THE DECLINE AND FALL OF WESTERN CULTURE

© 1987 by Stuart Norman


Appeared in RFD #52, Fall ‘87, “Roika: Frogskins Discarded.”
I have not changed my views since this was published. I was wrong about forecasting a depression so soon. We did, however, experience a prolonged recession. It and other social catastrophes are still probable, given overpopulation and strain on resources. These problems are again being discussed in the media, but we refuse to recognize and discuss other underlying problems. When do we reach the breaking point?


        Whatever little good writing will do, I am writing this in anger and hurt over the politico-social direction in which our nation and much of the world is heading. Last time I wrote that the pendulum might swing back to liberalism. This is indeed possible for a time, and we can be of assistance in the progressive swing. I believe that is a natural role in any culture for gay people. But a longer range outlook appears dismal. It has to do with the nature of western culture. It’s extremely unbalanced philosophy toward the rationalistic-reductionistic and the exploitative are a danger to the human race. Our social system uses up all resources, but environmental and spiritual correctives which have arisen in the past few years may be too late. After all, every culture has a finite lifetime, and ours is dying.
        The problem with this approaching death is that it could take most of life on the planet with it. So it is our duty to alter our culture in order to survive at all. I’m not sure we can do this. We seem to be blindly heading down a one-way road to destruction. Western culture is doomed. It has had its day. But what can replace it?
        I must ask you to withdraw your support from our culture and actively work to subvert it by nonviolent means. I’m not advocating revolution - that won’t work. But keeping up our activism and searching for new philosophical concepts which would support a humane culture are very important now. We have already built part of a life-sustaining foundation of belief which could succeed. However, we may not be able to affect cultural change. Our culture may continue on its path to destruction through ignorance and inertia.

        Have the American people lost faith? Has complacency and cynicism set in? So few seem to care what is happening to our society or even want to know where we are heading. Most of us had hopes for a better world during the 1950s, but now those are dimmed. Yet these values are still alive among a few of us. How can these be fostered? Now Americans only seem to want our country to be a strong world leader and economically prosperous. Economic success, consumerism , conservatism and a refusal to self-introspection or outward concern for social problems characterize the 1980s. This is from fear because we face lowered standards of living and declining expectations of the American dream. So can we really be angry at the rest of our people?
        Our economy may be on the brink of disaster. Economic parallels now and preceding the 1929 stock market crash are very close. Expect a severe depression within 2-3 years. Politically, that could foster increased totalitarianism worldwide and light the fuses of many volatile political situations.
        A lack of ethics and no consensus on ethical behavior in the nation have fostered the temptation to act expediently. Our philosophical system has broken down and is now in flux. Yet we gays and other progressives can’t support a return to all traditional views of ethics and morality. Those are part of the problem. This pernicious influence has spread even to New Age spirituality which has taken on a right-wing tone and is used to justify material gain, exploitation and hardheartedness.

