The 5 ways civilizations collapseI watched a great video about the collapse of civilizations and I'd like to comment on it, with a bit more of a focus on the economic reasons and outcomes.
1- Crushed in a war by a far stronger force
Destroyed, or elite destroyed (government & big banks & business owners)
Aztec Inca Baghdad Carthage...
Modern examples include Iraq and Libya. Just look at before and after pictures. Libya was destroyed by the USA and has returned to slavery, Iraq is some sort of warzone with a currency being literally sold as a ponzi scheme (search the Iraqi Dinar scam), he by the way the "it will go up" Dinar crashed so hard a few months ago I wasn't sure if it was worth posting about.
PRO TIP: DO NOT INVEST IN A COUNTRY THE USA ARE ABOUT TO "BRING DEMOCRACY" TO!
2- Too aristocratic
Central American, Andean, Greek, Anatolian, Syrian, Ghana, Zimbabwe, Indus Valley, Khmer civilizations ended in big part because they were too inegalitarian.
(Very) ancient civilizations were all ultra aristocratic with the population getting vampirized by a minority through slavery (wageslavery), ravenous taxes (reminds me of something), human sacrifices. And they went down the same way.
In ~1150 BC all civilizations around the anatolian peninsula (including the famous Mycenaean one in Greece) rapidly collapsed at around the same time.
In some cases tiny barbarian armies were able to wipe out much stronger civilizations. The reason is the population hated their parasitic rulers and did not want to pay heavy taxes for their rulers to waste (ancient elites did not know well how to manipulate a population into submission and even WANTING higher taxes, also people used to have more common sense)
The world entering the iron age meant the plebes could easily get armed, and an unfair government with crushing taxes would simply get killed (like in France in 1789). I wonder why today governments are trying so hard to disarm the population? Probably just a coincidence.
Ancient Egypt near the end had taxes that could get as high as 60%. Huh with 25% corporate taxes plus 20% VAT plus 15% social contributions plus 10-50% income tax plus other taxes we're easily reaching that Egypt max and even going past it.
We do not have that much evidence of bronze age nations, but more recently we know that the American and French revolutions started as tax revolts against unfair privileged governments. Everyone knows this, it's clear, precise, not my opinion, unlike the subjective list Davos made on how civilizations end (link at the bottom of this article).
Inequality also allowed some ruling class to replace the previous one, like with the Caliphates for example.
The population was keen for a change of government.
These bronze nations with crushing taxes I mentioned could never grow very big and collapsed with the iron age (bronze weapons and armors were expensive and slow to make but not iron which allowed the peasants to get armed and not submit). Following their collapse large empires rose, such as the Roman and Persian mega-empires (at its height, 50% of the world population lived in the Persian empire, talk about a beast). Rome only had a 1% wealth tax from what I've read and did not over-rely on slaves. Rome lasted 1000 years and ended because of decadence. Obviously treating the population fairly (mostly with reasonable taxes, that's really all they care about), rather than a population that hates the rulers and would see foreign invaders as saviors, is what allowed these empires to grow and maintain their size.
Modern governments tricked the workers into thinking "only the rich pay" and playing this childish "divide to conquer" tactic, but everyone pays, and people over time slowly figure it out. Some extremely ignorant and stupid members of the population support 90% taxes. Never seen in history. Cool so a company hiring workers will have to charge $10,000 for them, pay $9000, and there's $1000 left as wage minus the owner margin with life being way more expensive (hiring a $2000 wage plumber would cost $20,000). In inflation adjusted terms if basic workers still get charged $3000, rather than getting a wage of $1500 they'll get 10% so $300, minus the boss margin. Brilliant! So they would be totally reliant on welfare. And what? Even more mad at companies that pay them a misery wage? And ask for even higher taxes? Lol how are they falling for this?
This explains why western government are doing everything to prevent people becoming their own boss, or they'd see it first hand.
3- Becoming too conservative
After the great plague this happened:
- MENA became ultra conservative, with Sharia law, and looking for the "return to the golden age". Still to this day they are primitive and ultra conservative. Iran had a ray of light of progress with the shah 50-60 years ago but it was short lived, the medieval backwards religious leaders quickly took over and imposed their rule of darkness.
