The Failure Of Western Civilization

The Failure of “Western Civilization” - A 4-Dimensional View By: K.H.Azam Ahamed Azam Ahamed is a freelance writer and can be contacted via his email: [email protected] or blog: www.azamahamed.blogspot.com Introduction Civilization, as defined by the American Heritage Dictionary of English Language; “An advanced state of intellectual, cultural and material development in the Arts & Sciences, the extensive use of record keeping, including writing and the appearance of complex political and social institutions.” Immanuel Wallerstein postulates that from the sixteenth century onwards, the west started to establish a world system. A series of economic and political connections were being established to link the “West” to the “Rest” for the sake of expanding capitalist world economy. The whole world was being forced into a process of conversion to modern capitalist production and exchange. This is not just a political and economic enforcement, but rather a strategic foundation for a long term cultural invasion. The whole world is now experiencing the golden pages of Globalization & the wonders of the western technological advancement that has leveled the space and time for man. The west uses the modern technologies for harmful as well as beneficial things, in good an evil. The World War I and World War II pose an evidence of the great destruction the western civilization can inflict on the humanity. Hiroshima and Nagasaki are another living evidence. But have this so-called Globalization and mammoth scientific advancement brought him happiness? Have they given an acceptable meaning for the life of a human being in this world? Have they ever been able to maintain the least moral standards required by the humanity? Have they succeeded in addressing the inherent needs of a human being? Cultural Deterioration & Imperialism “Western Culture” has long been a burning topic among many intellectuals and sociologists. Especially in the past few decades, the East is being undergoing a cultural transformation to stick with the needs of the West. Thus the world is moving towards a homogeneous culture where indigenous cultures of the rest part of the world are being replaced by the western culture. An expert in global history & international relations, Rauff Zain quotes a best example for Cultural Imperialism. “It is a fashionable attitude which prefers Cola soft drinks instead of natural fruit drinks which has many useful vitamins knowing the fact that those artificial soft drinks contain chemicals which are very harmful to our health”. A political critic of Nigeria, Jisawa Elaigwu describes the Cultural Imperialism which we are facing today, as “From Coca-colonization of the world, we have arrived at CNNisation of the World”. “Moral Standards & Sexual Behavior” is considered as the backbone of a culture and thus ensures the social and cultural stability in a civilization. As far as the Western Culture is

concerned, the moral standard and sexual behavior has reached the worst edge and it has led to the social instability. The following reports and statistics would further strengthen the above point: Since the inception of sexual revolution that began in 1960’s, it was reported that due to the sexual & cultural liberalism of the western civilization, the sexually transmissible diseases Chlamydia, Gonorrhea and AIDS were the three most commonly reported infectious disorders in the United States. The British newspaper The Independent recently reported that “genital herpes, the incurable sexually transmitted disease that was lost from sight in the shadow of AIDS, is infecting record numbers of people in Britain.” Experts estimate that “about one in ten women in London carry the virus,” and in the United States “it is estimated that 500,000 people contract genital herpes each year.” A report from the Kinsey Institute estimates that, during their married lives, 37 percent of American males will be sexually unfaithful to their wives, and 29 percent of American wives will commit adultery (June Reinisch, 1990, p.7, 73) According to social critic William Kirkpatrick, divorce is “up 700 percent in this century, with most of the rise occurring in recent decades” (Why Johnny Can’t Tell Right From Wrong, 1993, p.249). He also notes that “the pain of parental divorce is more difficult for a child to overcome than the death of a parent” (p.250). An astonishing three in five American children born in 1986 will live with a single parent by the age of 18. The recent statistics on divorce shows that the divorce rate in the United States stands at approximately 50% and in Australia 40% (Australian Historical Statistics & ABS), in Canada it is 48% (Department of Justice, Child Support Initiative, Evaluation report). “Most experts in the filed agree that somewhere over 60 percent of American teenagers have had sexual intercourse by the time they finish high school” (Lillian Rubin, Erotic Wars, p.61). In Britain, “one in five (teenagers) report having intercourse before their 16th birthday.” Also in a 1996 poll, “31 percent of female respondents