The LA Times' foreign correspondent David Lamb wrote a book called The Arabs in 1987. (He also wrote The Africans, which Barack Obama found such a disturbing read on his first flight to Kenya.) Here are excerpts from Lamb's chapter on Cairo, where he lived for several years. (This is from the 2002 edition of The Arabs, but it seems pretty similar to the edition I read in the 1980s). I don't know how much has changed since then. Lamb wrote:
The capital is sinking under the weight of people, more and more people, and Egypt itself seems in danger of becoming a Bangladesh on the shores of the Mediterranean, an impoverished land gripped by lethargy and decay ...
... a system that has never rewarded competence and has seen its skilled craftsmen head off for better-paying jobs in the oil-rich countries. In their absence, janitors become clerks, farmers become builders, cooks become mechanics. When the results are predictably diasastrous, the ever-tolerant and patient Egyptians merely shrug and say, "Malesh," -- Never mind.
... The sand is powder-fine and so pervasive that it sneaks through the tiniest cracks and clings to everything. ... Open a book and there on page 105 is a fine coating of dust.
Grit turned out to be a big problem when Egypt's ambitious and energetic early 19th Century Albanian ruler, Mohamed Ali, attempted to industrialize the country by buying steam engines and powered cotton looms from Britain to turn Egyptian cotton into textiles. The expensive power machinery kept breaking down due to sand getting in.
Sometimes on the dusty shelves of unlit bookshops, you can find old guidebooks to a city that is no more. They speak of Cairo's fine opera house [I believe Verdi's Aida had its world premiere in Cairo], of banyan trees and patches of green that stretched along the verdant promenade of the corniche, ... of days when Cairenes could live and breathe and move easily in what was, until the 1950s, among the last of the twentieth-century Westernized enclaves in the Arab world. Cairo, in fact, was really two cities throughout most of the 1800s and 1900s: there was the Cairo for Europeans and the Egyptian aristocracy with manicured gardens, elegant hotels and palaces, fine carriages and well-dressed people, and further back from the Nile, past the parks and villas, there was the crowded, dirty Cairo for everybody else. ...
An apathetic public, economic mismanagement and a wildly out-of-control birthrate have become the cancers of Cairo, sapping its strength and leaving its dazed inhabitants the victims of what is known in Egypt as the IBM syndrome: inshallah (if God is willing), bokra (tomorrow) and malesh (never mind). ... That Cairo is being transformed into a vast slum of rural peasants, attracted to the city by the illusions of a better life, does not greatly concern the individual Cairene because, the reasoning goes, man does not really control his destiny or his surroundings.
But here's a curious thing: while Egyptians are content to live in filthy, battered buildings, the insides of their home are always immaculate. ... When I asked friends if anyone had ever considered a neighborhood block association, or an owners' association to clean up common areas, they would chuckle and say, "Oh, that would never work here." ... That attitude, I thought, represented a troubling omen for the undisciplined Egyptian society as a whole and brought to mind the words that T.E. Lawrence spoke more than seventy years ago: "The Semitic mind does not lean toward system of organization. It is practically impossible to fuse the diverse elements among the Semites into a modern, closely knit state." ...
In Tahrir (Liberation) Square, out the back door of the Nile Hilton Hotel, the cluster of small gardens and the strips of grass have been paved over to make way for an outdoor terminal serviced by fifty-four bus companies. ...
A generation ago, when Egypt produced a hundred or more feature films a year, Cairo's thirteen first-run movie theaters were as grand as any in London. ... "The audience that used to support the first-class theaters just doesn't exist anymore," said one of Egypt's widely known character actors, Salah Zoufoukay. "Now it's a peasant society."
Cairo's deterioration is of more than passing interest because the conditions that have allowed it to happen were largely avoidable. ...
The first force of destruction was government centralization. Everything is centered in Cairo. If an Egyptian needs a new passport or has a question about his war pension, he must come to Cairo.
Then military spending in 1948-1973, then socialism and apathy about the birth rate. ...
The intellectual class became more isolated and less influential, its voice drowned in the sea of look-alike, think-alike peasants who have taken over Cairo and to whom politicians, educators filmmakers and newspaper editors seem to believe they must cater.
A big question would be what changes in government would be necessary to allow civil society to flourish. And what are the odds it would flourish?
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82 comments:
The force of decay that is Islam. The Europeans and the socialists merely delayed the inevitable.
They're a nasty lot too:
http://chiesa.espresso.repubblica.it/articolo/1346582?eng=y
A fascinating read certainly. Stories about Egypt like this and on the stagnanting and decaying near-east makes Tyler Cowen's constant recommendations of Timur Kuran's analysis even more pressing.
Oh!, for the golden years!
Anal retentive, stiff upper lipped pythonesque British army officers muttering 'damned wogs' unde their breath at every available opportunity, and then there's good old King Farouk - described by a friend as a 'stomach with a head attached', a gourmand who ate a dozen eggs for breakfast every day, proudly owned the world's biggest porn stash, and reputedly made a comcubine of any attractive Egyptian girl his roving eye alighted upon.
So Egypt's problems ca 1987 are basically those of California today? Interesting to be reminded that Muslim Brotherhood Salafism wasn't even considered a factor back then, even though to expurgate it Syria had levelled the entire city of Hama a few years previously.
Anon:
"Anal retentive, stiff upper lipped pythonesque British army officers muttering 'damned wogs'..."
While applying the Rule of Law to the far-flung colonies, for the first time since the fall of Rome.
Um, Golden Years, Your case against the locals seems substantive, but what exactly was your complaint against the British colonial officers?
Gilbert Pinfold.
"The Semitic mind does not lean toward system of organization. It is practically impossible to fuse the diverse elements among the Semites into a modern, closely knit state."
Must be the European admixture in you-know-where then.
"While applying the Rule of Law to the far-flung colonies, for the first time since the fall of Rome."
