A number of emails have asked for a post on the Greek situation, of which I personally know little. I feel a little bit like Casca, who when asked by Cassius in Shakespeare’s play what Cicero had said, answered that “those that understood him smiled at one another and shook their heads; but, for mine own part, it was Greek to me”.
The press has a number of explanations. The Economist says that the riots are merely a symptom of frustration with corruption, maladministration and poverty that has finally reached a boiling point. For example, Greek public health care and education are not all they are cracked up to be:
In health, schooling and other public services, bad state provision fuels a huge under-the-counter market—creating in turn vested interests opposed to any change. Life is tough for youngsters with energy and talent but no cash or connections. To get anywhere, they spend all day in rotten state classrooms, then trek off to private night schools where the same teachers do a slightly better job in return for money.
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The Wall Street Journal writes that the Greek government, which is press styles as conservative or pragmatic, is so incompetent it can’t even defend itself. What is worse, pragmatism in Greece has apparently become redefined to mean a total lack of principle. The result is a perfect storm.
When Greece’s conservative New Democracy party came to power in March 2004 it promised three things: to “reinvent” the state, to eliminate corruption and to initiate much-needed educational reform. Four years later, the situation remains unchanged: The state is still a tool for bestowing benefits and favors, corruption in the public sector is still rampant, and all attempts at educational reform have quickly fizzled out. …
What was unique about the events in Greece — as opposed to, say, the riots in the banlieues of Paris a few years ago — was the total withdrawal of the government and the security forces from the scene of the riots. Civil society was left alone and unarmed to fend off the violent attacks on their property by the hordes of predators. On Tuesday night, one of the worst nights of rioting, more than 400 shops were attacked in Athens: Some were torched, others looted and seriously damaged. Similar events happened across the country.
The Daily Telegraph says that while the core of the protesters have come, as is usual in Greece, from the radical left, their often ignored antics have found large quantities of dry tinder lying on the ground so that even they are surprised by what they have touched off, rather like someone who lights a firecracker and finds it has lit off a ton of thermite instead.
True, Greece has a particularly violent radical left. Students have spearheaded anti-globalisation and anti-establishment movements since the 1970s. The university quarter of Athens is often under a police lock-down. Also, the scandal-riddled conservative Greek government has alienated much of population, not only extremists.
But this uproar is unprecedented – even for Greece. It spread rapidly around the country. Rioters have targeted banks, looted stores and burnt cars. The police were caught off guard and have responded with enough violence to fan the flames of discontent. The protest is no longer limited to an anarchist fringe. There is widespread anger at the government.
Though as I have explained, the events are personally Greek to me, I can’t help wondering how much dry tinder is on the ground in some of the weaker European countries whose system of state benefits will come under pressure from the world economic downturn and demography. Low European birthrates have caused an explosion in the proportion of the elderly to the young. Whatever the particular conditions of Greece, a continent in which the proportion of people over 65 is will rise to to 30% by 2050 — up fivefold from 1900 — while the proportion of children below four will fall from 10% to 3% in the same period, is bound to put pressures on the young. When the ratio between children and the old changes fifteenfold (5×3) in a century in a half, then the young are enslaved to the old. But those are just random thoughts. Time will show what the events in Greece mean.
Below, come on baby light my fire.
embedded by Embedded VideoYouTube Direkt
Thank you for spotlighting this; and yes, this is still a head-scratcher to those of us who had plenty of other things to preoccupy ourselves with.
My concern was that there was a lack of background in any of the news about the real origins of the anger that led to the riots. There is an air of surreality to headlines and stories that focus on two incidents that “sparked the riots.” There is also a cavalierly irresponsible air to the media refusing to delve into underlying causes — a kind of “Euro-cool, Shit Happens” quality to the reporting.
Europe is hollowing out, and I think that there are aspects of that which are helping to cause these disturbances. There is, in Europe, a grotesquely skewed reverence for process and a contempt for results in governance.
TO: All
RE: Heh
This sounds more and more like a Jerry Pournelle novel of the Co-Dominion.
Regards,
Chuck(le)
P.S. Meanwhile, down the hall from here, Bernard Chaplin is discussing the Decay and Fall of the West.
[Are we learning, yet? -- Young John Connor to the T800 in Terminator 2]
It’s the left trying to take over in another country.
The remarkable thing to me is that Greece, cradle of Western Civilization, is today basically a third world country. A friend of mine was there on a diplomatic support mission a few years back and described it as more or less a pesthole.
It appears that “Progressivism” equals “Deevolution.”
In one of my rare moments listening to NPR yesterday (Wednesday), I heard their news readers applying their stylized diction to the riots in Greece. It’s obvious that the ‘youths’ are taking advantage of an opportunity to sow some wild oats, torch a few banks, bust in some store windows and extract loot – but those ‘news’ purveyors carefully informed us that they were ‘protestors’, and signified the righteousness of the rioters by pointing out one after another the sins of the government and the police! As if a proper punishment was being meted out to the evil government by the judgement of the people – at the expense of the poor sods foolish enough to rent property and run businesses.
Civil society was left alone and unarmed to fend off the violent attacks on their property by the hordes of predators.
At least the Wall Street Journal can recognize predators – the Daily Telegraph ritually intones ‘protestors’. The question is, who benefits from these so-call ‘protests’? Only the rioters, and the media cheering and cashing in on them. In a perverted morality play, the ‘protests’ would be be the indictments by the plaintiffs, and the government the defendant – but who’s to be the judge, and exactly what body of law is invoked? And why must the indictment/punishments be inflicted on unarmed businesses run by the parents and grandparents of those ‘youths’?
Real justice would round them up and find them a nice island with a mountain of rocks to break by hand into aggregates for use in reconstruction of those torched businesses. But the ‘justice’ of the NPR set is only to be applied against the grownups, not the nihilists. How in hell did we wind up with a Federally-supported megaphone preaching such perversions of rectitude to the ‘intellectuals’ in such plummy cultivated tones?
I’m not surprised. Greece and the rest of Europe has as a population comprised mostly of
belly-crawling, gutless cowards. In the United States where I live, we have a constitutional right to bear arms, and if someone tossed a fire bomb anywhere near my house, police or no police, that person would need two separate funerals, one for his head and the other for the rest of his worthless carcass.
