One of the news items in the BBC World News, on Thursday, 19th November, was the fact that the younger generation in the UK is no longer guaranteed to be better off than their parents. The younger generation below the age of thirty are already poorer than their parents from the moment of birth. Malta is following this trend and the number of poor families is on the increase. Different is the situation in other countries, in particular ex-British colonies, such as India. Their children still have the aspiration and the chance to be better than their parents. The BBC linked this situation to economic factors.
As an academic, I find this logic a little bit unconvincing for the simple reason that the UK and Malta are still registering economic growth and therefore, this situation should not occur unless this growth is being registered only within a section of the population, that is, the rich who are getting richer and the poor, poorer.
However, as an individual who studied historical demography, I think that there is another reason. This should be linked to the family. The changes in the concept of the family, which have partly resulted from an academic effort to radicalize the Western family and change it from a traditional to a more individualized one, can in part be the result for this situation. Unlike in economy, social change takes times to be felt. There will be inevitable social consequences for the number of drastic changes that the traditional concept of the family has been subjected to and these changes will leave their pinch on society. I think that the UK is starting to taste its own medicine for the forced changes that were made to the family structure. I am sure that Malta will soon be in the same situation.
I know that this point is contentious and can bring a lot of reactions. But what is going to happen next should be of no political controversy. If our children are going to start feeling that they can no longer be better off than their parents, the chances for them to start radicalizing themselves is extremely high. Unlike what we have been told during the Commonwealth meeting, education will not be enough to stop radicalization or terrorism. This does not necessarily mean that they will become Muslim terrorists. The chances here are for the locals to start embracing extreme ideology. In part, this explains why the extreme right is making headway in European politics.
This phenomenon is already being felt by those who are on the fringe of society, the sons and daughters of migrants, whose parents migrated to Europe with the hope of a better living and they found that this is just a dream. Instead, they found barriers. Others sought to behave as free riders.
The attacks on Paris give us the opportunity to analyze this complex situation a little bit better. ISIS is adopting a policy, which is very much American. One only needs to return to the basic texts on American democracy to realize that ISIS are behaving in the same way that American democracy behaves against the other. Tocqueville’s classical text, Democracy in America showed what democracy in America really means. Tocqueville spoke in terms of circles. He realized that democracy is only important for those who are within the circle of power. But if the educated youth are kept outside this circle of power, with no chance that one day they can share in the responsibility of administering power, if not suffering from ostracization, then democracy is meaningless to them. ISIS is turning this whole logic upside down. It is recruiting educated youths who think that the Western society is ostracizing them. They are accepting to be radicalized, as radicalism, is seen as the only gateway where they can prove themselves. This goes beyond the Muslim religious creeds. Was it not an educated Christian who opened fire in America on the staff of an abortion clinic?
To destroy Putin and his power, America has supported and financed the propagation of the concept of atheism and the death of religions. It has even forced and paid for the propagation of new concepts of the family. I think in Malta we have the proof of all this. An American ambassador was removed for the simple reason that he was Roman Catholic and was mixing too much with Catholic quarters. Instead, another ambassador was brought over whose main interest was to promote the LGBTIQ agenda. I am not going to enter into whether this is correct or not. But these facts confirm my arguments that the American administration was seeking to export new family concepts, which until 1989, were considered Communist precepts mostly practised behind the Iron Curtain. When the Soviet Union took these positions America supported Religions and the traditional family. With the fall of Communism, the roles have been inverted. America now is supporting sexual diversity and the propagation of atheism. Russia is appearing as the bulwark of Christianity and the traditional family. Ironically enough, after abandoning its Communist principles of atheism, Russia has become the only reliable partner for Europe, capable of hitting at ISIS. Even Israel of Netanyahu is eyeing in Putin’s Russia a reliable partner.
Adopting Communist precepts developed in the West, in particular by French thinkers, America presented hedonism as a solution to world problems. Then radical groups started coming in. They are attacking hedonism at its roots. This is why these terrorists are attacking centres of pleasure in Paris.
The new religion of Liberals and the American Left that the god of pleasure can win over all other gods is coming crashing down to the shouts of “Allah hu Akbar” that is “our Muslim God is greater [than the liberal god of pleasure]”. The Socialist President Hollande is realizing that leftist theories are leading him nowhere. As his speech at Versailles confirms, political pragmatism is the sole answer. If he fails, the answer will be sought in the extreme political groups in Europe.
The strength of the Muslim believers is not in the terrorist attack per se but in the fact that they are ready to die for their belief, while none of the followers of the American god (or gods) are prepared to die for their hedonistic religions for the simple reason that Mammon and hedonism make you appreciate your life and escape from your responsibilities more than anything else.