Civilization and Barbarism

By Free Republic | Created at 2024-12-15 14:22:30 | Updated at 2024-12-25 13:27:42 1 week ago

Civilization and Barbarism
American Thinker ^ | Lars Møller

Posted on 12/15/2024 6:03:44 AM PST by RoosterRedux

As the true scale of German war crimes committed during the 1940s eventually became known, the public response across the West was one of outrage and disbelief.

That the native country of such master spirits as Immanuel Kant, Johann W. von Goethe, and Ludwig van Beethoven could also have bred the vile Nazi mob looked like a mystery. It was such a long way from the creation of philosophy, poetry, and symphonic music, respectively, to the implementation of fake-scientific, inhumane eugenics after the seizure of power by Adolf Hitler. And the distance between good and evil became infinitely long as soon as the Nazis indulged wholesale in their emblem atrocities of the Holocaust, industrializing the sadistic orgy of genocide in the vast territories occupied by their troops.

Of course, there is no real contradiction, unless you insist on an unduly innocent (misguided) view of human nature. Since the foundation of civilization, scientific and literary masters, whose brilliant works continue to amaze and inspire us, have trodden the same places as the worst scum under the sun. The rendition of life in antiquity by artists has, as a rule, omitted the boringly prosaic in favor of romantic idealization. And as long as we are busy perfecting the institutions of civilized society, we are likely to be blinded by our own ideals and forget that perfection is impossible in this world. The truth is that barbarism — our base instinct as humans — always survives in the shadows.

...

What separates modern man from Stone Age man as a fellow human being is not his DNA, but the contingent layout of institutions determined by the cultural history of his society. From cradle to grave, they help shape his state of mind and behavior.

(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...

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1 posted on 12/15/2024 6:03:44 AM PST by RoosterRedux

To: RoosterRedux

Civilization never did quite take hold east of the Rhine.

2 posted on 12/15/2024 6:13:28 AM PST by BenLurkin (The above is not a statement of fact. It is either opinion, or satire, or both.)

To: RoosterRedux

That the native country of such master spirits as Immanuel Kant, Johann W. von Goethe, and Ludwig van Beethoven could also have bred the vile Nazi mob looked like a mystery.

Not such a mystery. America has had George Washington and Obama.

3 posted on 12/15/2024 6:15:26 AM PST by grobdriver (The CDC can KMA!)

To: RoosterRedux

The Left's obsession with Wokeness, DEI, and Marxism has shoved us back toward barbarism.

And think of the barbarism of chopping body parts of children for gender reassignment or ripping babies ready to be born from their mothers' wombs. It doesn't get any more savage than that.

4 posted on 12/15/2024 6:17:11 AM PST by RoosterRedux (Emerson (paraphrased): "If you strike at the king, don't fail." The Democrats failed. )

To: grobdriver

America has had George Washington and Obama.

Washington was born here. The long legged mack daddy wasn't.

5 posted on 12/15/2024 6:21:35 AM PST by Sirius Lee ("Never argue with a fool, onlookers may not be able to tell the difference.")

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