said they had been (pressured) to have sex before they were ready” (The Independent, Sep 16, 1996). In the United States estimates are that “Nationally 11 percent of unmarried teenage girls become pregnant each year” (Lillian Rubin, p.75). To put it in another way, “Every 64 seconds….. a baby is born to a teenage mother…..” (Children Defense Fund, The Adolescent & Young Adult Fact Book). According to William Bennett, former U.S. secretary of education, illegitimate births in the United States increased 400 percent from 1960 to 1990 (The index of Leading Cultural Indicators, March 1993). Based on current trends, U.S. News & World Report predicts that “early in the 21st century, unless we change, 1 out of every 2 American children will be born out of Wedlock” (October 02, 1995, p.88) Each year “almost 01 million American teenagers will become pregnant, nearly 75 percent of them out of wedlock. About 80 percent of these new mothers will end up in poverty, dependent on welfare payments. The problem costs the American taxpayer $7 billion a year…. Everyday in America there are 1300 teenage births and 1100 teenage abortions. (The Sunday Times (US), January 12, 1997) It is reported in the European edition of Newsweek: “In Sweden, more than half of all babies are born to unmarried parents; in France and England, it is about one in three.” (January 20, 1997) Many Americans are concerned about the future of their nation. In a Newsweek poll, 76 percent

of Americans said that they believe the United States is in a moral and spiritual decline. (Newsweek, June 13, 1994, p.31) A report from Amnesty International says that “one in three Native American women will be raped at some point in their lives”. “It is disgraceful that such abuse exists today” said Larry Cox, Amnesty International’s executive director. “Without immediate action, an already abysmal and outrageous situation for women could spiral even further out of control”. Rape is a serious problem in the United States today. The United States has the highest rape rate among countries which report such statistics. A study among college women has shown that one out of every five college women report being forced to have sexual intercourse (National College Health Risk Behavior Survey). 22 percent of all women say that they have been forced to do sexual things against their will. As a matter of fact, only 16 percent of rapes and sexual assaults are reported to the police (Rape in America: A Report to the Nation, 1992). In 1995, there were 97460 rapes reported to the law enforcement officials. At a 16 percent reporting rate, this means that there were actually closer to 609125 rapes in the United States, the so-called motherland of the Western Civilization. It was also reported that one in three sexual assaults victims are under the age of 12 and 2/3 of the victims are under the age of 18. (National Crime Victimization Survey) Thus it is justifiable to say that, this deteriorated Western Culture is a fatal catastrophe for the well being of the humanity! Spiritual Poverty Spirituality; most often a neglected fact by the Western Civilization. The pure materialistic western concept of knowledge granted men just only a physical comfort, not the spiritual one. Yes, men has succeeded in achieving many state of the art technologies but failed to have peace of mind. This has led to a sort of disparity between man’s outer appearance and his inner self. His life, though decorated and colorful, is shallow from within. It has become a common matter to hear cries of distress, fear, sorrow and despair from people of the so-called developed world. With all the means of comfort they have, they lack spiritual calmness. No wonder to see psychiatrists in those countries always having a busy schedule with throng of clients bringing in their complaints of moral corruption, worry, family disintegration, lack of social stability and solidarity. According to the official statistics of the American Association of Suicidology, 89.4 suicides are being reported per day in the U.S. To put in another way, average of 01 person every 16.1 minutes killed themselves. As the Great scholar Dr.Yusuf Al-Qaradawi says, the cause of all these ailments is the absolute freedom granted man under the umbrella of the western civilization. This has corrupted man’s inner nature and failed to satiate his unfulfilled needs. The west fails to realize that there is no absolute freedom in the universe. All planets and stars move in certain orbits, ships & planes go in a certain ways that if struck by a tiny change, it may lead to a fatal catastrophe. People lack the fuel that makes them lead life and look to their future through a dim perspective. They are like a living corpse walking on earth. Many scholars, philosophers, instructors, men of letters and politicians have warned against the dangerous effect of this materialistic western civilization on man. The well-known American philosopher, Jhon Dewey says: “A civilization that allows science to destroy the existing values with no capacity to create new ones is a self-destructive civilization”.

