I was at the gym today reading an article in Vanity Fair, "Empire Falls," by Niall Ferguson, in which Ferguson compares what he sees as the decline of the modern-day West with the decline of the Roman Empire.
The article starts off all right, with Ferguson drawing his parallels and bolstering his conclusions with facts and what comes off as sober, levelheaded reasoning. His argument is by no means fresh (yes, Virginia, we're doomed -- and we've heard it all before). But for the first four pages or so I found his corollaries interesting enough to just sort of go along, as I bopped away on the elliptical, and consider here and there and think, "Hm, interesting point."
But then, I got to a section that left me so flabbergasted, I barely thought I could read on. In discussing what he sees as a relatively recent shift away from religiosity -- specifically, "the de-Christianization of Britain" -- Ferguson slings this quotation: "When men stop believing in God, they don't believe in nothing. They believe in anything." He also, by way of extension, cites one G.K. Chesterton, who wrote, "You all swore you were hard-shelled materialists; and as a matter of fact you were all balanced on the very edge of belief -- of belief in almost anything." Ferguson then goes on to volunteer numerous of his own examples to illustrate why these quotations are Oh So Right (italics are mine):
"Evidence to support [Chesterton's] point is now abundantly available in post-Christian Europe, where all kinds of New Age cults and irrational beliefs flourish. Otherwise intelligent people choose apartments on the basis of feng shui. … They are simultaneously against poverty and against global warming, when it is precisely the reduction of poverty in Asia that is increasing emissions of carbon dioxide. … With the decline of Christianity, Europe is also experiencing a rise in what politicians euphemistically call "antisocial behavior." The restrained civility that was once a hallmark of English life has all but vanished, to be replaced by a startling rudeness. … Shame has gone; so has civility. On Friday and Saturday nights, most English city centers become no-go zones where drunken, knife-wielding youths brawl with one another and the police. Another striking symptom of this new primitivism is the extraordinary surge in the popularity of tattoos, once associated with the unruly Picts of the Far North. In this modern decline and fall, it seems, at least some of the barbarians come from within the empire."
Wow. Just…wow! Who is this guy? I thought. And there I was, still quite a ways from being done with my workout, and committed to attend a meeting at work thereafter, and so I had to wait until hours later to sit down and look this dude up. In my mind, I'd imagined a crusty old white-haired curmudgeon, most likely egg-shaped, dressed in crisp white collar and corded navy sweater. So imagine my surprise when I Googled the bloke and up popped this youngish L.L.Bean-looking guy posed all foreign-correspondent-like next to a monument of a tank. Turns out he's a Harvard professor with a reputation as a "controversial" and prolific commentator on society and empire and stuff. Who knew.
So of course I'm no Hah-vahd gal, and, sans pedigree, who am I to argue with the above-quoted observations, right? Problem is, I just can't help myself...
Ridiculosity No. 1:
"Evidence to support his point is now abundantly available in post-Christian Europe, where all kinds of New Age cults and irrational beliefs flourish."
Here, by his spare choice of words alone, Ferguson implies that anyone who does not subscribe to Christian beliefs is, in essence, irrational. One must also assume, based on this sentence, that pre-post-Christian Europe was the height of rationality. Never mind the people who see Christian beliefs as irrational in and of themselves. (What? Mr. Ferguson wasn't aware those people existed? Oh, O.K. Well maybe we'll give him that one. Just this once.)
Ridiculosity No. 2:
"Otherwise intelligent people choose apartments on the basis of feng shui."
The horror! This is certainly the end of civilization as we know it -- that modern-day apartment-hunters might dare to demand some design, some aesthetic pleasure, some feeling of harmony in their living spaces. Dastardly indeed, these misguided heathens.
Ridiculosity No. 3:
"They are simultaneously against poverty and against global warming, when it is precisely the reduction of poverty in Asia that is increasing emissions of carbon dioxide."
Foolish post-Christians, wanting to save the people and the world, too. Can't they see that we've gotta keep the poor man down, lest we destroy the planet?
There are so many things wrong with this logic I don't even know where to start. I mean, sure, take a nation of billions and transform it from an agrarian culture into a quickly industrializing one, give the people electricity and access to motor vehicles and build a bazillion factories and high rises and whatnot, and emissions are going to rise. But Ferguson is trying to say that the modern-day concerned individual -- the post-Christian who believes in lifting up the poor and saving the Earth (wicked, delirious wishes, these) -- can't possibly have it both ways, that any rational, Christian person would see that this cannot work.
