the African countries.

In summary, I expect the America of the next generation to be one characterized by both stabilizing global power and a reduced, restructured domestic USG role. This is not contradictory. In fact, this is what the America of the Founding Fathers actually looked like. The average American pioneer might barely interact with the same USG that was waging successive wars against North African pirate kingdoms. The Presidents who conducted these wars? None other than one Thomas Jefferson and a certain James Madison. To view these changes as the end of America is naive. Perhaps unsurprisingly, one notices that the purported hard-headed realism of American Demise so often seems to complement the political wet dreams of its proponents.

The post Don’t Get Too Bearish On America appeared first on Social Matter.

Dr. Zhang Weiwei

Al-Jazeera English’s Head to Head program recently featured a debate with Dr. Zhang Weiwei, renowned expert on the Chinese model of development and professor of international relations. It’s not the strongest of debates; AJE host Mehdi Hasan leaps from point to point and doesn’t grant Weiwei much opportunity to address the worldview and grand strategy of the Chinese State. As a result, Weiwei comes off looking weak at points. I’d encourage watching it anyway in addition to Eric Li’s fuller exploration of these topics. Hasan also seems to assume that the results of Chinese democracy would be good and desirable ones, ignoring that anti-Japanese and pro-expansionist nationalism would likely increase.

The problem is that Hasan attempts to frame the debate in a way which looks at China as operating almost in a vacuum, ignoring the fact that China has an entirely different culture and is in the process of transitioning from a brutal Communist system. We don’t consider Maoism as particularly relevant to the modern day, but a system which killed 40-70 million people cannot be overcome in the single generation of reform since 1978. It’s unsurprising that the West, with its increasing political time-preference, has trouble seeing this. Martin Jacques, the British academic and journalist, pointed out during the debate that no Western country had liberal democracy in the sense that Hasan articulates (universal sufferage, total freedom of the press, electoral rights and rule of law) during our own period of industrialization. I think this comment strikes at the far more interesting question which Hasan ignores.

Given that both China and the West are encountering periods of dramatic economic, social, demographic, and political transformation, which system has the greater potential to a) create long-term solutions for existing problems, and b) reform itself as necessary? A lot of political debate focuses on the question of what system or ideology is “better”: more democratic, more stable, and so on. The problem with this is that the world is a flux. Policies and entire political systems become discarded as new information comes in. The West again has trouble understanding this because all our reforms over the past few centuries have been in the direction of greater liberal democracy. But across the Eurasian sphere from the former USSR to China itself, a huge segment of humanity has experienced what happens when ideologies have a static idea of a “perfect system“, rather than structuring themselves so that new information will continually improve them.

Totalitarian practices arise when states are terrified of new information, and don’t even require the state ideology to be inherently totalitarian. Communist states once suppressed economic information showing that market systems were more productive, even when this was self-evident to the population (such as in East Germany). Theocracies suppress information which could challenge religious orthodoxy. German physicist Philipp Lenard attempted to marginalize Relativity on ethnic rather than scientific grounds – ironically, the Nazis ended up rejecting this claim because of its sheer ridiculousness. Progressive ideologues are increasingly coming to terms with the idea they don’t fucking love all science. In essence, totalitarianism is a sign of increased fragility.

This is actually one of the arguments for liberal democracy. Ideally, a liberal democratic state exists only to protect the rights of all citizens, and leaves them otherwise free to vote how they will based on their values and beliefs. Because the rights of citizens are sacrosanct, the state cannot avoid uncomfortable information. Of course, we can see today that this isn’t at all how things work out. States which begin as liberal, democratic ones end up being captured by special interests as much as any other system. Its system of rights makes it exceptionally ripe for entryist strategies employed by private and ideological agents. Policy is not passed on the basis of true information, but on what the populace believes to be true information. Rent seeking increases as parts of the population can vote themselves some portion of wealth. The saving grace of liberal democracy is that rights to free speech still exist to a far enough extent that we may be able to overcome these structural weaknesses. For now, anyway.

