WITH the advent of the Internet Revolution and the growth of social media, every voice, lifestyle and action, once insignificant, trivial and inconsequentially irrelevant, is making headlines.
A quiet voice in the shadows could be the stuff of a rally, a protest of major
significance. A dominant culture of the community is no longer a guaranteed universally accepted standard for everybody. Has anyone noticed the demise of books on “Etiquette”? Calling one’s attention to “what’s proper” could be met with a cold stare or worse, a repartee that asks you “to F yourself”!
There is a louder opposition and outright rejection of what used to be the “signa aurea” of a mainstream culture. Society’s cultural norms are under attack, especially by the young. I reckon it is less a rejection of the older culture but rather a generational shift in values on the one hand and, on the other, a settling of inequitable treatment of disparate members of society.
Let’s look at some recent examples to illustrate these points: “Rubiales vs. Hermoso,” the flap that resulted from the World Cup victory of Spain’s women’s soccer team. Rubiales’, President of the Spain Football Federation, planted a kiss on the lips of Hermoso in a congratulatory moment as the team celebrated their win over the UK. There was an initial “disbelief,” even a weak acceptance from Hermoso. A protest ensued, then a tepid call for resignation that got louder. Initially, his colleagues received him well as he declared, “I will not resign” in speech after speech.
Three weeks later, he resigned. The relentless pressure from the women’s team and calls from sports officials to resign melted Rubiales’ support. Coach Jorge Vildo was also forced out.
The Canada Junior Hockey scandal in 2003 and 2018. The group sexual assaults (2018 ) were initially kept quiet by the organization, hoping it would all blow away. The woman in the 2018 assault eventually took the matter to the police, and charges were laid. Hockey Canada settled for 3.5 M.
Major corporate sponsors, including Nike, Canadian Tire, and Tim Hortons, withdrew ( financial) support. Again, the “boys” thought they would get away with it.
And then there was Don Cherry, the loud voice ( matched only by even loader suits ! ) on Hockey Night in Canada’s Coach’s Corner.
He thought he would get away with anything outside of hockey. No, the rough and tumble that is pro-hockey was no match with his ruminations about the immigrant community. Two words did him in: “You People…” Enough, CBC got rid of him.
In each of these examples, they were all led by people who were products of a pattern of behaviour typical of that generation. Even if they were regretful in retrospect, put simply, “they couldn’t help themselves.” They have been “memed” by the generation before them.
Quite apart from these examples, there is another class of assault perpetrated by men motivated by unrestrained power and privilege but caught in the new culture of the “Me Too” movement. Four come to mind: Cosby, Weinstein, Epstein, and Nygard.
Thirty years ago, all of them would have gotten away with nothing more than a slap on the wrist. Most male-dominated society has seen an unmistakable counterblow to the prevailing long-established dominion over the subordination of women’s rights. In India, the high incidence of sexual assault through the years has given way to new laws to give a voice to the differential women.
Even the last bastion of women’s subservience is being tested. In Iran, Masha
Amini’s arrest for not wearing the Hijab properly and her death in police custody inspired a wave of protest not seen in Iran’s history. In Afghanistan, the Taliban’s cancellation of post-elementary schools launched an unprecedented rebellion from young women.
The same issue prompted the Pakistani Taliban to shoot Malala Yousafzai in the head. She survived and won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2014. She became the face of women’s oppression in Theocratic countries.
These are small snippets of a larger “war .” Social media have undeniably provided a more expansive stage and following of what used to be a “quiet” debate by opposing views.
Highly opinionated young people have congregated with like-minded ones to voice a vastly opposing opinion espoused by the older generation. The growing cultural inequalities between sexes have become flashpoints.
The greater acceptance of LGBTQ rights and other emerging gender identities has pitted allies against the entrenched, long-established politics of the right.
A BRIEF HISTORY OF MODERN CULTURAL WARS.
There have been conflicts ever since the advent of civilized man, thought to be during the Neolithic period that resulted in the birth of Agriculture ( 10,000 to 8,000 years BC).
From the hunting-gathering period, man began to build villages around farms and was no longer transmigratory. About 5,000 years ago, man initiated the practice of
Polytheistic Religion. It inevitably became the seed of religious wars.
