Lileks Looks at Europe
20th April 2012
It’ll probably end poorly. I don’t think there will be civil war in any countries, just weary acquiescence to illiberal forces on one side and ever-constricting forces on the other. An English school considers banning alcohol on campus because 20% of the students are Muslim, that’s the former; the latter is more surveillance, more internet monitoring, carbon audits, and so on. Where the illiberal demands collide with the values of the overclass – say, a Muslim innkeeper refuses service to a gay couple – there will be an assertion of the overclass values and a simultaneous carve-out of regions where it is tacitly assumed those values will not be enforced.
Is there any next at all? Maybe that’s the problem: you invent democracy, classical music, and perfect representational art, and there’s not a lot left to match your previous achievements. Europe is a highly successful band that hasn’t had a good studio album in three years.