Northern Europeans less prone to “blaming the other”
A recent paper by Sebastian Pothoff et al. published in Personality and Individual Differences finds that Northern Europeans (Germany, Netherlands) are less likely to “blame the other” than Southern Europeans: “Self-blame includes thoughts that relate to blaming yourself for a traumatic or stressful event. Other-blame is the process of blaming others for what happened to yourself.”
They also discuss evidence that northern Europeans score lower on power distance, where power distance refers to the degree to which less powerful people in a culture accept power inequalities; in other words, Northern Europeans are more egalitarian.
These findings fit well with the theory that there is a north-south cline in individualism and egalitarianism (see here toward the end), with the north being higher on both. Re egalitarianism, Scandinavian society in general has a history of relatively small income and social class differences. An anthropological study of hunter-gatherers found that the economic inequality approximated that of modern Denmark (Eric A. Smith, et al., Current Anthropology.51(1),19–34, 2010).
The difference in other-blame is particularly interesting in that it is consistent with the idea that Northern Europeans more readily take the point of view of the other when assigning blame. I think this is part of the deep structure of individualism. When Michael Polignano wrote a book titled Taking Our Own Side, he put his finger on a major problem for Western individualists: We tend to take a neutral point of view in moral issues — not biased in our own favor or what’s good for our group. We tend to take the point of view of the emotionally disinterested, rational observer, not swayed by personal interest. So we are less likely to blame others for problems and try our best to see the situation from the other person’s point of view. Read more
The Testament of a European Patriot: A Review of Dominique Venner’s “Breviary of the Unvanquished” (Part 2)
Dominique Venner in his youth
We Heretics: A Thankless Struggle
Venner has no doubt that, if we are to live amidst the existential threats against us, we must struggle. Again illustrating his attraction to the heroic Western tradition noted in Part 1, struggle is integral to life. In a particularly inspiring passage for those of us at war with the present system, Venner writes:
To exist is to struggle against that which is denying me. To be unbowed does not consist in collecting heretical books, dreaming of fantastical conspiracies, or taking to the maquis in the Carpathians. It means holding oneself up to one’s own standard in the name of a higher standard. To be loyal to oneself in the face of the void. To ensure one is never cured of one’s youthfulness. To prefer alienating people to living on one’s knees. Amidst the setbacks, to never ask oneself the question of the uselessness of the struggle. We act because it is disgraceful to give up, and it is better to go down fighting than to surrender. (28)
Venner often notes that history is filled with surprises and unexpected reversals. As a result, the demobilization caused by hopelessness is somewhat irrational and in any case unhelpful: You never know in what circumstances our labors could prove salutary. Read more
The Testament of a European Patriot: A Review of Dominique Venner’s “Breviary of the Unvanquished” (Part 1)
Dominique Venner, Un samouraï d’Occident: Le Bréviaire des insoumis (A Samurai of the West: Breviary of the Unvanquished; Pierre-Guillaume de Roux, 2013).
All Europeans, whether they are of the Old World or the New, are suffering today. Their very existence is demonized by a reigning culture which would prefer to see them blended into oblivion. Whereas the old beliefs — Christianity, communism, fascism — are dead or dying, no new faith has replaced them. We, ourselves, are dying as peoples, slowly vanishing from the face of the Earth. But some Europeans refuse to go down quietly, notwithstanding the base allures of comfort. So it was with Dominique Venner, an erudite historian and European patriot, who lived, fought, and died by the pen and the sword.
Venner’s last book — which translates as A Samurai of the West: The Breviary of the Unvanquished — presents itself as his political testament and his final attempt to reconnect Europeans with their tradition and thus awaken them ethnically and politically. This Breviary is not a traditional prayer book but rather presents “the substantive core” of the European tradition and is “a collection of writings, thoughts, and examples to which one can turn to every day to nourish one’s thoughts, one’s acts, and one’s life” (34). Venner says that the world-view implicit in this work can form the basis “to build the personal life of each of us, of families, of nations, and of living communities” (36).
