Is the West hopelessly overwhelmed by “Satanism” as Russian media suggest?
In his recent book The Russian Art of War, which I heartily recommend to all who want to understand why and how Western politicians and media experts have condemned Ukraine to a tragic defeat, author Jacques Baud highlights the distinction between propaganda and disinformation. The former tends to blow out of proportion one’s own advantages, while the latter is outright lies about one’s opponents.
In this regard, I have to say that Russian state media have for many months been engaging in disinformation by spreading the myth of the decline and imminent fall of Western civilization under pressure from the LGBTQ+ movement, by secularism run amok and other aberrant behavior now celebrated as ‘inclusivism’ in many American states and in the most progressive EU countries.
To be sure, the visual demonstrations on Sixty Minutes and Evening with Vladimir Solovyov of the ‘Satanism’ that they say has overtaken the West and is a prelude to its collapse, in the spirit of the sage observation from the past that ‘those whom the Gods would destroy they first make mad,’ these videos are taken from major U.S. and European television channels. Of course, for the most part the reporting was generated in the West by producers who are practicing ‘tabloid’ journalism. Along with stories on UFOs, videos of parades by the morally depraved sell newspapers and improve ratings.
However, for Russian state television it all serves the ongoing Information War in which the Kremlin counters the libelous anti-Putin, anti-Russian narrative emanating from Washington, London and Brussels with its own narrative in which Russia is the defender of traditional values against the Satanists and perverts who now rule in Western countries. Russian television airs special programs on how normal God-fearing Christians living in the West are resettling in Russia to raise their children in a morally healthy environment.
I write to you today from Knokke, a resort on the Belgian seacoast 120 km from Brussels and 20 km from Bruges, the epicenter of foreign tourism in Belgium, where the reality around me in my rented apartment totally overturns all notions of the West’s moral decline and possible fall. Indeed, Vladimir Putin could move here tomorrow and feel totally comfortable with the way traditional values predominate daily life.
This city of 33,000 is probably the wealthiest per capita in Belgium. That is worth noting because the crusade against traditional values is everywhere being waged by elites, not by your ‘man in the street,’ for reasons of political gain through the divide and conquer aspect of identity politics. I say ‘wealthy’ in a qualified sense: when studio apartments sell for half a million and family apartments sell for two or three million euros, the owners are properly speaking ‘millionaires.’ At the same time, they are not billionaires, who are more likely to have their getaway residences on the shores of Lake Como in Italy or in other more prestigious foreign locations. My educated guess is that the folks I see strolling down the digue (literally, ‘dike’ but in fact a very wide sidewalk that borders the beach) in these days before the season starts are successful owners of small businesses, high executives in major corporations and high civil servants, all of whom work for a living. They are Belgians with a small admixture of vacationing Germans, French and visitors from other nearby countries. During the high season, there are a great number of day visitors who come from all levels of Belgian society and whom I will not take into account in what follows.
The overwhelming impression is that Knokke is a family resort. There are a great number of young couples pushing baby carriages with their newly hatched offspring or accompanying toddlers and kindergarten age kids who are taking their first rides on scooters or bikes. But there are also great numbers of retirees who are taking charge of their grandchildren on weekends or holidays while the parents get time off.
There does not appear to be any decline of fecundity in Flanders. Among the adolescents, there are ‘girl power’ threesomes, and the boys are similarly grouped. But at dating age, all I see is heterosexual couples.
I have no doubt that the traditional rule of 10% homosexuals holds true in the populations in Knokke, but as in the past there is no aggressive promotion of alternative life styles here, no ‘in your face’ parades. There are no sex neutral toilets or advertising for sex change operations in the media.
There is a well cared for Catholic church in the midst of the Knokke shopping district. They have an 11.30am Sunday mass, which I may visit later today to do a headcount. But religion is not a big social determinant in a culture that is strongly commercial like the one in Knokke. We have seven day a week shopping, and stores are full on Sunday as well as on other days.
The mood here is ‘la vie en rose’ as the good times roll on for this stratum of the population at least. This good life centers on the innocent pleasures of the table. There are a great many very good restaurants in Knokke and also some restaurants of gastronomic distinction. They all seem to be well patronized. The concentration here is much greater than in Brussels. Then there are also a large number of top quality traiteurs, i.e., caterers, many of whom offer prepared and portioned gourmet food for take-away at half the cost in restaurants.
What else is a beach bordering the cold waters of the English channel good for if not staring out at the sea or at the digue strollers with a mug of beer and some chips or peanuts ready to hand? My grandfather, who came from Lithuania, often repeated that ‘there is no bad beer.’ I don’t quite know what he had in mind, but here in Knokke it remains true that the Belgian beers remain enormously diverse and of exceptional quality. And there are hundreds of people seated each afternoon at cocktail tables in concessions managed by restaurateurs who are quaffing the beers and socializing.
In conclusion, I strongly urge RT or Russian state television to send a crew here to Knokke to see that the end of the world is not nigh in Western Europe. And also to see that Belgian society is not ‘tired of the Ukraine war,’ as the Russian ambassador recently commented to the press. Leaving aside Prime Minister De Croo and his politician buddies, Belgian society is utterly indifferent to the war and focused on its own pleasures and challenges.
©Gilbert Doctorow, 2024