Moralism & Greece

This started as an answer to Mr. Devereaux, but then I got to ranting at cruising speed, & there was then no turning back: You know Admiral Farragut–damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead! He pointed out reasonably that Germans should not be blaming Greeks or Greece, but themselves. I would add, Germany, the EU, & the banks have not acted reasonably or charitably, either. So off I go into the minefield, but not before summing up what might be a confusing essay: Germany, German persons of influence with public opinion, & the various banks, mostly non-German, had cause to know better than they did or do; & they were under no compulsion to do the things that they have done to get into this situation; & they are only angry now out of moralism: They think they’re good people, so they deserve better.

So this then is where we are now: Germans do not wish to pay to bail out Greece. Without apparently unending bailouts, the EU will have to acknowledge a failure, kick Greece out, & show a weakness that might prove fatal. Germans must now choose between a debt-default which would cost EU-based banks dearly & the first EU & Euro failure, which would cost EU politicians dearly. It’s their own damned fault or at least it’s their own doing.
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First, let’s do a bit of basic psychology. You see a wino staring in the store-window, gazing lovingly at the liquid courage, you do not start throwing money at him. You invite a wino into your home, you do not invite him to take the occasion to start making love to all your bottles.

& yet this is what the EU has done. Greece could not force the EU to get into the EU or into the Euro. & it could not use fraud to get in either, being that the EU or the individual countries had all the knowledge they could possible desire. Without force or fraud, it was done with consent. All the lies told on all sides were consented to. & then the terrible debt came. Greeks did not steal that money. It was given them by institutions that boast of their knowledge. They don’t know that Greece has defaulted on all its debts, repeatedly, in the last two centuries?

These days, we do not say a man is a slave to a passion & is therefore not all that human. We use euphemisms: Addiction, enabling behavior, co-dependant relationships. Gambling, getting drunk, whatever else–these days we pretend we have the knowledge to prevent or cure these things. We believe secretly or not so secretly that knowledge is power–that we can get what we know to be good by science. Why cannot we face the ugly truth?

One good reason is this: We’re often carelessly evil. Look at the all right-wing types showing off callousness or cruelty in the case of Greece. It’s not their job to help out, admittedly, so they cannot be faulted for not making things better. But there is something sick in taking pleasure in humiliating people who are suffering things most of the critics cannot imagine. There is a kind of small, mean evil in humiliating people who are not only suffering, but really confused & desperate about what’s going on…

People who know anything about people should be concerned about a generation of Greeks growing up facing bankruptcy & unemployment at home, humiliation abroad, & no hope for a livable life or anything better in the future… Moralism, of course, is not going to fix the institutions or the psychology in Greece. Maybe nothing will. But moralism reveals a dangerous thoughtlessness & carelessness. The EU types who want to hold Greece accountable only really want to make sure they themselves are not held accountable. If these politicians & pundits think Greece was irresponsible with EU monies, weren’t they far more irresponsible & first?