Actually, the Muslims conquered it from the Byzantines, partly by offering more religious freedom (the Byzantines weren't very ecumenical about their Christianity) and lower taxes (the dhimmi tax was lower than the tax the Byzantines charged).
I'm not so sure Egypt went downhill so much as Europe went uphill much later.
"Actually, the Muslims conquered it from the Byzantines, partly by offering more religious freedom (the Byzantines weren't very ecumenical about their Christianity) and lower taxes (the dhimmi tax was lower than the tax the Byzantines charged).
I'm not so sure Egypt went downhill so much as Europe went uphill much later."
It's both. Europe greatly improved, but the Islamic world declined; the Islamic world is not only backward compared to the West today, it is backward compared to its own past.
The Islamic world had its golden age, but later went into steady decline as religious fundamentalism took over and the acceptable scope of inquiry was radically narrowed.
This decline is precisely the kind of 'reform' that some religious types - conservative 'Judeo-Christians' who often misuse words like 'nihilism' - would like to inflict on the West. Ironically, these 'Christian Taliban' types are almost always psychotically anti-Islamic.
Few of them have the courage of their convictions to openly praise Islam for its avowed anti-intellectualism and its anti-Westernism and its primitivism, all necessary 'features' of a robust 'anti-nihilistic' stance based on a literalist, fundamentalist religious foundation.
There is much frustration with corruption in Egypt. I don't see how any revolution would change that. Corruption is an integral part of Middle Eastern culture.
Perhaps at least the scale of corruption can be reduced? If Mubarak's wealth is actually $40 billion as has been reported, then I suppose punishing him (by ousting him and blocking his son's succession to the royal throne) would be worthwhile to send a lesson to future corrupt Egyptian leaders to keep it within reasonable limits.
My grandfather was born and raised in Cairo, part of a professionally eclectic Arab and French-speaking Sephardi Jewish sub-elite who did everything that the French and British didn't have the local knowledge for and the local aristocrats considered beneath them - tea trading, translation, and organising camel trails in the interior. His opinion of the Egyptians is pretty close to what is suggested here: not necessarily stupid, but apathetic, fatalistic and lazy to the point of being undevelopable. During WWII, as a junior doctor, he was part of a huge operation to vaccinate Egyptian peasants against cholera, the prevalence of which was threatening the British army. He recalls the Europeans having to call in troops to coerce villagers into having the free injections that would save hundreds of thousands of their lives - not because they didn't know believe they worked, but because they simply did not seem to care. Interestingly, he has a much higher opinion of Arabs from the "Maghreb", the rest of North Africa - less lazy, more honourable, and generally less infuriating. Perhaps there's something to be said for a cultural explanation based on the different mindset required for sitting around waiting for the Nile to flood and scraping a living from the stones of the Atlas.
A generation ago, when Egypt produced a hundred or more feature films a year, Cairo's thirteen first-run movie theaters were as grand as any in London.
My mother-in-law is an Arabic speaker, and she gets sattelite TV from the Middle East. I was surprised by the quality of the older Egyptian movies (from the forties to the fifties). They were generally about as good as most of the offerings coming out of the studio system in Hollywood. A serious drop in quality, though, happened--amazingly!--at the same time Nasser took control.
Speaking of the forties and fifties, I took a tour of Alexandria in 2000. The guide made a point of blaming pretty much all of Egypt's problems on King Farouk's gambling debts (Seriously!). I guess Farouk's shade can rest easy now, knowing Mubarak's will be taking over.
Obama's treatment of Mubarak is the case for AIPAC: without a strong, indeed fanatical, internal US lobby, no ally of the US can expect loyalty from us.
Of course, there's a case against AIPAC too.
Thank God that could never happen here.
The Social Pathologist said
>The force of decay that is Islam.<
You're selling no nostrums to me. Seeking causes in ideology is putting the camel before the cart.
"The Semitic mind does not lean toward system of organization. It is practically impossible to fuse the diverse elements among the Semites into a modern, closely knit state."
That mind seems pretty good at turning human habitats into deserts, though.
Does egypt have a sufficient number of high IQ minorities?
In countries like Singapore, the low IQ majority racial group is mature enough to accept that they don't have the IQ needed to organize industry and allows a super high IQ minority to do the organizing.
The result is a symbiotic relationship in which the low IQ majority actually does OK.
Low IQ Singaporeans are lucky that they have a high IQ minority to run things.
Similarly, the citizens of Quatar have exceptionally low IQs but since they voluntarily put a high IQ minority in charge of industry, the citizens of Quatar enjoy just about the highest per capita income in the world.
In some countries it is indeed a smart strategy for the low IQ majority to allow a super high IQ minority to run industries.
So again, does egypt have high IQ minorities around to run things? If not perhaps that is part of the problem.
Calls to mind that book about India, "Heat and Dust." Mish has a good analysis today of what is wrong with Egypt--in macro terms, a deep worsening of its terms of trade. Also, Spengler astutely says that it is China which is killing Egypt and other "aspiring" Third-World countries: on the one hand, it drives up food prices with its demand for more beef and such; on the other hand, it sucks up all the industrial jobs that could have given a place like Egypt a chance to move up the economic letter. Indeed, Egypt's industry is apparently being hollowed out by China in the same way that America's is. Amazing times.
heh.. he should look mr. TE Lawrence's assessment of another 'semitic' peoples.
The first force of destruction was government centralization.
Thank God we don't have that problem here in the United State of America.
Correction. Should be "cart before the camel." An elementary error of euphony over sense; apologies.
Singapore is approximately 75% Chinese and is thus composed primarily of a high iq population not low. Malays only form 13% of Singapore's population(and dropping) though they are the indigenous inhabitants of the island. Your idea of having a low iq majority country perform rather well economically due to the presence of a high iq minority group would apply to the rest of Southeast Asia, South Africa, East Africa, and Latin America.
You can't have a First World country populated with Third World people.
So again, does egypt have high IQ minorities around to run things? If not perhaps that is part of the problem.
