The Bloody Road From The City State To The Nation State
By Eric Le Roy
An Essay in Two Parts: Part 2 (Part 1)
Content 18+ We tend to box history into convenient little chunks: Ancient, Classical, Medieval, Renaissance, Reformation and Enlightenment, Industrial Revolution (1 & 2), Technology Revolution, Information Age, Digital, etc, etc, as if the next one could only begin after the previous one ended. Of course, nothing happens this way. One only has to look around at the household appliances we have now that didn’t used to exist. Was there ever a day when we just scooped up our old radios, typewriters, black and white TVs, landline phones, polaroid cameras, bath tubs, victrolas, paraffin heaters, copies of Life magazine, Look magazine, the Reader’s Digest, and pitched them all into the street, then immediately started wheeling in the smart vacuum cleaner, big screen TV, microwave, smart refrigerator, smart phone, laptop, and so on? Did it all change in the snap of a finger? Of course not, and neither does history.
We know now that the human race was not a single entity and, above all, never the case of a man looking like Leo DiCaprio tumbling out of the womb of an ape – but rather a number of species that all fell by the wayside until the only one left standing was the homosapien. Anatomically, not much has changed about this pesky fellow for the last 700,000 years. Size, life expectancy, technical knowledge, of course, what else would you expect? But the main fallacy that occurs is when modern people assume that prehistoric people spent their life wandering about with clubs in their hands, muttering and grunting and dropping loads of shit everywhere. Try again.
What we now call ‘mythology’ was merely the science of the prehistoric world and that followed right on up through the days of the Romans. People believed in a polytheistic way not because they were stupid but because if you did not understand astrophysics or meteorology, why wouldn’t you think the sun was a god in a golden chariot and that rain could be induced by a dance or sacrifice (goat, lamb, or human) on a roaring bonfire? This way of thinking persisted for thousands of years, yielding only little by little to the advances brought on by technology (although nobody called it that then). Some say it persists even to this day in the form of religion with its seemingly unquenchable thirst for supernatural solutions to what more and more appears to be an earth enriched by atoms and molecules, corrupted mostly by human folly and human wishful thinking from prison cells of its own imaginings.
So let’s fast forward to the ancient world – that of the Mesopotamians, Egyptians, Greeks and Romans – and this without comparing the movement of these cultures with parallel happenings in Asia, Africa and the Americas – unbeknownst to the civilizations featured in the history books, starting with the Fertile Crescent.
Obviously, there had to have been some form of cooperation and commerce going on, or else each individual history would have arrived at the same deadend. But that doesn’t mean it was a seamless sheet or in any way benevolent. In fact, it was the opposite. Far from going out of their way to find community and multicultural consideration, these sandy old cities rose and fell according to the might of single individuals: Sargon, Ashurbanipal, Gilgamesh, Hammurabi, and the rest. Such leaders were cruel beyond the standards even of psychopaths like Stalin and Hitler. And their excesses are even more confounding to the modern mind because they seem (according to the accounts of Ashurbanipal himself) so remorseless and so gleefully celebrated.
In those days, conquest meant annihilation of the enemy, but victory lasted only as long as the supreme personality was able to control all others. Given the grasping exigencies of the time, it is not surprising that the death of the dominant leader foretold the end of the realm once it had been placed in the hands of lesser ‘gods’ of his own progeny, In plain language, a mighty tyrant gave his ‘empire’ to a son who lacked this kind of charisma, ruthlessness, intelligence, and, (if here we do not dishonor the word, ‘wisdom)’, and the result was disastrous. Two outcomes were likely to befall the weaker KIng-According-to-God: assassination or military defeat. The only thing that distinguished right from wrong was the status of the person in question, his ability to stay alive, his ability to instill terror in others by further conquest and the threat of death for disobedience. The King, the Pharaoh, the Sultan lived for the day, in the day, ruthless in terms of seizing the day for himself – all the while planning his retirement in a permanent mansion deep among the golden suburbs of eternity.
Artem clearly takes the ‘history book overview’ approach and subsequently sees a mixture of (dare I say ‘progressive’) city states that were always sort of looking out for each other, sharing their cultural goodies and engaging in what would have amounted to a vast ‘team-building’ operation that spread from Babylon to Ur to Urok to Nineveh and on to Cairo, Athens, Venezia, Firenze, and Rome in a more or less unbroken chain of scientific, social, and even artistic progress. And there is some justification for Artem’s view: advances were made, but the question is, were these improvements carefully thought out designs inspired by altruism and a shared vision of the future of the human race – or did they simply happen via a kind of historical osmosis in which the human species managed to advance in spite of itself, and that what ended up being a step forward was born of mostly military ambition and the inevitable hunger of the human ego for more and more and more.
