Saturday, February 17, 2007
Luxus
The recent flap involving William Arkin brings this prescient observation from Victor Davis Hanson to mind:
The Romans had this word, luxus, which I guess would translate as license. It was used to express the idea that the danger to a civilisation that is sophisticated and that has conquered the age-old challenges of feeding people, and of keeping them sheltered and protected, has always been over-abundance of wealth, and how you inculcate to an affluent suburban youth principles of an agrarian virtue, muscularism, patriotism, family values-
GB:-and civic duty-
VDH: Absolutely, civic duty. We have a large group of several million people in our media, government, and universities who have the privilege and the luxury to almost make fun of, indeed, trash or criticise, the very culture that gave them so much abundance.
Comments:
Post a Comment