I’ve read that the riots there were touched off by trouble with asylum-seekers (read: young Muslim men) who were told that asylum permits were being temporarily limited.
Do you have any information on this? If true, it would be precisely the kind of un-PC information that the MSM would hide like it was an ace in a game of three-card monte . . .
EU Referendum says it’s the first sign of the collapse of the Euro-Zone, which seems to make as much sense as anything else..
http://eureferendum.blogspot.com/2008/12/its-economy-stoopid.html
Wouldn’t the decline in the percentage of young people of the total population be a good thing for the current generation and a bad thing for old people? Statistically I would expect the opposite effect than what you claim.
It would make labor more costly and increase the wages that young people can demand when they enter the workforce… and old people would have to pay more for the services they need/want. I seem to remember a recent study about generations in the USA and that the smaller generations were more likely to earn more money or advance their careers than the larger generations, because they had less people competing for the same jobs, so dimmer/less talented people could rise higher and earn more in a small generation than a large generation.
I’m not sure if it’s actually possible for a developed welfare/socialized state to seriously cut back on entitlements without the country just falling apart like the USSR. Even small government conservatives here in the U.S. refuse to consider a reduction in their own benefits, and would probably continue to do so even in the face of a massive prolonged economic nightmare.
I share the view of many others that a government-run system of health care spells the death knell for a nation-state. There’s no going back from it, because the system becomes too entrenched within the government itself and people start to depend on it being in their lives forever.
As we may see in the next decades, the scheme breaks down, runs out of money, health care is rationed, patients receive terrible treatment, etc, but nothing can be done. Britons will never agree to rescind their national health care program, even as their mothers and fathers are dying for lack of basic care. It’s a right, dammit, and I want mine!
We must oppose the inevitable push for national health care in the U.S.
This story is amazing ! The Greeks dont mess around….
I think they are setting an example to the rest of the world not to live in “FEAR”…(over gov and police)
With the power of the internet it seems people can ban together and make a mockery of a perfectly peaceful country.
Ill still go there to vacation HANDS DOWN
I dig the Greeks and their tempers
-G
The main problem in Greece is appears to be a complete collapse in the ability of Greek youth (anyone under 40 actually) to get ahead in life. And the fault lies with both the Left and Right. The Greek Right are moribund. Many hold jobs such as university professorships and senior business positions and will be damned if any sort of true accountability will make them part with their jobs.
The Greek Left, like much of the European Left, have created a welfare state of such high expectations and low quality that universities and hospitals are a bad dream at best. In the universities, for example, the professors pretend to teach and the pupils pretend to learn all in the name of egalitarianism. And you do not ever want to spend time in a public Greek hospital. Believe me.
The upshot is that youth are bored and see no way to improve their lot in life. As the Left has a more seductive vision they riot (always in vain) in hopes of better quality.
Young Greeks have much higher expectations than in the past and there is a overwhelming Greek tendency inherited from the days of the Ottoman occupation of a strong dislike of overlordship by the government or by the police. As someone of Greek descent with contacts in the UK, US and Greece, I can only say that Greeks could have lives of far higher quality that either the US or the UK (albeit with, perhaps, less ostentation), but they have been betrayed by the political ideologies of the Left and the corruption of both Left and Right.
A real solution would be true capitalism (anathema to the Left) with accountability (anathema to the Right), but I cannot see it happening soon and I despair.
EUReferendum also reports that some think the ‘immigrants’ are mostly keeping their heads down due to lack of any real influence. And the recent crackdown on educational institutions has the leftist ‘students’ seething and just waiting for an excuse to explode.
Also, the southern European governments are used to overspending and then devaluing their currencies to compensate, which spreads and dilutes the pain. Now they are in the Eurozone and cannot do that anymore.
And of course what buckets #11 just said.
#13–a week or so ago Victor David Hanson wrote a piece about what is good about the US vs other parts of the world. If I remember right, he wrote a paragraph about his experience in a Greek hospital–not good. He is a classics professor and I suspect speaks Greek which, if so, didn’t apparently help him much.
Correction: middle name is “Davis”. Unable to find the article right now.
Gordon #15
Professor Hanson does indeed speak Greek. And understands the responsibilities of citizenship a whole lot better than the current inhabitants of Greece.
‘Democracy Now’ is interested that the Greek riots (correction, they say ‘protests’) are spreading through additional countries beyond Greece. Also they’re eagerly leading up to interviews with the last of the Red Army Faction/Baader Meinhof gang still behind bars, and an attorney who was disbarred ‘because he defended them’ in court. Glamorization of radical chic, anyone?
With sympathetic attention like this from the media, and not much employment to divert anyone’s time, it’s no wonder that riots are the entertainment du jour of the ‘youths’ of sophisticated Europe – they can gain public notice, and media praise, and possibly even some hasty gummint programs to pay them off to tone down the barbarism a bit.
Though as I have explained, the events are personally Greek to me, I can’t help wondering how much dry tinder is on the ground in some of the weaker European countries whose system of state benefits will come under pressure from the world economic downturn and demography.
Interesting, in that the usual prediction is that it is excessive numbers of young men who generate this kind of instability (the so-called “youth bulge” hypothesis). Greece, I presume, has relatively few young men these days. Of course, that youth bulges do cause instability doesn’t mean other things can’t, and perhaps it is idle young men who are the biggest problem, and perhaps Greece has plenty of those.
I once saw a presentation by a Greek student at my university. The conversation turned to corruption. I told her that in America, petty corruption – shakedowns by low-level bureaucrats to get a driver’s license, submit a business-registration form, etc. – is not common, but political corruption – solicitation of bribes by high public officials – is. She forlornly replied, “In Greece we have both.”
A good number of years ago a friend of mine was working in Greece when they got their first Mirage jets (a half dozen of them)…these jets were the hottest they had at that time and they were temporarily sequestered away from public view until they could be formally presented. My friend was working (mid-shift) where they were parked and noticed one of the Greek guards doing chin-ups on the nose probe (pitot tube?)of one of the jets, a nose probe which each of the jets had. Unfortunately, in this case, the probe could not support the weight of the Greek guard and it bent. My friend saw this, shook his head, laughed, whatever, and went back to work. In the morning when he left he noticed….each jet had a nose probe bent slightly downward.