The contemporary British thinker and renowned historian Arnold Toynbee is quoted as saying that the solution to the problems of the Western society lies in giving the religion high priority for them to gain salvation. The American intellectual, John Steinbeck, sent to his friend Adlai Stevenson that reads: “The problem of America lies in its luxury and the many things it has. With all those things, it has no spiritual vocation to offer. We are in a dire need to something that will awaken us from our slumber. We have really overcome nature but still unable to overcome our own selves.” The German poet Brochert expressed the problem of these new generations being brought up under the umbrella of this new civilization and said: “Our generation is shallow from within. We really lack religion, comfort and tranquility. Our love is physical and the gloom of youth fades away in us. Our generation knows no limits, no borders and no protection.” Among the politicians who showed concern in this regard is the well-known American Secretary of State, John Foster Dulles, who wrote a book, entitled “War or Peace” that included a chapter “Our Spiritual Need”. In this chapter, he addressed many things that America lacks. He wrote: “The problem is not one of material things, for we have the state-of-the-art materials. What we really need is strong sound faith, for without it all our materials do not worth a tinker’s cuss. Such deficiency that arises out of lack of faith cannot be compensated for by politicians, diplomats, scholars or anyone else.” He further wrote: “Before his demise President Wilson wrote: ‘All in all, our civilization cannot keep on this way unless it regains spirituality.’” Dr.Yusuf Al-Qaradawi says that, “People are now complaining of being wretched and miserable. They feel that life is purposeless. With all these technologies and unprecedented scientific discoveries, people are still unable to gain happiness. These forms of sciences fail to remove people’s wretchedness, misfortune and triviality. Great scientists have always reiterated that science cannot act as a savior for mankind.” Among those scientists is Alexis Carrel, the Noble prize winner in science and the author of “Man; That Unknown Being” in which he put Western civilization to criticism based on scientific criteria. Alexis Carrel wrote: “Modern civilization is on the horns of dilemma, for it does not really suit us. Such a civilization was established on the images of scientific discoveries, people’s lusts, fake ideas, theories and wishes. In spite of the fact that it is we who established it, it is not suitable for us.” In another place, he wrote: “Man is to be librated from the chains of this universe. It was scientists and astronomers who placed man in such chains. Though being immense, the world of matter is still limited for man.” Finally, Carrel wrote: “It is now time for man to get out of these shackles; man needs to revive himself. This is not a matter of laying down a program, for a program is no more than a new chain that imprisons our future inside the bars of our mind.” The well-known American psychologist Dr. Henry Link writes: “Science does not have remedies for complicated life problems. Science is not the source of happiness, for more scientific advancement means more complicated life. Unless these free sciences are unified and placed in the frame of clear facts of life, they will inevitably lead to decay in minds and total collapse. It is faith only that can play this important role.”

