"So it is hard to square that progressive circle of idealism and realist self-interest. The Westerner does his best in the abstract by praising the non-West, lauding all cultures as equal, and deprecating his own legacy and traditions. That way, he manages to guiltlessly enjoy his exceptional Western privilege and is never responsible for the ramifications of his own ideology."
Victor Davis Hanson via
The Hoover Institution
. . . "These precise Western values allow the immigrant to enjoy a security, affluence, and freedom unknown in his abandoned homeland. Yet, we, the host, prefer not to “judge” those other places, and thus do not fully embrace the immigrant’s ostensible wish to become one of us. We dare not ethnocentrically elevate our culture over others. Instead, we rebrand the human sins of slavery, sexism, and racism as uniquely Western depravities rather than age-old pathologies that predated the West and still exist unchecked outside it. The immigrant immediately senses that his troubled Western host is not so much privileged as unsure and unhappy—and ripe for psychological exploitation. Hyphenation and tribalism, not the melting pot, are often seen as the natural, expected and more “authentic” path for the recently arrived.
"Note that most immigrants do not arrive with natural empathy for the West. Most forsake countries that are hostile to the West. International surveys reveal that the United States, for example, is not popular in China, Latin America, or the Middle East—the current popular launching pads to America. In such places, popular opinion is shaped by the relentless propaganda of autocratic governments, which deride Western decadence, colonialism, imperialism, and racism. Latin American poverty, for example, is often explained as a result of el Norte exploitation rather than flawed political institutions." . . .
Jazz Shaw at Hot Air "Here’s quick pop quiz for you… which US political party is “The Party of Science” today? I’d be willing to bet that nearly everyone had an answer at the ready and half of you disagreed with the other half. (Assuming a readership which matches the generic national political profile.) Rather than the usual finger pointing, perhaps this is an opportunity to ask ourselves if politics is simply ruining science. And if so, that’s a disastrous shame because we used to be really good at science in the United States.
