Do you consider Central/South America part of the west? If not, you might be a racist

[Seaside]

If that's your definition of "west" then fine, but that's not the traditional definition of west. I think you're confusing "west" with first world (USA and allies, including Japan), second world (USSR and allies, including China), third world (non-alligned states during hte cold war).

This is huntington's definition of "civilizations," largely based around the cultural history of the population, religion, and maybe race. There is some flexibility in it and some exceptions (he lists Israel, Japan, Haiti, the anglophone carribean, and Ethiopia as their own "mini-civilizations"). But the biggies are west, orthodox (think eastern europe), Islamic, Sinic (think China and some of its neighboring countries), Buddhist (which he argues is small and not that important), Hindu, African, Latin American as the big ones, with the anglophone carribean (think Jamaica and hte like), Japan, Ethiopia, Israel, and Haiti as being unique enough that they could be categorized as unique or in various civilizations. I have my own personal issues with some nations and their classifications (I think the pacific nations should be their own thing), but I think generally they fit relatively similar cultural models, though I don't subscribe to the idea that cultures are inevitably set to fight each other.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clash_of_Civilizations#/media/File:Clash_of_Civilizations_mapn2.png

Latin America is its own thing IMO, but it's got its hisotrical links to the west. I'd

He got it perfect in my opinion.

I also like this that someone did. I think they colored israel dark blue for western but it is not.

But you always got people wanting to claim west. I just search on internet and found someone on quora swearing brazil is ´western´. Even though nobody thinks so.

 

[Rod1]

Every south american immigrant I've met (in Sweden) has been a goddamn commie. And there's nothing I've heard about South American politics that would make me think of them as anything but predominantly Second World or at least closer to it than the First World. I know the terms don't apply today, but to me the West are the countries that historically opposed the Soviet bloc.

You clearly dont understand what the second world is and where communism was invented.

I would say that the definition would only apply in a limited way, the cultural and moneyed elites would apply but the downtrodded wouldnt.

 

[VivaRevolution]

Italy is in the eastern hemisphere. And the word west or western civilization was mostly made about America or western europe I think. Most American's originated from western Europe. America developed it's own distinct culture that gave it the word western or allowed for it to be added to "western civilization". At least that's how I've always perceived it.

So hemisphere is North/south. Not sure how North/South has anything to do with the West.

What is it about Latin American culture do you think separates them from the cultural identity of the west?

 

[ironfist05]

He got it perfect in my opinion.

I also like this that someone did. I think they colored israel dark blue for western but it is not.

But you always got people wanting to claim west. I just search on internet and found someone on quora swearing brazil is ´western´. Even though nobody thinks so.

I have issue with the reasons as to why he brought up the divisions to begin with (Huntington argued that, post cold war, political ideology stopped becoming the defining factor of conflict and now it is instead "civilizations" (cultural units which he predicts will tend to act as rough, informal political alliances in the future as civilizations inevitably clash over whose morals and ideals should become the determinants of the world order), and I think there isn't enough nuance in some of these divisions (Papua, for instance, is clearly it's own thing, not sure I'd say the PHilippines are "western," the Islamic and Buddhist worlds are far too broad) but overall, yeah, gun to my head, if I had to divide up the world along vague cultural lines, I think that's a decent outline of vague cultural overlap zones.

There are other variants of hte map customized to each persons ideas of the world. I agree that Brazil as western is a bit of a stretch, but I could see Argentina or Chile or Uruguay.

 

[VivaRevolution]

He got it perfect in my opinion.

I also like this that someone did. I think they colored israel dark blue for western but it is not.

But you always got people wanting to claim west. I just search on internet and found someone on quora swearing brazil is ´western´. Even though nobody thinks so.

By what measure would you claim Australia is Western, but not Brazil? I mean they speak Portuguese. Outside of their poverty rates, they are a first world economy.

