The New Vichy Syndrome : Why European Intellectuals Surrender to Barbarism

Something rotten -- Anxiety -- Weakness -- Demographic worries, or the dearth of birth and its consequences-- Immigrants instead of children -- Something missing -- Apocalypse soon, or not -- They breed like-- -- Demographic counter-revolution -- Immigrants change -- Fun-loving Moslem women -- Fundamentally wrong -- The woman question -- Vive la differâence -- Summary and conclusions so far -- The role of relativism, moral and epistemological -- Come back, Descartes, we need you -- The attack on science -- The spread of doubt -- The multiculturalism of daily life -- Choice the highest good -- All options open -- Why are we like this (i)? -- A herd of individuals -- Secularization -- Life without transcendence -- A new pagan transcendence -- The transcendence of small causes -- Anti-nationalist transcendence -- A new identity -- Why are we life this (ii)? -- Everybody a community of identities -- The importance of national identity -- Persistent animosities -- The causes of peace -- German self-deprecation -- Common currency as a source of national antagonism -- What is it really all about? -- European Union as a pension fund -- Why are we like this (iii)? -- Doing their best for their electorates -- An experiment against reality -- Why are we like this (iv)? -- Patriotism and its discontents -- Nothing but-ism -- Problems in and with the past -- A change of meaning -- If that's what the victors thought, what about the defeated? -- Why are we like this (v)? -- Nothing but-ism revisited -- Last and best -- Vichy in the blood -- After liberation, massacre -- Unequal treatment -- We have no history -- Why are we like this (vi)? -- Why are we like this (vii)? -- Another way of being important -- The consequences -- The constructive urge is also destructive -- Hedonism at best, comfort at worst -- American envoi. A profound malaise haunts Europe. On the one hand, everyone is aware that the continent is no longer in the forefront of anything, that it daily loses ground to other regions of the world, in economic growth, scientific research, influence and power; its population does not even reproduce itself; on the other it is seized with immobility, largely because those who are currently comfortably well-off fear to lose their advantages and privileges.

The European Union is both the cause and response to this profound existential unease. It answers France's need to be a great power, Germany's desire to be other than German, and the desire of the defeated or retired politicians of all countries to remain powerful and influential ad infinitum. It is in effect a giant pension fund for superannuated politicians, as well as a trough at which a large bureaucracy can feed. Everyone knows it is corrupt and holds the continent back, but no one sees any mechanism of changing it.

In The New Vichy Syndrome, Theodore Dalrymple traces the malaise back to the two great conflicts of the last century, with their disastrous though understandable effects upon self-confidence. As a result of the recent past, Europeans no longer believe in anything other than personal economic security, an increased standard of living, shorter working hours and long vacations in exotic locations. As a result, they are not in a frame of mind to face the challenges before them, whether of increased Islamic penetration or economic competition from the rest of the world. Western Europe is in a strangely neurotic condition of being smug and terrified at the same time. On the one hand, Europeans believe they have at last created an ideal social and political system in which man can live comfortably. In many ways, things have never been better on the old continent. On the other hand, there is growing anxiety that Europe is quickly falling behind in an aggressive, globalized world. Europe is at the forefront of nothing, its demographics are rapidly transforming in unsettling ways, and the ancient threat of barbarian invasion has resurfaced in a fresh manifestation. In The New Vichy Syndrome, Theodore Dalrymple traces this malaise back to the great conflicts of the last century and their devastating effects upon the European psyche. From issues of religion, class, colonialism, and nationalism, Europeans hold a "miserablist" view of their history, one that alternates between indifference and outright contempt of the past. Today's Europeans no longer believe in anything but personal economic security, an increased standard of living, shorter working hours, and long vacations in exotic locales. The result, Dalrymple asserts, is an unwillingness to preserve European achievements and the dismantling of western culture by Europeans themselves. As vapid hedonism and aggressive Islamism fill this cultural void, Europeans have no one else to blame for their plight. -- ‡c From back cover Western Europe is in a strangely neurotic condition of being smug and terrified at the same time. On the one hand, Europeans believe they have at last created an ideal social and political system in which man can live comfortably. In many ways, things have never been better on the old continent. On the other hand, there is growing anxiety that Europe is quickly falling behind in an aggressive, globalized world. Europe is at the forefront of nothing, its demographics are rapidly transforming in unsettling ways, and the ancient threat of barbarian invasion has resurfaced in a fresh manifestation. In The New Vichy Syndrome , Theodore Dalrymple traces this malaise back to the great conflicts of the last century and their devastating effects upon the European psyche. From issues of religion, class, colonialism, and nationalism, Europeans hold a “miserablist” view of their history, one that alternates between indifference and outright contempt of the past. Today’s Europeans no longer believe in anything but personal economic security, an increased standard of living, shorter working hours, and long vacations in exotic locales. The result, Dalrymple asserts, is an unwillingness to preserve European achievements and the dismantling of western culture by Europeans themselves. As vapid hedonism and aggressive Islamism fill this cultural void, Europeans have no one else to blame for their plight. Theodore Dalrymple explains how European intelligentsia turned on Western civilization and paved the way for hedonism and Islamism to run roughshod over a once proud European culture. Western Europe is in a strangely neurotic condition of being smug and terrified at the same time. On the one hand, Europeans believe they have at last created an ideal social and political system in which man can live comfortably. In many ways, things have never been better on the old continent. On the other hand, there is growing anxiety that Europe is quickly falling behind in an aggressive, globalized world. Europe is at the forefront of nothing, its demographics are rapidly transforming in unsettling ways, and the ancient threat of barbarian invasion has resurfaced in a fresh manifestation