For example, the great pyramid at Gaza and the sphinx that ‘guards’ it were built to satisfy the immeasurable and vainglorious self-obsession of Khufu, the pharaoh who, as did the others, viewed himself as more god than man. Based on this happy self-appraisal he forced slaves and common citizens to work for a quarter of a century, finally pulling off a feat of engineering so great that many people today believe it must have been aliens from another planet that got the job done. And, of course, when the Pharaoh-God died, his faithful servants were promptly butchered so that they could accompany His Majesty across the great divide and continue serving him throughout eternity.
The following is a charming quote from Ashurbanipal regarding his favorite method of dispatching his conquered enemies: The records of his punishment read, “I flayed as many nobles as had rebelled against me [and] draped their skins over the pile [of corpses]; some I spread out within the pile, some I erected on stakes upon the pile … I flayed many right through my land [and] draped their skins over the walls.”
In fact, one of the most revealing testimonies to the gory path that human history has followed is to be found in any study we might make of the ingenious devices people have come up to torture people. Not enough just to put them to death, mind you; rather the idea has been to make the victim suffer as much as humanly possible, to put them through shrieking agonies that are the stuff of nightmare.
The ancient past was scourge, a stampede, a savage chronicle of conquest, conquest, and more conquest. Probably there were intervals which, frankly, must have been monotonous, even boring, not to mention hard, just plain hard. Life was, to borrow from the famous Thomas Hobbes quote: “nasty, brutish, and short.” I am not sure how well this matches up with Artem’s claims of “Ancient Tolerance”, although a good case can be made that paganism or pantheism, as it were, never was anything like the vicious intolerance of later religions, namely Christianity and Islam. The ancient gods were lewd and lusty, capricious and conniving, mighty and immortal, but they had better things to do than worry about ‘sins’; nor did the ‘sinners’ need to stop what you were doing every five minutes to ‘beg forgiveness’ from some curmudgeonly old tyrant who sat on his ass demanding that people ‘believe in him’ and worship him and beg his ‘forgiveness’.
But, in short, the ancient world was an unreflective bloodbath, not a commune of gift-givers and jolly good fellows..
Artem’s position on Nationalism begins well: “Anthropologist Ernest Gellner argued that nationalism is a product of modernity, arising from the needs of industrial societies for a homogeneous culture to maintain an efficient workforce. The standardization of education, language, and cultural norms serves economic and political purposes.”
He continues by examining some of the features of nationalism but seems to focus on the hypothesis that Nationalism divides people, narrows their vision, and causes them to create scapegoats and to identify and isolate outgroups. Nationalism therefore is based on what amounts to an innate paranoia which reacts to perceived threats (real or imagined) by striving to recreate some Golden Age of past heroism based largely on racial and cultural purity. He also understands the inherent danger of this ‘Us vs Them’ mindset. And we are justifiably reminded of the extreme forms of Nationalism, such as resulted in the Nazis seizing control and setting forth on their genocide agenda.
But how did it all begin? Well, it started in Europe with the French Revolution and continued on through the Napoleonic Wars. Remember that, earlier, Europe was ruled by monarchies; vast stretches of territory were controlled by foreign powers. Nationalism was all about self-determination and newly formed governments. Nationalism was the ideological impetus that, in a few decades, transformed Europe. Rule by monarchies and foreign control of territory was replaced by self-determination and newly formed national governments.
Leon P. Baradat (Political Ideologies: Their Origin and Impact, 10th ed. Upper Saddle, NJ: Pearson, 2009, 44.) argued that: “Its twin ideological goals, nationalism and democracy, were given substance and form during the tumultuous events beginning at the end of the eighteenth century. Revolutionary armies carried the slogan of “liberty, equality, brotherhood” and ideas of liberalism and national self-determinism…. a sense of nationality was the cement that held modern societies together in the age when dynastic and religious allegiance was in decline.”
From that standpoint, Nationalism can be viewed, not as some racist or fascist anomaly, but instead as a form of progress. A sense of national identity grew from people bonding out of a common interest, or a variety of interests: politically, socially, and culturally.
Then technology began to shrink the world and the acceleration brought on our sudden ability to interconnect at a moment’s notice promoted ideals of globalization, diversity, and multiculturalism which, at first glance, seem laudable, indeed another step forward on the train of progress. Unfortunately, globalization has, at least temporarily, failed – not in the sense of promoting access and understanding in many ways few thought possible – but because of inviting chaos in the form of mass immigration: the arrival of hordes of people who, to the apparent astonishment of their naive and gullible European hosts, have refused to be assimilated into the established culture and who instead set themselves up – without any sign of gratitude or humility – as permanent parasites.