- India well... They were 40% or more of world GDP before, and they dropped to some unbelievable low number like 1%. They roll themselves in cow dung and bathe in the radioactive Ganga river. And open defecate. The Maharaja and silk road traders would never believe this future. It's beyond, I'd cry if I was indian.
- China: I think most of the great wall was built by the Ming dynasty (1368–1644), or rebuild. They got into isolationist policies, got bureaucratic, corrupt and superstitious and stagnated at best.
- West Africa: At the hand of slavers with primitive superstitions I guess. China still has their bureaucrats. Maybe that's why Africa is so poor, they whole civilizations were centered around slavers, and now they can't do that, meanwhile China is still allowed to have its bureaucrats (some of it works for them it's too much that is bad).
- Russia: Became the third Rome. Went from an area of maybe 1-2 million square kilometer in east Europe and half of France population to this monster of 20 million square km and 3+ times France pop.
- West Europe: Age of Enlightenment, progress and so on. Unlike others that had an unfair ruling class (Brahmins/Priests in India, Slavers in Sahel, Bureaucrats in China, Samurais in Japan, etc), the West had a balance between the monarchy, merchants, warriors and priests. Wealth equality was way greater back then that it is today. Yes the industrial revolution was a big factor.
The conservative "civilizations" like China had contempt for the West, and saw them as irrelevant weirdoes. And then they went through centuries of humiliations and conquests by the West. To this day the (declining) West still makes 50% of world GDP.
A funny example is India in 1000 AD during the muslim domination. The superstitious ruling priests in the face of muslim invasions rather than use taxpayer money to build armies, built... temples... are you serious? Well it did not work.
Before that at the start of the iron age the old bible civs (Babylon, Assyrians...) that were ruled by corrupt and superstitious priests were wiped out by the mighty Persian empire, and Persians were so nice that people actually wanted to live there the priests had no chance of rallying the population and start a rebellion. As I explained in 2-.
Bruh: "Darius allegedly asked his satraps whether the tribute was not too high. When they said it was moderate, Darius ordered that they should pay only half as much.". Another version says he took taxes and returned half of it "back to the people" (tax returns?). The empire was at its greatest extent under his rule which was in the early days of it. He divided taxes by 2 and everyone wanted to join. You don't always need huge armies.
Unlike the modern west, Persia DID NOT PROVIDE AN "US VERSUS THEM" STORY. Can you imagine? A huge empire, and no divide. People actually enjoyed living there. No divide to conquer.
www.oxfordhandbooks.com
4- Becoming too reformist
The flip side of the conservative coin. Look at China with the cultural revolution. They went from what maybe 15% of world GDP to 1%, and they were the poorest country in the world.
Russia in the early 1900s was a big empire, the 4rth world economy (smallest than Canada today) and if their population bred like non communist countries (UK, France, Germany), they'd have a population of at least a quarter of a million, they'd probably be nearly as powerful as the United States.
The marxist reformists hurt Russia so much it's nauseating. They set them back at least a century. Yes there was technological and standard of living progress but of course there was! Even in Somalia. It's worldwide. It's like a super strong uptrend but within that worldwide uptrend they lagged behind.
The reformists have no moral boundaries and work to totally destroy the "old world" to reach their idiotic utopia.
These disgusting creatures are an absolute plague to humanity and set civilizations back centuries.
They love to destroy statues, change constitutions, send people to camps, burn books etc.
Hitler said about Christianity as "We have no sort of use for a fairy story invented by the Jews" and criticized its weakness compared to glorious islam, Catholics were sent to camps (especially Jehovah Witnesses) and moral standards went poof. Germany lost 1/3 of its territory, 15 million Germans were deported, West Europe stopped ruling the world, the USD became the reserve currency, and so on.
Communists are so evil and stupid they dried up the Aral Sea for their "great" irrigation projects, and destroyed entire forests.
