I have just re-read an article from my accumulated stack written for The Globe and Mail in July, 2020, by one Peter Turchin who calls himself a “complexity scientist.” A professor at the U. of Connecticut as well as a member of The Complexity Science Hub in Vienna, Turchin engages in what he suggests are objective, statistically based analyses of the histories of various societies and the factors which ultimately led to their decline. Bemused by the notion that such phenomena could be explained with the same level of certainty as any chemical reaction, I quickly discovered in re-reading the article that he is in fact but another Leftist ideologue pretending to be a purveyor of scientific truth.
In his opening paragraph Turchin proudly declares: “Ten years ago, I predicted that 2020 would mark “a new peak of violence” in the United States and Western Europe.”
Feigning a medial position by admitting that some degree of socio-economic inequality is in fact inevitable, he nevertheless repeatedly invokes such inequality as the legitimate cause of the discord presently tearing apart the States. While America has prospered over the last four decades, he says, those in the top 1% have done so far more than those below them. Of course the cause of this disparity is eminently obvious and in no way a result of some massive abuse of power by the wealthy. If one has millions of dollars available for investment, one is obviously going to financially outstrip even those affluent members of the upper middle class burdened with mortgage payments and the cost of putting their kids through university. It’s simple common sense!
Revered for his “scientific” approach to history, Turchin is in fact a Leftist Ideologue whose obsession with “inequality” is a fundamental Neo-Marxist obsession, an obsession born of the belief that human history has little to do with intelligence, merit, effort, etc., but is a never ending saga of oppression. Turchin refers to the “divisive presidency” of Donald Trump which, he says, has taken the U.S. “to the point where a civil war or revolution becomes probable.” Repeating for the thousandth time my awareness that Trump is hardly a flawless human being, I must nevertheless assert that the narrative of the Left is inherently, unequivocally DIVISIVE, its basic agenda being the exploitation of envy and resentment amongst the “oppressed” for those apparently responsible for their oppression. To suggest that “conservatives” such as Trump who reject that narrative are the sole cause of the divisiveness presently plaguing the States, is absolutely absurd.
In his final paragraph Turchin says: “In a way, the science that I worked on successfully forecast our current moment of unrest.” But is it a scientific fact that humans will inevitably, spontaneously come to resent those who have surpassed them or is this “current moment” the result of the relentless lobbying of Leftist hypocrites such as Turchin who simply cannot deal with what I would suggest is the Scientifically Demonstrable Fact of genuine Human Diversity, diversity based not on skin color or gender, but on intelligence, integrity, merit and the will and courage to apply them?
What, one wonders, does Turchin’s “science” have to say about the fact that over 5 million illegals have entered the States since Biden took office, apparently under the delusion that America’s horrid Capitalist system with its intolerable “inequalities” is far superior to the regimes they have left behind?