Given the fact that the concept of “multiculturalism” in Western countries has gained a status of officially sponsored policy, and also the fact that the hawks of political correctness in these countries have convinced many citizens that they will be much better off, while applying neutral-sounding euphemisms to signify the meaning of emotionally charged notions, the very utilization of words “filth” and “cleanliness”, for as long as people are being concerned, became a taboo. According to promoters of neo-Liberalism and Globalization, people cannot be referred to as clean or unclean in apriori.
We, on the other hand, will dare to disagree with this point of view. While analyzing metaphysical and historical factors that created a precondition for the issue of public cleanliness to affect the existential essence of Western civilization, throughout the course of its history, we will aim at revealing these factors as being objectively predetermined by the laws of biological evolution. That is – the reason why White people became the undisputed masters of the Western hemisphere by the end of 19th century and the reason why Japanese became the undisputed masters in South-Pacific area around the same time, is because of their genetically predetermined sense of existential idealism, reflected in these people’s tendency to bath as often as possible.
Even a brief analysis of what accounted for Greeks and Romans’ existential concerns, during the time of antiquity; leaves no doubt as to the fact that one of these concerns derived out of these people’s continuous strive to keep their bodies and minds clean. In her book “The Dirt on Clean: An Unsanitized History”, Katherine Ashenburg provides us with the insight onto the rational reasoning, which prompted ancient Greeks to pay such a great attention to the issues of cleanliness: “The ancient Greeks cleaned themselves for the reasons we do: to make themselves more comfortable and ore attractive. They also bathed for the reasons of health, since soaking in water was one of the major treatments in their physicians’ limited arsenal” (Ashenburg 2007, p. 18). However, the explanation as to why ancient Greeks and Romans used to be obsessed with cleanliness cannot be limited to strictly pragmatic considerations, on their part. In the same book, Ashenburg suggests that in the mind of ancient Westerners, the degree of their bodily purity accounted for the degree of their closeness to Gods: “Homer stresses the transforming power of bath… not only does a bath turns nice looking young men into near-divinities, but Odysseus gains height, strength and splendor when his old nurse bathes him” (Ashenburg 2007, p. 16). Thus, it would be wrong, on our part, to think of ancients’ natural desire to live up to the high standards of personal cleanliness solely within a context of hygienic-mindedness. Apparently, the cult of bathing among Greeks and Romans reflected their deep-seated anxieties as to the notion of filth. It was not simply by an accident that in ancient mind, the meaning of words “filth”, “blackness” and “evilness” coincided. In his book “Black History and Black Identity: A Call for a New Historiography”, William Wright states: “Greeks and Romans had negative views toward the word black, because that word was associated with nighttime, uncleanliness, and the fears and mysteries of nighttime, which led to evil and unfavorable omens being associated with the word black” (Wright 2002, p. 100). It appears that, even though ancient Greeks and Romans did not know anything about genetics or sociology, they nevertheless managed to adjust their behavior to correspond to the objective laws of nature. Apparently, Greeks and Romans did not regard the concept of personal hygiene as solely utrarian notion, but as their civilizations’ metaphysical foundation.
The same applies to ancient Indians. Ever since Aryan invaders from the North had conquered India’s indigenous principalities around 2000 B.C., they subjected themselves to strict laws of racial hygiene, while forbidding inter-marriages between members of their own caste and “unclean” dark Dravidians. In his article, “The Aryan-Dravidian Controversy”, David Frawley points out to the actual origins of caste stratification of Indian society, even though it was far from his original intention of promoting “race does not matter” concept: “European scholars also pointed out that caste in India was originally defined by color… White is the color of purity (sattvaguna), dark that of impurity (tamoguna)” (Frawley 2001). Why did the ancient Indians attach such a great importance to the color of one’s skin?
