In the Shadow of Giants
By Lars MøllerIt was the time of trials. The twentieth century tested the strength of civilization to the limit. As Westerners indebted to Roman law and Erasmus of Rotterdam humanism, we barely survived the mortal challenges of Bolshevism and Nazism. Like the ancient Greeks, the founders of democracy who had to go to war with the Persians time and time again, we faced the threat of final annihilation. It was touch and go.
Before the outbreak of World War I, none but the most tormented misanthropes could have guessed the extent of the man-made disasters that awaited humanity. Bastards of the war, the twin ideologies of Soviet-style communism and national socialism — rivals unto death — marked the transition to modernity. Moving far beyond Christian ethics, observing the transgressive standards of deception and violence that characterize totalitarianism, and preaching both group hatred (i.e. class and race war, respectively) and rebellion in a setting of utopian hypocrisy (i.e. revolution), they were on the verge of overthrowing the West. In pursuit of undivided dominance (including control over history, as modern wokeists also have in mind), they created general unrest, organized sabotage against social institutions, and worked to destroy the trust of civil society. Fortunately, they failed to succeed with their malignant venture at first. That is the reason why we have so far been able to reflect on the course of history without academic boundaries — self-censorship never seriously distorted the public debate until the breakthrough of second-generation Marxism, the so-called “wokeism” threatening “cancellation,” if not physical incapacitation.
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The present-day alliance forged against the West consists of (a) Eastern European revanchists, (b) Middle Eastern Islamists, and (c) Far Eastern communists. Although a triad of widely disparate conspirators, they are the united enemies of the “open society” — in other words, united by the fight against a common enemy rather than anything else. They form a fearsome criminal cartel all the same.
How do we then deal with the situation that could conceivably herald our imminent doom? Many of us refuse to face the danger, but prefer to trivialize it and indulge in superficial diversions as if nothing had happened. That is “denial.” Others covertly serve the interests of the enemy and attack anybody who warns of the danger and demands timely countermeasures. That is “treachery.” However, both denial and treachery as defined above may very well originate in cowardice; the cowards do not believe that the West can hold out in the long run. They consider resistance utterly futile and are only trying to save their own skins.
The antiprogressive skeptic, encouraging moderation and reflection, may find it difficult to get through with his messages in the cacophony of social-media nonsense and political announcements without insight and determination. On the whole, it seems to be a minority of people who actually realize the danger and are willing to act on it. Heroism is in short supply these days. Most do not value the freedom that they have inherited and therefore take for granted, but are sadly diverted by the endless temptations of consumerism.
Unfortunately, the will to survive has become like a distant motif in our collective memory. We refuse to be in touch with our own past as Westerners and learn from our hard-earned experiences. Long-forgotten is the resilient spirit of the Spartans, outnumbered by the Persians, who fought bravely at Thermopylae, though betrayed by one of their own in the end (i.e. Ephialtes of Trachis). Similarly, nobody cares about the victory of the Athenians at the battle of Marathon, allegedly a turning point in the wars between the founders of Western civilization and the tyrants of the Orient.