Ecological Crisis As Martin Hickman said, we are living beyond our ecological means. A U.S academic group, Global Footprint Network stated that “Humanity has started eating the planet”. This has caused a variety of ecological problems such as global warming, climate change, deforestation, etc. Pope Jhon Paul II writes in one his articles that, “Certain elements of today’s ecological crisis reveal its moral character. First among these is the indiscriminate application of advances in science & technology. Many recent discoveries have brought undeniable benefits to humanity. Unfortunately it is now clear that the application of these discoveries in the field of industry & agriculture have produced harmful long term effects”. The gradual depletion of Ozone layer and the related “Greenhouse effect” has now reached crisis proportions as a consequence of industrial growth, massive urban concentrations and vastly increased energy needs. Industrial waste, the burning of fossil fuels, unrestricted deforestation, the use of certain types of herbicides, coolants and propellants; all of these are known to harm the atmosphere and environment. The resulting meteorological and atmospheric changes range from damage to health to the possible future submersion of low-lying lands”. Global Footprint Network (U.S) estimates that the human race is over-using the earth’s resources by 23 percent. While each individual should use up no more than equivalent of 1.8 hectares of earth’s surface, the actual area we use is 2.2 hectares per person. Maths Wackernagel, executive director of Global Footprint Network, which analyses 6000 pieces of data from such sources as the United Nations, warned that the limit of the Earth’s endurance had already been reached. He said: “Humanity is living off its ecological credit card & can only do this by liquidating the planet’s natural resources”. Professor Tim Jackson, head of sustainable development at Surrey University, one of Britain’s leading expert in sustainability, said the research was broadly right and that we are using resources faster than they can be replaced by the planet. The upsetting of ecological systems, the widespread pollution, the threat to renewable resources as well as the running out of non-renewable resources and in general the rapid downgrading of the environment and the quality of life have made the ecological implications of the economic growth manifestly apparent in the past 30 years. Global warming, one of the major elements of today’s ecological crisis, outlining the impact of global warming, Jhon Reid (Former Defense Secretary of the UK); “Impacts such as flooding, melting permafrost and desertification could lead to loss of agricultural land, poisoning of water supplies and destruction of economic infrastructure”. Global warming is projected to have immense effects on freshwater and wetland ecosystems, according to a report by a team of scientists led by a biologist from Colorado State University. In a report titled “Aquatic Ecosystems & Global Climate Change”, “Researchers forecast substantial shifts in fish habitants, decreasing water quality and disappearing wetlands. According to the study, rivers, lakes and wetlands may be seriously affected by the predicted global warming trend”. In a report which was released recently by the Pew Center on Global Climate Change, Biologist N.LeRoy Poff of Colorado State University states that “Water quality will likely decline greatly due to expected reduction in summertime runoff and elevated temperatures. Additionally warmer waters will likely increase the amount of blue-green and other nuisance algae that can reduce the amount of dissolved oxygen in the water”.

Each year, the per head Carbon Dioxide (CO2) output in countries like United States, Canada, United Kingdom and Australia is approximately 10 ton, whereas this CO2 output per head in Asian countries is just 0.5 ton. Therefore it is apparent that the technological advancement of these so-called developed countries has significantly contributed to the increased proportion of the CO2 in the atmosphere, thus has led to global warming. Still Washington & Sydney keep refusing to sign in the Kiyodo Environmental Agreement, which was initiated few years ago in a Japanese city, Kiyodo, since they are the two main nuclear weapon manufacturers and thus the largest contributors to Global warming and its impacts. The recent publication of the report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) finally brought the ecological crisis to the status of universal front page news. The catastrophic climate change threatening us all because of the Greenhouse effect becomes obvious once we take into account that even if we take the best-case scenario of 2.2 C rise in temperature this century (while a 4.4 C rise is much more likely!), this would mean, according to the European Commission that an extra 11000 people in Europe would die within a decade and from 2071 onwards there would be 29000 extra deaths a year in southern Europe alone, on top of 27000 extra deaths on northern Europe. Global Warming is likely to have the greatest human impact in poor countries unable to adequately respond to the changes. Professor Robert Dickinson of the Georgia Institute of Technology’s School of Earth & Atmospheric Sciences presented the evidence behind this assessment at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Sciences (AAAS) as follows: “Current climate models can indicate the general nature of climate change for the next 100 to 200 years. But the effects of Carbon Dioxide (CO2) that have been released into the atmosphere from the burning of fossil fuels last for at least 100 years”. Therefore, beyond any doubts, beyond any