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The Forum > Article Comments > Without Greece there is no Western civilisation > Comments

Without Greece there is no Western civilisation : Comments

By Evaggelos Vallianatos, published 28/11/2011

Humiliating and punishing Greece by the West is matricide.

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I've often heard it said that the Greeks still think that the world
owes them a living, for what their ancestors achieved 2000 years ago.
This article kind of confirms that.

But at the end of the day, it was the Greek people who lived beyond
their means. It was the Greek people who dodged taxes and retired
early. It was the Greek people who elected corrupt politicians.

Now that the chickens are coming home to roost, the Greek people
have to accept that they are responsible for the consequences of
their actions and its pointless trying to shift the blame somewhere
else.
Posted by Yabby, Monday, 28 November 2011 10:25:02 AM
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Evaggelos Vallianatos wrote 28 November 2011:

>The West has always been perplexed by Greece ... modern Greeks, are they really Greek? ...

The North Eastern Mediterranean contributed much to western civilization, but this has little to do with the modern Greek state.

In 2008 I attended a wedding at Palaios Panteleimon, a village near Mouth Olympus, in "Greece". I started from Istanbul and traveled clockwise through Turkey, across the Aegean, Athens, Delphi, up the spine of Greece and back to Istanbul: http://blog.tomw.net.au/2008/07/malaysia-turkey-and-greece-technology.html

My first surprise was that Istanbul was a civilized and prosperous city, (with mosques which looked like Greek churches): http://www.tomw.net.au/travel/istanbul.shtml

The next surprise was that the Greek islands off the Turkish coast were previously Italian. The islanders have had to adapt to the customs of whichever external power is dominant at the time: http://www.tomw.net.au/travel/rhodes.shtml

"Zorba the Greek" turned out to be from Crete, with author Nikos Kazantzakis was born in Heraklion (Crete) when it was part of the Ottoman Empire. I visited a recreation of his library: http://blog.tomw.net.au/2008/10/zorba-greek.html

On the way from Delphi to Mount Olympus, I stopped at Thebes (Thiva), which has not recovered since being sacked by Philip II, father of Alexander the Great. In his book "Philip II of Macedonia: Greater than Alexander" (Potomac Books, 2010), Richard A. Gabriel argues that Phillip II created a unified Greece by bringing the Greek city states under Macedonian control: http://blog.tomw.net.au/2011/07/phillip-ii-of-macedonia-has-lessons-for.html

When I got to Palaios Panteleimon, I found I was in Central Macedonia. Traveling further north, Greece's second city Thessaloníki, turned out to be the capital of Central Macedonia. Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, is named for a Macedonian teacher, who came to fame later in Athens. From Thessaloniki it was an overnight train ride back to Istanbul: http://blog.tomw.net.au/2008/07/excellent-thessaloniki-to-istanbul.html

After this trip, my suggestion for dealing with the Greek financial crisis is not to distance Greece from Europe, but to bring it closer, by allowing the Republic of Macedonia and Turkey to join the European Union. This would then allow more trade across the current national boarders, restoring ancient trade routes.
Posted by tomw, Monday, 28 November 2011 10:39:42 AM
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Ancient Greece and its legacy to Western civilisation has, like Rome, been vastly overrated.

The Greeks pinched democracy off the European Celts, who had been running their societies as egalitarian mini-republics with elected chieftains for at least a millenium before the Greek classical period. The supposed legacy of classical Greece to the West has always been the insular preserve of the European artistocracy, who used the ancient Greek and Roman empires as blueprints for creating their own. Europe's lower orders, on the other hand, remained attuned to the egalitarian ways of Old Europe.
Posted by Killarney, Monday, 28 November 2011 12:23:52 PM
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Unfortunately for nations as well as individuals, glorious achievements in the past don't make up for rational behaviour and good economic management in the present. Just ask all the geriatric rock bands who are still touring the RSL clubs in order to pay their alimony and child support bills.
Posted by Jon J, Monday, 28 November 2011 12:29:40 PM
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Agreed Killarney,

We could also say that without...