“Virtually all the candidates for the Standing Committee of the Party, China’s highest decision-making body, have served at least twice as a party secretary of a Chinese province or at similar managerial positions. It takes extraordinary talent and skills to govern a typical Chinese province, which is on average the size of four to five European states. Indeed, with the Chinese system of meritocracy in place, it is inconceivable that people as weak and incompetent as George W. Bush or Yoshihiko Noda of Japan could ever get to the top leadership position.” – Dr. Zhang Weiwei

China’s defenders portray the Chinese model as being based on a meritocratic approach to governance and a low-time preference “civilizational state” appropriate to Chinese culture and history. This applies to Chinese business as well as government. The Economist describes a focus on speed as being vital to the Chinese model of management. China is skilled at carefully selecting aspects of Western strategies and technologies which it believes to be appropriate. Companies begin selling quickly (skipping the Western norm of beta testing) and then rapidly incorporating market feedback in order to improve the product. The goal is not to out-innovate the West, because China realizes that this is not as yet possible. Its strength is its huge resource base, and so it focuses on “accelerated development” instead. Presumably, it will begin to shift toward innovation as it increases its human capital base. This may help us explain the phenomenon of ghost cities in China. The model is wasteful on the one hand as resources may be pumped into enterprises which yield losses. But it’s also geared towards increased antifragility, since China is willing to bear the brunt of losses in order to strengthen its long-term development. This is only possible with China’s system of government, in which politicians cannot attempt to overthrow the government for every short-term loss. Examining how China improves this technique to decrease its wastefulness will be something to look at in future.

Overall, China’s model of governance more closely approximates how large private corporations operate (don’t let the apparent waste throw you off – Silicon Valley gets similar criticism). In a competitive market, firms must minimize waste and optimize development if they want to maintain their customers. This applies to firms with high market power as well as ones without. Like corporations, China must deal with corruption, human error, short-term biases, and so on. But because China is currently competing against both developed countries like the US and developing ones like Brazil or India, it also faces similar competitive pressures in how it governs the country. The West has not faced such pressures from outside its own region for a long, long time – perhaps not since before the colonial era. As China and other countries shift economic and political power away from the West, our own governmental structures will no longer enjoy the luxuries of wasting resources because of ideological impotency. This goes beyond questions of economic policy. Foreign policy and our approach to demographic issues will also change. Conservatives who howl against President Obama’s sensible approach to Cuba will join progressives who think that evolution no longer matters on the dust-heap of history.

My argument here is not that the Chinese model is a perfect model. The moment a perfect model is discovered, a new crisis will return it to imperfection, and the Chinese model may soon face its first major test. The question is which model is better equipped to respond to our rapidly shifting economic, social, and technological conditions. Which will take a more long-term approach in planning? Which will maintain stability through crises without stifling dynamism and innovation? At this moment in time, China is adjusting their ideology to deal with the new reality. The West is largely trying to ignore the new reality in order to protect its ideological biases. It’s not hard to see which one is more fragile and less effective.

Of course, the West will continue to produce massive wealth and the Western powers will continue to be major contenders for a long time coming. But let’s not be deceived into thinking that we built that. The economic and political position of the West is largely the result of previous generations. The current management is taking some steps to maintain that, such as making us more energy independent. But our ideologies are dangerously undermining us. The conservative base still thinks that talking about how awesome the US is will make it true. The progressive base is stuck in the same old rut of wanting increased welfare benefits while undermining economic incentives and social cohesion. Europe is already challenging this establishment. The barbarians reach the peripheries first.

Meanwhile, China views the whole thing from the perspective of practical businessmen. They continue to learn from others while adapting it to their own context. They reach their hands out to those who want to work with them. They are increasing pressure against their political and economic competitors. In the words of Dr. Zhang Weiwei:

“If you think our model is good, you can learn from us. If you think our model is not good, we don’t care.”

The post Political Antifragility: China and the West appeared first on Social Matter.

All three walked quickly. They maintained a nervous gait, as if trying to angrily injure the ground with each step. Hands in pockets, their backpacks hoisted high and tight so that they were leaning inwards. Their eyes never met mine, because their peculiar postures kept their lines of sight directed firmly downwards two meters ahead of them. All three had white earphones firmly implanted into their heads. All three became separate again as quickly as they had become close.

For a moment as they walked away, I felt as if I had witnessed something of supreme importance, even though I didn’t know what it was. Breath firmly bated, balanced somewhere between contemplation and bewilderment, I then finally exhaled a knowing chuckle: I had just witnessed social alienation!