Egypt has a huge population (about as high as Germany's, IIRC) and the only minority of note are its own Christians, who are about 10-15% of the population. Many of them are poor, and reportedly, unlike in Lebanon, their birth rate is not significantly lower than that of their Muslim compatriots. They do tend to have a higher potential of becoming wealthy if given the chance, possibly since they don't have the apathy that seems ingrained into the Muslim mind.
There used to be Greeks, Italians, British, Jews, and such, but they're mostly gone now, and those that remain are a minuscule portion of Egypt's total population.
Hi Steve-
I know this is off topic, but I thought you might be interested in my review of Black Swan since it references and expands on yours in TakiMag. Thanks for the good movie reviews.
http://www.amazon.com/review/R95WOY1PAROZ0/ref=cm_cr_rdp_perm
Anonymous: Few of them have the courage of their convictions to openly praise Islam for its avowed anti-intellectualism and its anti-Westernism and its primitivism, all necessary 'features' of a robust 'anti-nihilistic' stance based on a literalist, fundamentalist religious foundation.
Islam is nihilistic in its own way, but there is simply no denying the fundamental tautology of human relations: The people who make the babies make the future.
So either get busy making babies, or get busy going extinct.
PS: This very same tautology applies not only to the Muslims of the Middle East, but also to the Negroes & the Aboriginal Amerindians of the USA.
PPS: You might want to spend some time studying the foundations of the various religions so as to decide for yourself whether or not they are fundamentally [or fundamentalistically] nihilistic.
Steve, please comment -
"Texas finances not as rosy as they seemed"
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-texas-budget-20110207,0,3480477,print.story
"Now it's a peasant society."
Ah, now I understand better a remark an Egyptian friend made to me a decade ago. We were discussing religion; after I said that I was an atheist, he said that he was too. Islam, he said, was believed in only by the peasants. He added that his country was being destroyed by the peasants and their beliefs.
(...and that he was going to obtain the citizenship of one of the EU countries, so that he could work and live anywhere in the EU.)
Egypt's problem is too many people, which among other things kills innovation. Egypt produces fine cotton. The Nile is an agricultural factory, and always has been. Mechanized farming, of cotton and other exports, with textile manufacturing done on the spot, to the highest quality, is a way for Egypt to hit a "sweet spot" in generating wealth that no other country can match: water from the Nile, making cotton, reliably year after year, and then spinning it into yarn and textiles (powered by the Nile).
This is a no-brainer, but it can never succeed because of all those people, who have entrenched institutions, corruption, and lethargy that make technological change that in turn changes society simply impossible.
Islam all over the world takes populations and puts them in amber, frozen. It is very good at resisting change. Bernard Lewis, friendly to Islam, notes that time and again, Muslim rulers in Egypt and Turkey and North Africa sought to institute technology such as the Printing Press, or newspapers, or telegraphs, and found their populations intent on smashing them. Because they abhorred the social change. Meanwhile Northern Protestant Christians in Europe, with small populations and a need for change (against powerful enemies intent on crushing them) embraced these technologies and others.
A steam engine will work just as well for an Egyptian as the European colonizers who kept steam railroads and ships on the Nile running. But to get it and keep it running in dust you need a society oriented towards machine building and fiddling and crafts oriented, instead of mass fatalism.
This decline is precisely the kind of 'reform' that some religious types - conservative 'Judeo-Christians' who often misuse words like 'nihilism' - would like to inflict on the West. Ironically, these 'Christian Taliban' types are almost always psychotically anti-Islamic.
It would be helpful if people who went off on jags about the "Christian Taliban" would name names. That way readers could evaluate whether there might be a coherent, evidence-based opinion here, or just another anti-religious hysteric with a terminal case of blinkered presentism. (The only remotely Christian Taliban-esque conservatives I've run across are positively swoony about Islam, think it would be a vast improvement on modern secular society, and are slavering for "Eurabia".)
"Also, Spengler astutely says that it is China which is killing Egypt and other "aspiring" Third-World countries: on the one hand, it drives up food prices with its demand for more beef and such; on the other hand, it sucks up all the industrial jobs that could have given a place like Egypt a chance to move up the economic letter. Indeed, Egypt's industry is apparently being hollowed out by China in the same way that America's is. Amazing times."
The difference between Egypt and America is that there's nothing Egypt can do about this, since it's not a large enough consumer market to attract industry for its own sake. America, on the other hand, has all the leverage in the world, if it would only use it. We still have the largest consumer market, by far, and on top of that we have rule of law, an excellent transport system, etc. A tariff on Chinese goods equal to the undervaluation of China's currency (about 35%) would draw factories from China to America. A similar tariff on China by Egypt wouldn't.
Of course it goes without saying that many low IQ groups would be better off in every way if they were ruled by high IQ groups.
But usually pride and ego prevents low IQ groups from happily submitting to rule by a group with higher IQ.
You have to admire the low IQ groups with the good sense to happily embrace rule by those with higher IQ.
For example, in Barbados, the majority of the population is of African ancestry. These folks of african ancestry accept rule by a small minority of people descended entirely from Europe. As a result of letting Europeans run everything, Barbados has one of the highest per capita incomes in the caribbean.
Similarly, Malays in Malaysia have dramatically lower IQs than the Malaysian citizens of Chinese ancestry. Malays accept that Chinese have higher IQ, accept that Chinese are to run the industries.
Barbados and Malaysia are examples of countries in which the low IQ majority accepts economic rule by a high IQ minority. Results are great.
Of course the usual pattern is that low IQ people can't accept that they were born with a low IQ and instead they murder or expel their high IQ neighbors. Uganda kicked out all the Indians and as a result the economy has been terrible ever since. Rhodesia kicked out almost all of its whites and as a result it has been doing pretty badly ever since.
Are egyptians realistic enough to accept that they have genetically low IQ and therefore to invite a high IQ minority to move in and run industry, or do egyptians have so much foolish pride that they will refuse to accept super high IQ industrialists?
