Not the most uplifting piece you are going to read this week as the author, David Solway, is reflecting on the decline and probable collapse of Western civilization.

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Nothing is too big to fail, including civilizations, and ours is no exception. The decline of the West is historically inevitable, subject to the universal principle of entropy that functions on every plane of natural existence, including the cultural. The agencies by which it works on this level are readily isolated: the endemic vices and pathologies of human nature (greed, resentment, hatred, envy, sloth); the tendency to take for granted the benefits, rights and privileges that have been painfully won in the past and gradually squandered in the present; the eclipse of historical memory and the concomitant exhaustion of mental vigilance. Whether decline can be retarded is, of course, an open question, but one thing is certain: pushback is futile absent the recognition of the symptoms of decay.

Perhaps the most evident sign of civilizational devolution is the inability or unwillingness to acknowledge reality, to come to terms with things as they are, and to oppose the suppression of objectivity and its substitution by fantasy, illusion and wish-fulfillment.

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Herewith some of the signs Westeners (us) are denying what is real.

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•Biological sexual differentiation must yield to voluntary gender identity.

•A cooling climate is obviously warming.

•The demonstrable failure of socialism wherever it has been tried is proof that it has not been properly implemented.

•Democratic Israel is an apartheid state.

•Islam with its record of unstinting bloodshed is a religion of peace.

•Illegal immigrants are undocumented workers.

•Terrorism is workplace violence.

•A child in the womb is a mass of insensible protoplasm.

•The killing of the old and the ill is merciful, even when the recipient of such tender concern is not consulted.

•There is no such thing as truth, an axiom regarded as true.

•Green energy is a social and economic good irrespective of crony profiteering, exorbitant cost, wildlife devastation, and unworkability in its present state.

•Storms, earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, floods, tsunamis and mortality itself are natural phenomena, but Nature, which cares nothing for human life, is nonetheless sacred, vulnerable and at the mercy of human indifference

Women are disadvantaged in the workforce, academia and society at large despite the fact that high-end hiring practices, legal judgments, custody protocols and university appointments, as well as student enrollment, wholly favor women to the detriment of men.

•An enemy is a friend.

•Criminality is innocence.

•Losing is winning.

•Prosperity is avarice.

•Redistributing wealth, i.e., robbing the affluent and productive, is a form of compassion and basic justice.

•Those who claim victim status are always credible.

•Accumulating debt is an economic stimulus.

•Big government is a boon to mankind.

•War is passé (so 19th century).

•Diplomacy and talk—the higher Twitter—will prevail over barbarism.

•The most gynocentric society ever created is a rape culture.

•Palestine is a historically legitimate nation.

•Uniformity of thought and action equals cultural diversity.

•An exploded lie merely confirms what it lies about (e.g., Rigoberta Menchu).

•Morality is relative.

•Merit is an unearned distinction.

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Orwell would be proud.

Given the prevailing cultural atmosphere does the author see any hope? He concludes:

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Notwithstanding, perhaps in the long run the only way to beat the cultural odds is to let the culture crash of its own accord, as it most likely will, and hope against hope that a viable replacement, a new and better form of civilized life, will rise Phoenix-like from the ashes. A melancholy calculation indeed.

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https://pjmedia.com/blog/a-melancholy-ca...singlepage=true

From the "Well, it COULD have happened this way" Files:

Back in the 60's, science fiction movies and TV shows (like the Twilight Zone) were popular. A common theme was "what would life be like in the future - say, 50 years from now?" What would civilization look like? Would it even survive?

Would mankind wipe himself out in an all out atomic war? Would we be invaded by space aliens?

In that vein, back in 1966 a movie producer went to some financial backers to float an idea for a movie that would be set in the far-off year of 2016.

"So give us a quick synopsis of your movie, and we'll discuss whether or not we want to back it", the producer was told.