arguments it is apparent that the World’s Eco System is heavily threatened by the irresponsible human behavior and by the materialistic approach on resources. Economic & Social Injustice “Global Financial Crisis”, the most hearable topic nowadays in global Medias. Facts show that the whole world is in an Economic uncertainty. German finance minister Peer Steinbrueck told parliament on 25th September that “The long term consequences of the crisis are not yet clear. But one thing seems likely to me; the U.S will loose its superpower status in the world financial systems”. A global financial firestorm swept the world after Wall Street giant Lehman Brothers, the fourth largest investment bank in the U.S, filed bankruptcy protection. The collapse of Lehman and financial woes of other financial institutions like insurer giant AIG knocked down global markets in turmoil touted as the worst since the great depression of 1930s. This is no more than an impact of the improper economic system, Capitalism which is a product of the western civilization. The whole world is now suffering from the outcomes of the prevailing capitalist world economy, a system which is far beyond the concept of justice and ethical considerations. The economic and social disparity caused under Capitalism has reached the worst stage and the following comparisons would further prove it: Socially and economically, we have created great disparities of wealth. A minority of the world’s population (17%) consume most of the world’s resources (80%), leaving almost 5 billion people

to live on the remaining 20%. As a result, billions of people are living without the very basic necessities of life – food, water, housing and sanitation. Specifically, 1.2 billion (20%) of the world population now lives on less than $1 per day, another 1.8 billion (30%) lives on less than $2 per day, 800 million go to bed hungry every day, and 30000 – 60000 die each day from hunger alone, The story is the same, when it comes to other necessities like water, housing, education, etc. On the flip side, we have increasing accumulation of wealth and power, where the world’s 500 or so billionaires have assets of 1.9 trillion dollars, a sum greater than the income of the poorest 170 countries in the world. The amount of money that the richest 01 percent of the world’s people makes each year equals what the poorest 57 percent makes. The world’s 358 billionaires have assets exceeding the combined annual incomes of countries with 45 percent of the world’s people. The richest 05 percent of the worlds have incomes 114 times that of the poorest 05 percent. The combined wealth of the world’s 200 richest people hit $1 trillion in 1999; the combined income of 582 million people living in the 43 least developed countries is $146 billion. The Gross Domestic Production (GDP) of the poorest 48 nations (i.e. a quarter of the world’s countries) is less than the wealth of the world’s three richest people combined. A few hundred millionaires now own as much wealth as the world’s poorest 2.5 billion people. 20% of the people in developed nations consume 86% of the world’s goods. 12% of the world’s population uses 85% of its water. Globally, 20% of the world’s people in the highest-income countries account for 86% of total private consumption expenditures – the poorest 20% account for minuscule 1.3%. The cost of providing basic health care and nutrition for all people in the world would be less than the annual cost of pet food in Europe and the United States. The annual revenue of Motorola Inc is almost equal to the annual income of Nigeria, Africa’s second largest economy. The country is almost the size of the Europe and has the largest population of any African country – 120 million. Over 840 million people in the world are malnourished – 799 million of them are from developing world. Sadly, more than 153 million of them are under the age of 05. Every day, 34000 children under five die of hunger or other hunger-related diseases. This results in 06 million deaths a year. But current figures show how half of the food in the U.S. and a third of food in the UK goes to waste. In the U.S, this amounts to total losses of up to $100 billion per year, $20 billion of that occurring in the farm and processing sectors, and $30-40 billion occurring in the retail sector. Household losses account for a further $40 billion, reveals research conducted by Dr.Timothy Jones, an Anthropologist at the University of Arizona’s Bureau for Applied Research in Anthropology. (Organic Consumers Association) These comparisons are simply a few examples of the ultimate results humanity has obtained under this pure materialistic Capitalist economy. These are the Economic crimes; the Capitalist West is convicted of. Conclusion In conclusion, it is an obvious fact that this so-called Western Civilization is a system which is based on fake ideologies, concepts & philosophies. It has brought humanity more evils than goods. It has failed to bring him happiness, it has failed to give a meaning for the human life, it has failed to maintain the moral standards of the humanity, and it has failed to address the inherent needs of the human being. Therefore this Civilization has failed in all aspects and the humanity is in need for an alternative Civilization which accommodate the human values, feelings and which gives priority to Spirituality.

Ending with the words of the great scholar Dr. Yusuf Al-Qaradawi; “How can we say, after all this, that the west is still able to grant happiness to the world. How to expect those who are shallow from within to be saviors? How to think that those who are wretched will give happiness to us? Indeed, those who have nothing can give nothing.”