In speech after speech (not to mention the war on Georgia), beginning in July, Kremlin’s intent to show up NATO as a spent force has been made plain as day. Turkey and Greece have in Cyprus the same “frozen conflict” that Kremlin complains that the USSR breakup has left festering all along Russia’s borders. So some of this may be the familiar old cold war subverting attack (Greece had a full blown and very bloody & ugly east/west proxy war just after WW2), in the streets of Athens but aimed at the Dardanelles, the straits which connect the Black Sea and the eastern Mediterranean with its vast amount of Greek shoreline. I’m sure Israel is playing close attention to this “unrest”.
…not to minimize the effects of western social pathologies –only to suggest that, as per nature itself something will sooner or later ruthlessly exploit any living thing’s vulnerabilities.
#11
I share the view of many others that a government-run system of health care spells the death knell for a nation-state. There’s no going back from it, because the system becomes too entrenched within the government itself and people start to depend on it being in their lives forever.
Ponzi schemes are a bitch, eh? Especially govt run ponzi schemes. Like social security. Or medicare.
All I know is I love pictures of Greece but never want to go there, and I want to live on the same street as Bill DeBiase!
“Democracies usually collapse not too long after the plebs discover that they can vote themselves bread and circuses…for a while.”
–Robert A. Heinlein (and Jerry Pournelle)
It will be interesting to see what happens to the welfare states when declining demographics demonstrate that, in essence, the whole model that it is based upon is little more than a Ponzi scheme. In order to keep the boat afloat it will be necessary to increase the burden upon the younger productive people, but at what level does the productive sector finally decide that they have had enough? And then what happens?
But that has always been the inherent contradiction in the Leftist models–at their essence they depend upon coercion, while proclaiming that they will bring economic liberty and equality. After all, if our masters are really wonderful people, then we’re not really slaves after all, are we?
My take on the reason why Greece in particular and Europe (and chillingly enough the U.S. to some extent) are headed pell-mell for anarchy and collapse:
Apres moi, le deluge!
To understand the power of Communist ideas we must come to terms with the emergence of the modern nihilistic misfit and his special brand of narcissistic megalomania. Lenin once wrote that there is no such thing as Communist dogma. This statement may confuse the party idiots, but it clarifies the real situation for the politically perceptive. The apparent abdication of the Communists during the period 1989-91 was a subterfuge long in the making. It was conceivable by the strategists in Moscow because the framework of their ideology involved the integration of sociology, economics and psychology with politics and war. It represented the science of “divide and conquer” carried to perfection.
Everyone can see that Lenin’s successors have refused to bury him. They buried Stalin. They buried Khrushchev. They buried everyone in the country. But they refuse to bury Lenin. He lays in state, in his mausoleum, the great symbol of Communism’s persistence and the KGB’s ongoing mission. The cadre stays the course.
America’s financial collapse threatens to uncork the totalitarian genie from its bottle. I believe it is too late to stop the worst from happening. The sequence has begun. The Kremlin knew that a financial crash was about to take place. They’ve been waiting on it. They are prepared to exploit it. And the Americans are completely oblivious. They are utterly unprepared.
Three snips from the September 19th column (or ‘Jeremaid’?) “Financial Collapse and Destructive War” by JR Nyquist.
Young Dude — the smaller pool of younger labor will be crowded out by immigrants. PC prevents young people from protesting, they lose mating opportunities by being labeled “racist” and meanwhile become discriminated against minorities in their own countries.
Australia is set to discriminate against straight White Men, in all areas of employment. That’s the new Labor Government.
Greece? Help me understand this: why do we care about Greece? Do we start worrying about Belgium next? Let them all riot and burn from within. We’ll find another market for Coke and Microsoft products.
I visited Greece about 20 years ago and still have many fond memories. However, I also remember being appalled by the graffitti in the area in and around the University of Athens. There was so much that it was really disturbing. I wondered how could any self-respecting faculty and student body tolerate the continual creation of such a mess in the place where they taught and studied? Why didn’t they do something to stop it and clean it up? It looked like an insane asylum run by the very worst inmates.
I assume nothing has changed for the better with the graffitte problem at the university. It’s probably even worse.
Also, I remember that there were quite a lot of Middle Eastern students (Palestinians, etc.) at the university.
Denny @ #30 –so, Thermopylae was a waste?
I was in Athens last fall for a couple of weeks. The streets are so crowded, odd and even license tags alternate days they are allowed on the street. For every breath-taking view, you have only to look down to see an equally appalling pile of garbage covering the entire hillside from highway to shore. The strangest phenomenon I encountered, however, was the rampant Al Gore worship. Apparently he gave a great speech at the Olympics a few years back. I could go on and on, but won’t. I will say the relatives I have there remain of their own will. They have dual citizenship here in the States. Go figure.
think back to biden’s warning – the british foreign minister’s office made similar predictions in the telegraph, although these were not interesting to the media.
i beg the pajamas readership to consider that these events are not the simple spontaneous inevitabilities caused by economic or political degeneracy. there is no denying that such degeneracy occurs and characterizes entire countries; the key problem is that this inference is *casuistry.* it is Hegelism. it is an attribution of agency to “forces” – it is an anthropomorphism, although perhaps a sophisticated one. it is, briefly, a superstition.
the proposition that a single force or conspiracy of forces (animated by a single though multi-faceted goal) is actually much more cogent an explanation than anything else when it comes to the rapid sequence of events that now seem to tip nations towards either crisis or left – Communist – victory.
think of the reaction to the Islamists: “it’s poverty.” no: it’s a highly educated and sohpisticated coven of individuals sufficiently united by the anti-American project that, despite ultimately diverging goals, a high degree of coordination, support, planning and execution is possible. it is, in fact, a conspiracy. that certain social conditions exacerbate certain personality types inspired by a certain interpretation of a fundamentally political-legalistic-martial culture masquerading as a religion is not a sufficient answer to the question of WHO is doing this, NOW?
ooo – political-legalistic-martial culture masquerading as a religion… was i just describing Islam(ism) or Communism?
and that probably is the key to question: but wait, how can atheists unite with fanatical believers?
because they are part of the same hypocrisy. i urge everyone to read Richard Pipes’ The Formation of the Soviet State. it’s boring but short and informative.
