RedDwarfIV wrote:Of all the examples you could have used, why on earth did you think "people from that part of German history when nazis and communists were fighting in the streets, and antisemitism was rampant" would demonstrate the pinnacle of western moral ideals?
The street battles were more of a thing of the 30s, I believe. Btw, anti-communism appealed far more to the German population than anti-semitism. Unsurprising since there was an unsuccesful civil war in Germany to install communism as well as a series of soviet invasions in East Europe in that decade.
You couldn't have pointed to the abolition of slavery (a practice used by most cultures throughout human history, and still practiced by some places today)?
That abolition was and is a purely European matter. There are now more slaves worldwide than ever.
But yeah, the Brits essentially making war upon slave traders was pretty great.
we did come up with the concept of the liberal democracy, which works very well.
Our democracies are right on track into oligarchies. We can't even maintain replacement level fertility, something which should be a non-issue with western surplus. The Greeks described democracy in its entirety two millenia ago.
The first thing every liberal democracy does in times of trouble is cut back liberties. In Europe we're seeing it now under Covid, but it also happened under islamic terrorism and pressure from the US.
... to try and salvage your argument for you: "savages" are neurologically just as capable of advanced morality as westerners. But because they haven't had the benefit of an industrialised society that can divide labour enough to support dedicated academic facilities where people can spend their time thinking about how to be nicer to one another, they don't know about advanced morality, and may be living in conditions dire enough that they cannot afford to live by our moral standards.
Europeans domesticated themselves in the process of developing our modern nations. That doesn't mean non-Westerners aren't human, it just means they took a different evolutionary path. There is no reason to believe that something like hormone levels, which are largely genetic, don't affect morality.
boldilocks wrote:Because 1920s europe was literally the pinnacle of moral ideals.
Bomd claim, but the 20s were also a degenerate time. There was a wide split between the poor, the crippled and the well-off who could enjoy the golden 20s. The degeneracy pushed the people into the cultural conservative pushback the fascists enforced.
My suggestion for the most moral time period would be the 1840s, specifically the student movement. At least in Germany that was a period of idealism reaching for very good, very strong moral principles. Yeah, it ended in a bloody uprising and largely failed, but no upheaval is without resistance.
Other countries have their own high points, of course.
But other question, what time period is the best dressed? What would the Loroi say?