Some terms are frequently and thoughtlessly used. When a word becomes popular it is in danger of being abused. Fascist" is a case that explains the intended point. Strictly speaking a fascist is one who in the tradition of its Italian inventors place the assumed interests of a nation above other things such as democracy individualism or the rights of other communities. Fascism might be boisterously chauvinistic but unlike National Socialism it is not racist. Nazism divides mankind along the racial lines it is aware of. Accordingly nationality is of small importance.
Nevertheless polite society calls Nazis Fascists. While in exile in Moscow Dimitroff a Bulgarian communist disliked National Socialism" because of the socialist" in the term. So he had the idea to cover up reality by calling the Nazis Fascists. Even now that mask continues to protect the guilty. Assorted movements practice Orwellian Newspeak" in which peace means war solidarity submission and freedom servitude. In response of the overuse Fascist" and even Nazi" are losing their effect. No wonder. When certain circles dislike someone he is automatically a fascist". Supposedly familiarity breeds contempt. Well overuse builds immunity.
Because of that it can be stated that no right-wing extremist has done so much to restore fascisms social acceptance than did the left-liberal camp.
A frequently applied popular and correspondingly misleading term is medieval". In its everyday use the phrase indicates something that is primitive brutal retrograde and stone-age. Actually as applied to Europe these associations are misplaced. For the benefit of those that wish to knowingly appreciate western civilization -also to defend it from its detractors- that age deserves corrective treatment. The more so because a weakness in our ability to defend our civilization is that its origins are not understood and its achievements are underrated.
What we call the Middle Ages (the period from about 500 to 1500) has a record that most other civilizations have not equaled. The era commenced on the ruins of a high-grade ancient civilization whose decadence it expressed. Since civilizations rise and fall there is not much unique in this. Except perhaps that as a consequence the West limped behind several other civilizations. It is the ultimate organic response to this reverse that established what we now call Western Civilization as world historys leading and pathfinding culture. The comeback has a unique feature. It is not a restoration of the earlier achievement of a stagnant classical civilization but that it broke through the level achieved by these. That opened the door for the creation of a new dynamic and open-ended system that overcame the then accepted limitations of the human experience.
Albeit unintentionally the European Middle Ages served as the foundation of something that systemized innovation and then knowingly endeavored to be original. Classical civilizations were static. Their goal was to achieve harmony and a balance that produced a stable order. Change assumed to bring imbalance and to destroy perfection was to be avoided. Therefore they produced individuals that ideally were content with what could be had and who found satisfaction in the cultivation of inherited ways. This type of contentment produced happiness within the assumed confines of a God-willed and natural order whose boundaries were not to be tested. Its privileged had no bad consciousness for being relatively better off than their fellows and those at the bottom of the pile learned that the proper response to suffering is bearing it. Overcoming creating new sources of wealth searching for better technical or social solutions not to mention revolutions were all beyond the horizon of the contemporary.
Due to the cumulation of the accident" of untypical mutations regardless of its intentions mediaeval Europe intent to recreate the conditions of its admired origins produced a novel civilization. This can be attributed to numerous factors. The wish to recreate the lost golden age implied that some progress was intended. The lack of exact knowledge regarding the ancients" made exact copying difficult. That different languages and peoples developed into nations and thus enshrined a disunity out of which individual solutions flowed also played a role. In time feudalisms local application prevented not only the unity of conformity but also triggered individualism. Equally significant is that in Europe due to its geographic location some of the great religions met and competed. Thereby an impulse to observe and to judge critically came about.
When a modicum of wealth knowledge and skills emerged it came about in progressive clusters. This made differences tri-dimensional and the impression so created suggested that man is able to create his own order. Once the notion took hold that nature" is rationally understandable and thus open to manipulation a historically unparalleled process unfolded. The consequence of having created what we call a take off" brought about a new type of civilization.
When Europe recovered to the surprise of all it transgressed the boundaries achieved by the classical civilizations. The mediaeval roots of the Renaissance aimed at reconstructing what had been lost earlier. Instead it produced a self-confident civilization that broke with hither experience. As a result it was not the Aztecs" that discovered" the Europeans but the other way around.
With these changes that amounted to a qualitative alteration of mankinds development history assumed a novel character in that it headed symbolically and in actual fact toward outer space. Contrary to the patterns of the past in which tradition represented a norm to be achieved and preserved the new world-view deputized man to expand his traditional existence beyond its achieved limit.
The middle ages possess a uniqueness whose aftermath changed human existence. For that reason regardless of the backwardness of its beginnings it is a stage of development that deserves not derision but appreciative celebration.
Getting an informed and realistic grasp of the European middle ages involves more than adjusting historical recall. It is so because contemporary issues are related to the matter. One is the unique role of western civilization to lay the foundations of the modern world. That ties in with self-defense; the western inspired modern world expresses a new culture and is not to be attributed to imperialism". Second since the world war numerous attempts to inspire finance and export modernization has failed in several cultures. Identifying the forces that moved backward Europe to invent modernity and having the courage to implement them might help to solve a global problem. The wrong kind of respect" for the breaks built into some cultures will shred more funds and preserve backwardness once they become enshrined by proclaiming bad habits to be expressions of a unique identity.
Relying largely on its own resources and by nurturing impulses that ultimately furthered growth the middle ages enabled a human community to transcend the customary restraints of its time. Ultimately the fermentation created by jettisoning ballast transformed the world. Numerous also non-western nations have at their own pace participated and benefited of this. These successes and their origins deserve to be understood applied and respected. The institutionalized backwardness of those that opt to be left behind does not.