Is it possible for people here to discuss any subject without it degenerating into an idiotic discussion of "high IQ" and "low IQ" groups?
All Egyptians do not suffer from low IQ just like all Malays and all Africans do not have low IQs. The problem that arises is when a given group has a larger proportion of high IQ individuals who then go on to significantly impact and control the economy while also disparaging the low IQ majority group. Such a scenario gives rise to resentment among the majority group and makes it even difficult for those of a high IQ from the population with the lower mean to break into the elite since this elite is composed primarily of the 'other group' whose clannishness leads them to effectively block out individuals with a high intelligence from the lower IQ group. The overall sense of alienation between the two groups leads to low self-esteem for the individuals(even those with a higher iq) from the poorer performing group.
What I would like to ask the readers and Steve here is that wouldn't it be better for all human ethnic groups if a policy of benign eugenics were implemented across every country(and in particular the third world) such as encouraging/forcing those citizens with desirable traits(IQ being one of the most important) to have a large number of children? Within a century of such aggressive but benign eugenics(sterilizing those truly unfit but bettering their lives through monetary reimbursements for the sterilization for example) we could have a much more equal world with friendlier, happier, more peaceful and more intelligent people?
For those who will be quick to pipe in that 'regression to the mean' would make this vision defunct, please save yourself the embarrassment of such faulty thinking and do yourself the favor of learning more about genetics!
Too much cousin marriage in Egypt for a civil society to work. At least according to this chick.
It's hilarious the extent to which IQ fetishists don't understand the very thing they're so obsessed over. Instead of posting about "super duper high IQ minorities" maybe they should bust out a Z table and slowly get into their thick skulls that any large grouping of people will possess its own "high IQ minority."
There are well over a million Egyptians with an IQ of 120+ even if you use the lowest estimate of Egypt's mean IQ. Voila, there you go, Egypt does have a super duper high IQ minority, no Jews or Asians required!
"But usually pride and ego prevents low IQ groups from happily submitting to rule by a group with higher IQ."
Is it really pride, as in the moral failing, or is it the genetic aggressiveness that allowed them to survive despite being dumb?
The Malays instituted massive affirmative action for themselves, paid for by the productive Chinese minority. The Malays also have kept political power for themselves. The Chinese are the hamsters on the wheel that keep everything afloat. Without them, Malaysia would look like some slum in Manila.
Another anon is clearly delusional.
What makes America the largest consumer market? We have 300 million people and a declining currency. China and India have about 2.5 billion people. All it would take is a run on the dollar and end up about the size of South Koreas consumer market.
Rule of Law? Excellent transport system? Apparently you have been listening to emperor Obama's speeches too much. Our rule of law is administered by Goldman Sachs, and don't get me started on our infrastructure. We are going to blow a trillion connecting San Francisco to LA, meanwhile our regular rail lines are falling apart.
Oh and higher tariffs are the low-IQ people's solution to everything. Why would people manufacture in America when they could manufacture in Vietnam or Eastern Europe Or South America?
You have to admire the low IQ groups with the good sense to happily embrace rule by those with higher IQ.
Is that you, Yan Chen, or some other Asian supremacist?
Oh and higher tariffs are the low-IQ people's solution to everything. Why would people manufacture in America when they could manufacture in Vietnam or Eastern Europe Or South America?
Because they want to sell in America, my faux high-IQ friend. Why do you think the Japanese car companies built factories here in the US?
What makes America the largest consumer market? We have 300 million people and a declining currency. China and India have about 2.5 billion people.
You don't understand what the words "largest consumer market" mean. It has nothing to do with numbers of people.
"...then there's good old King Farouk - described by a friend as a 'stomach with a head attached', a gourmand who ate a dozen eggs for breakfast every day, proudly owned the world's biggest porn stash, and reputedly made a comcubine of any attractive Egyptian girl his roving eye alighted upon."
- Any relation to Clinton?
Another high IQ anon:
Oh and higher tariffs are the low-IQ people's solution to everything.
If that were true then you wouldn't be against them.
Why would people manufacture in America when they could manufacture in Vietnam or Eastern Europe Or South America?
Oh lawdy. How can this guy write about tariffs and in the same post ask this question? How?? Could it be due to that other thing he talked about in his post, namely low-IQ?
"The Islamic world had its golden age, but later went into steady decline as religious fundamentalism took over and the acceptable scope of inquiry was radically narrowed."
"This decline is precisely the kind of 'reform' that some religious types - conservative 'Judeo-Christians' who often misuse words like 'nihilism' - would like to inflict on the West. Ironically, these 'Christian Taliban' types are almost always psychotically anti-Islamic. "
- Actually, I'm more worried about the religion of diversity and marxism, that seems to be a much more sweeping and devastating force in the West.
"...Similarly, Malays in Malaysia have dramatically lower IQs than the Malaysian citizens of Chinese ancestry. Malays accept that Chinese have higher IQ, accept that Chinese are to run the industries.
Barbados and Malaysia are examples of countries in which the low IQ majority accepts economic rule by a high IQ minority. Results are great."
- Alot of problems with this view. Malays don't cheerfully agree to Chinese domination there. There is alot of racial turmoil with Malays granting themselves affirmative action type quotas to Universities and choice government jobs among other benefits. The rule of law is an Islamic (Malay) centered law. Also Malaysia isn't doing great, GDP-wise its pretty mediocre.
"In some countries it is indeed a smart strategy for the low IQ majority to allow a super high IQ minority to run industries."
"You have to admire the low IQ groups with the good sense to happily embrace rule by those with higher IQ.
"
Whether this was intended as IQ-fetishish satire or truly earnest hasbara from somebody who fancies themselves a "super high IQ minority", I'd like you to know that it made me throw up just a little in my mouth.
