The world is a sewer

[Argus]

I've been called arrogant before - with cause. But I prefer to think of myself as simply having high standards.

Those who have read me here before will find it less than surprising that I do not favour immigration from most of the world. I dissaprove of most of the world, its people, their cultural values, behaviour and often appalling lack of sophistication, culture and care in the well-being of their fellows.

The ludicrous sight of rioting Muslims from Nigeria to Libya, from Pakistan to Syria, only serves to reinforce my view that, by and large, the world is populated by savages who, aside from a few creature comforts derived from the West, would be culturally and intellectually right at home in the world of a thousand years ago.

They aren't alone, however. Be it the stunning scope of tyranny in nations like North Korea, and their idol worship of their demented god leader, the brutal hypocrisy and corruption of China, the ignorance, violence and bigotry of the Africans (they still burn witches, you know), or the swaggering machismo of the violent and corrupt Latins, the world seems to be, with a few exceptions, a great big old sewer

And please don't bore me with tales of how mean and nasty the Americans are. No one is perfect - Anyone familar with the French knows that - but the Americans, as a people are centuries more socially advanced than the likes of the Arabs, Africans or Latins.

What brings about today's jaundiced complaint? A story from today's Star on the torture slayings of women in Mexico. An obscure point, you might think. But to me, the story resonates with my image of what one might call the barbarian hordes out beyond our borders. It's the story of massive numbers of torture and sex slayings in Chihuhaha province, and the lack of care of the authorities. It's a story which is impossible in a Western country.

The murdered women of Juarez

Add in the near daily riots from the bug-eyed crazies all across the Muslim world, the latest military parade the chubby little tyrant-god of North Korea held before his starving people, and the fact bird flu has been spreading across Nigeria - thousands of birds dying in the last month - without anyone really doing anything about it because, well, it's Africa, you know, and we can't expect much.

Why is most of the world such a sewer? And why does it not seem to be getting much better? The people of Canada and the West are undeniably more sophisticated and culturally enlightened today than they were a half century ago. Can the same be said for most of the rest of the world? Are Africans still going to be burning witches and Muslims stoning suspected fornicators while the West is flying starships out past Alpha Centauri?

[theloniusfleabag]

Dear Argus,

You are not exactly wrong, but...

I dissaprove of most of the world, its people, their cultural values, behaviour and often appalling lack of sophistication, culture and care in the well-being of their fellows.

Much of what this says is based on ignorance (which I share, to a large degree) as concern for fellow beings is sometimes greater elsewhere. It too, though is waning, as 'western culture' pervades it. In my liquor pusher's hometown, for example, (in India), he said he remembered when no one locked their door, and if a neighbourhood kid appeared at the door you invited them in and fed them. He says much of this is gone now, but India used to be a much more caring and open society. I suppose he sees the same things you do, and laments their loss.

the world is populated by savages who, aside from a few creature comforts derived from the West, would be culturally and intellectually right at home in the world of a thousand years ago.

Most of our moral standards, even in the west, predate 1000 years ago, and we still haven't got it right.

You are correct, though, that superstition and base aggression haven't changed either, and most atrocities against other humans occur in other parts of the world.

How can this be addressed? I, for one, think more openness is needed, more freedom and less borders...but this is against 'free enterprise' and capitalist notions...we feel the need to demarcate what we have.

[Black Dog]

It's a story which is impossible in a Western country.

Ahem.

[Argus]

It's a story which is impossible in a Western country.

Ahem.

Oh please. Prostitutes going missing are not quite the same thing as hundreds of bodies turning up grossly mutiliated. And I don't recall hearing many people in charge in BC dismissing it all as unimportant, or journalists who investigated it winding up dead.

[Riverwind]

And I don't recall hearing many people in charge in BC dismissing it all as unimportant.

Pickton was able to get with murder for years because the police did not take the reports of disappearing prostitutes seriously - so at one level they showed the same contempt for women as the Mexican police. However, I do believe the Vancouver police would be falling over each to find the culprit if multilated bodies acutally showed up in the streets like in Mexico. So at that level there is no comparison between Pickton and the case in Mexico.