Some terms are frequently and thoughtlessly used. When a word becomes popular it is in danger of being abused. Fascist" is a case that explains the intended point. Strictly speaking a fascist is one who in the tradition of its Italian inventors place the assumed interests of a nation above other things such as democracy individualism or the rights of other communities. Fascism might be boisterously chauvinistic but unlike National Socialism it is not racist. Nazism divides mankind along the racial lines it is aware of. Accordingly nationality is of small importance.
Nevertheless polite society calls Nazis Fascists. While in exile in Moscow Dimitroff a Bulgarian communist disliked National Socialism" because of the socialist" in the term. So he had the idea to cover up reality by calling the Nazis Fascists. Even now that mask continues to protect the guilty. Assorted movements practice Orwellian Newspeak" in which peace means war solidarity submission and freedom servitude. In response of the overuse Fascist" and even Nazi" are losing their effect. No wonder. When certain circles dislike someone he is automatically a fascist". Supposedly familiarity breeds contempt. Well overuse builds immunity.
Because of that it can be stated that no right-wing extremist has done so much to restore fascisms social acceptance than did the left-liberal camp.
A frequently applied popular and correspondingly misleading term is medieval". In its everyday use the phrase indicates something that is primitive brutal retrograde and stone-age. Actually as applied to Europe these associations are misplaced. For the benefit of those that wish to knowingly appreciate western civilization -also to defend it from its detractors- that age deserves corrective treatment. The more so because a weakness in our ability to defend our civilization is that its origins are not understood and its achievements are underrated.
What we call the Middle Ages (the period from about 500 to 1500) has a record that most other civilizations have not equaled. The era commenced on the ruins of a high-grade ancient civilization whose decadence it expressed. Since civilizations rise and fall there is not much unique in this. Except perhaps that as a consequence the West limped behind several other civilizations. It is the ultimate organic response to this reverse that established what we now call Western Civilization as world historys leading and pathfinding culture. The comeback has a unique feature. It is not a restoration of the earlier achievement of a stagnant classical civilization but that it broke through the level achieved by these. That opened the door for the creation of a new dynamic and open-ended system that overcame the then accepted limitations of the human experience.
Albeit unintentionally the European Middle Ages served as the foundation of something that systemized innovation and then knowingly endeavored to be original. Classical civilizations were static. Their goal was to achieve harmony and a balance that produced a stable order. Change assumed to bring imbalance and to destroy perfection was to be avoided. Therefore they produced individuals that ideally were content with what could be had and who found satisfaction in the cultivation of inherited ways. This type of contentment produced happiness within the assumed confines of a God-willed and natural order whose boundaries were not to be tested. Its privileged had no bad consciousness for being relatively better off than their fellows and those at the bottom of the pile learned that the proper response to suffering is bearing it. Overcoming creating new sources of wealth searching for better technical or social solutions not to mention revolutions were all beyond the horizon of the contemporary.
Due to the cumulation of the accident" of untypical mutations regardless of its intentions mediaeval Europe intent to recreate the conditions of its admired origins produced a novel civilization. This can be attributed to numerous factors. The wish to recreate the lost golden age implied that some progress was intended. The lack of exact knowledge regarding the ancients" made exact copying difficult. That different languages and peoples developed into nations and thus enshrined a disunity out of which individual solutions flowed also played a role. In time feudalisms local application prevented not only the unity of conformity but also triggered individualism. Equally significant is that in Europe due to its geographic location some of the great religions met and competed. Thereby an impulse to observe and to judge critically came about.
When a modicum of wealth knowledge and skills emerged it came about in progressive clusters. This made differences tri-dimensional and the impression so created suggested that man is able to create his own order. Once the notion took hold that nature" is rationally understandable and thus open to manipulation a historically unparalleled process unfolded. The consequence of having created what we call a take off" brought about a new type of civilization.
When Europe recovered to the surprise of all it transgressed the boundaries achieved by the classical civilizations. The mediaeval roots of the Renaissance aimed at reconstructing what had been lost earlier. Instead it produced a self-confident civilization that broke with hither experience. As a result it was not the Aztecs" that discovered" the Europeans but the other way around.
With these changes that amounted to a qualitative alteration of mankinds development history assumed a novel character in that it headed symbolically and in actual fact toward outer space. Contrary to the patterns of the past in which tradition represented a norm to be achieved and preserved the new world-view deputized man to expand his traditional existence beyond its achieved limit.
The middle ages possess a uniqueness whose aftermath changed human existence. For that reason regardless of the backwardness of its beginnings it is a stage of development that deserves not derision but appreciative celebration.
Getting an informed and realistic grasp of the European middle ages involves more than adjusting historical recall. It is so because contemporary issues are related to the matter. One is the unique role of western civilization to lay the foundations of the modern world. That ties in with self-defense; the western inspired modern world expresses a new culture and is not to be attributed to imperialism". Second since the world war numerous attempts to inspire finance and export modernization has failed in several cultures. Identifying the forces that moved backward Europe to invent modernity and having the courage to implement them might help to solve a global problem. The wrong kind of respect" for the breaks built into some cultures will shred more funds and preserve backwardness once they become enshrined by proclaiming bad habits to be expressions of a unique identity.
Relying largely on its own resources and by nurturing impulses that ultimately furthered growth the middle ages enabled a human community to transcend the customary restraints of its time. Ultimately the fermentation created by jettisoning ballast transformed the world. Numerous also non-western nations have at their own pace participated and benefited of this. These successes and their origins deserve to be understood applied and respected. The institutionalized backwardness of those that opt to be left behind does not.