"There are well over a million Egyptians with an IQ of 120+ even if you use the lowest estimate of Egypt's mean IQ. Voila, there you go, Egypt does have a super duper high IQ minority, no Jews or Asians required!"
True. Had Mubarak not wasted the last 30 years he could have had every young Egyptian teen tested and cultivated the high IQ ones (sent them to the best schools overseas, offered them subsidized housing in the best parts of Cairo or Alexandria, given them cash bonuses to have 3 or 4 kids, exempted them from Gamal's 20% cut etc.).
"What makes America the largest consumer market? We have 300 million people and a declining currency."
We're the largest consumer market in terms of aggregate spending. A poor American has more buying power than 10 Indians or Chinese. Our currency is dropping because of our persistent trade deficits. A tariff would fix that.
"Rule of Law? Excellent transport system? Apparently you have been listening to emperor Obama's speeches too much. Our rule of law is administered by Goldman Sachs, and don't get me started on our infrastructure. We are going to blow a trillion connecting San Francisco to LA, meanwhile our regular rail lines are falling apart."
Our rule of law is a hell of a lot better than China's. And yes, our transport infrastructure (highways, waterways, cargo train lines) is excellent when it comes to moving manufactured goods.
"Oh and higher tariffs are the low-IQ people's solution to everything. Why would people manufacture in America when they could manufacture in Vietnam or Eastern Europe Or South America?"
Yes, I'm an idiot for thinking that the policy that built America into the greatest economic power in history might have some value. And you are much smarter, because you're able to rationalize an opposite policy that has ground us down for decades. Touche.
"Steve, please comment - 'Texas finances not as rosy as they seemed'"
That is aswesome news. Texas has pretty much been the lone holdout contradicting all the other data that shows that rapid growth of the Hispanic population is bad for the bottom line.
Huzzah!
You have to admire the low IQ groups with the good sense to happily embrace rule by those with higher IQ.
"Alpha children wear grey. They work much harder than we do, because they're so frightfully clever. I'm really awfully glad I'm a Beta, because I don't work so hard. And then we are much better than the Gammas and Deltas..."
Yes, I'm an idiot for thinking that the policy that built America into the greatest economic power in history might have some value.
You're an idiot if you think that the policy that built America into the greatest economic power in history was free trade. For most of its history it was a high tariff country. It still is, for certain products.
Anonymous said...
Too much cousin marriage in Egypt for a civil society to work. At least according to this chick.
Take 2:
http://hbdchick.wordpress.com/2011/02/07/aigyptos/
"You're an idiot if you think that the policy that built America into the greatest economic power in history was free trade."
You're an idiot if you think that's what I think. Try to understand the exchange before you jump in next time.
So far, I've nursed three high-IQ children while being entertained by these comment threads. EUGENICS WIN!
Ironically, these 'Christian Taliban' types are almost always psychotically anti-Islamic. "
what do you mean by 'christian taliban' what exactly who, and what, exactly do they wish to do ?
As another poster pointed out, cultural marxism, ie pc has been far more authoritarian.
as for nihilism? How so. Please show me an example of one your secular paradises? The french republic (s)? where has that taken them?
If Christianity was so bad, than apparently is the West, because Christanity was and to a large part still is, the west. Please show me an example of if being a net detriment to a Western society (don't you dare use Isabel and Ferdniand or the so called 'inquisition' - because Spain would still be a caliphate if it weren't for them - and , in that we've rejected Christianity - it might become one again.
If Christianity is so 'rigid' why did it give birth the university system and scientific method, not to mention the declaration of indpenendance (from Locke's glorious revolution of 1688 - we have our rights from God, not kings (or sultans)
That is aswesome news. Texas has pretty much been the lone holdout contradicting all the other data that shows that rapid growth of the Hispanic population is bad for the bottom line.
Texas "hispanics" tend to have lived in the Texas area since the 1700s. They are often European Spanish or mostly so, in descent. I went to a wedding of a Mexican to an American recently, and sat at the table with a couple who looked sort hispanic, yet different in type and personality from the others. His family was from Texas. He and his wife looked more Spain Spanish, though of course I don't know his lineage. But definitely a different type than the other Mexicans there, although some of them were educated and most were more or less middle class.
"There are well over a million Egyptians with an IQ of 120+ even if you use the lowest estimate of Egypt's mean IQ. Voila, there you go, Egypt does have a super duper high IQ minority, no Jews or Asians required!"
I think this is understood. However, left to their own devices, it's not enough to lift a whole country full of obstinate dullards, as we have seen in other countries who threw out ambitious foreigners. I regret having to resort to IQ-fetish tactics, but populations regress to their own mean. 120 IQ (and considering the marriages are often arranged and involve cousins, it is likely only one partner is high IQ) parents will be lucky to have kids within the norm much less higher. And grandkids....
People just don't get it. Inventions and innovation do not exist just in individuals here and there, coming out of the blue. The genius of a Newton or a James Watt is the result of generations of input, and surrounded by a society with enough oridnary, average-intellect people capable at least of understanding and implementing the inventions, and of maintaining and improving them. Just having a high IQ does not in and of itself ensure high achievement anyway. High intelligence is necessary to handle complex professional jobs, or even complex trade jobs, but having a high IQ does not ensure that one will be "into" such things. Many people are underachivers when not coerced into doing something with their brains. It might just mean they prefer to loll around and listen to recordings of the Koran when not watching porn on the cable channels (a common activity in Moslem countries.)
"Why would people manufacture in America if they could manufacture in Vietnam, Eastern Europe etc".
- Then why don't these self-same companies sell all their product in Vietnam, Eastern Europe etc.
Felix....
Instead of posting about "super duper high IQ minorities" maybe they should bust out a Z table and slowly get into their thick skulls that any large grouping of people will possess its own "high IQ minority."
There are well over a million Egyptians with an IQ of 120+
Get your head out of the book Felix. 120 is not a "super duper high IQ" by any stretch. That's only slightly above 115 which is typical for serious college work. That makes for a lot of competent bureaucrats, nurses, school teachers and other middle class types.
