SODOM & GOMORRAH: Material and technical progress, the last legitimate refuge for the modern progressive mind, has now been called into question.
In the 18th century, we were promised moral progress. The intellectuals of the age promised us that we were rising above the savagery and violence of our primitive past and moving toward a bright future where even the basest of us would be blessed with the most refined moral insight. The utter barbarity of the French Revolution, the Napoleonic period, and the repressions that followed proved them wrong.
In the 19th century, they countered with a belief in economic progress. They promised us an age of abundance. The vote was split down the middle though – would economic progress come from capitalism or would it come from socialist revolution? In the 20th, with the invention of the automobile and mass communication, the intellectuals added technical progress to their creed. The world would get richer, technology would be more advanced, and our children would be better off than we.
The innovation in the concetration camp as the future of industrialized societies and the development of atomic weaponry did little to stop western civilization’s blind belief in progress. The concentration camp was solved for with militant liberalism. The atomic weapon, through the great lie of “deterrance” actually prevented war.
Now with the imminent collapse of the Euro and an economic apocalypse approaching, faith in material and technical progress is being challenged in the West. This time, we may tender a small hope that this challenge will finally instruct us in the truth. For if we must suffer, let us at least know the truth.
The oldest generation is now significantly richer than the youngest. Previously, there was a 10 to 1 ratio, but now it stands at 47 to 1. Compared to same-aged groups in 1984, the younger generation has seen its net worth decline 68% while the older group has seen theirs rise 42%.
The conclusion? The world might be worse, not better, for the next generation by every single benchmark. Progress is in its deathbed.