Curzon

I had a buddy on the road who said: "I don't travel to meet the locals, they're all peasants; I travel to meet other travellers, people who've been around and who know things and do things."

Is there a point to our vacuuous modern Western lives? God-obsessed flagellants living in terror of going to Hell 1000 years ago in the midst of the plague might well have been happier and better adjusted to their societies and their personal lives than many people living today in suburban America. The neurotic self-obsessions of the High Middle Ages had to have been more satisfying than ours today. They must have had it made, no pollution, no urban blight, no slums, no multinational oil companies making them go to war for no reason other than to allow the rich to get richer. And then there was the organic food they ate, natural spring water, sharing and caring communities. It's all a matter of emphasis, like the fellow who explained to me that Hitler wasn't such a bad guy, Hitler just had a lousy foreign policy. I've been so judgemental all these years. I'm not getting the hang of this relativist thing. In fact, I seem to be getting less accepting of craziness all the time. I really want to hang out with Lord Curzon. I don't care if I'm a maladjusted bigot duped by the capitalist system and so on. Curzon is my kind of guy. I'm just not keen on self-flagellation and the certainties of the gnostic Left. I like haughty snobbish English imperialists. I like their foreign policies in particular. I like the attitude. Yeah, I could whip myself and worry myself sick about being offensive so that I became certain that I was actually pleasing to the gods, but I prefer myself as I am. I do like nature and stuff. Some animals make great carpets. And health food? Totally. Curzon and I could hang out and be pals. I can't find any enthusiasm for hanging out with Muslims. Socialists don't even make good carpets. Peasants? No. Curzon? Now there's a guy.

What's the difference between Lord Curzon and Maudidi? Emphasis. Maududi is a neo-feudalist; Curzon is a Modernist. In our Janus-like time we look both ways, to the past and to the future. We have to decide where we will place our faith, and then we need the attitude to carry us in one or the other direction. The peasants of the world have a say in this too. They have to decide for themselves which way they go. Left cultural imperialism leads many of the locals locked in a putrid system that exploits them as terribly as did Belgian colonialism. I say toss out the imperialists and bring in real leaders like Lord Curzon.

The English aren't going to return to restore the Raj. That ship has sailed. The Raj, nevertheless, needs resotoration, not the caliphate. And since the English aren't coming back, it will be up to the locals, the tedious and ignorant and venal creatures we don't much care for , to make their own Raj. Yes, they might be happy in the plague of this, our bifurcating time, or they could be very cool guys like Curzon, not really the happiest guy in history.

Peasants in Europe were likely happier 1,000 years ago than they are today. Muslims today are likely happier than most Westerners. I like to think of an unhappy world of peasants all with the attitude of Curzon. I would say, "Colonize thyself, and let's hang out."