[Black Dog]

Oh please. Prostitutes going missing are not quite the same thing as hundreds of bodies turning up grossly mutiliated.

What about prostitutes going missing and turning up in pieces (and possiblby fed to pigs)? ANd as for how many, well, we may never now.

And I don't recall hearing many people in charge in BC dismissing it all as unimportant, or journalists who investigated it winding up dead.

Rebecca Guno, a drug addict and prostitute, vanished from Vancouver's downtown eastside in June 1983. Her name was the first of 61 that would eventually be placed on the list of women to disappear mysteriously from the drug-infested area over the two decades that followed.

Twnety years and no action by authorities. Why? Because they were prostitutes. Now, is that to say western culture is the same as the culture which fosters the killings in Juarez? No. But let's not delude ourselves into thinking we are above monstrosities. After all, it was the enlightened West that spawned the Holocaust, the benchmark for inhumanity and horror.

[Argus]

Rebecca Guno, a drug addict and prostitute, vanished from Vancouver's downtown eastside in June 1983. Her name was the first of 61 that would eventually be placed on the list of women to disappear mysteriously from the drug-infested area over the two decades that followed.

Twnety years and no action by authorities. Why? Because they were prostitutes. Now, is that to say western culture is the same as the culture which fosters the killings in Juarez? No. But let's not delude ourselves into thinking we are above monstrosities. After all, it was the enlightened West that spawned the Holocaust, the benchmark for inhumanity and horror.

Okay, first, the Holocaust is the "benchmark" for inhumanity only because most of you don't know anything about history. If you really want to see the benchmarks for inhumanity look to Asia, or for that matter, the Indian subcontinent during the Muslim conquests and colonial period. You might also look up the actions of the Mongols sometime, as they swept across Asia and the middle east.

A few dozen prostitutes disappearing (and how do you even establish a prostitute has disappeared anyway?) over twenty years - that's not like hundreds turning up in a year or two. In other words, it was easy to suggest that many of them simply moved onto new hunting grounds, or got out of the business, or overdosed somewhere, or yes, a few died at the hands of their clients - something long a part of the business. I'm not saying the police investigate such things as closely as they would if they were more "respectable" but the degree of unconcern can't possibly be compared to what has been going on in Juarez.

[BubberMiley]

"Canadian suspects sought in Mexican killings: reports"

[theloniusfleabag]

Dear Argus,

because most of you don't know anything about history. If you really want to see the benchmarks for inhumanity look to Asia, or for that matter, the Indian subcontinent during the Muslim conquests and colonial period. You might also look up the actions of the Mongols sometime, as they swept across Asia and the middle east.

Argus, Argus, Argus....what of the Spaniards and Portugese virtually depopulating and pillaging South America? The Japanese in WWII were arguably worse than the Nazis, and at least the Mongol hordes didn't try to pretend that they were 'religious and enlightened'. Virtually all of the 'western, civilized cultures' were engaged in the African slave trade.

History is rife with barbarism, and you are absolutely right that we still see it today, and in some places more than others.

I think the saddest part is that, aside from technological advances, humans haven't learned new or constructive (philisophically) ways to get along since Plato, Confucius or Buddha.

[August1991]

Okay, first, the Holocaust is the "benchmark" for inhumanity only because most of you don't know anything about history.

Let me weigh in on this remark with my two cents.

First Argus, I understand your point. And BD, I understand what you mean about Pickton.

Argus, what is civilized? How is it defined?

Europeans are considered to be sophisticated and civilized. Really? European history is one of astonishing brutality and violence. As recently as 10 years or so ago, Europeans were killing each other in a Civil War (Yugoslavia) while other Europeans (German, French) did nothing.

I grew up in Canada and still in my teens, I first travelled abroad (Europe and Africa) alone with little money. On my first travel abroad, and on later travels, I was astonished to learn that the rest of the world was racist. I now understand this to mean "superstition", or a lack of critical thought. I have further understood this to mean ordinary people's inability to be themselves freely.