O yeah – the COmmunists are trying to tip the country toward legal domination by the Socialist party, currently in opposition. the ducks are being lined up for the big explosion in the Middle East/South Asia. as Larsen’s post pointed out, the fundamental error in popular thinking about Leninism is that it is rigidly orthodox. No! Read Lenin’s “Left-Wing Communism: an Infantile Disorder.”
the big explosion may or may not come, but there should be no doubt that many powerful actors are intending and working for exactly that. or does the turmoil of the last 7 years seem utterly normal to everyone?
There is very little understanding in the world concerning the Greek riots, probably because of the way it was covered by the main-stream media. Here are some relevenant facts.
1. Police and impunity: Police in Greece has always been (purposefully) separated from the people. It’s “us” and “them”. Through impunity for their actions – which range from stupid brutality to right-down murders – they assumed great power and earned great contempt. Not all police officers arer the same, of course, and these cases may not be the norm but since they are usually applied to a lower caste of citizens (students, poor youth, foreign workers) the police find it very easy to lie about facts and get away with it.
2. Technology. The internet and mobile phones has made the previous fact more relevant and uncovered the lies of the state to protect their “praetorians”. YouTube videos shot with mobile phones with officers beating people to a pulp when the offcial claim is that their injuries came from an attempt to escape and falling on plant pots, or other street fictures have infuriated common Greeks and alienated the police even more. Other dicusting videos of officers “playing” with foreign workers (usually economic migrants) have not helped either. There was one video with two Albanian boys ordered to slap each inside a police station and videoed by the officers themselves on a mobile that was particucarly sickening.
3. Economic and social factors. Years of neglect of the countryside and anything outside Athens – apart from European ordered transport infrastructure – have resulted in an overpopulated capital with fewer opportunities for work. Add to that the huge influx of illegal economic migrands (about 1 million in a country of 10 million) mainly from Albania (about 500,000) but ranging from Africa to Asia and you may start to understand how difficult thinks have become. A lack of immigration policy and consistent failure or even unwillingness to address the issue has created an underclass of people (both Greek and foreign) which survive through a para-economy (a.k.a. black economy) of illegal, uninsured, temporary, badly paid, money-under-the-table work. By extension employees exploit the fact that there are more people than jobs and pay them pittance (hence the “700 Euro Generation”), fire them at the drop of a hat, and usually keep them illegally uninsured (that’s public insurance contributions – i.e. state pension money – not some priviledged private health care thing).
4. Education. In Greece, education is free all the way… At least on paper. You may not pay for school or University education but in fact most parents pay huge sums of money for private tuition, private foreign language courses, books, and a lot more. University entry is by country-wide exams are quite difficult and the offered free education is usually not enough, hence the private tuition. Kids end up with 12-14 hour work days (e.g. 6-7 hours school, couple of hours English language, couple of hours private tuition, plus homework). Students with less money and lower abilities inevitably fail to get a deegree and are condemned to unemployment and a sence of worthlessness. However, even those with degrees (all the way up to PhD) find it difficult to find a job in their area due to lack a strategic higher education to produce what is really needed. This creates a social stratification with several levels with main parameters being money, social status (usually, but not necessarily synonymous with money) and “connections”. Connections are imperative in Greece even if you have a good education. In most cases the “conection” is a political party member that “arranges” for you to get a goverment job in exchange for votes and/or party alegiance. Public sector jobs are highly sought after since they are permanent, as public sector workers cannot be made redundant and are very rarely fired even for gross incompetence.
5. Politics. Politicians in Greece have always been highly corrupt. They use their power for two purposes mainly: to stay in power through “favours” (usually public sector employment, but also including turning a blind eye to minor illegalities), and make LOTS of money for themselves. There are exceptions but they don’t usually last long and end up being “populist” and laughed at. Governments, care little about “the people” and a lot about “their people”, who voted them in in the first place. And here’s a hint: young people of voting age (18+) are a very small minority due to low birth rate, itself due to money constraints. Recently, (again aided by technology) huge scandals have been uncovered even involving the Greek Orthodox Church (previously a beacon of moral stability in a sea of corruption). Older people may have been already “indocrinated” and at ease in a society where corruption is rampant and expected. Unfortunately for the leaders, and besides their best efforts, Greek education is designed to produce thinking people and not mindless robots. As a result the youth is hugely disillusioned, disheartened and angry.
6. Corruption. I have already mentioned corruption but it’s worthwile making the distinction between goverment corruption and the wide-spread corruption in everyday life. Tax evasion is the norm, doctors demand their bribe (fakelaki – “little envelope” is the common term, and if you think it contains a “thank you” card, think again…), public sector workers require a “fast-action stamp duty” to move your papers through the well-fed beuracracy, large companies that don’t want to pay taxes are given discounts while small companies’ owners go to jail (yes, for debts). To prove how corrupt the system is, here’s an interesting fact: the Greek tax system doesn’t tax you on how much money you say you made but how much THEY think you made. So if you have a large car (doesn’t matter how you got it – may have been a parent’s gift) and declare income below a certain level you get taxed sometimes double because you own that car. They assume you lied because the car is beyond your means. At the same time, politicians and their circles go around in big cars and yachts and generally living in oppulance, infuriating people even more.
There are other factors as well, perhaps more specific to Greek society. Even so, the above are enough to create a large marginalized group of mainly young people (I won’t use the word underclass since they come from almost all walks of life). These young people are disillusioned, frustrated, purposeless, futureless, stressed, unhappy and very, very, very angry. Add to that the normal energy of young people – and especially teenagers – and all you have to do is wait for critical mass and a trigger incident. Then you have what happened in Greece.
I will put the usual disclaimer here: I don’t personally condone destruction of property and looting. But I will also add something very few have said: I understand it. If you fill people’s heads with the notion that a huge 4×4, LCD, PC, CD, DVD, Xbox, PS3, and other acronyms, or by talking more on your latest mobile for less money is the way to a better life, it is inevitable you will have destruction and looting by the “have-nots”. Unfortunately, the Greek government has used this (and its TV coverage) as a way to get public support and divide the public into “us” and “them”. This is the true meaning of “divide and rule” and they have done a good job there for a change… Now most people care more about safety than what the young people’s problems. I personally think the destruction and looting was instigated by the police and state exactly for that purpose.