The excerpt from Arthur de Gobineau’s book “The Inequality of Human Races”, which can be found in “The Idea of Race” by Robert Bernasconi and Tommy Lee Lott, provides us with an answer to this question: “The word degenerate, when applied to people, means that the people has no longer the same intrinsic value as it had before, because it has no longer the same blood in its veins, continual adulterations having gradually affected the quality of this blood” (Bernasconi & Lee Lott 2000, p. 45). In its turn, this brings us closer to uncovering the true meaning of famous ceremony of bathing in the Gang River, practiced by virtually all Indians even today, as such that has nothing to do with the process of physiological cleansing, but rather with Indians’ subconscious strive to get rid of “genetic filth”, accumulated in their veins during the course of centuries.
The following excerpt from Eleanor Zelliot and Maxine Berntsen’s book “The Experience of Hinduism: Essays On Religion in Maharashtra”, fully substantiates the validity of this suggestion: “We got up early as usual and went to the river in the dark, in order to wash. A large number of people were there, cleaning their teeth, washing their mouths, and spitting into the stream. I could not bring myself to clean my mouth with the water, and took only a cursory wash. However, the women in our Brahman group apparently felt no hesitation, took their baths with the usual cries of “O Ganga! O Bhagirathi!” and even washed their mouths with the water. Apparently the spitting of members of other castes was not considered as pollution of their bathing water in the stream, while the clean well water was considered polluted because it had been brought by a man of non-Brahman caste!” (Zelliot & Berntsen 1988, p. 154). Thus, for today’s Indians, the process of bathing represents a highly symbolical act, just as was the case among the original creators of Greek and Roman civilization. Just as ancient Greeks and Romans, today’s Indians strive to actively oppose just about anything they associate with the notion of “genetic filth”.
Even if we did not know anything about Japanese culture of bathing, we could still deduce such culture’s extensive subtleties, due to high aesthetic value of Japanese culture, in general. The fact that Japan has become one of world’s most powerful countries was not by an accident – it is namely because Japanese people were being traditionally entitled with genetically predetermined sense of existential idealism, which allowed them to operate with highly abstract categories, which in its turn, created objective preconditions for the pace of technological and cultural progress in 19th and 20th centuries’ Japan to assume truly extraordinary properties. In its turn, such existential idealism directly derives of out Japanese people’s much higher degree of racial purity, as compared to representatives of other cultures in South-Pacific. Therefore, Japanese culture of cleanliness is being essentially objective. In his book “Japan, a View from the Bath”, Scott Clark points out to innate connection between Japanese culture of bathing and Japanese people’s ability to push forward civilizational progress: “At the beginning of the Kamakura period (1185) the iron bath became common. These iron baths resembled the huge pots one sees in cartoons where missionaries are being boiled by cannibals. Often this type of bath was heated directly by a fire underneath; at other times water was heated in other vessels and then transferred to the tub” (Clark 1994, p. 26). Without being “clean” in their minds, Japanese people would not be able to master the secrets of metallurgy. Moreover, it is because of such their mental “cleanliness”, that Japanese people had taken an immediate advantage of various scientific discoveries to keep their bodies clean as well.
Apparently, whereas the representatives of some cultures try to bath as often as possible, the representatives of other cultures make point in doing something entirely opposite. Ever since Christian “lambs of God” had found themselves in position of political power, they instantly began destroying Roman public termas, as their foremost priority. They acted in accordance to Jesus’ commandments, who insisted that people should eat food without bothering to wash their hands first: “Not that which goeth into the mouth defileth a man; but that which cometh out of the mouth, this defileth a man” (Matthew 15:11). In fact, the “savior of mankind” would go as far as “curing” people’s illnesses by applying filth mixed with his saliva to their faces: ”He (Jesus) spith on the ground, made some mud with the saliva, and put it on the man’s eyes. “Go,” he told him, “wash in the Pool of Siloam”. So the man went and washed, and came home seeing” (John 9:1-41). The reason why Jesus had enjoyed a status of an “eccentric celebrity” among Jews is because his message of anti-aesthetism appealed to the existential mode of Jews, as people who could not care less about keeping their bodies clean. For example, even today, one can easily tell of a nearby presence of a Hasidic Jew without even seeing him – such individual emanates a strong bodily odor, due to Hasidic laws that require Jewish “true believers” not to bathe more often then two times a year. In their book “Race, Science and Medicine, 1700-1960”, Bernard Harris and Waltraud Ernst imply that one of the reasons why Jews continue to hate “goyims” with such a passion is because “goyims” have historically tried to force Jews to observe the laws of public hygiene, despite “chosen people’s” will: “Rabbis were summoned to Warsaw where they were addressed by a German military doctor on the importance of cleanliness; he persuaded them that delousing was not against religion and showed them greatly enlarged photographs of lice.
