Warhawk and radical galaxy-brained centrist Victor Davis Hanson thinks America is Third Worldizing and he doesn’t like it.
In his Townhall column Third Worldizing America, Hanson complains
After traveling the last 45 years in the Middle East, southern Europe, Mexico, and Asia Minor, I observed some common characteristics of a so-called Third-World society. And all of them might feel increasingly familiar to contemporary Americans.
-Victor Davis Hanson
Whether in Cairo or Naples, theft was commonplace. Yet property crimes were almost never seriously prosecuted.
In a medieval-type society of two rather than three classes, the rich in walled estates rarely worry that much about thievery. Crime is written off as an intramural problem of the poor, especially when the middle class is in decline or nonexistent.
Hanson goes on to point out that the American government crushed the Jan. 6 capitol “insurrection,” but is completely unconcerned about riots and looting across the country. He’s right, there is a two-tier justice system in the United States. But still, it’s funny to me that Hanson is just now getting upset about it. The American government has spent decades killing millions and supporting tyranny and instability around the globe (including the countries Hanson complains about!), and he was fine with it. But today the problem has gone full circle and is rotting our society too – now he’s unhappy?
From the tone of his article, I get the impression that Hanson appreciates the third-world aesthetic. It’s probably nice for him to get to travel to the third world where everything is cheap and he can look at the quaint, simple natives living in hovels, like zoo exhibits. Their lot in life doesn’t matter to him and he doesn’t feel any personal responsibility for it.
The problem with propaganda, brainwashing, and dehumanizing other people is that these techniques are just too effective, especially when they’re employed almost nonstop for a century. War propaganda is so effective that it’s tempting to also use it against internal enemies within American society, and that’s exactly what happened. Various groups of Americans do genuinely hate each other now, and why shouldn’t they?
I hope Hanson is reflecting on his own personal and political beliefs, but I have a feeling that he isn’t.
Ian Kummer
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