The Protestant Work Ethic Is Alive and Well

Where did America go wrong? Readers of this blog know how I have answered the question. Links here and here.

We embraced the therapy culture with such fervor that we lost touch with the Protestant work ethic that built the nation.

The therapy culture emphasizes the importance of aesthetics and erotics. It makes life into theater and then advises us all to sit back and enjoy the show. And it involves seducing people, either by mind or body, into thinking as you think or doing what you want them to do.

At best, the therapy culture pays lip service to the value of work, but, given its glorification of celebrity, it cannot see us working our way out of our dilemmas. As with any culture based on celebrity, it sees us spending our way out of our problems... regardless of whether we have the money.

If you, as I, have been wondering where the Protestant work ethic went, a story on Marketwatch yesterday announced that it was alive and well... in Israel. Link here.

So, if you were puzzled at the fact that so many effect intellectuals in Europe, for example, are violently opposed to the existence of Israel, perhaps the answer is that they simply find its work ethic to be grievously offensive to everything they hold sacred.

It would not be the first time.