The Aral Sea was one of history greatest environmental tragedies. The region economy was devastated, bringing unemployment and hardship, the sea life is gone probably millions of species went extinct, the region is a pollution disaster. And some extremely dumb celebrities (pleonasm) think communism is the solution to save the climate.
"There is so little confidence in Russia's economy that there are more Rubbles outside of it than inside" damn. How long for the confidence to come back? 100 years? more?
The Soviet Union (I quote):
- Destroyed every functioning social system in Russia in order to usher in their glorious revolution and utopia
- Artists were totally controlled
- The Church was wiped out
- The most productive and hardworking members of the population were killed
- The ruling class enslaved people in gulags
- Standards of living were lowered for faster industrialization and make it look like progress, like it was working
- Non Governmental organisations and clubbed were banned
- Labor Unions were banned (the irony)
- People that were 1 minute late to work were eliminated by the secret police, or people feared that was the case
- Makes me want to vomit
Societies are held together by structures such as religion, family, patriotism. The state is not intelligent enough to control and run everything.
The state tries to run the economy it's a catastrophe. The state tries to run a pandemic OH MY GOD. Anything they do is shit and vomit.
I'd say the state is not intelligent enough to not forget to breathe. Oxygen thieves.
The French revolution resulted in The declaration of human rights which says the government must be held responsible via violence if necessary, revolt is not a right but a duty. The Americans that wrote their Bill of Rights literally 6 months later have a similar thing with their amendments or something. Of course these sickening evil creatures that are not Politicians but demagogues with 0 convictions that only care about personal success and power and getting votes have used manipulation and brainwashing to get away with everything, cause great harm, and not get held responsible.
"Extreme reformers aren't smart enough to realize how dumb they are, thinking themselves geniuses (😆) and everything that's not under their control is an evil force that gets in the way of the great plan"
Today the west is obviously at risk. How big is this risk? I can't tell because this would get me mass reported and banned, and maybe even sent to jail. (That answers the question). I cri evertiem.
5- Decadence
Maybe the slowest way to end. How Rome ended but it was accelerated with decadence bringing in destroying armies (1-).
The 3 natural stages: Barbarism, Civilization, Decadence.
Greeks near the end (obviously) saw themselves as "above" earthly matters, and used slaves for work while they enjoyed themselves in "higher" ways.
In other words they were lazy bums that felt morally superior and selfish greedy perverts that took it easy. Disconnected from the real world.
A bit like modern westerners with robots and not wanting to work, and importing much of what they consume. And disconnected from reality, terrified of dying at 80, willing to ban hunting, and much more.
We see low birth rates (there are Roman and Greek texts complaining about this, and blaming the nobles for "having fun" rather than procreate, for "being eager to see their bloodline die").
We see low (or no) economic growth.
We see sexual perversions.
And so on, you get the picture.
An example is when germanic barbarians invaded roman south france (gaul), the local aristocracy claimed there was no danger, barbarian terrorists that cut heads off with massive axes were a tiny number of "lunatics" nothing to worry about and those that wanted to protect the region were far right islamophobes wups I mean germanophobes. The aristocracy smelled their own farts and were stuck inside their own heads and thought it was impossible for these third world barbarians to hurt in anyway their region. Morons. What options do the population have when the ruling class is useless? It's like cutting a serpent's head. Combine being useless to outlawing weapons and spreading propaganda to make sure "radicals" never gain power and you get an inevitable collapse.
So to conclude, you have all these ways for societies to collapse, once great civilizations vanish.
And today:
Point 4 => Who will seriously invest in Russia? So much for marxist progress.
Point 1 => Who will buy Iraqi Dinars or invest in Libya other than fools?
Point 3 => Who will invest in Iran? Who wants to invest in Afghanistan?
Point 2 => Who wants to invest in old Babylon and Egypt. Ye there are no recent examples.
Point 5 => Who wants to invest in the Nikkei 225 since 1990?
But there is 1 thing that survives all these collapses, that keeps its value: It's yellow and shiny 😉
The world economic forum made their own list of reasons definitely not biased, here is a link for a good laugh:
www.weforum.org