When Christianity started in the Middle East 2,000 years ago, religious differences and the imposition of the dominant dogma on others exacerbated the severe strain on human relationships.
Augustine’s “just war” provided a cover for killing the “enemies of God. “ Pope
Urban II, in 1095, started the first Crusade ( the Holy War ) against the Muslims to convert and capture land.
The Crusade lasted until 1291. More religious wars followed: the Eighty Years’ War (1568-1648), the French Wars of Religion (1562-1598), and the Thirty Years’ War (1618-1648) – are examples of wars rooted in doctrinal intolerance.
The theological disparity is the primary justification for the ongoing conflicts in Syria, Afghanistan, Iraq and the Israeli-Palestinian acrimony. Few countries have not been tainted by religious strife.
If it’s not a full-blown war, there is a continuing simmering culture clash among people of all faiths. In the name of ideology, superstition or outright delusion, the powers-that-be have continued to poison human relationships by calling a jihad, a crusade or instituting some specious creed.
(Fareed Zacharia’s interview with Iran’s President Ebrahim Raisi, Sept. 24 on Iran’s new “Hijab Bill,” a 10-yr jail term for breaches of the dress code is a contemptible head-scratcher, especially since other Islamic countries do not dictate what women wear. In Egypt, wearing a Hijab is not mandatory )
The “Doctrine of Discovery” by the Vatican is a dogma that gives them the right (according to them) to take over Indigenous culture and a presumptive right to dispose of their beliefs in favour of Christianity. (Pope Francis renounced this 550-year-old doctrine on March 30, 2023, initiated by the Indigenous people of Canada out of the Residential School scandal ).
The Doctrine of Infallibility ( 1854 ) is another that is fast becoming a Vatican albatross waiting to be rescinded. This one would require much more creative “Ignis Fatuus” as the extent of its pronouncements had become the very fibre of the Catholic church.
Society ought to teach this self-proclaimed all-knowing crowd a taste of its own medicine. Evidently, the missionaries lost sight of what “spiritual” really means: Love, Gratitude and Humility.
How much “Truth and Reconciliation” would erase the abuses of the Catholic church on Aboriginal children? Probably nothing short of the Pope’s (and his power of Infallibility ) declaration that the missionaries who abused the children have all gone to hell. The silent voices of those in unmarked graves will concur.
CRITICAL RACE THEORY AND RACIAL DISCORD
After Religion, race conflicts also have a long history and are at the forefront of culture wars. When Portuguese explorers and later Christopher Columbus discovered Africa, there was an early realization that they did not share a European ethnicity.
Religion played a crucial role in the exploitation of African blacks. The Bible identified them as pagans and foreordained them to be servants. Later in the 17th century, laws that further discriminated against blacks were passed. In the 18th century, the scientific community implied they were alien and intellectually inferior.
There was a racial classification that put the Caucasian (white ) race on top and the blacks on the bottom based on the size of each race’s brain.
The consequence of the emancipation of blacks from slavery intensified racism rather than diminished it. Race relations became competitive and an arena for conflict.
When things were not going well, the blacks and other people of colour became scapegoats. In the American South, the cradle of slavery, the passage of racial segregation and discriminatory laws continued after the abolition of slavery ( 1865 ).
There was widespread racist propaganda putting fear in the minds of the white community that feared African ancestry could “contaminate” the white race. Nazi Germany carried racism to the extreme by the extermination of entire ethnic groups based on racist ideology.
The modern reincarnation of culture wars started in the US; conflicts over gender identity, gay marriage and abortion top the list. Here again, you can see that the deeper origins of these disputes are actually between sectarian and secular forces.
There is a clear polarization of the conservative (sectarian ) vs. the liberal (secular) forces. It is mirrored in the political battles between the Democrats and Republican positions in the US.
Are you “WOKE” ?
In Part II, we will look at the so-called “WOKE” and how this slang had become a buzzword embraced by many but shunned by others. How politicians of the left and
right use this word with a positive or negative connotation.
Abortion is arguably one of the oldest cultural flashpoints in the world; how it is playing today domestically and internationally, also in Part II.******
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