Distributions also matter, especially in democracies. The relatively small percentage of potentially competent middle class Egyptians are at the mercies of the overwhelming and rapidly growing numbers of angry, unproductive and increasingly dependent underclass.
Even the small middle class cannot realize their human or economic potential when mired in an apparently dysfunctional system like Egypt. Negative feedback.
Finally, these figures and their future trajectories are not going to create a globally competitive wealth generating center. They will never compete with Silicon Valley, Wall Street or Hollywood on the high end nor with China and India on the low end.
http://prudentbear.com/index.php/thebearslairview?art_id=10501
"The Semitic mind does not lean toward system of organization. It is practically impossible to fuse the diverse elements among the Semites into a modern, closely knit state."
Must be the European admixture in you-know-where then.
Are you referring to the non-existent ethno-state for all Semites?
Whether this was intended as IQ-fetishish satire or truly earnest hasbara from somebody who fancies themselves a "super high IQ minority", I'd like you to know that it made me throw up just a little in my mouth.
What about high-IQ peoples who are too dumb to invite in higher-IQ people to rule them? Are they "high IQ" or "low IQ"?
"Cognitive elitism": the belief that Jews and Chinese are dumb.
Get your head out of the book Felix. 120 is not a "super duper high IQ" by any stretch. That's only slightly above 115 which is typical for serious college work. That makes for a lot of competent bureaucrats, nurses, school teachers and other middle class types.
Are you really this stupid? The talk was of Egypt surrendering itself to a "super duper high IQ minority" to run the country. I'm merely saying that Egypt already possesses a "minority" of well over a million people whose IQ is AT LEAST 120. The AVERAGE IQ of this 1 million+ people is clearly much higher than 120, since 120 is the lower bound of this group. This is simple shiite, son.
In any case, what we've now established is that Egypt already possesses a super duper high IQ minority of 1 million + people whose average IQ is well over 120. Thus, there is clearly no need to import a million or two Asians whose average IQ is (supposedly) a paltry 105 and surrender the running of the country to them. Is that clear to you now, or do I have to sing a song?
Egypt would be better off in every way if it had HALF of its current population. You have 80 million people living in an area the size of Maryland. The population has increased 500% since WW2 began. This is madness.
"If Christianity is so 'rigid' why did it give birth the university system and scientific method, not to mention the declaration of indpenendance (from Locke's glorious revolution of 1688 - we have our rights from God, not kings (or sultans)"
Wow, way to completely miss the point. Islam had its great universities and scientific method too, and a lot of other things that got lost thanks to a regression. Go read some Spengler (no not that idiot writing under an assumed name, the original one). Civilization is cyclical. The point is not where the West has been, but where it is going. The "second religiousness" that Spengler observes doesn't lead to all those wonderful universities and scientific progress and the like, it leads away from it.
If you can't see the parallels between our situation today and similar situations in past civilizations, then you are beyond help. If you can't see the groups today within "Christendom" who have similarities with the Taliban, you are beyond help. The idiots pushing for teaching Creationism in the schools are not the kinds of people who are going to create a second flowering of universities and science and the like, they wouldn't know how even if they were so inclined, which they are not.
Pointing out the glorious past of the West and then shaking the magic talisman of "Christianity" is simply magical thinking. No amount of festishizing Christianity is going to restore a past that is gone forever. The "second religiousness" that comes isn't a restoration, it is the final exhaustion of civilization that has exhausted its potential. If you expect these to somehow resurrect the potential that existed 1,000 years ago in the West, you are going to be sorely disappointed.
You religious types are so hepped up on defending your religion from perceive attacks, that you simply don't get the point being made. Pointing out the accomplishments of the Christian West 1,000 years ago or 500 years ago not only misses the point, it reinforces the point you are arguing against. Islam can make similar claims about its past, with equal truth. It doesn't change the reality of what happened afterwards.
Islam had its great universities and scientific method too,
no it didn't. A madras is not a university. they never embraced the scientific method which came from a christian monk.
they never innovated. They never did much of anything, in fact. Some caliphs had scribes copy things of the greeks and romans but that's about it. Most of architecture and medicine islam was known for were actually nasarid christians.
Wow, way to completely miss the point.
There are some really dumb anonymous commenters on this thread. You, for instance. Nothing can be done about your intelligence or lack of it, but it should be easy enough for you to give yourself a frickin' name!
Just ordered "The Arabs" from Alibris, total $5.07Lamb wrote a great book about the minors, too.
Pointing out the glorious past of the West and then shaking the magic talisman of "Christianity" is simply magical thinking. No amount of festishizing Christianity is going to restore a past that is gone forever
pretty tiresome to regurgitate dawkins here. This is simple sounding narrative, but it is not tied into reality. at all. Do you think that there has been a steady progression of backward religiousness vs. enlightenment? that's a false argument - the so called enlightenment and its spawn generated some of the most barbaric, irrational violent behavior of the past three centuries - communism, the french revolution, for example - meanwhile the russian orthodox church was a leader in reform - and making real progress, until the bolsiviks came along.
The idiots pushing for teaching Creationism in the schools are not the kinds of people who are going to create a second flowering of universities and science and the like, they wouldn't know how even if they were so inclined, which they are not.
No, but nor are the secular, atheist idiots pushing blank slate- atheists are overwhelming left leaning, btw.
There actually is a great flowering of theology and religion and science- John Polkinghorne (rev, and former head of the cambridge mathematical physics department) is among many scientist theologians.
but I'll leave you to your simple minded black and white Richard Dawkins morality plays (btw, kind of ironic that you, and obvious dawkins fan, is posting here, because Dawkins is notorious in his ignorance of geo-political conflict )
Sounds like something Gregory Clark would also point out. A Malthusian society where modern medicine even in the third world has so lowered death rates in childhood and pregnancy that the population has exploded in a stagnant economy. Now with all those unemployed and poor the country begins to come apart at the seams.
