Why Non-Westerners Hate Westerners

Why the Rest Hates the West

Ever wonder why non-Westerners seem to hate Westerners? C.S. Doemner quotes from Meic Pearse’s new book: Why the Rest Hates the West: Understanding the Roots of Global Rage.

To generalize a global phenomenon: Westerners are increased perceived by non-Westerners as “rich, technologically sophisticated, economically and politically dominant, morally contemptible barbarians.” Westerners are viewed as barbarians for several reasons:
(1) they do not revere their ancestors and traditional way of life;
(2) they express condescension toward religion;
(3) they advocate a culture obsessed with the ephemeral and commercial;
(4) they exhibit sexual shamelessness and promiscuity;
(5) they devalue the family; and
(6) they exchange a sense of honor for freedom from responsibility.

Western nations are rich and powerful and have deviated from traditional morality. As western nations, especially the USA, promote and push their values (or “anti-values” as they are perceived), non-Westerners become understandably resentful and anti-Western.

Things get much more complicated than this, but that’s the nutshell of it. In the end Pearse looks to the Christian faith, in cooperation with other faiths, as a source of reintroducing morality, honor, and duty into Western cultures. Skepticism of nonbelievers might only prove his point. People of faith would certainly agree with him.

The big question that remains is: Could this reintroduction really happen? What would it take?

What do you think?