The Minoans, The Romans, the Etruscans, the Babylonians, the Sumerians, the Arabs, the Indo-Europeans, the Phoenicians, the Persians, The Indians, the Chinese, the Germanic peoples, the Celts...there would be no Western Civilisation.

The Greeks didn't invent democracy (they don't seem to understand it) it's really an invention of NW European culture.
Posted by mac, Monday, 28 November 2011 1:52:38 PM
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Well said Mac.

I'm just gobsmacked by the author's claim that without Greece there'd be no Western civilisation. Unless, "western civilisation" is a euphemism for 'catastrophic financial crisis'. In which case, I agree completely.
Posted by David Jennings, Monday, 28 November 2011 2:42:37 PM
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The author also omits the other great influence on western civilisation. The Hebrews (mostly of the new testament)contributed to our justice system and it's forgiving nature. The Greeks mostly only contributed logic and reason.

Of course the reformation and the enlightenment were the greatest developments in western civilisation and they had no contribution from anyone other than westerners.

The Greeks are lost somewhere in their past and antiquated socialism.

They'll pay the price for trying to be modern western and antiquated socialist.
The two are incompatible.
Westernism is about individualism. Socialism, it's exact opposite, is about unworkable collectivism.
Posted by imajulianutter, Monday, 28 November 2011 4:58:42 PM
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Xenophobic attacks on the Germans won't save Greece.

Many people's fears about Sydney becoming complacent after the 2000 olympics came true. It seems Greece has been suffering from this complacency since the original olympics.

How can you justify retiring at 55 years when the Germans (and us) retire at 67?

The author talks about Byzantium yet fails to address any of the Byzantine rules that got Greece into this mess. How about laws that allow single women to 'inherit' their father's pension if he dies? Even monks do dodgy deals in Greece.

Europe is going through upheaval because they think the world owes them a living. But the millions of people in China and through the developing world work much harder and for much less than spoilt Europeans.

Greeks are going to have to suck it up because it's only going to get worse. Nobody owes them anything.
Posted by dane, Monday, 28 November 2011 5:09:37 PM
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It's actually highly contentious to claim that The Ancient Greeks were the originators of the Western Enlightenment, or that it lifted the West our of barbarism. There's a wonderful essay by the celebrated philosopher Simon Critchley called "Black Socrates: Questioning the Philosophical Tradition" which suggests that, like most histories, the Western intellectual tradition is conceited crap, indeed elitist in its determined prehistory in the Greeks. It's only logical after all that the Greeks were drawing on yet earlier traditions, obviously the Egyptians and Mesopotamia for instance, and probably others so that Westernism is in fact hybridism--a melting pot of philosophical bastards.
The decidedly "modern" view of Western Philosophy as instituted in the Greeks is arguably part of a Eurocentric and imperialist, even racist genealogy--still hegemonic today--that was "confabulated" barely two centuries ago!
"Without Greece there is no Western Civilization" pshaw!
Without the sum total of human culture there is no Western Civilzation!

But even putting aside the conceit and effrontery of the ersatz Western tradition, I'm intrigued by the notion that we should "save" Greece; when Greece might (ironically) save us from barbarism, for real this time, by being the first to "fall" from the ghastly graces of the market monster we invented in the name of the Enlightenment!
Posted by Squeers, Monday, 28 November 2011 5:21:11 PM
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We's invented civilisation & youse owes US.

And ... We know where youse lives!
Posted by KAEP, Monday, 28 November 2011 5:25:12 PM
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There is barely any resemblance between Modern Greece and Ancient Greece. National Geo's genetic project - or the company associated with it - showed that only 30% of modern Greeks have a Y-DNA ancestor who was an Ancient Greek. I've lived in Greece and the Middle East (Lebanon & Egypt) and noticed something similar. The worship of Ancient Greece by Modern Greece is reminiscent of the way poor Islamic countries talk about their past. They both believe that they have been robbed by the west or the Ottomans of their heritage and place in the world; and this results in a victim mentality. I was in Greece when there was a blockade of Macedonia by them because they thought Macedonia was stealing their history - it really was insane. The writer reminded me of that attitude.
Posted by Stampy, Monday, 28 November 2011 7:27:33 PM
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Oh and please don't blame Greece's weapon acquisitions from Germany for your debt.