This is just the beginning and not just for Greece. Wherever in the world you may be, have a look at the above list and identify the similarities in your country. If there are even a few, brace yourselves. People are angry and getting angrier worldwide. And they are right to be angry, when their governments don’t care to spend a few dollars or euros to save their homes, their jobs, or even their lives (remember Katrina?), while spending billions to save some bankers. With a little knowledge of economics I may understand why they do that, but governments shouldn’t deal only in faceless economics. The masses will eventually go out and break something out of pure frustration, and they will throw your economic forecasts out of the window. All they need is someone to cast the first stone for a good enough reason.
Apologies for the long analysis, but I thought it was needed.
What will the world be like when it reaches the other side? By that I mean after the bulge in the aged demographic has died off and the world is relieved of the health and pension obligation?? Will economies be buoyed by the loss of the elderly or will waves of third world immigrants negate that?
I don’t know George, under that analysis all of Eurasia, Latin America and much of Europe, including Russia, ought to be perpetually toppling its governments and laying waste to its economies. And of course, that isn’t the case.
As a philosophy professor once replied: “Oh? it’s because someone had a bad upbringing that they committed murder? Really? And what of the 1 billion other people that had the same upbringing – why aren’t they out committing murder? Why isn’t the murderer’s brother out committing murder?”
dan @ #34: it’s a highly educated and sohpisticated coven of individuals…united by the anti-American project (ellipse mine)
…selected young and on merit (Putin lived in the former East Germany much of his life and speaks fluent German), to work on given projects for a lifetime, free of fear of domestic political winds changing every few years and blowing them in front of partisan congressional committees, hostile judiciaries, powerful partisan law firms, and the media Tyrannosaurus Rex.
To hold the line for western systems against such, we’ve always relied on the heroic individual principle, sufficient-to-the-day twilight warriors arising in our agencies with new ways of leveraging a certain built-in western moral design margin. How’s all that going? Wish i knew. Folks will say that Kremlin couldn’t be happy with the Russian market crash but again they are seeing that system as ‘like’ ours.
I lived in Greece for five years between 1998 and 2003. My grandparents came from Greece (actually they were Greeks in Turkey) in the 1910′s. I speak the language and keep up with events there.
The country has been though a lot. A decimating occupation by the Nazis and a nasty civil war when the rest of Europe was rebuilding and serous security threats along every single border. They have gone from having about .05% immigrants to about 12% in the space of a few years.
Really, all and all given factors which the average Greek has no control over, the country has moved forward remarkably in the past two generations.
This business of political demonstration, including occasional street violence is distasteful but it doesn’t really show the country or the average Greek at all.
As far as the government response I think the WSJ piece is off base. The current conservative government is refusing to give the provocateurs who took over the peaceful demonstrations what they want — more shootings of young people.
As to the comments by “GeorgeM” above, I hope not to insult him but his position is part of the problem.The young people have to make their own future. They have been given a MASSIVE gift none of their parents and grandparents had which is in relative terms huge advances in national security (the Turkish threat is nearly dead and the Communist threat is dead), huge advances in personal security and liberty (think what you may of the cops and security forces but they are not what they were in the civil war or Junta) and economic opportunity through membership in the EU.
For observers here is the thumbnail: Greece is normalized, what you are seeing here is NOSTALGIA by the violent extreme left. The government is doing the right thing by not giving these idiots what they want — more shootings and more fake martyrs. The amount of street violence in Greece , even with this event, has been dropping for decades. That is the trend.
Dan,
An excellent point. Above I listed the main reasons why the Greek riots came to be but I ommited some that most of us take for granded:
1. “Long-term Two-Party Democracy”: This is the post modern western type of democracy where two main parties with almost identical policies and behaviour in government. These parties succeed each other in government every 4 or 8 years, ALWAYS blaiming the previous administration for problems, at the same time following a well-planned agenda of economic evolution towards complete globalization however good or bad for the people. It has to be long term because people are inherently optimistic and believe the lies for quite a while.
2. “Enough democracy”. Again in quotes. This is a simple concept, enough democracy to consider the police beating someone to a pulp to be a punishable crime. Also, enough democracy to allow people to demonstrate peacefully.
In addition, it is easy to make this associational falacy of economic prospect and happiness. A country may be poor but their people may be happy enough even though they themselves are poor. A poor factory worker from Brazil or Russia may be happy because he is doing as well as he expects. A person in the France with 3 degrees that cannot find a job and works part time as a waiter just to survive with no future improvement is much more possible to react. Also, it helps if you haven’t got anything to lose.
So to answer your question, the murderer’s brother is not out committing murder because his world view is different.
From where I sit it is somewhat obvious that the protesting youth want something…..trouble.
GeorgeP – yes, the nostalgia argument is always a strong one until we know more.
GeorgeM – that is fair enough, but from a certain height there is a continuity of events, a pattern of events, that begs certain questions which your sociological and historical analysis does not, I think, account for.
Buddy – yes. i really wish pajamas would have a resident Communist-phobe to provide commentary on this since analysis of events is conducted as though the USSR never existed, the former KGB does not run Russia, and in any case even if it did and does, that’s basically just like the USA except they speak Russian there. that is just flat ignorance, even if concerns about on-going KGB-type statecraft is paranoid. this sensibiity regarding what the USSR and Communism were/are is at least as in need of correction as the vague popular sentiment about Islam and Ali Baba that existed prior to 9/11.
bah – i just read an AP article that says Greek students “also angry at government fiscal policies.”
F*cking “fiscal policies”? Do these idiots even listen to themselves? Only Communists riot over “fiscal policies.”
GeorgeP,
First let me say that i am not young or disillusioned myself, I am turning 40 in a few months and I live and work in the UK. I am also well paid and would’t consider myself as part of the G700 Euro. I am one of those that gave up on Greece and moved on, and I was one of the first to do so. Now there are 500,000 young Greek scientists and professionals that did the same.
I would like to understand which position you consider to be part of the problem if we are to have a serious discussion.
