Western culture?

[Exeter]

Do you believe there is a western culture or civilisation?

[Cirrus]

Yes, but there are two meanings in my opinion :

- First, West or "Occident" as the civilisation of Western Europe, with a local meaning. I think it makes sense here.

- Secondly, West as the expension of this civlisation, but with a global meaning (Europe+USA+Israel+etc...), as used in the Cold War, for exemple. Here, the definition is more idle, I think.

[Menydh]

Short answer: NO.

[Marcus Marulus]

Originally Posted by Cirrus

Yes, but there are two meanings in my opinion :

- First, West or "Occident" as the civilisation of Western Europe, with a local meaning. I think it makes sense here.

- Secondly, West as the expension of this civlisation, but with a global meaning (Europe+USA+Israel+etc...), as used in the Cold War, for exemple. Here, the definition is more idle, I think.

Here I concur with Cirrus. There is West European civilisation/culture, subdivision of the European civilization.

The modern globalized West is a degenerated offshot of the original Western European civilization, a mutant, so to say.

[Carnyx]

What would have been this Occidental civilisation about? Christendom?

[Errigal]

Originally Posted by Carnyx

What would have been this Occidental civilisation about? Christendom?

Even that doesn't seem to be true; Israel and Japan are often counted as part of the West, and it is often used to mean non-Russian countries although Russia itself is Christian.

I'd say the term should be abandoned as a Cold War relic.

[Cirrus]

Originally Posted by Carnyx

What would have been this Occidental civilisation about? Christendom?

Basically, I think there is something like a Western Roman Catholic (and Protestant) Europe ; while another part being the Eastern Orthodox/Byzantine Europe.

Originally Posted by Errigal

Even that doesn't seem to be true; Israel and Japan are often counted as part of the West, and it is often used to mean non-Russian countries although Russia itself is Christian.

I'd say the term should be abandoned as a Cold War relic.

The term was used in this sense during Cold War, but the word is more ancient, and should not be uniquely used in this American/Capitalist meaning.

[Carnyx]

Originally Posted by Cirrus

Basically, I think there is something like a Western Roman Catholic (and Protestant) Europe ; while another part being the Eastern Orthodox/Byzantine Europe.

Yes, I would agree that there used to exist something similar in Europe once.

Even that doesn't seem to be true; Israel and Japan are often counted as part of the West, and it is often used to mean non-Russian countries although Russia itself is Christian.

I'd say the term should be abandoned as a Cold War relic.

Hmm, yes this West is quite bastard. I don't identify with the West myself.

[Errigal]

The problem still exists that a person could not claim that Cuba, Uruguay and Argentina have no link with Spain, or that Quebec has no link with France, or New Zealand no link with Ireland and the UK. That would be arguing against reality. How important those links are, and how they should influence political policy is another question.

I'd like for the term "the West" to be abandoned because it is almost always used to mean rich countries who must help the US govern the world as junior partners.

Even so, "the West" still makes sense as an historical reference to the Latin Western Empire of Rome and to the inheritors of that tradition, but it should only be used with that meaning, IMO.

[Engelbrecht]

Originally Posted by Errigal

Even so, "the West" still makes sense as an historical reference to the Latin Western Empire of Rome and to the inheritors of that tradition, but it should only be used with that meaning, IMO.

I agree with you. As I have pictured the West, it´s all of us who today are the legacy of the antient Roman Empire, who in turn are the legacy of the ancient Greece.

To be more precise, the legacy of the Western Roman Empire, since the bigger part, if not all, of the Eastern Roman Empire went in another direction.

Here I include all of that wich we mean when we talk about civilization, such as religion, philosophy, law, military, economics, political structure etc.

[Weltschmerz]

Put shortly, "western civilisation" doesn't really mean much to me. Its contemporary use is highly ambiguous and to a large extent entangled in various forms of critique of the concept itself and/or of civilisation x.

A good example of my detachment has something to do with my views on Christianity. The Bysantic "eastern orthodox" church seems more sound to me than Catholicism or Protestantism, for various reasons, one of them being the addition in the western tradition of filioque - "and from the Son" - about the emission of Spirit. The emphasis in spiritual matters on dogmatics or what is also called "systematic theology" is something that I'm generally detached from. It seems to me that it makes a barrier between God and man rather than anything else. Of course there are important thinkers within the "western" tradition still. I'm just seeing a general tendency. Although I may not be completely at one with the Bysantic church either, I tend to have bad feelings about the "western" churches.

I was at a lecture a while ago, by a man of the Swedish church (Lutheran protestant), who oddly enough was quite inspired by "eastern" thought. He made an interesting caricature on "western" thought. He said that it doesn't matter if grace is administered before, after, during, in, above or beside the sacrament. We'll just have to have faith that it is administered, or else we can call the whole thing off.

[Ariets]

Yes, and I think it's most rotten thing ever

[Weltschmerz]

Originally Posted by Ariets

Yes, and I think it's most rotten thing ever

Elaborate your point of view, please. You may think that it is the most rotten thing ever, but why do you think so?

[Ariets]

Originally Posted by Seekers

Elaborate your point of view, please. You may think that it is the most rotten thing ever, but why do you think so?

All whats bad come from west: liberals, wester life style, anarchists, comies (if you add that Marx & Engels ware from Germany AFAIR), tolerance for deviations, sexually transmitted diseases (j/k) and so like stuff.

[Marcus Marulus]

Originally Posted by Ariets

All whats bad come from west: liberals, wester life style, anarchists, comies (if you add that Marx & Engels ware from Germany AFAIR), tolerance for deviations, sexually transmitted diseases (j/k) and so like stuff.

Yes, I agree, this modern "West" is an utter rubbish, embodied in the rubbish mass-"culture".

But let's not confuse this modern rubbish West with the original Western European culture, which has its great merits...

[Weltschmerz]

Originally Posted by Ariets

All whats bad come from west: liberals, wester life style, anarchists, comies (if you add that Marx & Engels ware from Germany AFAIR), tolerance for deviations, sexually transmitted diseases (j/k) and so like stuff.

I see. "All of what's bad comes from the west" is an extreme generalization, but the things you mention prevail in the cultural west to a great extent, AND these things are also a facet of the western civilisation in the most commonplace sense. We could of course think of a lot more positive senses of a western civilisation. But there's another problem:

The split between west and east, although leaning on some history, draws a line where it is questionable if we need one. Whatever would its function be?