The submarine contract was 2 billion Euro. Greece's debt is 300 billion Euro - 150 times the cost of the submarine contract - which wasn't even fully paid - the company repossessed one of the subs.

The real culprit is the Greek public sector and the pensions that are better than Germany's
Posted by Stampy, Monday, 28 November 2011 7:33:52 PM
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well...my friend Evaggelos Vallianatos...don't worry too much...yes, greeks made logic&reason into a form of art...but that seems to be an dying art in this modern age...

whats happening now could have been easily predicted when greeks had access to easy loans years ago...and instead of applying some logic&reason to assess the whole life cycle to it...well Greeks seem to have gone crazy on 'lets live now'...lot money quickly siphoned away and smaller portion actually spent on mega billion projects...

few greeks...those given power and position, got rich quick for doing nothing\looking other way\spinning bull*@8$ etc...while the rest of greeks marveled at the superficial transformation of their country...

now the birds have come to roost...'birds' as in the intentionally kept murky world of big money finance...which we the common people are slowing realizing is privately owned...and seems that bankrupt Greece has to sell ALL its assets that is still left to foreign owners to get out of this hole...without a shot fired...amazing...

and more amazing...same pattern here in australia, england, usa and many other countries that once used to be 'rich'...

well...lets all continue sleeping on our watch shall we...just focus on our own mortgage and debts...let the current political-government-law complex keep doing what they are without any fear of consequences...and we all join Greece shortly...

sam
Posted by Sam said, Monday, 28 November 2011 8:55:32 PM
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This is laughable.

No wonder Greece is in such a mess if this is in any way representative of how some Greeks think. Many of the country's problems are self-created, and like all of us they will have to face up to reality and not take refuge in the glories of the remote past.
Posted by Michael T, Monday, 28 November 2011 9:47:43 PM
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Speaking as someone Greek,tThe author is over-the-top with his comments. Its not so much that ancient Greece didn't have a monumthatental impact of western civilization. It did. (to those that doubt I recommend you check into the etymology of words like philosophy, physics, mathematics, biology, democracy, logic, etc.. etc..) However, that was then and this is now. Hubris over ancient accomplishments is unearned and unwise. I am no more responsible for the works of Aristotle than the average brit is responsible for Newton.If anything Greece is a backwater today.

That said, the author is correct there is currently amti-Greek hysteria. Greece is certainly to blame for its fiances but demonization over the matter is excessive (as Greece only represents 2% of the EU economy). A dead giveway prejudice is a factor is how apologists for the former Yugoslav republic have suddenly developed amnesia when it comes time to noticing the rampant "united Macedonia" rhetoric and remembering what government officials from FYROM used to claim about their consatntly shifting identity only a few short years ago. (prior to recognition)

'We are not related to the northern Greeks who produced leaders like Philip and Alexander the Great. We are a Slav people and our language is closely related to Bulgarian.' - FYROM´s former Canadian Ambassador Gyordan Veselinov, Ottawa Citizen Newspaper, February 24 1999

"We are Slavs who came to this area in the sixth century ... We are not descendants of the ancient Macedonians" - FYROM's first President Kiro Gligorov, Foreign Information Service Daily Report, Eastern Europe, February 26, 199
Posted by Demetri, Tuesday, 29 November 2011 11:27:14 AM
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@StampY

You have things exactly backwards. Greeks are among the few ethnic groups that share massive amounts of culture and langauge with ancient counterparts. (along with Chinese, and a hanful of others)

You are also a quack geneticist. There is no ethnic group that's pure but studies have consistently a high percentage of the Greek population is biological connected to ancient (again higher then most country's actually)

If you argued the same sorts of thing to someone Jewish (that have mixed far more than Greeks and have less in common on practical level) you would be called a racist (and rightfully so). Unfortunately harassing Greeks as not "real" Greeks is practically an international sport. I would look in the mirror to see what you have in common with your claimed roots before csmuggly riticizing others. My bet is far far less than Greeks.
Posted by Demetri, Tuesday, 29 November 2011 11:47:41 AM
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Demetri,

I'm not going to discuss genetics as different studies lead to different conclusions and I'd agree that the subject is not relevant here and there are plenty of traps for the unwary.