There is a pleasure in seeing people suffering, if you think they had it coming. Do we take pleasure, though, in seeing a wino drink himself to death? He had it coming! He did it to himself! He’s not a moral person like I am–in my morality I have power over myself & the universe! This is the uglier side of moralism. Moralism is not wisdom. Our horse sense tells us, if moralism does not get in the way, that you should not give drunkards more drink. That morality–self-control, to be brief–does not apply to them. That in losing their self-control, they cannot be trusted. What they do & what they say vary wildly. Even kids know this.
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Secondly, let’s look at the political facts & speeches. Many of us on the right look at the Germans & the Greeks & blame the latter. Much is wrong with this.
1. The political psychology is basic: There is a moralistic assumption that good habits lead to good things–that is sometimes true, but not always. & who knows how to get good habits?
2. Then there is the history: It amuses me to remember that Germany raped Greece & America, after destroying Hitler’s power, rewarded Germany beyond anything imaginable, while doing next to nothing for Greece, at least comparatively.. Surely, Greeks know that there is almost no justice in the affairs of men…
3. Then the latter-day foreign policy of silly governments & the sillier banks they want to protect: Banks in various European countries were happy to lend money to people in a state that showed no signs of fiscal sanity. They lent the money; they collected payments on it. They had no care for the people there or the state or how many times Greece had previously defaulted. There is no law in such things, there is only what happens. People who lent money without reason are foolish to complain that the money was taken without reason… The money was lent out of love of money–but it turns out people who do that are also moralistic, not practical & prudent about what they do with money…
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Thirdly, there is the matter of how to think about this problem prudently. Prudence is not the same as justice. Prudence is oriented toward the common good. What then is the community? Is it Greece or the EU? If the former, then the question is, what kinds of institutional changes are required to give people the reassurance that they are sacrificing for a good reason? This is when the personal is the political: Massive political change in a time of crisis does not often happen without a man broadly trusted by his people. If the latter, then the EU needs a mechanism to supervise political changes that cannot be made in the short term. Either way, the debt has to be erased, on whatever conditions seem likely to be enforced & likely to deal with the problem now called moral hazard. That is the opposite of the moralism we see so often. It does not do justice to the banks; perhaps they can get their money back starting in the next generation. But it is what is good & necesary. No one says there is any way for these debts to be paid; that is, no way but a harsh tyranny… It is time to learn that prudence is the opposite of moralism.

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8 Responses to Moralism & Greece

  1. DevereauxDevereaux says:

    I am reminded from what you write of the biblical story of the king who forgets the debt of one of his advisors, who then deals harshly with one of HIS servants who owe him a far lesser sum. So it is with America and Germany.

    But understand. There has long been a snobbery – by the Western Europeans especially – of the Balkans. Greece is included. Look at the Austrian treatment of the Serbs and you see just how this was demonstrated. After WWI the French particularly extracted war debt that Serbia, now Yugoslavia, incurred while it protected its territory. This was taken as bauxite from mines in Serbia. BUT the ore had significant amounts of gold in the bauxite, none of which went against the debt incurred.

    So theft by European states is a long and well established pattern. America didn’t do itself or others much good when it bowed to Russia and Stalin, mostly just because. But as you note, once again the Balkans got the short shrift.

    So long as Germany is full of mostly unrepentant Nazis who hide in different clothes (fascism is more a way of life for them I believe) there is no solution to Greece. Germany is too arrogant to understand the magnitude of her mistake and too stubborn to admit to it either. You can call it moralism or what have you, but this is what it boils down to.

    So Greece will continue to bump along along the bottom while the German boot is kept on her neck. Such is life.

    • titus says:

      I know a bit about Europe. I do not believe snob is the right word. Perhaps there is no great difference between the European powers in the West & those in the East. Perhaps they do not act unlike America in Canada & Mexico. I suppose the similarities are far more obvious if you recall America’s Asian territories. Such is empire. It is a kind of power.
      As for the way Stalin & the Soviets were treated by American foreign policy, there is much to dislike, but there is also more than a little sense. There is, however, no justice.
      The Balkans had it easy compared to the Eastern lands where the fighting was hell. Most Americans cannot understand at all what it means for populations to disappear. For tens of millions of people to disappear. That is an Asian fact. The world wars were really European wars & rediscovered that fact.
      I do not believe Germans to be fascists in any meaningful sense. I’ve lived a few years in Berlin; I did not come to think of Germans as in any way connected to a past where military manliness meant something or was supposed to mean something.
      But there is a real problem with how Germany thinks of the EU. I expect that it will soon become obvious how difficult it is to keep the EU together. Whether the Germans will make a serious decision I do not know. I believe, no.

      The point about moralism is that the people who think they’re clever & they know how to get what they want react to ugly surprises as though they were injured & must extract a price, a revenge. There is a lack of self-awareness in moralism that makes thinking next to impossible… Lots of people really did & do react to the Greek crisis in the way I have suggested, not least in America. That moralism is the ugly truth behind all the Greek money jokes of recent vintage.