The Breviary is then not only a wonderful introduction to Homeric and Stoic wisdom, but also has practical advice on day-to-day life: On establishing one’s own “breviary” of quotes from sacred texts and great thinkers, on communing with nature in the woods, on traveling across Europe like the Wandervögel, on cultivating beauty in one’s own life, or on the reconstruction of one’s family tree. Read more
Dr. Daryl G. Smith’s Imperative for Diversity (Part 3 of 3)
So let us examine some realistic aspects of those three foundational branches of “Diversity’s Promise”: It must be an imperative; it must be inclusive; and it must differentiate:
Since this campus is in San Diego County, there is a perfect example that I personally recall regarding the U.S. Navy in San Diego. LT Kara Hultgreen was a Navy Pilot over twenty years ago who was artificially thrust forward through a jet training pipeline because there was a “Top-Down Imperative” (from Washington) to produce a female F-14 Fighter Pilot. Her flight performance record as a student would never have permitted her to get as far as she had if she were a male F-14 pilot. She was killed in 1994 behind the tail of the USS Abraham Lincoln, having stalled her airplane out through pilot-error, crashing the $38 million dollar fighter jet into the Pacific Ocean, and almost killing her backseat Radar Intercept Officer (who safely ejected).
My point is not that women don’t have a place as Navy Jet Pilots (there are countless women in the field of aviation), but they would have fallen naturally into this position as those with “The Right Stuff” were given the opportunities. The point is the Navy’s affirmative action imperative resulted in an unqualified candidate and a real-life catastrophe. Similarly, the line of thought Dr. Smith makes can be compared to making it an imperative to fit a square peg into a round hole, wishing to fit as many different shapes as possible into that round hole. If the square peg or other shapes don’t fit into the round hole, then modify the round hole until that new peg can be forced in!
As an employee in a field that requires demanding skills, experience and scientific knowledge, the idea of rewriting the job descriptions to reflect this new diversity mandate essentially trivializes serious professions, and I view this as more a disservice to the institution, one that could easily produce an accident as in the Hultgreen story or at least drag down its overall effectiveness or efficiency. Read more
Eine Rezension von „Warum die Deutschen? Warum die Juden?” — Teil 2
- Januar 2016
English version: Review of Why the Germans? Why the Jews?
Götz Alys Neidtheorie als Erklärung für den deutschen „Antisemitismus”
Wie in Teil 1 erwähnt, ist die zentrale These in Warum die Deutschen? Warum die Juden?, dass die deutsche Judenfeindschaft im 19. und frühen 20. Jahrhundert durch den Neid des durchschnittlichen Deutschen auf den rapiden sozialen und wirtschaftlichen Aufstieg der Juden motiviert war. Aly baut auf der These seines vorherigen Buches, Hitlers Volksstaat auf, in dem behauptet wird, dass die Beliebtheit der Nationalsozialisten der Tatsache zugeschrieben werden kann, dass „die Mehrheit der Deutschen in materieller Weise, direkt oder indirekt, von der Enteignung der Juden profitierten.”[i]
Aly hält fest, dass das gleiche Argument ursprünglich vom jüdischen Intellektuellen Siegfried Lichtenstaedter vertreten wurde, der beim Versuch, den Aufstieg des Nationalsozialismus und seine antijüdische Politik in Deutschland zu begründen, 1937 bemerkte, dass die NSDAP „eine Partei von Emporkömmlingen” sei. Juden wurden gehasst, weil sie Konkurrenten waren, was „Überleben, Ehre und Prestige” anging. Der aggressive „Antisemitismus” in Deutschland basiere auf Neid und dem Wunsch nach sozialer Besserstellung. Wenn Juden als Gruppe als „unverhältnismäßig glücklicher” angesehen wurden als andere Gruppen, schrieb Lichtenstaedter, „warum sollte dies nicht zu Missgunst und Ressentiments, Sorgen und Bedenken führen, was die eigene Zukunft angeht, wie es allzu oft der Fall ist zwischen Einzelpersonen.”[ii]
