The adage, from shirtsleeves to shirtsleeves in three generations, refers to a pattern in the rise and fall of fortunes.
From Builders, Stewards to Squanderers
The first generation builds wealth through hard-work, entrepreneurship, shrewd investment, and innovation. The next generation retain enough of the attributes of their forebears to preserve their inheritance. But the third generation is often pampered, gifted every advantage they become victims of their own self-importance, and squander the family fortune or, in this case, an entire civilization.
It is not an ironclad rule. There are innumerable examples of fortunes surviving well past the third generation. The adage merely warns of an underlying atrophy, not its inevitability. But no adage arises from a vacuum and right now, across the western world there is an epidemic of idiocy led by these spoilt, rich, dumb people.
The greatest civilization in history
The post-World War 2 generation brought in the bounty. We sometimes referred to them as the golden generation. They were firsthand witnesses of the great-depression and two world wars. They integrated that lived experience and embraced rational enlightenment principles as a foundation. And ushered the greatest civilization in history. Their children, the second generation came into power around the late 1970s and stayed the course-largely. The third generation, our squanderers, took the wheel and began the path of destruction around the turn of the century.
To understand this generation of squanderers we need an appreciation of their formative experiences. They were raised to believe that they are special. This is the time the culture began issuing participation instead of merit badges. The time when Academic standards were lowered so that virtually everyone was smart enough to attend university. A generation that wanted for nothing. When they came of age, they expected to be gifted cars and apartments. If they were upset, they were sent to a psychologist and given pills. When they were in trouble they were rescued.
The final decades of 20th century saw an unprecedented social transformation. We exiled grand-parents into aged care centers. Divorce rates and single parent households boomed. Blended families, absent fathers, property settlements, and custody battles were normalized. Televisions, videos and electronic games became surrogate parents.
Spoilt, pampered and stunted infants
Never reprimanded, never sent to their rooms, and never smacked.
These are our pampered elite and managerial class. Macron, Trudeau, Gates, Bezos, Schwab, all these leaders represent the victory of form over content. there is no grappling with complexity, no vision for the future, no nuance just this well groomed, empty confidence lavishly littered with meaningless catch-phrases and scripted talking points.
What they represent is the cartoon world they inhabit. And with the assistance of the media and our dumbed down education system the masses are seduced by this insufferable vaudeville farce.
Toddlers and Tantrums
How have we come to this? There is no end to our collective cultural obsession with grievances. They dominate public discourse: race, gender, patriarchy, and white privilege. These claims rightfully belong in the impoverished third world, the disadvantaged form the developing world, or from the ghettoes of the first world. Instead, they germinate from the most elite universities, in the most prestigious locations and from a population of the most entitled people in all of history. The lack of self-awareness and idiocy required to sustain this hypocrisy is without parallel.
It’s apparently not enough that they’ve been gifted every advantage, all the wealth and status they could possibly desire. They need to also claim solidarity with the oppressed and dispossessed. It’s breath-taking.
There is no understanding it.
But this is the mindset in charge of everything: global finance, geo-politics, economic policy, the legislature, the media, corporate conglomerates, the judiciary, the military…
Disconnected from reality
Confusion around gender identity is a normal phase for teenagers, not for adults. If you mock a child, it is normal for them to be offended. It is normal for them to cry and seek comfort. It is not normal for an adult. Adults should win humbly and lose graciously. Adults who cannot develop that little bit of self-awareness become misfits – unless they belong to an entire class who share the same pathology.
OK. They are dysfunctional, fragile, irrational, and stunted. Take away an infant’s chocolate bar and you will witness the same reaction.
We witnessed this in the wake of Brexit and Trump’s victory. We saw it during the pandemic. Every criticism whether it is the wearing of masks, the lockdown protocols or the vaccines, all reflexively cause our snotty leaders to throw a tantrum. If you hesitate to support the Ukraine War, you are carrying water for Putin. There could be no other reason.
Resist and they will shadow ban you, label your criticism misinformation, racism, hate speech and/or domestic terrorism.
Hegemony, hubris and the decline of the western world
This plague has overwhelmed the USA, the EU, Australia, New Zealand, Canada, and Britain. The rest of the world looks upon us–privileged 15% – with a mixture of horror and amazement. The fall, from global hegemony to irrelevance, is happening in a single generation.
President George Bush–September 20th, 2001, declared:
“Every nation, in every region, now has a decision to make. Either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists.”
This is a declaration of war. Not against terrorism, but against the entire non-western world. A demand of total dominion. Over the next 20 years, the world would come to understand that it was the west itself, who were the terrorists.
Since September 2001, ever larger numbers of these insufferable infants have filled the ranks of leadership. The Biden administration is the current high watermark. But there is no certainty we have reached peak stupidity.
It is always 1939.
In a manner unthinkable during the cold war, our leaders in the US and the EU routinely push, prod, and aggressively saber rattle against China and Russia. Moscow and Beijing urge restraint peace agreements and diplomatic solutions. Washington and Brussels see the far right everywhere. They are stuck in a 1939 paradigm. The specter of NAZI and Hitler doppelgangers is ever present.
The resistance
For now, our civilization has not fallen apart. The ruling and managerial classes are a fraction of the population. There still remains a sizable resistance to their idiocy. The greater portion of the population are suspicious, sane, semi-competent, committed to their families, community and country. Largely, they continue to uphold the same democratic institutions and values that inspired the golden generation.
Against this admirable resistance is a western elite locked in a perpetual cycle of wars, money laundering and Ponzi Schemes and tantrums:
- Global War on Terror and the erosion of the civil rights
- Invasion of Iraq, illegal rendition programs of torture
- Global Financial Crisis
- Global Financial Bailout
- Regime Change and the destruction of Libya
- ISIS and the Civil War in Syria
- Regime Change in Georgia
- Maidan Revolution and Regime change in the Ukraine.
- Continuous Expansion of NATO
- Financialization and zombication of the global economy
- Quantitive Easing and asset inflation to zero and Negative Interest
- A Global War against a virus and mandated vaccinations
- Infinite expansion of debt
- Renewables and Climate Change Hysteria
- Endless support for the war in the Ukraine
- Sabre rattling against China over Taiwan
- Support of Israeli apartheid policies and the continuing genocide of Palestinians
The sun will rise after the Western countries have fallen off their pedestal. It may even be a good thing.
Whether anyone picks up the baton to champion civic rights and freedoms of expression is another things. Neither China, Russia nor any other budding power has the tradition we once held sacred. Here lies the real tragedy.
The fate of our legacy is now embodied in Julian Assange. It lingers forgotten, neglected, condemned, and rotting without charge at his Majesty’s pleasure. It is gnawing to think we have so haplessly and cravenly surrendered the best of ourselves.
Now, what do we do about it?
https://aish.com/spoiled-child-syndrome/Spoiled Child Syndrome – Aish.com