Felix
No, this post isn't about Egypt importing millions of Asians. Only a few comments ventured down that tangent. Steve's post is about David Lambs observations about why Egypt is the way it is.
Again, 120 IQ may be "super duper" high to you but that's only your own misfortune. If you think this you've never really worked in an globally competitive intellectually demanding field doing complex original work.
The kind that creates significant new industries, wealth and jobs. The kind many bureaucrats wishfully think they can create out of whole cloth with radical blank slate premises and taxpayer stimulus.
You artfully ignored the other problems mentioned about Egypt but I'm sure that was intentional so it warrants no repeating here.
You could say the Egyptians have a super high IQ minority within itself merely through its high IQ subset, but I would think this would be a misleading to equate this to an East Asian minority, because that high IQ subset would seem like it would have less internal variation than an East Asian minority (or a European minority, if it were ever demographically possible), so would have fewer elite level geniuses and intellects. If we buy the smart fraction thing, then that would be a big difference.
You know, the Christian Taliban who blow up schools that teach girls or pour acid on their face for now wearing a veil? The ones who beat,
ahh you see if don't ban Christmas trees from schools, or prevent kids from singing "Hark the Herald" that's RIGHT around the corner.
@Silly Cat
You still seem to miss the point. I guess your IQ just isn't as stratospheric as you imagine. And, I have no responsibility to tackle every single point even tangentially touched upon in this thread, so the fact that I didn't is not at all "artful" in any way.
If Christianity was so bad, than apparently is the West, because Christanity was and to a large part still is, the west.
So was paganism. And much of western Christianity is very much pagan. The early Church had to sell itself to skeptical pagan nations that did things their own way. In other words, the early Church had to adapt. It was only later when Christians had the resources for genocide, such as in the Baltic region in the 13th century.
You know, the Christian Taliban who blow up schools that teach girls or pour acid on their face for now wearing a veil?
You forgot the point about hijacking passenger planes and ramming them into buildings.
Mind you, this is not so much a fault of Islam itself, but Islam plus Arabism. As a wise and wizened sage pointed out to me, it was neither Christian Arabs nor Indonesian Muslims who blew up the World Trace Center.
And what about blowing up abortion clinics, and murdering doctors who perform abortions?
The ones who beat, torture and kill anyone not publicly adhering to the strictist interpretation of Koran: no beard, listening to music, or being gay or divorced.
There are more than a few Christians who beat and torture (and even kill) those that offend them. Or, more likely, use their social and political power to oppress them in more minor ways - bullying, police harrassment, false accusations of murder, unjust dismissals, even rejection for country club memberships.
You already mentioned gays.
What about freethinkers, neo-pagans, Wiccans, satanists, spiritualists, neuro-atypicals, left handers, redheads, short people, people with certain disabilities, drug users, drug law reformers, libertarians, hippies and other harmless "dropout" types. Shall I go on?
What does a Christian Taliban shout just before he blows up innocent civilians in a Mosque or marketplace?
In fairness, you're right on this point. I have yet to hear of any Christian extremist suicide bombers.
And what about blowing up abortion clinics, and murdering doctors who perform abortions?
what about doctors who murder babies - late term abortions, botched ones where they strangle or smash the fetus, etc?
ou are insane to even think this much less post in public such a claim.
yes, but even though he's proven wrong here, he'll repeat it tomorrow. leftists media operates on the big lie theory whether they know it or not, and most howard zinn types are at least honest enough to admit honesty does not matter to them.
not your subjective adolescent feelings of rejection by that hunky star quarterback or the cool kids back in Little Sticks, AL.
:D :D :D :D
Christian Taliban:
A moral equivalence between the violence inspired and guided by Christian and Muslims teachings and practice. That deserves a WFT Dr. Evil "Right..."
The lesser of two evils is still evil.
More than a few? Again I ask you to specifically name what branches of Christianity, churches and leaders beat, torture and kill infidels
Most of the militant 700-club/PTL churches and leaders are far too restrained and PR-minded to do any of the beating, torturing, torching, and killing themselves. It's the followers, not the leaders, who indulge in most of the actual hateful behavior.
(Not to mention the more petty forms of hate as well - remember that elephants don't bite, mosquitoes do.)
And how the hell do you think "freethinkers, neo-pagans, Wiccans, satanists, spiritualists,
neuro-atypicals, left handers, redheads, short people, people with certain disabilities, drug users, drug law reformers, libertarians, hippies and other harmless "dropout" types" would be treated in the Muslim world?
Let's take this one at a time.
freethinkers, neo-pagans, Wiccans, satanists, spiritualists,
On this point, Muslims are much worse. A good example is the persecution of "devil-worshipping" Yezidis in post-Saddam Iraq.
neuro-atypicals, left handers, redheads, short people, people with certain disabilities,
Hard to say. None of these persons are popular in any society. But in my extensive travels throughout the world (I didn't live my whole life in "Little Sticks, AL", you know.) I have found more acceptance of such types in non-Western societies, including Muslim ones, than in the so-called West.
Look at how the Christian West historically treated "lepers and madmen". No compassion, no charity at all. You could say that those were unenlightened barbaric times, but some of these attitudes still live on - particularly when it comes to neuro-atypicals and so-called mental illness. Read some Szasz and Laing, rather than Bob Larson, for goodness sakes!
Considering the hypocritical paranoia Christian-influenced society has towards "evil evil crazies" makes me wonder about the Establishment having any mental health itself!!
drug users, drug law reformers,
Muslims don't have the same "reefer madness" paranoia that can be found in Western and East Asian societies. Their hated alien drug is alcohol, not cannabis - the reverse of the West.
libertarians, hippies and other harmless "dropout" types"
Mostly ignored rather than persecuted. It all comes down to how much self-confidence society has, not to feel threatened by them.
Even these fringe and/or vulnerable groups are accorded Western protections of law.