        Those world leaders and others in positions of great power and influence are so often part of the problem leading the world into hell. They demonstrate no love, have no heart, are amoral, sick and evil. They lack compassion for the poor and minorities. Their minds are blind to the dangers their beliefs and actions pose for the world. They don’t see that they are creating a world in which no one can survive. They don’t want to accept reality, only to hide current problems by force or cover-up.
        In a world where millions die of disease and starvation every day, and yet is technically capable of caring for them all, the moral imperative is to do so. Power, politics, religion and the affluent life be damned. The situation can only grow worse with increasing population. It is only a matter of time before we reach a breaking point. Then what?
        An indictment of our cultural, religious and government institutions is that they have not promoted peace, harmony, general welfare or lead us toward a more humane behavior, but have promoted the basest behaviors. They have not fostered any goals beyond the self to revere.
        They have called gay people perverts, criminals against nature, even monsters, but in reality that behavior is only deflecting attention from their crimes and guilt onto us. They are the sinners against Mother Earth. It is time their thinking and behaviors were swept away so the rest of us can live in peace. If they have their way no one will live at all. Shall we allow them to have power over us?
        These people cannot be considered sane. They have suppressed much of their humanity, but for what? If they have to defend themselves against humanity? Are they psychotic? Dare we let the less than sane rule us? How can we trust their decisions? Everything they support will surely lead to civilization’s collapse.
        The current U.S. administration is a good case in point. It is only a symptom of an underlying way of thought and limited perception. All nations suffer the same thought pattern, no matter the ideology or political issues.
        President Reagan was put in power by a coalition of right-wing southern Californians from John Birtchers to Christian fundamentalists and military industries. He is a doddering actor-puppet apparently leading a purely public relations based administration - all surface glitter while the substance is hidden beneath. His administration’s views are so narrow, elitist and isolated from the people that they don’t know what most Americans want. Nor do they care. Fortunately, most Americans aren’t in accord with the administration.
        This regime has its political agendas to pursue based on their version of the truth which apparently they believe they have by some divine revelation. Thus they don’t care how america is viewed by the world. Or else they have tried to hide their actions from us. What makes them think they can force their beliefs on us?
        The right-wing and fundamentalists have discredited themselves in the Iran Contragate and PTL-gate scandals. The Democratic party is weak, but the Republican party has been weakened by the scandals. Our administrations, whether Democratic or Republican, have been getting worse since World War lI. So on this 200th anniversary of our constitution our nation faces one of the worst crises in its political history.
        This administration has pushed through Congress oppressive laws with little public notice. We now live with preventive detention laws for some types of crimes. Bail can be denied and the accused held. It appears they are trying to establish a police state.
        They have made attempts at censorship of ideas and expression over rock music lyrics, pornography, sex/AIDS education, tried to gut the Freedom of Information Act and recently declared the Fairness Doctrine unconstitutional (there will be a big fight upcoming over this). The Mccarran-Walter Act is used to keep out controversial foreign thinkers, writers, artists by denying them visas. Covert groups, either governmental or private, are fostered to spy on or act against progressive organizations. Is there an inquisition coming?
        America acts as an empire attempting to control the world, intervening in many smaller countries for our business interests. We are perceived as acting in an antidemocratic fashion, and so we have lost respect in many parts of the world.
        Ecological issues are not addressed - pollution, nuclear industry, toxic wastes, clear cutting forests. Social issues are glossed over - the threat of famine, overpopulation, racism, homophobia, health and the stigma of AIDS.
        Our government lies to us. Most Americans know that, yet we do little to change it. We know the government has its bias, propaganda and fosters media bias and apathy. Special interest groups fight with each other in seeking favors and power from government. And the rest of us are left out of the system. The military industrial complex and other big businesses have the power to dictate public policy. Their views cannot be for the general welfare. Yet this nation could care for its people if we didn’t spend so much on the military.
        The Supreme Court is being stacked with staunch conservatives in the most blatantly political move that demonstrates no concern for fairness. It could affect our society for the next 30 years.
        The decisions by the court against our community in the Bowers vs. Hardwick sodomy ruling and the Gay Games (olympics) vs. the United States Olympic Committee recently expose the bigotry of the court, the naked power so thinly disguised in language. Little attempt has been made to hide it. Such decisions will be likely viewed as ridiculous in the future by judicial and legal authorities if our system survives. The court endangers itself and our system of justice by setting itself up for loss of respect.
        Beneath their agenda for mandatory AIDS testing and quarantine legislation lies obvious homophobia. We know it; they know it. They want us to die, to kill off our movement by attrition.
        If AIDS were germ warfare to destroy gay power, whether by intent or by accident in which an experimental viral strain escaped, it remains a possibility considering the power and resources of the government. There are groups within our society and in government which would not hesitate to carry out such a plan if they thought they could get away with it. In current situations in which covert activity plays such an important part of governmental policy, who would know? Secrecy rules the day. Responsibility to the people and morality have been dispensed with as impracticable, inefficient or counterproductive. The people don’t know what is going on in the nation and in the world.
        Eventually actions must have effects, and sometimes unexpected ones arise. The best laid plans can backfire, as we have seen in the lran Contragate scandal or over AIDS. Homophobia has assisted its spread into the general population. The problem facing us is that people in such power situations and mind-sets will cause much destruction before they wreak it upon themselves. It always comes back to them. Such is the lesson of human history. But have we learned from it?
        At this late date it is more important than ever before to heed history’s warning. We sit on the eve of potential destruction of the world. And their shortsightedness would allow them to ignite the fire, enthralled as they are at the possibility within the spark. They won’t ask us whether we agree.
        Is it time to identify them, see their aberration and say “no more” ?Are we willing to remove them from power? Lest their playing with a power they don’t understand consume us and them. It would be fine if their abuse of power would consume only them, but they wish to take everyone with them. And I doubt it would be to heaven.

        Perhaps it is time we consider severe closed-mindedness, resulting in psycho-fascism, bigotry and authoritarianism, as a mental aberration or disturbance. Can we find a way to treat it and rehabilitate its sufferers? Or else someday perhaps fundamentalists, bigots and authoritarians may have to be quarantined so their sickness won’t spread. Don’t think it can’t happen. Bigotry will backfire.

        We still have a thriving movement; we’re established. We’ve made some gains and suffered some depressing loses. And we will have to continue to fight for our rights. There is probably nothing we can say to the current administration which could help us. They are beyond redemption. So it is to the American people we must take our case. There are many out there who will support us when they see we have a common enemy. Mass protests may help. Some guerrilla political tactics might work, such as calling fundamentalist anti-gay rhetoric obscene and challenging it in court. We must avoid violence or else we become no better than they.
        If the human race is to survive at all we will have to play our part. I call for the shamans among us to set up the psychic bindings to prevent their aggression, to stop their agendas, to bring into play forces that will bring western culture to a peaceful end soon. Curses are not needed. Western civilization is cursing itself and Mother Earth. Those of us who are her stewards will survive because we are smarter than they.
        If I survive the coming end I want to sow salt in the philosophical ruins of Western civilization so it can never again spread its malignancy over the planet. It has been the most inhumane culture in all of human knowledge. Let us hope we have the chance to start over and restore the balance.

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