Anti-lice posters, produced by a military entomologist, were issued with a Yiddish text, and adorned the antechambers of synagogues, baths and schools” (Harris & Ernst 1999, p. 228).
It is important to understand that – as we have pointed out earlier, for as long as human beings are concerned, we can define three types of filth: hygienic, physiological and genetic. Hygienic filth can be easily washed off with soapy water. Physiological filth, which usually manifests itself in people’s tendency to emanate bad odor, regardless of how often they take bath, cannot be dealt with such an apparent ease. However, the worst case scenario is when a particular individual has excessive amounts of “genetic filth” in its blood – it usually results in such an individual being affected by different forms of physical and mental abnormality. This is exactly the reason why mentally inadequate individuals often exhibit a pathological attraction to filth. In their book “Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder Spectrum: Pathogenesis, Diagnosis, and Treatment”, José A. Yaryura-Tobias and Fugen A. Neziroglu state: “The attraction to filth is common among patients refractory to improvement” (Yaryura-Tobias & Neziroglu 1996, p. 43). In the next part of this paper, we will analyze how scientific breakthroughs in the field of biology, which had taken place during the course of 19th and 20th centuries, and also the emergence of racially-biological consciousness among Westerners, during the same historical period, had created preconditions for the process of designing social policies in Western countries to incorporate the notion of public hygiene as its integral component.
In her book “The Progressive Era’s Health Reform Movement: A Historical Dictionary”, Ruth Engs provides us with the insight onto the fact that 19th century’s raised levels of public consciousness, as to the issues of personal hygiene, have been resulted by scientists’ realization of a simple fact that is namely the accumulation of filth within and outside one’s body, which causes an individual to succumb to a great number of illnesses: “A major development of the Progressive era’s Clean Living Movement was education for personal hygiene. Campaigns to encourage individual efforts to prevent the “catching” or transmission of a disease to others began in the last two decades of the nineteenth century… By the 1880s, bathing tubs—permanent ones for the wealthy and portable folding ones for poorer individuals—were marketed. “Public baths,” which included a pool and shower facilities, began to be built in the 1890s in numerous cities to encourage cleanliness among young men” (Engs 2003, p. 251). By the beginning of 20th century, it became a common practice for the living quarters in major European and American cities’ residential areas to be equipped with complex sanitation systems. The collecting and disposal of garbage became the responsibility of these cities’ municipal authorities. In 1895, London’s municipal authorities have introduced penalties for loitering for the first time in modern history. Moreover, various hygienic practices have also become incorporated into the framework of a learning process in Western academic institutions.
