"Why the Idea of Western Civilization is More Myth Than History"
So I asked him—casually, I thought—why he was so interested in the ancient Greeks. He beamed up at me with an angelic smile and answered, "Because that's what you study, Mama."
At this point, my heart nearly burst with parental pride. I am a Professor of Classical Archaeology and the ancient Greeks are, quite literally, my bread and butter. But my heart sank when my son added as an afterthought, "and because the Greeks gave us Western Civilization." Buckle up, kid, I thought, you're in for a lecture.
I wanted to tell him that the ancient Greeks did not give us Western Civilization. That there is no golden thread, unfurling unbroken through time from Plato to NATO. That we in the modern West are not the heirs of a unique and elevated cultural tradition, stretching back through Atlantic modernity to Enlightenment and Renaissance Europe, and from there through the darkness of the medieval period and ultimately back to the glories of classical Greece and Rome.
[...]
But if the West and its history was invented in the imperial capitals of seventeenth century Europe, the notion of Western Civilization was born in the eighteenth century on the battlefields of revolutionary North America.
From Adams to Washington, the founding fathers found inspiration in the classical world not only for their revolutionary fervor, but also for how to justify the inconsistencies at the heart of the revolutionary movement—the cry for a freedom that permitted Black slavery, and the rejection of imperial shackles whilst continuing to impose them on others. It was the privileged inheritance of Western Civilization, the cultural and intellectual correlate of race, that justified the differential treatment of different groups of Americans.
Western Civilization is therefore not just a myth in the sense that it is a fiction that we tell ourselves, despite knowing that it is factually false. It is a myth that was invented to justify slavery, imperialism, and oppression. As such, it served the ideological needs of the time of its invention, reflecting the core values of the society that produced it.
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Modern rules of etiquette
Some of them are silly or obviously byproducts of the author's life experience, but others are good summations of current societal norms in the US which are not immediately obvious to outside observers.
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"We don't do that here"
Came across this blog post about the use of that phrase in a professional setting and I love it. I'm going to remember it as something to pull out as part of correcting and aligning culture for groups.
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Seen around online in multiple places. I am not sure on the original author unfortunately. But as I go through and do a rewatch of Strange New Things, I felt compelled to share it and archive it here.
- X-Men is about civil rights. If you didn’t get that, you didn’t get X-Men.
- Black Panther is about civil rights. If you didn’t get that, you didn’t get Black Panther.
- Captain America literally fought nazis. He is the embodiment of fighting the alt-right. If you didn’t get that, you didn’t get Captain America.
- The Empire in Star Wars is fascist. The Rebel alliance are Anti-Fascist. If you didn’t get that, you didn’t get Star Wars.
- Doctor Who was about an alien fighting for all of humanity in spite of totalitarian regimes. If you don't get that, you don't get Doctor Who.
- The Punisher isn’t meant to be a role model for police or armed forces. So much so that the writers of The Punisher made him actively speak out against it in a comic. If you didn’t get that, you didn’t get The Punisher.
- Deadpool is queer. He’s pansexual. Fact. If you didn’t get that you didn’t get Deadpool.
- Star Trek is about equality for all genders, races and sexualities. As early as the mid-60s it was taking a pro-choice stance and defending women’s right to choose. One of its clearest themes is accepting different cultures and appearances and working together for peace. (It’s also anti-capitalist and pro-vegan). If you didn’t get that, you didn’t get Star Trek.
- Superman and Wonder Woman (and a whole host of other superheroes) are immigrants. The stance of those comics is pro-immigration and pro-equality and acceptance. If you didn’t get that, you didn’t get Superman or Wonder Woman.
- Stan Lee said, “Racism and bigotry are among the deadliest social ills plaguing the world today.” If you’re bigoted or racist, you didn’t get any of the characters Stan Lee created.
- The stories we grew up with all taught us to value other people and cultures and to treasure the differences between us. Only villains were xenophobic, or sexist, or racist, or totalitarian. I can’t understand how anyone can have missed that.
- If you’re upset that there’s a black Spider-Man, or a black Captain America, or a female Thor, or that Ms. Marvel is Muslim, or that Captain Marvel was pro-feminism or any of the other things right-wing “fans” say is “stealing their childhood” - you never got it in the first place. The things you claim are now “pandering to the lefties” were never on your side, to begin with.
If you consider yourself a fan of these things, but you still think the LGBTQ+ community is too “in your face”, or have a problem with Black Lives Matter, or want to “take the country back from immigrants”, then you’re not really a fan at all.
Geek culture isn’t suddenly left-wing... it has been for decades. You just grew up to be intolerant. You became the villain in the stories you used to love.
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