&gt; You seem to think &quot;reflecting on its past&quot; is one of the advances that came with Western civilization<p>Not if taken so far as to become self-destructive.<p>&gt; Not sure what &quot;modern western ethnomasochism&quot; is,<p>It means that here in the West we are (were) the best (in relative terms) but we think we are the worst, and wish for our own end.<p>&gt; Can you really have one without the other?<p>Oh yes. Godspeed to Asia which will inherit the future, learning the good bits from the West without the suicidal self-flagellation.