Certainly the terms for modern sciences have Classical Greek derivations, however that doesn't justify the assumption that these sciences were invented in Ancient Greece, most were not. We should certainly credit the Ionian Greeks with being the first people to rationally examine the human condition and the natural world, however their methods of enquiry were, with rare expections, philosophical not scientific. Science is an invention of 17th century Western Europe.

As to the claim that the 'Greeks invented democracy', modern representive democracy doesn't share much in common with the Athenian variety which was basically an unstable oligarchy by our standards.

I have to say that the current controversy over the name 'Macedonia' is rather amusing to an outsider, considering that the Ancient Greeks regarded the Macedonians as semi-barbarians.

Everyone loves a winner.
Posted by mac, Tuesday, 29 November 2011 3:16:10 PM
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@Mac

Pop quiz.

Do FYROM nationalists speak Greek like Maceodnians did? No. Do they identify with hellenic culture as Macedonians did? no. Do theyself-identify with ancient Greek as ancietn macedonians did? no. Do they have records of ancesostors in the middle ages speaking Greek and referencing ancient Greeks as their ancestors as Greeks do? NoIs FYROM even in the original ancient maceodonia?. Paeonia and Dardinia are not ancient kingdom of Macedonia.

You say you are't going to discuss genetics but that is effectively the entire basis for FYROM's new found "macedonian" identity. Crackpot pseudo-scientific racial mixing arguments because it certainly has nothing to do with historical fact. Using such bizarre logic any country on earth could claim the identity of their neighbour.

Further reading by actual historians (as opposoed to patronizinng bigots who have no clue what they are talking about)
http://macedonia-evidence.org/obama-letter.html

Also a reminder as to what FYROM's own government used to assure everyone about their sacred "Macedonian" identity. You can't even tell history from 10 year ago correctly much less ancient.

"We are Slavs who came to this area in the sixth century ... We are not descendants of the ancient Macedonians" (FYROM's first President, Kiro Gligorov. Foreign Information Service Daily Report, Eastern Europe, Feb 26, 1992)
Posted by Delchev - the Bulgarian, Tuesday, 29 November 2011 6:02:20 PM
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@mac

I find it facinating how the rules of self-identifcation change for FYROM nationalists (and its applogists) when it comes to the self-identification of ancient Macedonians themselves. Why do you hypocritcally deny the right of self-identification to anceint macedonians.... who competed as self-identifying Greek, and were acccepted as Greeks by other Greeks, during ancient Greek only PanHellenic sporting events like the Olympics. (and don't get me started about how the self-identifications rights of Macedonians in maceodnia Greece are trampled on every day by FYROM and its Greek-hating apologists who pretend not to notice FYROM's sudden change of identity into "anceint macedoinans")

"Men of Athens... In truth I would not tell it to you if I did not care so much for all Hellas (Greece); I myself am by ancient descent a Greek, and I would not willingly see Hellas change her freedom for slavery. " 0 Speech of Alexander I of Macedonia upon being admitted to the Greek-only Olympic games as a self-identifying Greek, Herodotus, Histories, 9.45, ed. A. D. Godley
Posted by Delchev - the Bulgarian, Tuesday, 29 November 2011 6:15:51 PM
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Delchev,

You seem to have the idea that I intend to get involved in discussions as to who is or who isn't a 'Macedonian', I don't. I have no knowledge of, or interest in, the subject.

I, and other commenters here, are disputing (1) the author's exaggerated claims in regard to the Greek contribution to Western Civilisation and (2) any special pleading on behalf of the modern Greek state.
Posted by mac, Wednesday, 30 November 2011 6:58:54 AM
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