by Victor Davis Hanson<\/p>\n
National Review Online<\/em><\/p>\n The first Western Enlightenment of the Greek fifth-century B.C. sought to explain natural phenomena through reason rather than superstition alone. Ethics were to be discussed in the realm of logic as well as religion. Much of what Pythagoras, Socrates, Plato, and the Sophists thought may today seem self-evident, if not at times nonsensical. But that century was the beginning of the uniquely Western attempt to bring to the human experience empiricism, self-criticism, irony, and tolerance in thinking.<\/p>\n The second European Enlightenment of the late 18th<\/sup>\u00a0century followed from the earlier spirit of the Renaissance. For all the excesses and arrogance in its thinking that pure reason might itself dethrone religion \u2014 as if science could explain all the mysteries of the human condition \u2014 the Enlightenment nevertheless established the Western blueprint for a humane and ordered society.<\/p>\n But now all that hard-won effort of some 2,500 years is at risk. The new enemies of Reason are not the enraged democrats who executed Socrates, the Christian zealots who persecuted philosophers of heliocentricity, or the Nazis who burned books. No, they are a pampered and scared Western public that caves to barbarism \u2014 dwarves who sit on the shoulders of dead giants, and believe that their present exalted position is somehow related to their own cowardly sense of accommodation.<\/p>\n What would a Socrates, Galileo, Descartes, or Locke believe of the present decay in Europe \u2014 that all their bold and courageous thinking, won at such a great cost, would have devolved into such cheap surrender to fanaticism?<\/p>\n Just think: Put on an opera in today\u2019s Germany, and have it shut down, not by Nazis, Communists, or kings, but by the simple fear of Islamic fanatics.<\/p>\n Write a novel deemed critical of the Prophet Mohammed, as did Salman Rushdie, and face years of ostracism and death threats \u2014 in the heart of Europe no less.<\/p>\n Compose a film, as did Theo Van Gogh, and find your throat cut in \u201cliberal\u201d Holland.<\/p>\n Or better yet, sketch a cartoon in postmodern Denmark, and then go into hiding.<\/p>\n Quote an ancient treatise, as did the pope, and learn your entire Church may come under assault, and the magnificent stones of the Vatican offer no refuge.<\/p>\n There are three lessons to be drawn from these examples. In almost every case, the criticism of the artist or intellectual was based either on his supposed lack of sensitivity or of artistic excellence. Van Gogh was, of course, obnoxious and his films puerile. The pope was woefully ignorant of public relations. The cartoons in Denmark were amateurish and unnecessary. Rushdie was an overrated novelist, whose chickens of trashing the West he sought refuge in finally came home to roost. The latest Hans Neuenfels adaptation of Mozart\u2019sIdomeneo<\/i>\u00a0was silly.<\/p>\n But isn\u2019t that precisely the point? It is easy to defend artists when they produce works of genius that do not offend popular sensibilities \u2014 Da Vinci\u2019s Mona Lisa or Montesquieu\u2019s\u00a0Spirit of the Laws<\/i>\u00a0\u2014 but not so when an artist offends with neither taste nor talent. Yes, Pope Benedict is old and scholastic; he lacks both the smile and tact of the late Pope John Paul II, who surely would not have turned for elucidation to the rigidity of Byzantine scholarship. But isn\u2019t that why we must come to the present Pope\u2019s defense \u2014 if for no reason other than because he has the courage to speak his convictions when others might not?<\/p>\n Note also the constant subtext in this new self-censorship: fear of radical Islam and its gruesome appendages of beheadings, suicide bombings, improvised explosive devices, barbaric fatwas, riotous youth, petrodollar-acquired nuclear weapons, oil boycotts and price hikes, and fist-chanting mobs.<\/p>\n In contrast, almost daily in Europe, \u201cbrave\u201d artists caricature Christians and Americans with impunity. Why?<\/p>\n For a long list of reasons, among them most surely the assurance that\u00a0they can do this without being killed<\/i>. Such cowards puff out their chests when trashing an ill Oriana Fallaci or Ariel Sharon or beleaguered George W. Bush in the most demonic of tones, but prove sunken and sullen when threatened by a Dr Zawahri or a grand mufti of some obscure mosque.<\/p>\n Second, almost every genre of artistic and intellectual expression has come under assault: music, satire, the novel, films, academic exegesis. Somehow Europeans have ever-so-insidiously given up the promise of the Enlightenment that welcomed free thought of all kinds, the more provocative the better.<\/p>\n So the present generation of Europeans really is heretical, made up of traitors of a sort, since they themselves, not just their consensual governments or some invader across the Mediterranean, have nearly destroyed their won freedoms of expression \u2014 out of worries over oil, or appearing as illiberal apostates of the new secular religion of multiculturalism, or another London or Madrid bombing.<\/p>\n Europe boldly produces films about assassinating an American president, and routinely disparages the Church that gave the world the Sermon of the Mount, but it simply won\u2019t stand up for an artist, a well-meaning Pope, or a ranting filmmaker when the mob closes in.\u00a0The<\/i>\u00a0Europe that believes in everything turns out to believe in nothing<\/i>.<\/p>\n Third, examine why all these incidents took place in Europe. Since 2000 it has been the habit of blue-state politicians to rebuke the yokels of America, in part by showing us a supposedly more humane Western future unfolding in Europe. It was the European Union that was at the forefront of mass transit; the EU that advanced Kyoto and the International Criminal Court. And it was the heralded EU that sought \u201csoft\u201d power rather than the Neanderthal resort to arms.<\/p>\n And what have we learned in the last five years from its boutique socialism, utopian pacifism, moral equivalence, and cultural relativism? That it was logical that Europe most readily would abandon the artist and give up the renegade in fear of religious extremists.