PRODUCER: "Well, my movie is set in the United States in the year 2016. My movie is different from most movies being made now, because in mine, somehow we've avoided WWIII and all out nuclear warfare."
BACKERS: "Intriguing. Go on . . . "
PRODUCER: "There have been wars though."
BACKERS: "Probably because of the Soviet Union, right?"
PRODUCER: "Actually, no. The USSR fails in the late 80s, and by '92 it's not around any more . . ."
BACKERS: "that's not believable. You've got to have SOME credibility even though this is science fiction. But ok. No USSR. So who's causing the wars?"
PRODUCER: "Muslims"
BACKERS: "A seventh-century cult? Going against the civilized world? You're really going out on a limb here . . . "
PRODUCER: "Well stay with me. You see, we start having problems with groups of Muslims blowing up airports and sports arenas, and even individual suicide bombers going into schools and shopping malls."
BACKERS: "Hoookaaaay . . . "
PRODUCER: "It gets really bad beginning in the mid-90s. And as an aside, the US president is a low-life who gets busted for sexual acts (in the WH Oval office) involving a young intern . . . "
BACKERS: "Whoa whoa whoa . . . hold up there. This is supposed to be science fiction, not a porno . . . "
PRODUCER: "Stay with me. The US president gets impeached; bombs an aspirin factory in the Sudan (to divert attention); does not get removed from office, and his wife runs for the US Senate. And wins"
BACKERS: "That's pretty ridiculous, except for the last part. After all, Bobby Kennedy just ran for the US Senate and won. Make the state the former first lady wins New York, and at least that will be believable"
PRODUCER: "OK, done"
BACKERS: "So we're up to the 2000s. What happens now?"
PRODUCER: "A new guy from the other party is elected in 2000 in a very controversial election. He's from a very well connected political family."
BACKERS: "The Kennedys?"
PRODUCER: "No"
BACKERS: "Well it's got to be the Kennedys. Americans don't tend to like political dynasties other than them. But go on . . ."
PRODUCER: "It's the fall of 2001. Remember the Muslims? Well, 19 of them (from Saudi Arabia) come into the country, train at aviation flight schools, and hijack 3 planes with the intention of crashing them into financial, military and government targets."
BACKERS: "There's a plot hole there. Immigration would have been suspicious of these Muslims"
PRODUCER: "No"
BACKERS: "So the US declares war on Saudi Arabia, right?"
PRODUCER: "No. The guy who financed the hijackers was a Saudi billionaire, but he wasn't in Saudi Arabia at the time. He was either in Pakistan or Afghanistan."
BACKERS: "So the US went after him where he was, right? After all, the CIA has spies all over the place."
PRODUCER: "No, the US invades Iraq. And the CIA was gutted in a peanut farmer's administration, so it's not relevant anymore"
BACKERS: "You're getting pretty far out there, again."
PRODUCER: "Well stay with me. The people get pretty sick of the war (kind of like we're doing with Viet Nam) so in 2008 they decide to elect a new president."
BACKERS: "That's plausible. They probably went with someone with lots of experience who was well known, right? Someone mature and serious, ready to bring us together?"
PRODUCER: "Not quite. He's a half-black less than one term US senator. Before that, he served in the Illinois Senate and never voted yea or nay - only "present". About all that was widely known about him was he was a community organizer and he went to a church where the pastor preached "G** D*** America."
BACKERS: "So is the point of your movie about how this guy gets removed from office for being so bad?"
PRODUCER: "No, he gets re-elected in 2012"
BACKERS: "Ridiculous. This movie will never sell"
PRODUCER: "And remember that guy who was impeached but not removed in the 90s? Well he's the most popular political person in the country, and his wife (the former first lady) is running for president"
BACKERS: "Absurd"
PRODUCER: "One more thing. The hottest political topic in the land is whether or not people born male should be able to go into women's restrooms . . . "
BACKERS: "Stop stop STOP!!. Enough! Even as science fiction, this is just not credible. Not credible at all. But it might sell as a satire . . . "