 

[ironfist05]

By what measure would you claim Australia is Western, but not Brazil? I mean they speak Portuguese. Outside of their poverty rates, they are a first world economy.

the economy isn't really relevant to "culture." By all accounts, Saudi Arabia's economy is as developed as most of those in the "west." Bhutan's GDP per capita (PPP adjusted) is around the same place as Ukraine's and El Salvador's. Their all radically different countries though. Culture, religion, history, and race have as much to do with it as economics. There's nothing inherently wrong with not being western, but it's a little simplistic to say "well they're all at the same level of income on average, so clearly they're all pretty culturally similar."

 

[VivaRevolution]

If you have two eyes and can see the clear differences between the races, then you might be racist.

Thanks.

I can see the difference between a Appalachian welfare queen, and Florida welfare queen as well, doesn't mean they aren't Americans.

 

[Rod1]

Spain was never colonized as far as I know, and it doesn't have a particularly big indigenous american population or african population. AT least not to my knowledge. Let's put it this way, there's definitely overlap (catholocism and language being the biggest two), but post independence, they've had paths which have diverged too much that they can be considered culturally similar (at least in my eyes). That's why it's part of the west to me.

To me htat's like asking, why aren't greeks and turks in the same group? the turks ruled over the greeks for centuries and left their imprints on each others cultures. It boils down to how they developed after they split, as well as cultural elements which were always different to begin with.

also, classifying Latin America as wholly democratic isn't really accurate IMO. Certainly not from a historical perspective at least.

1.- Turks and Greeks diverge in religion and language, which tend to be overall what makes people's diverge the most.

2.- From an historical perspective? how old do you think democracy is and how naturally do you think it flourished?

 

[VivaRevolution]

the economy isn't really relevant to "culture." By all accounts, Saudi Arabia's economy is as developed as most of those in the "west." Bhutan's GDP per capita (PPP adjusted) is around the same place as Ukraine's and El Salvador's. Their all radically different countries though. Culture, religion, history, and race have as much to do with it as economics. There's nothing inherently wrong with not being western, but it's a little simplistic to say "well they're all at the same level of income on average, so clearly they're all pretty culturally similar."

I agree it isn't economic success that defines the west. I also don't think it is really geographical either.

But if Spain is apart of the west. If Portuguese is spoken in Europe, then by what measure is Latin America not Western?

 

[Seaside]

Are you arguing that central and south America have some Native American influence, that makes them culturally apart from Spain?

If so, what are those differences that you think separates them?

If not Native American, then who?

I dont really consider spain western compared to usa, canada, scandinavia, germany, western europe. Spain has decent size regions with separtist ultra nationalist movements. It being considered western under Franco also would not have made sense seeing how it was opposite of what the liberal rest of west was doing. But since franco passed it has moved slowly but to EU standard mostly through federal policy.

I have issue with the reasons as to why he brought up the divisions to begin with (Huntington argued that, post cold war, political ideology stopped becoming the defining factor of conflict and now it is instead "civilizations" (cultural units which he predicts will tend to act as rough, informal political alliances in the future as civilizations inevitably clash over whose morals and ideals should become the determinants of the world order), and I think there isn't enough nuance in some of these divisions (Papua, for instance, is clearly it's own thing, not sure I'd say the PHilippines are "western," the Islamic and Buddhist worlds are far too broad) but overall, yeah, gun to my head, if I had to divide up the world along vague cultural lines, I think that's a decent outline of vague cultural overlap zones.

There are other variants of hte map customized to each persons ideas of the world. I agree that Brazil as western is a bit of a stretch, but I could see Argentina or Chile or Uruguay.

I think he is was correct. In US and western europe the split seem between people arguing culturally against either wanting transsexual, gay etc agenda and open borders to not wanting it and preserve of nation homogenity, demographics whatever. There also in Russia is resurgance of people want more religion in life and return to traditional values. Yeah he maybe forgot the pacific and papua new guinea but those are irrelevant areas. His map has only changed little in my opinion. That new map that showed Iran, azerbaijan as different from islamic world is correct in my opinion and so was turkey at 1 point. Also separating philippines is correct away from west and papua new guinea should be separated from west too. I also think tajikistan, kyrgzstan wont fall into the islamic track and neither will uzbekistan or turkmen if the current leadership and there allies continue to stay in power and prevent militant islam from entering borders and continue to stick to secular education and deempahsis religion. Of the stans of soviet though kazakh, kyrg, tajik are least likely to fall to that my opinion.

