The expansionist aggression of the West is an inescapable expression of its roots in aristocratic men
the West was uniquely exceptional in exhibiting in a continuous way the greatest degree of creativity, novelty, and expansionary dynamics. I trace the uniqueness of the West back to the aristocratic warlike culture of Indo-European speakers as early as the 4th millennium BC. Their aristocratic libertarian culture was already unique and quite innovative in initiating the most mobile way of life in prehistoric times, starting with the domestication and riding of horses and the invention of chariot warfare.
Nietzsche too wrote of the ‘aristocratic’ warrior who longed for the ‘proud, exalted states of the soul,’ as experienced intimately through ‘combat, adventure, the chase, the dance, war games.’
Europeans were also exceptional in their contentious and expansionist behaviours. Their scholarly achievements, including their liberal values, were inseparably connected to their aristocratic ethos of competitive individualism.
While we agree with Duchesne's list of the traits valued by Western civilization, we must always oppose his use of the term "aristocratic" to describe this set of traits (which you correctly label as barbarism). I have also covered this in the past:
https://trueleft.createaforum.com/colonial-era/colonialism-as-viewed-by-westerners/msg13961/#msg13961https://trueleft.createaforum.com/true-left-vs-false-left/truth-knowledge/msg1185/#msg1185One of our tasks is to promote actual aristocratic traits, and demonstrate these traits in our own behaviour. Ironically, Duchesne's following description is technically accurate on the literal level:
aristocratic men who are free and therefore headstrong and ambitious, sure of themselves, easily offended, and unwilling to accept quiet subservience
It's just that he, being a barbarian himself, does not understand that the truly free are the ones who recognize material existence as imprisonment (rather than enjoy material existence as the barbarians do); the truly headstrong are the ones who reject adulteration (rather than celebrate adulthood as the barbarians do); the truly ambitious are the ones who want to escape the flow of time (rather than endlessly progress within time as the barbarians intend to); the truly sure of themselves are the ones who do not require social validation (rather than constantly seek the validation of glory as the barbarians do); the truly easily offended are offended by our own birth (rather than grateful for it as the barbarians are); the truly unwilling to accept quiet subservience are the ones unwilling to accept quiet subservience to our own desires (rather than be led by theirs as the barbarians are).
This is an example of how an inferior interpretation of words originally intended to refer to superior concepts can end up inverting the meaning of those words.
Whom would the prison-builder prefer:
a) those determined to destroy the prison;
or
b) those who want to be dominant within the prison population, and for this very reason have interest in preventing the prison from being destroyed, and even in endlessly expanding/complexifying it so as to make it increasingly difficult to destroy completely?
Thus who are the truly subservient to the prison-builder?
See also:
https://trueleft.createaforum.com/true-left-vs-right/arthur-schopenhauer-vs-friedrich-nietzsche/