Civilisation becomes Civi-lie-sation

He thinks he going to live forever, said Michael Corleone of Hyman Roth in Godfather III. Of course, no one lives forever on this earth. More to my point, no civilisation lives forever. Do those within a civilisation necessarily know, in the immediate aftermath of its death, that it has in fact died; that, effectively, they are living their lives in the beginnings of a new civilisation, which only later will be named and recognised by future historians? I suspect not. Thus I’m a pathbreaker or badly mistaken, one of the two. For I believe that Western civilisation is now dead. Not dying mind, but dead.

I’m no expert on civilisations so I could well be wrong. Then again, experts routinely disagree with each other so they can’t all be right all of the time. It leaves scope for lay men and women to spitball a view or two.

A breathing Western civilisation adheres to Judeo-Christian values. Without being exhaustive, this entails having a non-compromising regard for the truth. Dealing with other each other fairly and kindly, without favour stemming from position, kinship, ethnicity or belief systems. Exhibiting tolerance, decency and interpersonal trust. Applying the law equally. Maintaining a right to speak freely, to assemble and to associate. Protecting private property rights.

Nothing’s perfect among corruptible human beings. There is much ruin in a nation, Adam Smith wrote in the late 18th century. ‘Much ruin’ is short of total ruin. Western civilisation is not a fragile creature. It’s robust and resilient. But the strongest back is broken if enough force is applied. And the force which has been applied over recent decades is quite awesome.

Let me focus only on the death of truth and leave a wider focus for another day. That’s sufficient enough to ruin Western civilisation. Though, the legal persecution of Donald Trump by his political opponents. which Peter O’Brien wrote about, and the mass immigration of those with clashing values, have each individually also delivered mortal blows.

Lies are now common currency in the media. The way in which Donald Trump’s remark about a bloodbath was deliberately twisted to give a false impression is the latest example. To wit, The Australian’s editorial on March 19: “With Donald Trump warning of a bloodbath if voters failed to elect him in November, it is no surprise former US vice-president Mike Pence has refused to back his ex-boss’s campaign.” Sure, a sizeable number of sentences further on, the writer of the editorial conceded the context of the remark. But still said “it does him no credit.” Is the writer in question a young product of affirmative action? In any event, he or she doesn’t understand how the word bloodbath can be used. For example, “Wall Street’s bloodbath meant the Australian share market plunged…” (9 News, September 15, 2022). No, for the edification of our (jejune?) writer, people did not stab each other to death on Wall Street.

Of course, The Australian was not nearly as guilty as other news outlets, as Quadrant Online illustrated, but it just so happens that I’m stuck with it each day as the best of a bad lot. They are liars. It’s no good beating around the bush. The opening sentence in the editorial which I quoted is a lie and a calumny. It’s explainable only because standards have plummeted appallingly.

A correspondent of the same paper only last September repeated the lie that five cops had died as a result of the January 6 event at the Capitol building. He must know that isn’t true. Yet he lied shamelessly. I actually wrote to the editor. No response. What does it matter. One lie among legions.

The Covid episode was replete with lie after lie. Some of them admitted and described as “noble.” For noble lies read lies to batter people into ovine compliance; to make them give away hard won freedoms. Once you can cower people once you can do it again. And they will. Bye-bye Western civilisation.

The Yes campaign in the referendum was full of lies designed to convince people that a racially divisive addition to the constitution was a generous offer. We were told, at the same time, that the Voice was enormously consequential and a simple proposition. Doublethink leapt from the pages of 1984 into our living rooms courtesy of the current Prime Minister. Those opposing the Voice were called “racists”. Those spewing such slurs knew they weren’t true. They lied, why not?

And the daddy of them all, climate change, is its own empire of lies. How many times are people told that the weather is getting more extreme when there is no evidence of this happening. Those repeating the lie don’t care. Their agenda trumps truth. And we don’t have to go Chris Bowen and his fellow climate cultists to find lies.

Look at the federal opposition parties spruiking nuclear while knowing that‘s it’s political theatre, no more. Sure, if they dropped net zero, said there was no climate crisis, said that coal and gas would be used to power Australia until nuclear hits its straps in the 2040s, then truth would be in them. As it is, truth is still putting its boots on in the opposition parties’ rooms while the lie spins around the political ether, to paraphrase someone of yesteryear.

We go about our business as did those in Pompeii, not yet feeling the heat as Mount Vesuvius began erupting. It’s all over but we don’t quite know it. Future historians will write about it, as those past and present do about the Roman Empire.