Exhortations on the dangers of social alienation (or atomization, or isolation, if you prefer), are hardly limited to the Right. Slate, among other things, relates a statistic that “loneliness” has doubled among Americans since the 1980’s. The Los Angeles Times says “People who are socially isolated are more likely to die prematurely, regardless of their underlying health issues…” Social alienation – the term I will stick with – is hardly an invented problem for traditionalists and Luddites, yet its manifestations are poorly articulated by the secular clerisy and its implications even more poorly.

The most recent vogue seems to be to describe problems of social alienation in relation to, or as a result of, social media and technological advances. The Slate writer in the previously linked piece only implicates new technologies as causes of social alienation. Her personal anecdote about loneliness begins with a coast-to-coast relocation, but she doesn’t overtly identify her move as a culprit. It is easy to see why technology attracts the most blame – throw a stone through Times Square and you’re more likely to break someone’s iPhone than someone’s skull (at least, you’ll break both).

Yet technology alone cannot be blamed for social alienation – iPhones and Facebook accounts do not force themselves on unsuspecting socially integrated people in the middle of the night in a dark alleyway (or frat-house, for the feminists out there). The three atomized individuals who passed by me and my street corner made a conscious choice before they began their journeys across town not to care for the bustle and noise of their homes and fellow citizens. If a fellow citizen was whistling holiday tunes, they would not know. If songbirds sang today, they would not know. If a cry for help rang out from behind a building, they would not know. Since they had made a conscious decision to notice nothing but their feet and the two meters of pavement in front of them, they would hardly know anything about their surroundings at all. Ought one not feel a chill realizing that pop music might get in the way of rescue after an accident or attack?

Where does one typically shove in the earphones and ignore reality? On airplanes? Public transport? Yours truly, who strives to be socially integrated rather than alienated, typically only turns on the iPod on international flights, surrounded by cranky foreigners. I recall one particularly interesting transatlantic flight, wherein I was sandwiched between a number of uniformed American soldiers returning from Iraq on one side, and a number of bearded Muslim scholars of some sort attired in traditional Islamic garb on the other. Yes, in such a situation, I would imagine the healthy response to be alienating oneself from the particular social situation, and inputting the earphones. Yet what does it say about Western society, then, that self-imposed isolation by technology, even while in public, is the norm? Frankly, it says that the average Westerner has come to expect to meet cranky foreigners in daily life outside the home.

I see the roots of social alienation in the political policies enacted by government functionaries steeped in the ideologies of materialism, globalism, internationalism, secularism and socialism. From small Italian city centres swarming with Bangladeshi families to sprawling German cities filled with loitering Africans, the doctrines of diversity, multiculturalism and mass immigration have never been proven so harmful yet been so devoutly implemented anyway. While the precise source escapes me, I recall one German identitarian remarking that, above everything, what bothered him most about immigrants was how loud they were compared to Germans – boomboxes, shouting matches, loud conversations; all these disrupted the rhythmic lulls of native German life. In such a situation, why not atomize? Choice of music in, “vibrant” “multicultural” life out. This has become the default situation, seemingly, from Seattle to Stuttgart.

International industrial capitalism certainly plays a role too – the modern world is unique in the way it prompts people to move from city to city, or even country to country, in search of a paycheck. A growing class of rootless cosmopolitans certainly doesn’t positively affect the average social alienation of a society. Yet, the most flagrant gestures of inward, anti-social movement do not stem from periodic relocation. It is not just that citizens fail to invest money in their local communities, or fail to establish long-term clubs or businesses or relationships due to their nomadic modern lifestyles. Rather, they have opted not to invest even their eyes or ears in their surroundings. Modernity has turned the public sphere into a 3:00am Bangkok—Kabul flight with a crappy airline, and the Cathedral reassures us this is a great improvement on our societies of old.

On a recent trip to Germany, I spent an afternoon exploring the streets of my hotel neighborhood and killing time in the cafés and bars therein. In the few free hours I had, I remember noticing an animated Greek couple, an angry Serb yelling into a mobile phone, a visibly intoxicated (and possibly retarded) Russian, a Turkish kebab vendor who couldn’t affect a German “r,” and a surly blonde German waitress, covered in tattoos, who served me my coffee. (The café bathroom had an ANTIFA sticker on the door). The stream of native Germans, whom I passed on the street, silent and unobtrusive, failed to make an impression on me. I can’t remember how many of them wore earphones.

The post Thy Name is Social Alienation appeared first on Social Matter.