Sorry, pal, but -- might I interject? It seems to me that there are ways to go about lifting the poor out of their condition without harming the planet. It's just that those in power haven't yet figured out how to make a happy people-planet symbiosis a priority. That sort of thinking isn't compatible with the preferred short-term cost-benefit ratio. It would be possible to reduce poverty without harming the planet if the mobilization of a people progressed only with a green, renewable, sustainable plan for growth backing said mobilization (a plan that would have to include some combination of widespread education and continuing availability of birth control and major investment in green technology). For all sorts of reasons both political and economic, the Great Leaders of the developing world (and their allies) are largely not bothering themselves about that -- so far. Yet one might infer from Ferguson's tone that he is suggesting we stay out of the vexing anti-poverty/anti-pollution argument altogether. It's so complicated, after all. It's certain to work us into a hippy-dippy tizzy. Better to refrain from meddling, stay quiet, be polite to our neighbors and just pray to God to fix the problems of our modern world.
Ridiculosity No. 4:
"The restrained civility that was once a hallmark of English life has all but vanished, to be replaced by a startling rudeness."
I don't disagree that civility has declined. But I do disagree with Ferguson's assertion that the decline has its roots in post-Christianity. In my experience, startling rudeness comes not from any lessening of religiosity, but from a failure to instill discipline. I personally didn't learn manners from the church, but from adults who made it very clear when I was young that it would be in my best interest to demonstrate good conduct -- OR ELSE. I learned etiquette and restraint from parents (and uncles and grandparents and teachers) who declined to indulge my every childish whim. The church is not the sole vehicle through which to teach the young how to respect their elders, how to dress, how to speak with "inside voices" or how to say "please" and "thank you." I think we all either know or have observed some extremely "Christian" people who are also outrageously rude. Ferguson is giving the church way too much credit when he traces the decline of civility (and of "culture" in general) to the demise of the tradition of church on Sundays. (The practice of standing, kneeling, singing and eating stale wafers on demand, over the course of an hour or so, does not alone a well-behaved, saintly soul make.)
Ridiculosity No. 5:
"On Friday and Saturday nights, most English city centers become no-go zones where drunken, knife-wielding youths brawl with one another and the police."
Really? Does this happen that often in the U.K.? Because it's funny: I've had a few friends either breeze through the country on holiday or move in for a stretch of months or years, and not once did they report back with harrowing tales of knife-wielding youths. I feel so misled.
Ridiculosity No. 6:
"Another striking symptom of this new primitivism is the extraordinary surge in the popularity of tattoos, once associated with the unruly Picts of the Far North. In this modern decline and fall, it seems, at least some of the barbarians come from within the empire."
And this, ladies and gentlemen, is where I practically fell off the elliptical machine, I couldn't believe what I'd just read. The adornment by tattoo is a sign of the new primitivism?! Jesus H. Christ.
Full disclosure: I didn't stick with my religious studies long enough to get to the part where they talk about tattoos being a desecration of the body and therefore a sure sign of savageness, so if I'm a bit off on what comes next, apologies. My guess, however, is that Christianity says the body is sacred, and therefore it ought to remain pure and unscathed, and therefore tattoos are a big no-no, right? O.K. Christianity celebrates the sacredness of the body by clamping it in a chastity belt (both literal and figurative) and dressing it in clothes that button all the way to the neck. People -- entire cultures -- who dare to go bare must be infidels. Never mind the abundance of cultures throughout the world (cultures pre-Christian colonization, at least) that treated the "sacred body" as something not to be feared, but to be celebrated and adorned, with paints, with baubles, and, sin of sin, with tattoos.
As an ink-stained member of the tattooed barbarian hordes, I'll cop to it: Yes, Mr. Ferguson, there is a vast post-Christian conspiracy to undo Western civilization from the inside out, first by imposing our feng shui on unsuspecting Christians, then by swearing loudly and repeatedly at our Christian elders, and finally by strapping all the pre-post-Christians to tables and forcibly branding them with skulls and bones, butterflies and roses, kanji and calligraphy, and horrendous tributes wrapped in little red hearts and treacly banners -- like "Mom" and "Winona Forever." A sure signal of the apocalypse, in fact, will come the day they let my tattooed body into Harvard. Luckily for Mr. Ferguson, and for the rest of the Western world, that's highly unlikely to happen.