Hoping not to insult you this time I just wanted to say that I am really fed up with the “bad Turks” attitude they are feeding through education and the conscription army. It has worked well. Every nation needs an enemy to focus their anger and for us it has been the Turks for ages (and vice versa). Enough with that. It’s just an excuse to spend billions of euros we don’t have and put some of it in their pockets along the way.
I will accept that kids today have more opportunities than their parents. So what? If those opportunitie lead to a dead end, what’s the point? Besides, is that a measure that we should be happy with? Remember that their parents had to go through the same system and the same society. The new opportunities didn’t evolve out this system but out of new technologies, the EU membership and the changes to the global economy. In addition, they don’t benefit or apply to all the people, just the few that are in power and their “supporters”. I would really like for you to chat with my 25-year-old friend from Greece that earns €420 (after taxes) a month and has to live and plan for the future with that.
More disturbingly, the majority will take your stance, dismiss the underlying problems and blame some internal enemy, in an effort to make Greece look good. This is a constant effort to avoid losing tourist dollars. I will agree that Greece is as safe as any other country in Europe, and these things are internal greek matters. However, the politicians (and I am talking about both parties that have rules) are playing on the fears of people to subdue them. Don’t demonstrate because some will smash things up and the foreigners will see and stay away, and then we will lose all that tourist money and will suffer even more. Work done. Same as the Turks we found an enemy (those that smash things up – hoodies), villified that enemy and then scare the people with them.
Back to the point, we should not dismiss the underlying causes merely explaining the events as some boogiemen that we need to eradicate. These are not some lefties or anarchists, they are 15-year old students that go out to peacecfully demonstrate and get gassed by the riot police (which shouldn’t even be there after what has happened). It could have been my kid or yours. They are angry, and they don’t trust the state. Let’s ask ourselves why and ponder on the matter a bit, maybe try to find solutions instead of just saying “ah, it’s the commies again, they always make trouble”.
Think about it, that’s all I ask.
dan, right –at the expense of attracting that ‘paranoid’ label who can not see that at the very least the czar’s men in Greece are trying to help him get rid of the troublesome priest –that is, a peaceful coherent allied west under American leadership.
one wonders if it is paranoid to reflect on Georgia –not so much the bloody attack, not so much the well-planned and executed year(s) long buildup (including new railroads and infrastructure), not so much the new reality of Red Army now on the plains south of the mountains and a day march from Europe’s only Russia-free oil pipeline, not so much the west’s tepid response (including now the practice of being “reasonable” along the margins of of the great grab, and being lauded for that reasonableness by the west’s Chamberlain corp), not so much the now-split government hanging fire in Ukraine, not so much any of that, but that Kremlin foresaw the entire thing with perfect accuracy –even going so far as to say so, to its diplomatic corps, in the weeks before the D-Day.
can you even imagine western capitals having Athens-like street demonstrations theme’d “Russia out of Georgia” ?
“dan, right –at the expense of attracting that ‘paranoid’ label who can not see that at the very least the czar’s men in Greece are trying to help him get rid of the troublesome priest –that is, a peaceful coherent allied west under American leadership.”
Buddy larsen,
Actually, the “paranoid” already have spoken in Greece and the prevailing theory is that the Americans are trying to topple the government because it signed up for one of the “czar’s” projects (see planned gas/oil pipelines through Greece).
I am not in support of this theory but it sounds much more plausible that the other way around, if you know anything about Greece’s current affairs. Let’s not go the way of paranoia. It’s simpler than that.
“GeorgeM – that is fair enough, but from a certain height there is a continuity of events, a pattern of events, that begs certain questions which your sociological and historical analysis does not, I think, account for.”
OK, fire away, I will try to answer any questions you may have.
Ah – the explanation “CIA is behind this” is almost certainly KGB propoganda.
Actually GeorgeM4 your explanations really are inadequate – I was just trying to be polite.
For example, I invite you to go to a ghetto and try to start a riot some time. Tell me how that works out for you. You don’t think Al Sharpton can do it just with a wave of that impressive pompadour do you?
what’s simple about national riots that last for days, are evidently in the favor of “leftists,” and garner all sorts of useful media is that these kinds of things are precisely *not,* for example, poverty-caused.
or do you still think they get Newseek out in the Pakistan FATA?
“”"”"”"We must oppose the inevitable push for national health care in the U.S.”"”"”"”"
The inevitable rationing coupled with today’s “culture of death” will lead to state-mandated euthanizing of seriously ill elderly, and death-by-deliberate neglect for those over a certain age requiring expensive chronic care.
GeorgeM4, I can’t comment on the pipeline politics. It would need knowing whether a new government could or would abrogate the Russo-centric deal Athens has already signed on the so-called South Stream –which indeed supporters of the proposed and half-commited Nabucco project would like to see happen. Nabucco willpower suffered greatly via the Georgia war –not to mention the terror attack just a day or two prior to Rus invasion, on the Turk terminal of the existing, operating BTC pipeline. After all, if a major state plans regular sabotage of commercial competitors, the bloom comes off the investment rather completely. Re Kremlin, the benefit of the doubt, based on evidence and stated intent, has to go to those who assume Kremlin will subvert whatever it profitably and safely can, in the SE Europe/transcaucasus energy field.
Here’s another curve –if Greece has gone in a few years from .05 immigrants to 12%, with the overwhelminhg majority of the flood Muslim, then keep in mind that South Stream is perhaps a Nabucco-killer, and Nabucco, unlike South stream, will (if built) move Iranian gas to Europe. All this said to support the theory that this Athenian riot could be something other disaffected youth spontaneously combusting.
> Ah – the explanation “CIA is behind this” is almost certainly KGB propoganda.
As I already mentioned I do not agree with this consiracy theory. However, I would like to make this point: the theory appeared in the front page headline of a newspaper that supports the government. In turn the government is right-wing (although it claims to be center-right), and quite friendly to the US. The first thing that they did when they came to power was to cancel a large order for Eurofighters and buy F16s instead. There is a long-standing history of this particular party and their American-friendly attitude. In the other hand the alternative is the other party (PASOK) whose leader may be an American citizen but the party claims to be socialist (although it’s actually center/center-left), and quite anti-american by definition. And don’t think it’s anti-american Iran-style, somewhere near France would be more accurate.
> Actually GeorgeM4 your explanations really are inadequate – I was just trying to be polite.