IMV, North Americans in general assume too often that individuals elsewhere live as any individuals anywhere. They don't. At the same time, North Americans in general assume too often that society elsewhere is worse than in North America. That's false.

----

Argus, I am Canadian but I am pro-American. Your post is timely. We live in a world of failed States, societies where individuals are not free to be.

Fukuyama was right that this is the End of History: the answer is obvious. (The answer is society in which individuals are free to be.) Yet the solution is far from obvious. (How do we create such a society?)

Rather than be pessimistic, let me be optimistic. About 100 years ago, few places in the world (if any) allowed individuals to be free. Now, there are many.

[Black Dog]

Okay, first, the Holocaust is the "benchmark" for inhumanity only because most of you don't know anything about history. If you really want to see the benchmarks for inhumanity look to Asia, or for that matter, the Indian subcontinent during the Muslim conquests and colonial period. You might also look up the actions of the Mongols sometime, as they swept across Asia and the middle east.

Apparently, I'm not the one in need of the history lesson.

You might want to throw in the genocide of North America's native population. Oops! Doesn't fit in with your "Enlightened Whitey" theory. Obviously, wholesale slaughter and conquest is nothing new (nor is it restricted to the brown people you loathe so much). But the reason I cite the Holocaust as the benchmark for inhuimanity is because it represented the first time that modern technology and Industrial Age principles were applied to the singular purpose of wiping out an entire population. The degree of calculation, planning and organization involved is what makes it so much more chilling and horrific than any primitive rampage.

August:

Rather than be pessimistic, let me be optimistic. About 100 years ago, few places in the world (if any) allowed individuals to be free. Now, there are many.

I could revisit my old signature from Samuel "Clash of Civilizations" Huntington about how the west won the world not by the superiority of its ideas or values or religion but by its superiority in applying organized violence (again, the conquest of North America and the subjugation of the rest of the world offer many examples), but I'll take your point a sit stands. It's a good one. The point Argus misses is that the ideas that make the west such a shining example of civilization are very, very new and are products of a certain time and a certain place. The fact is, we're ahead of the game because we invented the game. If you lok around the world today, there's fewer wars, fewer genocides, and far more freedom than at any othe rtime in human history. Obviously, we're not there yet, but the remarkable progress humanity has made certainly defies Argus' xenophobic pessemism.

[Argus]

"Canadian suspects sought in Mexican killings: reports"

Are they Canadian-Canadian, or something-else-Canadian?

[geoffrey]

"Canadian suspects sought in Mexican killings: reports"

Are they Canadian-Canadian, or something-else-Canadian?

They have no idea. Just that it was a professional hit. Chances are both parties were up to no good.

[Argus]

Dear Argus,

because most of you don't know anything about history. If you really want to see the benchmarks for inhumanity look to Asia, or for that matter, the Indian subcontinent during the Muslim conquests and colonial period. You might also look up the actions of the Mongols sometime, as they swept across Asia and the middle east.

Argus, Argus, Argus....what of the Spaniards and Portugese virtually depopulating and pillaging South America?

Muslim conquests of India

The Japanese in WWII were arguably worse than the Nazis, and at least the Mongol hordes didn't try to pretend that they were 'religious and enlightened'. Virtually all of the 'western, civilized cultures' were engaged in the African slave trade.

But at least they learned better. It's not clear Muslims have. Slavery is still practiced in parts of the Muslim world. And the entire Muslim world appears to be standing shoulder to shoulder in solidarity with Sudan and its brutality towards Black Africans.

History is rife with barbarism, and you are absolutely right that we still see it today, and in some places more than others.

Indeed. My problem with Muslims - and not just radicals - is that it is not clear that the Muslim world could not produce hundreds of thousands, perhaps even millions of fanatics for jihad who would engage in the same brutality their ancestors did in advancing Islam in its first thousands years. I can't imagine you could get hundreds of thousands of Christian fanatics together for another crusade, but from what we see and read about the Muslim world, it would not be particularly difficult to find a few million Muslim zealots who, if they thought they had a chance to succeed, would attack "infidel" countries in an attempt to spread Islam.

A few interesting thoughts on Islam today from a Hindu.

Faith Freedom