Neil Oliver: The light of civilisation is easily and often extinguished

Civilisation – of the sort we have had here in the West, in these British Isles – is a brittle veneer, a thin blanket between us and the cold reality of the world and its history. A place like this, where we have had relative peace, equality and tolerance of difference, is not in the natural order of things. If you want to see the natural order of things, look at most of the rest of the world and consider most of human history.

The way of life that has been possible here for a few generations is so unlikely, so unusual and so rare in the story of human history, it can only really be described as an anomaly, almost an oddity.

Most of the people who have lived and died during the years of recorded history knew an existence utterly unrecognisable to us.

Most people endured what we would describe as unbearable misery. That we have known lifetimes of relative peace and safety – the right to a life unmolested being perhaps the most basic and yet of incalculable value – has been nothing less than miraculous.

The ever present danger, however, is that we lose sight of how inexpressibly lucky we have been. When the moment comes and we take it for granted – right there and then the foundations start to crack.

The warnings and lessons are all around us. Most of the world is not like here. There are perhaps 30 or 40 countries dotted around the globe, like lights in the darkness, where there is a chance of living the kind of life we have been able to take for granted. Much of the rest is ruled by tyrants, gangsters and crooks. Viewed in the context of world history, the rule of tyrants, gangsters and crooks is normal.

Afghanistan is a tragedy unfolding before our eyes. It is also a warning that civilisation is no rock, no impregnable fortress. It is a frail blossom or like water held in cupped hands.

That what is happening in Afghanistan is happening in the 21st century should make us all stop what we’re doing and think. It is our obligation to generations yet unborn to remember how tireless and irresistible is the surrounding chaos. Chaos is like always rising flood water that is only held back by constant vigilance and ceaseless effort.

Given what is happening in Afghanistan now – and what has happened there before in the recent past – it is easy to overlook the fact that during the 19th and 20th centuries there were Afghan leaders who made all manner of attempts to modernise the country and to improve the lot of the people – notably the lives of women and girls. There have been several times when schools were opened for girls as well as for boys.

There have been women in politics there, and in business. In the 1920s Amanullah Khan raised the age of marriage and banned forced marriage and child marriage. His wife, Queen Soraya, stopped wearing the veil. Then came the communist rebellion in 1978, followed by invasion by the Soviets. Then the rise of the Mujahidin and the Taliban and a fall into a medieval world. There was some hope after 2001 and the defeat of the Taliban, but now here we are. The Taliban are back and the darkness falls again.

It turns out the US presence there, our presence, was like a hand placed in a bucket of water. In the instant the hand was withdrawn the water filled the space as though it had never been there.

The light of civilisation is easily and often extinguished. I’m old enough to remember when Lebanon was associated with glamour and the high life, when, with its snow-capped peaks, it was called the Switzerland of the east, and Beirut was the Paris of the Middle East. Decades of war put an end to that and now it’s a place synonymous with heartbreak.

Europe and the west have mattered to world history for perhaps five centuries. For the rest of recorded history – 4,500 years – the story of civilisation was the story of the Middle East. From there came the technology of farming, writing, the first cities and empires, the three great world changing faiths of Judaism, Christianity and Islam. That time is long past.

Events unfolding now in Afghanistan should strike us like cold water to the face. There is totalitarianism. There is the rule of tyrants, gangsters and crooks. Notice too, that as the US and UK have withdrawn from Afghanistan, our absence has been a vacuum that has attracted other totalitarian regimes, other gangsters and crooks. Birds of a feather and all that …

There in Afghanistan is a glimpse of how the world can be – how the world has been for millions of people throughout time. Afghanistan in this moment is facing the absence of civilisation. We have spent too long here distracted by notions like gender choices and pronouns. Most of the rest of the world cares not a jot for genders choices and pronouns – certainly not right now and likely never.

I read all the time about the great reset. I think we need one right enough. But the recalibration I have in mind would have us wake up and pay attention to the fragility of what we have – and remember that whatever we hold dear is always vulnerable. It is never too soon to remember the chaos and to tend to the defences.

All over the world this weekend – and for weeks and months already – citizens of so-called civilised democracies have been walking through their familiar streets, in uncounted numbers. Across Europe, as far afield as Australia, ordinary folk are on their feet to declare that freedom is theirs by right and not the arbitrary gift of politicians.

In France, president Macron’s police have used pepper spray on the citizens – liberte, egalite, fraternite. In Melbourne, in Australia, the police have used pepper spray too, and fired rubber bullets at protesters and rode among them on horseback to frighten them back into line.

We are a long way from Afghanistan – in every way, of course we are – but the plight, the suffering of millions there must be a reminder to cherish what is here, what has been here for such a very short span of time in the scheme of things. We need to lift our heads up here and now and look at what is happening to rights closer to home.

We have been a lucky, a blessed people here in these islands – and the time to remember that, to seek to protect all of that, is right now.