For generations, developing countries — once called “the Third World” — wanted to be like us. They loved our freedoms and our luxurious middle-class lifestyle. But that was back when China made Christmas ornaments and Happy Meal toys. That was before the Burj Khalifa was built in Dubai and before India became your pharmaceuticals maker and IT outsource partner.
Times have changed, and you’re missing it. Fact check: True: The emerging world no longer sees the West as its exemplar.
This requires serious soul-searching from Western leaders. We are seen as insane bullies.
It’s impossible to pinpoint when the West began looking grotesque, so let’s look at the last two years. That’s when the ball really got rolling.
The world went into lockdown because of COVID. The policy emanated from China, but the Western world embraced it. In fact, the West adopted the lockdown model even more than China, forcing experimental drugs on millions. Protests erupted in New Zealand, Australia, the United Kingdom, EU and Canada. The protesters were met by riot police, smacked with batons and, in the case of Canada, had financial assets frozen. (Meanwhile, violent “mostly peaceful” protests by majority White people decrying racism were celebrated, and even deemed good for public health.)
The West was terrible toward its own people during COVID. Only China was as bad, but it is a one-party totalitarian state. The West is supposed to be for human rights and open societies, but if you stood in favor of that, you got pepper sprayed. Do you think Latin America, Africa, the Middle East and Asia did not observe how the West treated its citizens? I have news for you: they did. None copied us.
Then there was Russia. None are copying us here, either.
The Ukraine war was immediately met with sanctions against Russia’s economy and individuals. They were like no other before it. Only this time, thanks to its own wealth and power, the emerging markets largely ignored them. For this reason, Russia has been able to withstand asset seizures and bans on oil and gas exports to Europe, its most important market.
China stepped up and bought more. India was chastised for its Russian neutrality, but India reminded them that it does what is suitable for its people, not what Brussels or Washington tells it to do. Saudi Arabia bought Russian oil for its own market and shipped its crude oil to Europe. Where there is a will, there is a way.
In January, Brazilian president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva visited Biden in the White House. Biden asked him to send ammo to Ukraine. Lula said, “I’m not interested in prolonging the war. I’m interested in ending it.”
China wants to broker a peace deal between Russia and Ukraine. Most “experts” I talked to in Brussels in February told me it would never happen. A month later, China brokered a deal between Saudi Arabia and Iran.
Let me tell you this: if there is a successful Russian cease-fire mediated by the Chinese, it is the end of the West as promotors of peace and democracy. Unless the West tries hard to end the Ukraine war, the emerging world will see China as a peacemaker and the West as warmongers.
Europe is now realizing this, with French leader Emmanuel Macron joining China’s call for peace. Macron has no choice, really. The rest of the world is against the West, adding fuel to the fire.
Last, culture war nonsense and constant cries of racism are a turn-off.
Go to Brazil and find a Black person in a position of corporate, political or cultural power. Go to Vietnam and find diversity and inclusion and report back. They see the United States as hysterically inventing problems that barely exist.
Not long ago, the United States symbolized freedom for all mankind. Now it stands for freedom for trans-men to get pregnant. Latin America, Africa, the Middle East and emerging Asia have other things to fight for and worry about than your pronouns.
Because of Russian sanctions, the emerging countries see themselves being one felled tree in the jungle from climate change sanctions; one banned trans pride rally away from an import restriction. Punish them, and they will move farther away from our sphere of influence.
The leaders of these countries have all been to New York City and San Francisco. They’ve seen what it looks like. It looks “Third World.” They want no part of that anymore. For all those reasons, the developing world is turning away from us. In-your-face progressive politics and Western warmongers have themselves to blame.
