Finding Nazis in Norway's Closet?

The only conclusion that makes sense to me is that human beings are stuck in a condition of radical uncertainty. Something big and earth shaking is going on around us, but the information we have does not allow us to predict where it all goes. _WRM

Walter Russell Mead takes a look at the Norwegian tragedy and finds Nazis in Norway's closet. Even more profoundly, Mead finds that human nature has always retained the capacity for committing vile and unspeakable deeds, and suggests that the concept of "social progress" is a myth.

When a whole society is stressed by more change than it knows what to do with, the Dark Side gets crowded. People flip out in sects and groups rather than one by one. We see that in many Muslim countries today where the appeal of terrorists is strengthened by a pervasive sense of social frustration. Sometimes whole countries and whole nationalities flip. We saw it in the Bolshevik madness in Russia, the Fascist epidemic that swept Europe in the 1920s and 1930s; we saw it in Iran in 1979. The Serbs and the Hutus went over the edge in the 1990s. _AmericanInterest

Unfortunately, much of the stress that Norway has been feeling, was designed stress inserted by its own governing leaders and cultural overseers. In fact, the social engineers of Norway were trying to accomplish far too many disparate and conflicting goals at the same time, never understanding the underlying stresses that their policies were causing to build.

But Mead looks even more deeply to try to find meaning in the tragedy:

The same technological progress that helps create violent alienation and rage also empowers individuals and groups. 200 years ago a Breivik could not have done so much damage. 100 years ago Al-Qaeda could not have hijacked a plane. Modern society is more vulnerable than ever before to acts of terror, and developments in weaponry place ever greater power in the hands of ever smaller numbers of people.

This is still in early stages. Fortunately Breivik was a traditionalist and relatively low tech mass murderer; he did not hack vital computer systems to wreak murderous havoc with a rail or air traffic control system. He did not poison the reservoirs with weaponized biologicals. He did not even pump poison gas into a subway system.

We can be reasonably confident that an increasingly chaotic and stressful 21st century will generate more bitter nutjobs and place more destructive power in their hands. Democracy and affluence won’t cure it; the same forces that raise those golden arches build bombs to knock them down. _WRM

Europe is at the center of this chaotic cauldron of change, with a shrinking core population deeply in debt and hounded by increasing numbers of violence-prone immigrants being forced upon them by their own governments. Norway's government and culture is in the advance guard of the politically correct leftist multicultural drive to displace western culture and populations with more dysfunctional cultures and populations of the third world. Norway's cultural and political leaders had thought it was safe to move ahead quickly with that agenda, given the relative sedateness of 21st century Norwegian society generally.

But human nature does not change as quickly as political whim would like it to do. Within Norway's core population are many reactive personalities, who will reach a breaking point and strike out against the perceived oppressors. If such a person is reasonably intelligent and competent in the use of weapons, a significant number of this person's perceived enemies may die. But if the person happens to be a world class scientist or technologist who is competent in the ways of profound actuation, far worse things can happen.

The "masters of the universe" -- the clowns in control of western governments -- are intent on pushing their blind ambition of social engineering agenda to the bitter end, no matter what. They are underwritten by special interests with similarly amoral ambition and intent, including the legions of Green dieoff.orgiasts, faux environmentalists, energy starvationists, and other "well-meaning" persons whose agendas could easily and inadvertently result in mass starvation and other forms of mass death.

Individuals who strike out in the manner of the perpetrator of the Norwegian tragedy only make things worse for everyone, just as the well-intended faux environmentalists and leftist multiculturalists are bound to do. There are abundant ways to make things worse, and our leaders intend to explore as many of those ways as possible.


Walter Russell Mead does not think that these forces of chaos -- combined with the technological empowering of individuals to do large-scale harm -- will lead to an apocalypse or doom. But we need to accept that something of the sort may occur, at some level of probability.

Hope for the best, but prepare for the worst.