And you were polite. If you would now explain what part you didn’t agree with, we can have a dialogue.
> For example, I invite you to go to a ghetto and try to start a riot some time. Tell me how that works out for you. You don’t think Al Sharpton can do it just with a wave of that impressive pompadour do you?
No idea who Al Sharpton is but I seem to remember some riots in the US in the last decade.
> what’s simple about national riots that last for days, are evidently in the favor of “leftists,” and garner all sorts of useful media is that these kinds of things are precisely *not,* for example, poverty-caused.
> or do you still think they get Newseek out in the Pakistan FATA?
If you consider leftist everything left of the extreme right, I would agree. And maybe they are not poverty caused in the way you define poverty (i.e. no food, no clothes etc.). This particular event was caused by lack of opportunities for a future for those up to 35. When young men and women have to live with their parents until they are 35-40, when they cannot marry because they cannot afford to start a home and a family, when they have spent time and money to educate themselves, and then cannot find a decent job (and I am not talking strange degrees in paleoscatology, main stream ones like engineering and maths), then we shouldn’t be surprised when they are angry. These are the people that are now throwing the stones, not the *-ists (put whatever you like there). For these people there is no other way, not even voting (I explained why in a previous post).
Not sure what Pakistan, FATA, Newsweek(?), have to do with any of this. If you imply that distribution of this information will not reach these places, I thought I made it clear: it’s not Pakistan you should worry about but western democracies and those aspiring to be like them.
buddy larsen,
I think you know enough about the pipeline politics as you demonstrate. Although I didn’t want to get drawn into a Greek-American relation discussion but here’s the crux of it.
Greece is quite americanized in the everyday life, much like the rest of Western Europe. However, the anti-american sentiment is still prevalent, mainly because of the 7-year military junta that was proven to be US-instigated and supported (Bill Clinton admited it and apologized to the Greek people for it). Instead of this move being accepted, it confirmed the fact to even those that didn’t believe it and increased the bad feelings. When the right-wing government was elected it was an excellent opportunity for the US government to mend things a bit but they were too busy with the wars. Then they made a couple of diplomatic mistakes; considering the greek converment as their supporters whatever happens, took a couple of desisions that really infuriated the people. Even so the “anti-americanism” is more like the Americans are anti-French nothing more than that.
At that point Putin was gagging to sign the pipeline deals, he even visited Greece twice to get the whole thing going. It was so obvious you can only laugh. However, he got what he wanted and since then the US is “dissapointed” with this particular deal. For the Greek people themselves it doesn’t matter who provides their gas as long as it’s secure and cheap (they are new to natural gas as a country as well).
Thanks GM4 –good info & well presented. I had known the feelings ran deep over the Junta –another example much like Mossedegh in Iran, where the early cold war containment policy of USA seems to’ve precluded much concern for memories of the middle people, who will hate foreign meddlers regardless of the long view of the big picture.
Of course on must attach the thought of why a containment policy in the first place –what was being contained, and why. Answers to that could be found in the Baltic triplets, Finland, Poland, and etcetera moving southward toward Greece & Turkey –and Iran and the warm waters of the Persian Gulf lapping over the planet’s fuel tank.
S’agapo Hellas.
GeorgeM4 – the conditions you describe are also true of Italy, for example. In fact, they are probably similar to many “second world” countries. Actually they are becoming rapidly more common in the USA; many, many families, for example, are about to discover what happens when the income they used to subsidize Daughter’s upper middle class Manhattan lifestyle suddenly evaporates.
My argument is simply that riots like this are not unorganized anger. Spontaneous crowds are not spontaneous for 7 days straight. They are being led; the press is being directed. That the headline you site appeared in the government-supporting newspaper could simply be the opening shot of the new public relations (propaganda) effort. For example, contrary to the US left’s slogans, Fox News reported all manner of Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo, No WMDs, and so on.
I see in CNN that the riot began with police killing one youth when they fired on some kids throwing stones at their car. Early ballistic reports show that the bullet probably ricocheted off something and then killed the kid. Who knows whether this is true? Nonetheless, the next sentence in the CNN report is curious: “if this report is true, it is likely to further inflame” the situation.
Really? If the bullet unintentionally struck the punk throwing stones at the police car, this will have the effect of increasing rather than decreasing the anger at the police and the government?
How did that sentence get in there? And there is another but I don’t have much time at the moment – as the Greek PM said: there is a difference between understandable grief and outrage on the one hand and an organized political offensive against the government.
i repeat: the ruling party has a 1 seat majority. people from the Socialist Worker’s Party are acting as narrators in these articles.
come on. cui bono?
Final word on the facts as I followed them: The kid was a 15-year old from an affluent family and was there for a friends celebration. There was a group of 30 unconnected youths that threw some rocks to a passing police car. The officers drove off and parked the car at the local station and walked back about 200 yards to the place were the original group threw the stones. The started shouting at the young people gathered there (the youths that threw the rocks have already left) and then one officer drew his gun and then… it’s a bit hazy. The officer claims he shot two warning shots in the air and then his gun accidentally fired while he was puting it back in its holster. About 10 eye witnesses so far have said that he actually aimed and fired directly at the crowd. There is a very low quality video that corroborates this.
In his initial testimony (which changed later), the officer claimed that a group of youths attaccked his car and he got out of the car immediately and because the victim (specifically him) was going to throw a molotof bomb at their car he shot three warning shots in the air. He changed it later because the video I mentioned before was published on YouTube.
This may be OK in the US but in Greece and most european countries you don’t fire a weapon unless in self defence. Even worse you never, ever, fire at or even near a crowd (this was an area with crowded outdoor cafes etc.).
So, to clear this up. The kid was NOT a terrorist, leftist, or any other -ist. He was a simple 15-year old kid that went out to an internet cafe for his friend’s celebration. He never threw anything at anyone and was what you call “an innocent by-stander”.
The officer – a well known bully, apparently – parked his police car and walked back to the place of initial incident, started shouting profanities (yes, the officer) at the people that were there at the time (possibly mistaking them for the original group) and when some of them (we don’t know who) shouted back, he drew his gun, aimed and shot at the crowd. The third shot hit the kid in the chest. This is what comes out of eye-witness reports (imagine how crowded it was when you have about 20 people that cacme forward to testify).
