v2.0 The Root of Modern Decadence: A 30-Year Journey 2024-06-24

What is the root of today’s global spiritual, economical and societal decadence and depression? If we put aside historical traditions spanning over millennia, we may find the answer to our current challenges in the past thirty years. In times previous to modern globalization most countries kept certain distance from each other, respected their cultural identity, were mostly united and saw prospects of brighter future ahead. Such was the world up until the nineties. With the dissolution of the Soviet Union and acceleration of the global trade “the holy shrine of Profit“ has firmly been established everywhere. Economical growth has become the main pillar of our society, thus emphasizing the need in productivity but also multiplying psychological angst among the population to make living and reach certain prosperity thus ensuring security for yourself and if lucky for your family. However the standard of prosperity for which one needs to aim has been mostly set too high. Unable to achieve such a target people have split into a plethora of subcultures that could be identified either by external attributes such as patterns of behavior, status, interests and clothing or divided by religion and faith. This rise of religiousness that has occasionally resulted in extreme acts of terrorism and oppression of freedom. So baffling for most of today’s youth, such a struggle for asceticism and devotion to either religions or subcultures that differ from yours is only a shadow, an opposition to a much larger, all encompassing “Cult of Personal Success“. Imposed by the culture especially of the last forty years desire to reach the proverbial “top“ whatever the cost, disregarding well-being of most people around you and justifying it by false assumption that you can’t save everybody so why bother. When instead it has been proven wrong, where by collective effort many so called third world countries managed to get out of the gutters by collective effort realizing that they have been on a losing side of the history. So instead of falling for propaganda that instills depression and mistrust regions such as Asia and certain parts of the global South moved on and incrementally improved their living conditions and maintained somewhat sustainable birthrate. Meanwhile the winners of the history, the so called “Golden Billion“ of the collective West culturally and psychologically deteriorated in the pursuit of self-indulgence, over-consumption, tendency to be cynics, fully surrendering to the cult of the “Golden Calf“. This resulted in low fertility of western nations, migrants from impoverished regions seeking better life there that diluted the gene pool of these nations. Meanwhile native populations of the West gradually has become more and more apathetic failing to reach spectacular success and thus refusing to make babies, rejecting the traditional family values and welcoming so-called progressive values such as same-sex relationships and aggressively chasing after the carrot of careerism. The challenges of our today’s interconnected global society require fresh ideas, compromises and lasting solutions. However, such changes have to consider lessons of the past and its lasting conditions. These transformations demand patient evaluation of all present limitations and obstacles, seeking agreement and understanding between all segments of society, and putting a gradual end to the method of “divide and conquer“ which was meant to blindly control society and instead move towards to more mindful, less agitated mode of existence yet maintaining productivity.