Are We Doomed?

John Derbyshire certainly thinks so.  In We Are Doomed: Reclaiming Conservative Pessimism, Derbyshire laments that all is lost, American conservatism is in its death throes, and Western civilization faces a long, dark night from which it may never emerge.  Assuming that Derbyshire was writing this book in 2008-2009, as Americans voted into office the least qualified, least experienced presidential candidate in this nation's history, who subsequently proceeded to dig this nation further into trillions of dollars of debt, Derbyshire's pessimism is not without foundation.

But Derbyshire's gloominess is not limited to politics.  Across the board he sees a nation in full decline, from growing racial and ethnic balkanization that threatens national cohesion, to the devolution of politics into a grotesque sideshow that has transformed "public service" into obscene, mandarin-like money and power grabbing, to the cheapening of sex and the stagnation of a culture (high and popular) that presently produces little of value, to the growing behemoth of educational bureaucracy philosophically rooted in the nonsensical notion that more education is the cure to all of our society's woes.

The last category mentioned, education, strikes a particular chord with me because for better or worse (mostly worse), academia has been my profession for a decade.  Derbyshire quotes New York Times reporter Deborah Solomon's claim in an interview with eminent sociologist Charles Murray that if "given the opportunity, most people could do most anything."  That notion is complete horse baloney.  Billions of dollars have been wasted on primary and secondary public education for children and tens of thousands of dollars of loan debt have been incurred by millions of young adults based upon the foolish notion that education for education's sake is the key to prosperity in life.

It is not.  Referencing former National Review contributing editor Steve Sailer, John Derbyshire identifies this type of thinking as the "Yale or jail" syndrome, the underlying assumption being, Derbyshire writes, that "if you don't have a college degree, you are not good for much of anything other than selling crack."  Thus, millions of kids who would be better off pursuing more productive (and lucrative) career options are instead shoehorned into a one-size-fits-all educational system that for many of them is a complete waste of time.  As fellow blogger Carol Minjares of Missoulapolis wrote in a recent post: "Modest proposal:  Any student who says 'How will I ever use this [math, science, English, etc] in real life?' should be sent for CNA training."

Another topic of interest which Derbyshire hits upon is religion.  Derbyshire is an atheist, and I have written of his atheism before on this blog.  I have little doubt that Derbyshire's atheism underlies much of his pessimism, for if we are little more than overly intelligent apes who came about as the result of billions of years of chaotic random chance, what true meaning or higher purpose do our lives have?  If the answer is none, Derbyshire's comprehensive pessimism is not only understandable, it is incontrovertibly logical.  However, despite how much its adherents may argue otherwise, atheism is, at its root, a belief in nothing.  And people won't fight for nothing.  Hence, the sad spectacle of post-Christian Europe being overrun by unassimilable Muslim barbarians while the continent's elites fiddle away carefree.  As a writer whom I often quote on this blog has written, "never go to a gunfight without a gun and, if you intend to win, never go to a religious war without religion. You'll lose."

John Derbyshire believes the battle to already be lost.  With respect, I disagree.  Perhaps it's a cultural difference between the English-born Derbyshire and I, because Texans don't give up the fight so easily.  We've lost?  I say, "come and take it, you dirty bastards."