The public anger comes from the fact that previous such cases were covered up with lies and the police officers got off scott-free… Everytime. Some months ago, police officers in plain clothing beat a Cypriot student to a pulp and claimed that he fell on some plant pots in his effort to escape. He was also unrelated to any incidents that were happening at the time. Unfortunately for the officers, there was a very clear video of their actions and they got arrested and indicted. Out of the 6, 5 got acquited and one got a 6-month suspension. This decision came out very recently and was definately a factor in the public anger.
When the ricochet news came out people feared that it was going to be perceived as another cover-up (bullets in Greece have the habit of bouncing on things until they find their target). This is why these news were going to make things worse.
The officer’s lawyer actually succeeded in making things worse by coming out with a statement that the kid was often frequenting the area (considered a hotspot of anarcists – but otherwise quite a popular destination for normal people), and that he was thrown out of his previous school and that’s why he had to change and that he was going to football (soccer) matches causing trouble. It’s incredible, because immediately all the victim’s friends, teachers and relatives immediately came out to expose all the above as lies.
The people see that this is on its way to be another cover up. Previously, the victims were older and marginalized or foreign migrants or gypsies and all cover-ups succeeded (although not accepted by some journalists as “justice been done”). This time the kid could have been anyone’s kid. He wasn’t looking for trouble and he got shot in the heart by the people who should be protecting him. Also, the fact that the officer never sought necessary to appologize to the mother and instead attacked the personality of his dead victim through his statement has made matters even worse.
Now you know what we know. What do you think?
Forgot to answer about the political implications. First of all the party is the opposition party is the Panhellenic Socialist Movement (PaSoK). I was disgusted as well when ALL the parties came out and tried to gain from this death. Even more infriating was when a government minister declared that “the officer was hired during the previous administration”. First of all this shouldn’t matter but even more importantly, he was hired as a “special guard”. These guys were hired as a support group to guard buildings and police stations especially during the Olympics. They had no guns or particular training and were basically a cheap surveilance system. Somewhere after the Olympics, the current government decided it didn’t have enough police (the real police officers guard politicians and celebrities, litteraly; they have 2-15 police officers assigned to each). They initially gave them weapons, and they are now trying to incorporate the “special guards” into the police, effectively making the police officer through the back door.
To become a police officer you need 2 years of training (I heard that not sure about the exact training time), after entry exams etc. It seemed the only requirement to become a “special guard” was to show up. No training whatsoever.
Anyway, the opposition parties have exploited the situation, certainly, but the ruling party also made some major booboos in dealing with it.
well, you may have a point, GM4. There’s always exceptions that prove the rule –thanks for sticking with it –
Well done George! That is definitely a reasonable explanation. I also don’t think a genuine Socialist provocation would be decipherable from news reports, and that “police terrorism” is precisely the kind of pretext the Left would use to start and sustain a riot. Also, this sounds like the kind of explanation that would move journalists into battle, not the man on the street. However, i don’t want to completely give myself over to conspiracy theory either. The burden is now on me.
Still, a 8-day riot, in which the Socialists seem to have prevailed in the public relations campaign, and will probably lead to the pro-American government’s downfall? I admit that I retain a certain skepticism. Thanks for your analysis though, amigo, that was very informative!
Well, I am very late to this thread but still wish to add a few things of first hand experience in Greece about its people — even though it’s been more than a decade since my last sojourn there.
At that time, I considered Greece to be 2nd-world country. It was way before it was admitted to the EU community and seeing open sewage flow out of the ground and across sidewalks in Voula — which fronts a beautiful shoreline — made it so. How does man muck up such beauty?
On the other hand, I was consistently impressed by how learned and easy the typical Greek citizen had his/her way with language and customs of those of us enjoying their hospitality and graciousness. Most Greeks speak more than one language and often you find that they are fluent in at least three: their own and probably German and English or French. I often overheard conversations between Greeks where the language shifted more than several times depending upon the subject being discussed — often in mid-sentence.
Demotic Greek is an easy language to acquire and is joy to use as much as you may find yourself capable of employment. The alphabet may put you off a little, but after a few days it becomes second nature and is largely phonetic and therefore accessible to a speaker of English. It’s easier to get you mind around it than Hindi.
In some ways Greece is still tribal or at least provincial in viewpoints. If on Crete near Zaros, you will be deep in PASOK territory. If near Episkopi, totally different though those locations are not that many kliks away from each other.
I have every confidence that tensions in Greece will subside that they will be able to make better what they already have. Things here in the USA are not always so great either as a drive through central Detroit or Philadelphia can show.
Finally, and I’ve said it before, asshat police carrying weapons and shooting into crowds must be stripped of their badges and guns (and prosecuted, but I’ll leave that to be determined by the Attica DA). Like chemotherapy for cancer, sometimes the cure is worse than the disease. Law and order, yes. Disorderly law in abuse of authority, no.
RWE: The remarkable thing to me is that Greece, cradle of Western Civilization, is today basically a third world country.
Similar to what happened to Egypt, Rome, and other great empires.
The cycle is the civilization grows, and becomes an empire. Bright young men without connections into the elite have fewer opportunities under the empire. The bright young men move to the frontier of the empire where opportunities still exist.
After a while, the empire has lost most of its bright young men, and collapses. Meanwhile, a new frontier civilization emerges.
“After a while, the empire has lost most of its bright young men, and collapses. Meanwhile, a new frontier civilization emerges.”
Which is why we’re talking about colonizing Mars now.
Dan writes: “My argument is simply that riots like this are not unorganized anger. Spontaneous crowds are not spontaneous for 7 days straight. They are being led . . .”
GeorgeM4 writes: “The kid was a 15-year old from an affluent family and was there for a friends celebration. There was a group of 30 unconnected youths that threw some rocks to a passing police car.”
I respond:
“Youths,” indeed.
The socialist/marxist elements in Greece and the EU concentrate in university areas since the activists/thugs can receive benefits and identity as studetns. As commenters have noted, above, education is free.
Greek law prohibits police from entering into a university campus. The advantages of this policy for rioters is obvious.
ANSWER, during our election cycle, exemplified the possibilities of a marxist organization using and riding upon possible legitimate grievances.