By what measure would you claim Australia is Western, but not Brazil? I mean they speak Portuguese. Outside of their poverty rates, they are a first world economy.

liberal, cultural marxist values or whatever people in hear call it. I just see significant split and if you knew direction of brazilian politics today it is 180 from australia, canada or likes of france etc. And yes i know france has Le pen and those types but they dont hold power and the majority the society against them. yeah brazil has gay marriage what not but that was not done by majority that was done by leftist court under socialist president and forced through.

 

[Rod1]

the economy isn't really relevant to "culture." By all accounts, Saudi Arabia's economy is as developed as most of those in the "west." Bhutan's GDP per capita (PPP adjusted) is around the same place as Ukraine's and El Salvador's. Their all radically different countries though. Culture, religion, history, and race have as much to do with it as economics. There's nothing inherently wrong with not being western, but it's a little simplistic to say "well they're all at the same level of income on average, so clearly they're all pretty culturally similar."

I agree, latin American countries tend to be wildly diverse, but the core of what these countries are tend to be pretty much the same.

 

[ironfist05]

1.- Turks and Greeks diverge in religion and language, which tend to be overall what makes people's diverge the most.

2.- From an historical perspective? how old do you think democracy is and how naturally do you think it flourished?

1. You're not wrong. But a lot of the west diverges from Latin America in language. And catholocism, while closer to Protestantism than Islam and Orthodox Christianity are to each other, are still different, as are many of the Indigenous faiths you find in Native communities in Latin America. Not only that, but you're missing what is arguably the biggest difference between Latin America and the western world: those who have been colonized and affected by large scale genocides at the hands of the west and the those who did the colonizing. The west was never subjugated (at least not in the last six or seven hundred years) the way the Americas were, nor has the wests recent politics been that much like Latin Americas.

2. Depends on how you define democracy. There have been very selective democracies historically, as well as smaller societies which have managed democracies (or at least something kind of like it) decently. But historically, it's generally been oligarchies, theocracies or autocracies and the like, with the odd exception here or there. I think democracy flourishes best when people have hte least to disagree over, but each society makes its own norms work for themselves. There is no one size fits all.

I'm not saying Latin Americans are inferior to westerners, I'm just saying they've had very different experiences. True, each latin american and western country is different from each other, but if we're trying to cluster nations based on common features, Latin America stands apart from the west by quite a bit.

 

[VivaRevolution]

I dont really consider spain western compared to usa, canada, scandinavia, germany, western europe. Spain has decent size regions with separtist ultra nationalist movements. It being considered western under Franco also would not have made sense seeing how it was opposite of what the liberal rest of west was doing. But since franco passed it has moved slowly but to EU standard mostly through federal policy.


I think he is was correct. In US and western europe the split seem between people arguing culturally against either wanting transsexual, gay etc agenda and open borders to not wanting it and preserve of nation homogenity, demographics whatever. There also in Russia is resurgance of people want more religion in life and return to traditional values. Yeah he maybe forgot the pacific and papua new guinea but those are irrelevant areas. His map has only changed little in my opinion. That new map that showed Iran, azerbaijan as different from islamic world is correct in my opinion and so was turkey at 1 point. Also separating philippines is correct away from west and papua new guinea should be separated from west too. I also think tajikistan, kyrgzstan wont fall into the islamic track and neither will uzbekistan or turkmen if the current leadership and there allies continue to stay in power and prevent militant islam from entering borders and continue to stick to secular education and deempahsis religion. Of the stans of soviet though kazakh, kyrg, tajik are least likely to fall to that my opinion.


liberal, cultural marxist values or whatever people in hear call it. I just see significant split and if you knew direction of brazilian politics today it is 180 from australia, canada or likes of france etc. And yes i know france has Le pen and those types but they dont hold power and the majority the society against them. yeah brazil has gay marriage what not but that was not done by majority that was done by leftist court under socialist president and forced through.