Theodor Herzl
Die gleiche grundlegende Argumentation vertrat der wegweisende zionistische Führer Theodore Herzl. Kevin MacDonald zitiert in Absonderung und ihr Unbehagen Herzl: „Ein Hauptgrund für den modernen Antisemitismus ist, dass durch die Emanzipation Juden in direkte wirtschaftliche Konkurrenz mit der nichtjüdischen Mittelklasse getreten waren. Antisemitismus, der auf der Konkurrenz um Ressourcen basierte, war rational.” Laut Herzl „konnte man nicht von einer Mehrheit erwarten, ‘sich unterjochen zu lassen’ von ehemals verachteten Außenseitern, die man gerade aus dem Ghetto gelassen hatte.”[iii]
Was laut Aly Deutschlands Juden so beneidenswert machte war die Art, wie sie die neuen wirtschaftlichen Chancen ergriffen, die sich im Laufe des 19. Jahrhunderts ergaben, als die alte Feudalordnung der modernen Welt Platz machte. Nichtsdestotrotz, um die unangenehme Schlussfolgerung zu vermeiden, dass der deutsche „Antisemitismus” des 19. und 20. Jahrhunderts somit rational war, behauptet Aly, dass der eigentliche Grund für die von Neid getriebene Feindschaft gegen Juden ausschließlich in den psychologischen Unzulänglichkeiten und Deformierungen der Deutschen selber begründet lag. Somit waren es für ihn geistige Defizite der Deutschen, und nicht irgendein jüdisches Benehmen, das die deutsche Nation einen Weg einschlagen ließ, der im „Holocaust” gipfelte. Read more
Dr. Daryl G. Smith’s Imperative for Diversity (Part 2 of 3)
The Q and A
The first questioner noted that at a recent student meeting Whites who advocated an all-inclusive Student Union were “shouted down as being racist. Clearly on campuses across the nation the White European-Americans have been disenfranchised and marginalized to the extent that these are now the students with poor self-esteem, because the system is not inclusive, but exclusive. Whites are denied the right to association and denied the right to be who they are! The pendulum of racism has swung this last century clear from one side to the other without ever centering! The time is now to abandon the childish, well-worn, weaponized words like ‘bigot’ and ‘racist’, and to begin building on communities that can tolerate all the people they live with, including the majority that have been responsible for the unique contributions to the Western Civilization we enjoy.” He went on, quoting from a statement she made earlier about her inclusivity clause: “You stated that there is ‘not a single identity that you wouldn’t stand and fight for’. If that’s the case, then will you help me here today with your administrative connections and expertise in the field in establishing a White student union on this campus?”
This seemed to disorient the professor, and her response seemed to shift from one explanation to another without completing her thoughts. But basically she was saying that you have to consider the structure of the system as a whole. She agreed that not every White person is privileged — “There are a lot of poor [White] folks in the Appalachians. And we should be standing… as a matter of fact if Martin Luther King had not been assassinated, he would have dealt with class issues.”
But she insisted that Whites have a whole host of privileges denied others. “Just as I have a privilege called walking I need to recognize that I have a privilege called Whiteness. I don’t get followed. My son doesn’t get stopped by the police. That doesn’t diminish who I am.”
She also claimed that for Whites to have their own identity groups would be the same as being under “the banner of the Klu Klux Klan.” And the fact is that White people still run the universities. “As you go up [to the higher echelons], look at the faculty, the demographics of most faculties are quite White, and it’s historically White male. Now I’m not going to ban Whites or males … My son is one. But if we don’t begin to understand the histories….” Read more
Also available at Barnes & Noble
Also available at Barnes & Noble