In countries like France and Germany (known as desirable spots because of their wealth) these legions of displaced people park themselves, while ignoring poorer nations such as Bulgaria (where I live) and Romania because they know the freebies are not forthcoming. So there is something calculated and cynical at work here.
France is no longer recognizable. Increasingly the Islamic Far Left manifests itself in politics; one need only to look at the present disastrous developments in France to see the destruction wrought by the invasion, countenanced and blindly encouraged by ‘liberals’ who are still loath to admit that they have given their culture away. And with what to show for it? I, for one, would never even consider Paris as a vacation destination, and just think, 55 years ago when I first landed in Europe, Paris was my dream. But not now. So, what – I have now become racist? Ok, have it your way. But you won’t find me in Paris.
When I visited Sweden in 1973 it was the cleanest, calmest, most attractive place I had even seen. Yes, it was a small nation and yes, it was populated almost exclusively by white Swedish people. Now, by all accounts, it is a NIGHTMARE. Syrian gangs rule the communities and frighten the living shit out of even the police. Sweden is the cover story of how globalization and unrestricted immigration has RUINED a fine country, a once admirable nation that was held up as a model for all others to emulate.
Thus, what is known as ‘populism’ has now been labeled a synonym for fascism, spurred on by racism, and in my view it is not. Of course, in a world of out-of-control extremes, there is a great deal of hatred coming from all sides and angles. But – and the United States, with the landslide reelection of Donald Trump as the foremost blazing and bright example – European and British people whose parents and grandparents and long ago ancestors created, constructed, and refined their countries into uniquely distinguishable national identities over the course of many generations are now demanding to have their culture back. They do not hate the people who have traveled from afar to land at their doorstep, but they hate the position they are now placed in and stereotyped by: the label ‘…ist’ this and ‘…phobic’ that. They are sick of it.
They want order restored, and – even as I as a history teacher am well aware of the ruthless colonialism of the past and the fact that the great European countries (especially the British Empire) fed their coffers by exploiting the people of distant continents – I stand by my conviction that, whether entirely commendable or not – the fact that conservative, traditional, or so-called – Right Wing ‘extremists’ are now mounting powerful offensives against the free-for-all liberalism of the past several decades is perfectly understandable. From an historical standpoint, I am saying. I am not advocating or pontificating. I am offering you a sober analysis of why we are now seeing what we are seeing.
I will leave you with an analogy: Suppose that you invited me to your home. You are the owner and host, and I am your guest. You tell me to make myself at home – and I do. You tell me to help myself – and I do. Except that next thing you know, I am switching to all my programs on TV, cleaning out your refrigerator without putting anything back, sleeping in your bed while you now occupy the guest room, and then, instead of leaving in one or two weeks as promised, I now have decided to stay permanently and in the meantime, I have invited my family (all ten members) to join me. In YOUR house or apartment. And if you suggest that I might at least wash the dishes once in a while, I scream “RACIST!! FASCIST! CAPITALIST!!!!”
What would you think?
I think I would become a ‘populist’ and tell you to either mop the fucking floor once in a while or – better – just pack up and get the hell out.
But you know what would happen? You would call the local Woke Chapter of the People and accuse me of discrimination. And they would evict ME and throw me out of my own goddamned house. And chant “BIGOT, RACIST, MISOGYNIST, HOMOPHOBE” as I walked to the bus station.
This explains ‘Populism” and why ‘populism’ is ‘popular’. It is NOT Fascism. Its roots are the ancient code of self-preservation minus the instinct for annihilation that connects the ancient and modern world at the hip, or like an umbilical cord as long as 100,000 years. Finally, complete and total Nationalism is not likely to survive long in an interconnected world. It is reduced to peripatetic ‘movements’, but not empire-building– not anymore, not as it used to be.
Even universal the present use of English as the lingua franca gives the lie to the presumption that any isolated nation can long subsist in such angry separation. Putin’s Russia is a prime example. Sooner or later, the modern world will demand of Russia its willingness to join the crowd once more. Already, the effects of ‘Us Against the World’ and stupid cries of “Russophobia” are falling on deaf ears. In many respects, good and bad, the planet earth is rapidly becoming one great big, dirty, noisy city.
As ‘Nation’ morphs into “World’, the partisan must become a cooperative participant in something much bigger than himself. So the village becomes the town, the town becomes the city, the city becomes the city-state, the city-state becomes the nation, and the nation becomes the world. That’s how it works. It does not mean that the patriot is not entitled to preserve the unique identity of their own cultural upbringing instead of passively allowing it to be trampled on by incoming mobs of immigrants who are there only with the grace and hospitality of their well-meaning hosts.
