The True Meaning of “Civilizational Erasure”

 
No question, a broad range of Europe’s mature democracies are under assault, not just by wannabe autocrats at home, but more fundamentally from across the Atlantic, thanks to the machinations of Donald Trump and his MAGA camp.
 
What is the goal of Messrs. Vance, Musk and Thiel?
 
Spearheading the effort is a male troika, Messrs. Vance, Musk and Thiel. Their “sword” is the claim that Europe has willingly entered the stage of “civilizational erasure”. 
 
Now, Europe does face serious problems, including regarding its insufficiently targeted immigration policies.  However, that is an issue that can be – and indeed is being – managed.  Nobody can seriously speak any longer of Europe having open borders for all comers.
 
Why then do they push this alarmist agenda that, in a deliberate throwback to the 19th century, is based on the notion of tribe, blood and soil?  Why do they try so hard to transplant their not just implicitly, but explicitly racist brand of white, pseudo-Christian nationalism across the Atlantic?
 
The U.S. has been captured, but not Europe
 
To them, this agenda is only superficially about culture and values.  At the core are hard business interests.  Whatever the EU’s faults – and there are many – it has Elon Musk and Peter Thiel, along with JD Vance, their ex officio implementation tool, very frustrated for a straightforward reason.
 
While they have managed to capture the United States, the EU isn’t willing to roll over.  It stands in the way of their core interest of unfettered deregulation. 
 
The American plutocrats support Europe’s autocrats so ardently because they hope that, following these proto-fascist parties‘ electoral victories, they will stand in the way of Europe sticking by its regulatory guns regarding the digital economy and digital media.
 
To obscure that hard-core agenda, which is driven by unvarnished commercial imperialism, the Vance/Musk/Thiel troika pushes its “civilizational erasure” agenda.  It is but a cover-up for the cruel, inhumane and undemocratic ways in which they think and operate.
 
Europe’s hard-right parties as clueless accomplices
 
Europe’s hard-right parties, most prominently including Germany’s AfD, are their willing but stunningly clueless accomplices.
 
They are willing accomplices because their entire political agenda and appeal is based on the notion that blood, soil and tribe are the glue that binds us, instead of a common cause or shared ideals. 
 
They are clueless accomplices because they completely overlook the hard-core business purpose of why the Vance/Musk/Thiel troika is pushing the civilizational erasure agenda so hard.
 
Full-spectrum “civilizational erasure”
 
Messrs. Vance, Musk and Thiel deliberately misdirect their claim of “civilizational erasure” solely on Europe.  It is rather the entire world that has to contend with it in profound ways.  But that is the last thing this male troika would ever acknowledge.
 
Their political strategy is to use blood and soil issues as a cover for their full-scale avoidance of the true threats that may indeed lead to full- spectrum “civilizational erasure”.
 
Resorting to blood and soil issues is a cowardly reaction to the world’s true challenges which demand tremendous courage and ingenuity.
 
Climate change
 
Economic and social progress has come at a price. For a long time, we were in denial about that trade-off. At first, there were a few futurists like Carl Sagan, for example. Then insightful bodies such as the Club of Rome, and, after that, growing political movements, who brought the serious environmental cost of that progress to our attention. 
 
Today, it is indisputable that the earth’s capacity to support humankind is in decline.  At the same time, the growth in numbers of climate change deniers who occupy political offices is the result of fear and helplessness. For years, democratic governments have failed in addressing the climate threat to our existence.  
 
We have tried to bureaucratize ourselves out of this problem. It can be narrowed down to this “simple” question: What is the least harmful way for us to generate electric power that can “run” this planet? 
 
But wannabe autocrats have no answers. They won’t even ask the question.
 
Meanwhile, under “drill, baby, drill” Donald Trump, the entire U.S. government apparatus, once the dominant driver of global science, has completely opted out of even considering this a topic worthy of continued investigation. 
 
Automation replaces manual labor
 
With eight billion people on this planet and an exceptional accomplishment of dividing labor so humanity can live better lives than it ever could, we also undermined the ability of individual humans to sustain themselves and – in the longer run – to enjoy the benefits of our “progress”.
 
We have taken several quantum leaps in technology and automation since the 1980s, eliminating the need for skilled and unskilled manual labor. 
 
To be sure, most human beings, even in advanced countries, are either unskilled or somewhat skilled. Their survival required a transition to service jobs, all good in the books of economists, not so much at the dinner table of the working class. 
 
Hard as it is to find any real answers, wannabe autocrats opt out in the search for a serious answer. They suggest winding back the clock to the 1950s. 
 
Artificial Intelligence
 
Our technological quantum leaps have now brought us artificial intelligence (AI). AI will lead to massive job losses among the well-educated from accountants to programmers to radiologists. 
 
Of course, the same United States that is denying climate change is pushing the AI agenda forward as hard and as resolutely as its government and corporations possibly can.
 
European democracies are doing better in acknowledging the threat but have come up empty on solutions. And once again they try to regulate it without really addressing the existential challenge.  
 
Even if AI does not lead to sidelining the educated as many expect, this existential threat permeates their current lives, their thinking, their trust in the future.
 
But wannabe autocrats have no answers. They won’t even ask the question. 
 
Fact vs. fiction
 
Advanced information technology, predominantly pushed relentlessly by U.S. corporations, has created unchecked (and uncheckable) social media. The result?  The truth is no longer verifiable.  Orwell’s 1984 has become reality, albeit just over four decades later.
 
Any image that we look at or any story that appears on our devices is tailor-made to our specific IP address that reveals our search history, the sites we visit, the clicks we make and the comments we post. 
 
When these tailormade stories or images appear on our screens today, it is already sheerly impossible to fact-check them. This is a deadly weapon against any informed governance.
 
But wannabe autocrats have no answers. They won’t even ask the question.
 
The power of money
 
One more way in which the U.S. model has led the world in a cancerous fashion is that the concentration of wealth at the top is incomparable to anything we have seen before.
 
This does not mean that those outside the top 0.01% have become poorer in absolute terms. Many of them have, in fact, become richer even in recent years. 
 
But in relative terms, the bottom 99.09% have become irrelevant. And they know it. 
 
We all know that the concentration of wealth directly translates into economic, political and military power. It is not by accident that the largest portion of Trump supporters is composed of the downtrodden.
 
Their complaints against the establishment are also complaints against the wealthy. And yet, the top 0.01% have invested in their chosen leader, a billionaire, to make themselves even more powerful, richer and less accountable. 
 
Like gamblers, those who temporarily benefit from the power of money believe that they will win the jackpot. And even many of those who are currently losing the political game hope that their fortunes will change.
 
Everybody dreams of the jackpot. As New York State’s lottery motto went: “Somebody’s Gotta Win.” Yes. True. The House. Always. 
 
But wannabe autocrats have no answers. They won’t even ask the question.
 
Conclusion
 
Many of us who believe in a common cause or shared ideals are desperately searching for the Churchills and FDRs, who arguably represented such values. But the world is no longer made up of a simple set of binary problems.
 
Instead, we are facing multi-dimensional complexities. The second coming of the sage leader is unlikely.
 
By looking for them, we are leaving our countries free for the taking by one-dimensional blood, soil and tribe demagogues.
 
And that would indeed lead to complete and irreversible civilizational erasure.