<\/p>\n Those in an auto parts store in Fresno, or at a NASCAR race in southern Ohio, might appear to Europeans as primordials with their guns, \u201cfundamentalist\u201d religion, and flag-waving chauvinism. But it is they, and increasingly their kind alone, who prove the bulwarks of the West. Ultimately what keeps even the pope safe and the continent confident in its vain dialogues with Iranian lunatics is the United States military and the very un-Europeans who fight in it.<\/p>\n We may be only\u00a030 years behind Europe, but we are not quite there yet. And so Europe has done us a great favor in showing us not the way of the future, but the old cowardice of our pre-Enlightenment past.<\/p>\n \u00a92006 Victor Davis Hanson<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Europe turns its back on Socrates, Locke, et al. by Victor Davis Hanson National Review Online The first Western Enlightenment of the Greek fifth-century B.C. sought to explain natural phenomena through reason rather than superstition alone. Ethics were to be discussed in the realm of logic as well as religion.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[766],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p466Sb-Z8","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":3739,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/losing-the-enlightenment\/","url_meta":{"origin":3790,"position":0},"title":"Losing the Enlightenment","author":"victorhanson","date":"December 7, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"A civilization that has lost confidence in itself cannot confront Islamists. by Victor Davis Hanson WSJ Opinion Journal Our current crisis is not yet a catastrophe, but a real loss of confidence of the spirit. The hard-won effort of the Western Enlightenment of some 2,500 years that, along with Judeo-Christian\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "December 2006"","block_context":{"text":"December 2006","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/archives\/2006\/december-2006\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":5267,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/defending-the-greeks\/","url_meta":{"origin":3790,"position":1},"title":"Defending the Greeks","author":"victorhanson","date":"March 10, 2005","format":false,"excerpt":"by Bruce S. Thornton Private Papers This talk\u00a0was presented February 28, 2005 at California State University, Sacramento at a dinner hosted by the Tsakopolous Hellenic Foundation in honor of California State Senator Nicholas C. Petris The centrality of the ancient Greeks to the foundations of Western Civilization once was an\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Bruce S. Thornton"","block_context":{"text":"Bruce S. Thornton","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/our-contributors\/bruce-s-thornton\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":3770,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/the-dark-ages-live-from-the-middle-east\/","url_meta":{"origin":3790,"position":2},"title":"The Dark Ages: Live from the Middle East","author":"victorhanson","date":"October 30, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson Tribune Media Services The most frightening aspect of the present war is how easily our pre-modern enemies from the Middle East have brought a stunned postmodern world back into the Dark Ages. Students of history are sickened when they read of the long-ago, gruesome practice of\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "October 2006"","block_context":{"text":"October 2006","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/archives\/2006\/october-2006\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2757,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/europe-is-warning-us\/","url_meta":{"origin":3790,"position":3},"title":"Europe is Warning Us","author":"victorhanson","date":"June 13, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson Tribune Media Services Rome \u2014 If Americans think fuel and food prices are high, they should try Europe, where both can be nearly double those in the United States, while salaries are often lower. Italy, like most of the now-broke southern-European countries, is desperate to privatize\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Commentary"","block_context":{"text":"Commentary","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/the-world\/europe\/commentary\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":8469,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/building-the-new-dark-age-mind\/","url_meta":{"origin":3790,"position":4},"title":"Building the New Dark-Age Mind","author":"victorhanson","date":"June 10, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"America\u2019s descent into the Dark Ages will not end well. It never has in the past. by Victor Davis Hanson \/\/ PJ Media History is not static and it does not progress linearly.\u00a0 There was more free speech and unimpeded expression in 5th-century Athens than in Western Europe between 1934-45,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "History"","block_context":{"text":"History","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/history\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"america_anarchy_flag_11-30-14-1","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/06\/america_anarchy_flag_11-30-14-1-500x331.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":4141,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/losing-civilization\/","url_meta":{"origin":3790,"position":5},"title":"Losing Civilization","author":"victorhanson","date":"February 11, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"Are we going to tolerate the downfall of Western ideals? by Victor Davis Hanson National Review Online The great wealth and leisure created by modern technology have confused some in the modern age into thinking that history is linear. We expect that each generation will inevitably improve upon the last,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "February 2006"","block_context":{"text":"February 2006","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/archives\/2006\/february-2006\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3790"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3790"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3790\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3873,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3790\/revisions\/3873"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3790"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3790"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3790"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}