Cultural Invasion

In a previous article, I questioned the general effect of the Internet and whether it facilitated too much exchange of ideas and how this resulted in the boundaries around local communities around the world disappearing. I questioned whether this is raising the potential of diluting our cultural difference and making us too much of the same and resulting in a higher entropy and less colorful world where innovation will ultimately suffer.The previous analysis has not even considered the reality of the internet as it exists now and how the exhange of information and ideas is not equally balanced between the world's different civilizations and cultures. The flow of ideas has clearly favoured the flow of ideas from western civilization to other civilizations. Through this lopsided exchange, or rather single sided flooding, of ideas, these non-western civilizations are becoming more of a fake image of a western movie. Some societies have faired worse than others which is probably indicative of less self appreciation of their identity.

You can see this cultural invasion in the infiltration of western traditions into the daily lives of these societies and the dilution of native languages with hundreds of mispronounced english words. I have personally witnessed this in a recent visit to the Middle East where I was surprised to find that English was the most widely spoken language on the streets in some arabic countries. I have attended so many official meetings that were often conducted in English in countries that once prided themselves on their Arabic and Islamic heritage. Celebration of once western events such as Valentine's day has become very popular. Parents are more interested in how their kids speak foreign languages, mostly western, than the original native language. It was actually disturbing to hear some Islamic scholars intentionally insert English words into their speech as a sign that they are in tandum with the young generations. Are all these changes a result of the internet alone, probably not, but the internet has accelerated the pace of flooding of these societies with an idealized western culture especially among the younger generation. These societies do not even seem to realize the danger being posed to their culture and identity.