The Doctrine of Discovery
To understand how/why we got so far off, go back and figure out where "the West" even came from. We came from Europe, of course. Specifically, the "Age of Exploration" during the 1400s-1600s. And guess what? That shit was false-religion-based, in and of itself!
See: The Doctrine of Discovery.
I'll quote Grok right here for your convenience:
A core framework for the Age of Exploration was the Doctrine of Discovery, a set of principles drawn from 15th-century papal bulls issued by Popes. These granted European Christian monarchs the right to "discover," claim, invade, subdue, and exploit lands not inhabited by Christians — treating them as terra nullius ("no one's land" in a legal/religious sense).
Key examples: Romanus Pontifex (1455, Pope Nicholas V): Authorized Portugal to invade, capture, and subdue "Saracens [Muslims] and pagans," reduce them to perpetual slavery, and take their lands and goods. It framed this as a divine mission for the spread of Christianity.
Inter Caetera (1493, Pope Alexander VI): Divided newly "discovered" lands between Spain and Portugal, encouraging explorers to claim territories for Christian monarchs, convert (or overthrow) "barbarous nations," and spread the faith.
This directly supported Columbus's voyages and subsequent conquests.
The underlying idea was that European Christians were God's chosen agents (or acting under divine mandate), superior in faith and civilization, while non-Christians (pagans, infidels, etc.) had diminished rights to land, sovereignty, or even full humanity in some interpretations. Conquest was often portrayed as a holy duty to save souls, even if it involved violence, enslavement, or dispossession.
This was not fringe; it became embedded in international law and colonial practice, influencing how European powers justified empires.
Read that again. "The underlying idea was that European Christians were God's chosen agents (or acting under divine mandate), superior in faith and civilization, while non-Christians (pagans, infidels, etc.) had diminished rights to land, sovereignty, or even full humanity in some interpretations. Conquest was often portrayed as a holy duty to save souls, even if it involved violence, enslavement, or dispossession. This was not fringe; it became embedded in international law and colonial practice, influencing how European powers justified empires.
THIS WAS THE BASIS for OUR ENTIRE WESTERN CULTURE.
As I've come to say it today... and the title of another of my writings, that horse shit got baked into the bread we eat. The notion that "some are superior to others" and therefore have more rights than others. Hello. HELLO. Tell me our governments, politicians, media outlets - and sometimes even our own neighbors and "friends" - don't speak to us "like we are beneath them," when we don't conform to their precepts.
This general paradigm has been THE ROOT of the entire West.
It is still in the bread we eat, today. It is why our society has so many ills, so many unjustices, so many difficulties. Because it’s been unjust from the very beginning.
Eric