      Of course, this reminds me of the most moralistic moment in American history, so far as money is concerned–faced with the difficulties of England & France to repay their war debt, your president Coolidge is supposed to have said: Well, they hired the money, didn’t they?

  2. DevereauxDevereaux says:

    If you do not believe snob is the correct term, then put up another. I for one find Germany in particular to be extremely arrogant. They have always been that way, and nothing seems to have changed that attitude.

    As for being unrepentent Nazis, no, they don’t have quite the martial spirit of the Wehrmach, but that was more show than reality. What the Germans had and have is nationalistic socialism. I define that as fascism. It was the core of Hitler’s agenda. AND like all socialists, he evolved into a tyrant. So go all socialists, given enough time.

    I am not sure of your reference to “eastern suffering”. Serbs lost >10% of their total population during WWII – and they were allegedly OCCUPIED. ?What are you using for comparison. ?Are we talking WWI or WWII.

    • titus says:

      I’m not sure how to answer you here–I’m not sure quite what you’re saying: Living in Germany, you’ve found this about Germans? The way they treated you or someone else? I lived in Berlin for three or four years. Germans seemed somewhat ok, not preternaturally deformed by something like being snobs.
      Arrogance–I think you’re getting close to what I call moralism, the sense that one deserves what one wants or what one thinks good–is somewhat plausible, but I’d appreciate it if you talked at more length about your experience.
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      The Wehrmacht really was all that martial. I really don’t understand you here. Was there any better army they faced? I’d say the Japanese were even more savage & far more suicidal, but I’m not sure they were more efficient in battle in terms of kills & deaths.
      Germany today is not tyrannical in any meaningful sense & I am not sure I could point out anything really nationalistic. What do you have in mind? I know their immigration & citizenship laws really show no love of foreigners, but to an extent that’s ok. But I am not aware of anything that’s really nationalistic. As for socialism, here you’re on firmer ground, I think, but I would not overdo it: If Germany wanted or tended somehow to get to socialist tyranny, it would have happened in the last 50 or 60 years…
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      Finally, the point about what happened in the East. Whole regions were depopulated; populations were deported; & there were peoples caught in-between Nazi & Soviet extermination.
      Do you know Mr. Snyder’s book on the matter, Bloodlands? That’s a pretty good academic account, I am told.

  3. DevereauxDevereaux says:

    The Wehrmach was great fighting unprepared militaries. They suddenly got their butts handed to them by both the Americans and the Russians – when the latter finally figured out that the Nazis would just kill them so surrendering wasn’t much of an option. Their behavior towards western enemies was somewhat better, but overall they fought mechanically but without inspiration. If you are partial to a robotic military, you would like the Germans. They are like that today, too.

    That, of course, doesn’t mean they won’t or can’t kill you. But they weren’t really GREAT warriors. They didn’t innovate as they fought. They didn’t invent ways to win; instead they relied upon the organization to achieve their success. If you do it well, you will be rewarded with a victory. Yet they weren’t. And a lot of that was because the Americans in particular fought with a disdain for theory, or other “accepted” military maneuvers. And that was the Army. The Marines are even more self-propelled, so to speak.

    My other experience with Germans is less intense than yours. I recollect being in Europe and traveling across from Paris to Vienna via train. We had this nice old lady get on, and her son was helping her get her stuff in the section we were sitting. Some German lady next to me snorted and then said, “Bugarka” in a most condescending manner. I have been in German on deployments and found them to again be rather cold fish. They are not as purely arrogant as the Parisian but they have a totally different attitude. Like you just don’t count. I have had bible study with a German couple for a few years, until they left in a huff because several of us made jokes about Obama. Since then I have had exchanges with him on Facebook. Any of my friends who have engaged him universally respond to me, “?Who is this ass friend of yours.”. He is haughty, completely convinced in his righteousness and unwilling to accept anything else. He proposed the usual socialist rubbish while not recognizing that he LEFT Germany because he couldn’t get a job there – and ended up here. His wife in an unguarded moment said their move here was the best thing they ever did (they lived in South Africa for a number of years). He vehemently defends the actions of the guards at the various death camps.

