How complex the culture of fear in Europe and North America

[pampango]

In The Geopolitics of Emotion, the French analyst Dominique Moïsi observes that Europe and America are devolving into “cultures of fear.” Having travelled widely, I’m convinced he’s right. But what I haven’t fathomed until recently is just how complex the fear can be – and, therefore, why it’s simple-minded to accuse the fearful of being simple-minded. Let me illustrate through a YouTube clip that a fellow writer in Sweden sent me. The video features a small-town representative of the Sweden Democrats (SD). He’s being invited to name those elements of Swedish culture that need protecting. For several seconds, the man falls mute. Finally, he replies, “Christmas and, uh, ancient ruins.”

Mr. Lindgren believes that Swedes now suffer the “hidden, anaesthetized pain” of living in a country with little or no connection to its traditions. Their pain remains hidden because “we have learned not to complain.” Immigration didn’t precipitate this identity crisis, he emphasizes. Modernization and its various trappings did. As he puts it, “We were told – and we accepted – that our traditions were worthless compared to the benefits of modernity.” The upshot: A profound lack of confidence, individually and socially.

But it’s aggravated by our era of mass migration, Mr. Lindgren goes on, because you’re bound to bump into someone “who is full of self-confidence about his culture or religion. That confrontation brings out all the postponed feelings – you feel hurt, angry, inferior, ashamed, envious.” Mr. Lindgren claims that he has no idea how to move his country forward. Yet in one of our exchanges, he offers a valuable clue. “Whenever someone says that we should discuss the problems with immigration,” he sighs, “the response comes instantly: Aha! So you want to help the SD bastards!”

Which brings me to conclude that a culture of fear isn’t merely one in which the natives fear the immigrants. It’s one in which people of all backgrounds fear being branded for their sincere worries about whether unity can be extracted from diversity. After all, if you don’t know who you are, to what are you asking newcomers to adapt?

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/opinions/opinion/how-complex-the-culture-of-fear/article1813978/

[Iterate]

1. An alternate, simpler explanation

would be a more thoughtful understanding of the depth of the insinuation of post modern consumerism. It's more than just shopping, but has subsumed national and political identity as brand identity, politics as consumable political theater, and iconography as decoration.

A Muslim woman dressed in high street fashion may be invisible as Muslim; dressed in religious garb she can't be categorized in the consumerist boxes. Test yourself if I merely mention the latte, a BMW, NASCAR, shopping at Walmart, an SUV, a baseball cap worn backwards. Do you all know now what DWTS means?

Likewise the awkwardly dressed elder or not up-to-date poor. Though the Europeans have not bought into the fantasy to the extent Americans have, but it's still here, and still haunted by the embedded cultural memory of what happens when all turn against all.

And maybe the fear arises from more than just dissonance, maybe the fear arises from knowing the game is up.

[RainDog]

2. kick