Suicide of a Civilisation

I am constantly astonished by the self-harm modern societies keep inflicting on themselves. Those who rule us -- in most of politics and the media, and in various cultural establishments -- seem to have become bored of their ceaseless metaphorical self-flagellation and have instead decided on a kind of enforced collective seppuku.

We have become a culture that destroys rather than creates. We have a Rousseauian fantasy that if only we can just shed the sins of society we will be purer, freer and happier. We believe that our society -- Western civilisation broadly -- bears a highly disproportionate responsibility for the world's injustice and cruelty. So when we see the most horrific and enthusiastic violence and looting in our own societies, we say we deserve it. We even call this kind of meaningless violence 'protest'. It is a perverted sort of religious morality converted into a secular collective morality: if you beat me, I will stand there and ask for more beatings; if you steal my car, I will go into my house, rip the television off the wall, and offer it to you as well. 

And so when thugs and activists start burning down cities across America, destroying the livelihoods, if not the lives, of every type of American, we consider it progress. We are suicidally mad. I was deeply moved, like many others, watching the black St Louis Police Chief, almost with tears in his eyes, asking incredulously, 'can we make some sense out of this?' 

Why am I, an Englishman, scribbling a blog post about this? Well, inevitably the same madness has spread to here. The great London chamber music venue, Wigmore Hall, is streaming a concert every day from inside an empty hall. I wouldn't miss any of them, so addicted am I not merely to music but to that glorious hall, in which I have spent so many happy consoling evenings. When I tuned in to today's concert, I was firstly greeted by a message on-screen announcing two-minutes of silence 'to voice our support for the end to violence and inequality against black communities'. Quite why they thought this was appropriate or relevant is beyond me. Quite why anyone thinks these 'protests' have all that much to do with George Floyd's brutal death is beyond me. 

The US police force seems to me to be quite a corrupt, militarised and incompetent institution in many places. Ours is not necessarily better, though it's problems are different. Racism does not seem to be the primary problem so much as a general failure to police with proportion and consent. But for all the ills of the police force, this nationwide riot is more dreadful. It is a collective mass orgy of violence parading through American cities. It is the greatest threat to civilisation: barbarism. 

Yet the same people who think a handful of gun-carrying Republican protesting outside a state capitol building -- where no one gets hurt -- is a grave threat to democracy, who think if we don't socially distance many millions will die -- the same people think these riots are progress. No matter how many police are injured, no matter how many people beaten up, how many livelihoods destroyed, how many businesses smashed up, how many missiles thrown, most of those on the left will say this not the fault of the rioters, but of 'us' -- they may even encourage it. 

If these riots were committed by a combination of thugs and right-wing activists with their own grievances, what do you think the response would be? It would be described as terrorism -- and justly so. There does not seem to many of us left who abhor and fear violence, whatever the motive. There are few of us left who understand that destruction in itself does not produce any good, only create new evils. Why would anyone want to show solidarity with these rioters?

Lockdown and now the enthusiastic support for these evil riots. Two of the most blatantly destructive events in my life time. They will be ruinous for many, if not most. Just mad, horrifyingly mad.