    ?Enough.

    • titus says:

      Wow, a guy who actually defends Nazi extermination camps? In a Bible study? That’s really unpleasant stuff–I’m sure hes not the only guy like that–there are neo-Nazis in Berlin. Then again, whenever they marched, the police had to protect them from the far larger anti-Nazi, vaguely-commie marchers.
      I think you have a point about a kind of arrogance & dismissive attitude to strangers, which has some racial elements–you also have a point that it’s not how French people are arrogant on account of France’s past brilliance.
      But I do not think that’s enough to describe a people or the country’s politics.
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      As for the German army, your objection has at least some plausibility, but I am not sure how I can reconcile it with the talented generals. What do you think of Kesselring’s defense of Italy, for example?
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      I think the Ukraine might just be the part that went through the worst, going through hell twice in a bit more than a dozen years. Stalin also deported populations under cover of war. Millions of people. There was this sense, for those at least who paid attention to the coming of the war, that entire countries & peoples were surrounded by a coming chaos. No hope & little humanity left.

    • DevereauxDevereaux says:

      Germany had a professional general staff. Hitler, to our benefit, often disregarded their advise. They understood the tradecraft involved in making war. One cannot take that away from them.

      OTOH, they remind me of all the accoladed placed upon Gen Robt E. Lee. Lee, like the German general staff, was blessed with incompetent opponents – until he ran into Grant. Let us remember Ike was some transport or supply general at the outsed of WWII. He never particularly distinguished himself during the war outside of throwing his best general (Patton) under the bus. Bradley was likewise a paper pusher – a REMF. Note the Germans were CONSTANTLY worried where was Patton. MacArthur was the only general who understood air, land, and sea. He proved it in the Pacific, always a “second child” to the effort in Europe per FDR’s direction. He also proved it with the Inchom landing. And his desire to take on the Chinese in Korea. Just as Patton recognized the Soviets as the remaining existential threat in the Eastern Theatre.

      The Germans had a profound advantage with their MG42. It was by far the finest machinegun anywhere. But they backed that up with an ancient rifle, put together (in the early war) in a quality form but more suitable for hunting than military action. The Garand, OTOH, may have been THE greatest WWII invention. While Germans developed their squad and platoon tactics around the MG 42, the Garand kind of made every rifle man a bit of a machinegun. Granted only 8 rounds, but that was WAY more fire than the Germans could muster across the front.

      From a POV of “attitude” (since we cannot seem to find a word to describe their geshtalt) the Germans showed themselves in a big way in their invasion of Russia. Initally the Russian Army surrendered in herds. NO ONE liked Stalin OR his methods. But then the Germans started wholesale slaughter of prisoners. And the Russian attitude changed. Stalin, no fool, started exhorting people “in the name of ‘Mother Russia'” and opening the churches! The Russians rallied, but the Germans were already halfway across the nation. Stalin’s other saving grace was that his factories were on the other side of the Urals, so he kept making war materiel.

      But look at the battle of Kursk, the biggest tank fight in history and probably the turning point in WWII. The Russians simply outgeneraled and outfought the Germans. Didn’t help the Germans had spent a nasty winter there, but that, too, is part of generalship. You can argue that the Russians simply brought overwhelming numbers against the Germans, but then recollect Nathan Bedford Forest’s comment – “Be there the fustest with the mostest.”

  4. DevereauxDevereaux says:

    As for your point about the depopulation of regions of the east, in WWII there were lots of casualties. But Stalin killed off more Russians than the Germans ever did. If that’s what you mean, I agree. Ukraine suffered under the USSR hugely. The famines were plotted, not just happening.