I think anyone who says Spain isn't apart of the west, has a definition of the west based on race. Which by definition would be racist.

Change my mind.

 

[ironfist05]

I agree it isn't economic success that defines the west. I also don't think it is really geographical either.

But if Spain is apart of the west. If Portuguese is spoken in Europe, then by what measure is Latin America not Western?

because language is only one factor, and I pointed out several differences which are more pertinent than just language and religion in my other posts.

 

[ironfist05]

I agree, latin American countries tend to be wildly diverse, but the core of what these countries are tend to be pretty much the same.

I'm not entirely sure I would go to that extent (Chile, Argentina, Haiti, Uruguay are all quite different from say... Mexico), but yes, as a concept, Latin America, as diverse as it is, has more cultural overlap than it does differences. Certailny when compared to other regions. Interestingly, you might be able to slip the Philippines into that definition as well, but that's an entirely different conversation.

 

[VivaRevolution]

because language is only one factor, and I pointed out several differences which are more pertinent than just language and religion in my other posts.

But what you haven't told me is what about Latin American culture sperates them from Spanish culture, or how you could offer a definition of the west that excludes Spain.

 

[Rod1]

1. You're not wrong. But a lot of the west diverges from Latin America in language. And catholocism, while closer to Protestantism than Islam and Orthodox Christianity are to each other, are still different, as are many of the Indigenous faiths you find in Native communities in Latin America. Not only that, but you're missing what is arguably the biggest difference between Latin America and the western world: those who have been colonized and affected by large scale genocides at the hands of the west and the those who did the colonizing. The west was never subjugated (at least not in the last six or seven hundred years) the way the Americas were, nor has the wests recent politics been that much like Latin Americas.

Those who did the colonizing didnt disappeared just because they decided not to pay taxes or loyalty towards the parent country.

Do you think the US as different to Canada because it kicked the British out?

2. Depends on how you define democracy. There have been very selective democracies historically, as well as smaller societies which have managed democracies (or at least something kind of like it) decently. But historically, it's generally been oligarchies, theocracies or autocracies and the like, with the odd exception here or there. I think democracy flourishes best when people have hte least to disagree over, but each society makes its own norms work for themselves. There is no one size fits all.

Yup, and the same applies to a lot of places in Europe, i mean its not like democracies were flourishing in Europe, it took a World War to bring down autocratic governments, the whole iberian peninsula was autocratic.

I'm not saying Latin Americans are inferior to westerners, I'm just saying they've had very different experiences. True, each latin american and western country is different from each other, but if we're trying to cluster nations based on common features, Latin America stands apart from the west by quite a bit.

I dont disagree if you consider "the west" as France, Germany, England and the US.

Once you put Spain in there you cant simply ignore its colonies, at least those that were created as functional viceroyalties.

 

[Rod1]

I'm not entirely sure I would go to that extent (Chile, Argentina, Haiti, Uruguay are all quite different from say... Mexico), but yes, as a concept, Latin America, as diverse as it is, has more cultural overlap than it does differences. Certailny when compared to other regions. Interestingly, you might be able to slip the Philippines into that definition as well, but that's an entirely different conversation.

Colombia, Chile, Argentina, Uruguay and Mexico from the middle-class up, are basically the same people. All hispanic countries are.

Philippines cant be slipped because the Spanish never culturally reset that country, they have their own language, yet you can still find a lot of affinities.

 

[Seaside]

I think anyone who says Spain isn't apart of the west, has a definition of the west based on race. Which by definition would be racist.