That means that Western society has an even greater obligation to protect them, and less excuse for failure. And that goes double for Christians, especially the more extreme ones, that think they're so good.
Hobbit,
Again, please provide facts and hyperlinks to all those "militant 700 Club" Christians who are beating, torturing and killing others inspired by their religion. You can't because you're completely full of shite.
Now you shift to some undefined sense of "hate". Everyone hates - it's the human condition. Christianity, primarily based on Jesus and the New Testament, is far more about love and self-abasement than any other major religion save possibly Buddhism. Then again, Christians are far more proactive in going out in the world and helping others, particularly the weak and oppressed, as part of their evangelical mission.
neuro-atypicals, left handers, redheads, short people, people with certain disabilities
Again, you're full of it. Individuality, rights of man, respect of human life, etc are so much more advanced in the West as a legacy of our legal code arising out of Christianity so as to leave the rest of the world unrecognizable. I'm sure a handicapped person can't walk down the street and sue every business that doesn't have handicapped access ramps and restroom outside of the West.
So you're shifting your position to acknowledge modern Christianity is far better than modern Islam then?
Now you want to compare modern Christianity to what? Secularist? Not entirely right in the mind and/or fringe elements of society like Wiccans, Satanists, Scientologist, Libertarians, Communists, Fascists? You really think a living in a community and nation of these counter culture whiners would ever work (hint, there's a reason why history has never had such a untenable social structure).
Who were the biggest mass murders in the last century? The rabidly anti-Christian and slightly pro-Muslim Hitler (he rightly saw Islam as unashamedly violent)? The rabidly secular Communists under Mao and Stalin and Pol Pot? Where are the modern Christians to meet those tallies?
You also say you want to hold Christianity singularly to far higher standards, because you just expect so much more. That's a new line of argument, but also whiney self-indulgent. You live in the freest, wealthiest, most accepting society history has ever seen (in large part due to European and Christian culture) and you rail against with absurd comparisons with Islam or demands (it's not perfect).
Look at how the Christian West historically treated "lepers and madmen". No compassion, no charity at all.
We are speaking of the world today, but even in the past your leftish brainwashing that the West and Christianity were a singular evil are entirely wrong. The West had leper colonies and homes for the insane, usually financed by the Church and staffed by Christian clergy and staff. You think India, Asia, Africa or anyplace else had a significantly better setup over most of history you're delusional.
Muslims don't have the same "reefer madness" paranoia that can be found in Western and East Asian societies. Their hated alien drug is alcohol, not cannabis - the reverse of the West.
Not true at all. The Taliban would execute anyone who was growing opium unauthorized against their dictates. In the Middle East, Asia and many other places they routinely behead or otherwise execute drug smugglers. Corrupt dictatorships may turn a blind eye to some drugs to sedate the oppressed masses, but it ain't out of respect for human rights and individual freedom like a Amsterdam sex and drug romp.
libertarians, hippies and other harmless "dropout" types"
Mostly ignored rather than persecuted
What you are permitted to do as a decadent transient western stoner bumming your way through the middle east or other 3rd world is not reflective of the actual culture is there. You have immunity to act as an asocial asshole celebrity but if you were a local pulling such shit you'd certainly be treated much more harshly than in America. (Our daughter refuses to marry the man we promised her to, we must kill her to save our family honor, Our son doesn't believe in Islam any more or worse, wants to convert to Christianity/Judiasm or much worse a pagan form so we are obliged to kill him, etc).
That means that Western society has an even greater obligation to protect them, and less excuse for failure.
Wahhh!!! You are a disturbing example of the weak and whiney post-Christian Westerner. If everything is not to your impossible self-centered satisfaction then it's all shite.
You are intellectually lazy and unlearned in history and the human condition yet think you have overriding validity because reality doesn't 100% comfort your precious warped feeling. You cannot place things into logical and measured context but rather must create or grossly exaggerate non-issues into personal Crusades to give your soulless existence meaning.
Leftists like yourself today are the direct descendants of the worst sort of pre-modern Christians. Leftists are the modern zealots who in days past would be slaughtering the unconverted or burning witches. You think your channeling the divine when you parrot your MSM propaganda, but it's as unintelligible as babbling in tongues writhing on the floor. You have the same sick mental outlook that you so angrily project onto "militant Christians".
Hobbit
After being asked to back up your anti-Christian fabrications and distortions, you once again shift the discussion. This time to a personal attack: "christo-communist". Rigggght.....
You're a pretty confused "libertarian" since you argued Western society and the government owes even more special handouts and protections for "neuroatypicals" and many other groups you claim are beaten, tortured and killed by Christian as part of their intolerant religion. Or is your new line they are just "hated" on for being different? Apparently forcible governmental wealth transfers from the productive to the less/unproductive via welfare, health care, housing, set asides, special education, therapy, sex-change operations, etc. to these unfortunate "victim" groups are all part of your bizarre understanding of what it means to be a libertarian.
Also, you again show your ignorance of history claiming Western Civilization today and especially "personal liberty" are primarily products of the pre-Christian pagen West rather than Christian Europe.
What percentage of pagans do you think enjoyed "personal liberty" in Rome? The foundations of the sanctity of the individual and their rights largely evolved after a thousand years of a deeply Christianized Europe with such watersheds as the the Magna Carta, the Enlightenment, Bill of Rights, etc?
You keep on using the word "evil" (which I never used) to side step my request that you provide facts to back up your wild anti-Christian claims. I do see your words revealing yourself as a typical hateful, under-educated and unthinking drone parroting leftist anti-Christian propaganda.
An earlier poster was right, leftists zealot drones like yourself will never let logic or facts get in the way of your evangelical jihad to marginalize or exterminate Christianity.
You can't because you're completely full of shite.
Heavens to Betsy!!!!
What filthy language you use!!!
Teenager, you have no right to call yourself a Christian, and are probably demon-possessed! Go see an exorcist before you turn into a werewolf and murder everyone in sight!
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