Change my mind.

dont care if it racist to you i dont believe in that word or care. because again i dont live or from somewhere people cry over labels like that shit. It could be racial.. You could make argument that original spaniard people were pure mediterrnaeans indistinguishable from levant people and moroccans (excluding other north africans which derive from berbers but today are mistakenly called arabs because of similar brown complected skin and them speaking arabic, but truth is the arabs just spread islam to North africa, mauritania, etc but the people were not killed off out mixed. I think actual most arab peninsula people origins in north africa is in libya. Spain (excluding basque and galicia area) actually had its phenotype and pigment changed by europeans who came from france and colonized, moved, immigrated, invaded etc. The biggest divide can be seen south of madrid latitude.

That was not my argument mine was more on culture and direction spain has gone since Franco though.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iberian_Peninsula

 

[ironfist05]

I think he is was correct. In US and western europe the split seem between people arguing culturally against either wanting transsexual, gay etc agenda and open borders to not wanting it and preserve of nation homogenity, demographics whatever. There also in Russia is resurgance of people want more religion in life and return to traditional values. Yeah he maybe forgot the pacific and papua new guinea but those are irrelevant areas. His map has only changed little in my opinion. That new map that showed Iran, azerbaijan as different from islamic world is correct in my opinion and so was turkey at 1 point. Also separating philippines is correct away from west and papua new guinea should be separated from west too. I also think tajikistan, kyrgzstan wont fall into the islamic track and neither will uzbekistan or turkmen if the current leadership and there allies continue to stay in power and prevent militant islam from entering borders and continue to stick to secular education and deempahsis religion. Of the stans of soviet though kazakh, kyrg, tajik are least likely to fall to that my opinion.

Well, your first point seems to argue against what you're saying. Huntington argued that the western world would stick together pretty much no matter what.

What you're saying is that hte west is falling apart internally. Of course, there's a rising sense of "us versus them" in the west (wether it's conservative or progressive), but that often collapses once geopolitics come into play. I think there's certainly a part of the population that's worried about the homogeneity of their nation (not me, I don't particularly care about it, but a big portion of many countries), but people will give up on cultural ideals become secondary to strategic, political, and economic issues. Let's look at Vietnam: 30 yeras ago, you asked an American what they thought of the Vietnamese, you'd hear a long stream of racial invectives. Now, they're one of America's favorites in the region, and our necessary counter to China, even though their culture is much closer to China's than ours. Hilariously, George Friedman once predicted that by 2032, westerners would be begging for immigrants. Not because they want multicultrialism, but because the aging population demographics would simply mean too many old people and not enough young people to work. If the demographic populations hold up, I think he'll be right. Germans will suddenly find a way to praise the "hardworking Africans" and "moderate Muslims" which will come into their country once they all need somebody to look after them in nursing homes. Swedes will find a love of all the Chinese and Eastern Europeans moving into Sweden. It'll all be water under the bridge. Some will resolutely oppose it no matter what, but most will simply sigh, shrug their shoulders and do what they need to do to make sure their nation moves foward. Let's not forget there are a lot of muslims (particularly those leaving their countries of origin) who aren't particularly big fans of Islamism, and in some cases came from what were once secular countries like Iraq and Syria. That doesn't go away just because ISIS became a thing. You know the most about Central Asia, so I'll defer there, but even then hte US, China and Russia will compete over them for gas pipelines and resources. Wether or not that sees Islamists or secularists stay in power will be a functino fo the superpowers, not domestic politics

To be totally honest, I think Huntington's argument just falls short in that it doesn't really take into account realpolitik or geopolitics. Let's be honest: many of the gulf states are about as far from western civilization as you will find (I'd argue maybe even more so than say... Iran). Yet they are the wests' darlings in the region.

As for his cultural classifications. Yeah, Papua is it's own thing. the PHilippines is closer to Latin America IMO, but cna be it's own thing. Islam is too monolithic (Indonesia, Iran and a few Shia countries, Turkey/Albania/Bosnia can all be their own mini-Islamic variants).