While referring to the developments that had taken place within the America’s system of education, during the course of early 20th century, in their book “Children and Youth in Sickness and in Health: A Historical Handbook and Guide”, Janet Golden, Richard Meckel and Heather Prescott state: “School hygiene authorities sought to make the most basic hygiene rule of the microbiological age—wash your hands—possible in American schools. This was no easy feat, as it required schools to institute bathroom facilities that included hot running water, an ample supply of soap, sinks at appropriate heights, and paper towels, and to fund janitorial support that would keep these spaces clean” (Golden, Meckel & Prescott 2004, p. 97). Around the same time, the “hygienic revolution” had also taken place in the field of medical care. From late 19th century onwards, the process of operating of medical hospitals in Western countries became subjected to a variety of rules and regulations, which were meant to insure that the highest standards of cleanliness would be observed at all times by health care professionals, while treating patients. It is namely during this period of time that such hygienic procedures as fumigation and linen sterilization became strongly associated with hospitals’ functioning. In her book,
“Medicine by Design: The Architect and the Modern Hospital, 1893-1943”, Annmarie Adams reveals what were the most important principles, upon which operating hospitals in Western countries was based, during the course of late 19th and early 20th centuries: “The “image” of cleanliness informed the design of rooms occupied by patients. The emphasis on aseptic surfaces had scientific and medical implications, but also economic and ideological ones. Medical specialists developed sterilization to discourage contact (as opposed to airborne) infections. The hospital had to be arranged so that disinfection could be done as efficiently as possible. Most important, these procedures could appear to have been done, which was particularly important to entice middle-class patients to accept the hospital as an institution” (Adams 2008, 126). One of the most important breakthroughs, within a context of continuing progress in 19th century’s public hygiene policies, was the invention of morgues. In their article “Death, Decency and the Dead-House”,
Andrew Brown-May and Simon Cooke provide us with a better understanding as to what were the rational considerations behind the establishment of morgues in 19th century’s Australia: “The call for a morgue was partly a response to the desire of the government to identify its diseased members and label their deaths, and partly a requirement of the climate” (Brown-may & Cooke 2004, p. 1). Nevertheless, it was not up until the beginning of 20th century, that the government-sponsored policies, concerned with the issue of public hygiene, became truly effective.
And the reason for this is simple – it is during the course of early 20th century that biologists had come to realization that insuring high standards of public cleanliness in a particular society cannot be solely thought of in terms of a social policy.
As we have suggested earlier – it is namely the accumulation of genetic filth in one’s body, which represents problem on a far greater scale, as compared to accumulation of filth on the surface of his or her skin. In the book from which we have already quoted, Ruth Engs states: “Eugenic undertones to personal hygiene emerged in the second and third decades of the (20th) century. Correct hygiene practices were interpreted as lifting humans to a higher level of health, thus preventing racial degeneration. By the 1930s health habits and personal hygiene were accepted and practiced by most Americans” (Engs 2003, p. 252). During the course of this historical period, many politicians in Western countries have come to realization that, in order for a particular society to be associated with high standards of cleanliness, its members must be innately prompted to indulge in hygienic procedures, as the essential part of their daily activities. And, there is only one way to assure this – encouraging society’s members to observe the rules of racial hygiene, while interacting with each other, and also educating them on the subject of dangers associated with smoking and consuming alcohol.
Despite the fact that National-Socialists ruled Germany for duration of only 12 years, they have managed to turn it into the cleanest and healthiest nation on Earth, because they applied a three-dimensional approach towards instilling Germans with “hygienic consciousness”. That is – Nazis did not only strive to insure that all the members of German society had an access to hygienic facilities, regardless of their social status, but they also created preconditions for the amount of genetic filth in Germans to be reduced from generation to generation, as time would go by. Thus, we can say that the roots of modern hygienic policies, deployed in Western countries, can be traced back to the time of Nazi Germany, whatever the improbable such suggestion might sound.
The history of Western civilization through 19th and 20th centuries is the history of White people gradually realizing their long-lost essence as the spiritual descendants of ancient Greeks and Romans. As we have shown in earlier parts of this paper – the existential mode of ancient Greeks and Romans cannot be imagined without these people’s strongly defined taste for bathing. In a similar manner, it is quite impossible for today’s Whites to consider a possibility of enjoying comfortable live, without being able to take shower at least once a day. At the same time, there are now areas in virtually every large European and American city where people damp garbage out on the street in front of their houses, as the ultimate mean of “celebrating their ethnic uniqueness”, with the thought that there might be something wrong about it never even occurring to them. This came as the direct result of hook-nosed promoters of “multiculturalism” having succeeded in convincing White citizens that they will be able to benefit from allowing genetically filthy people from Third World to immigrate into Western countries. On the other hand, given the fact that the hawks of “tolerance” have never been given a green light to spiritually poison people in Japan, the standards of cleanliness in this country continue to improve, as time goes by, with Japanese cities being deservingly referred to as the cleanest on Earth. Thus, the conclusion of this paper can be summed up as follows: the more there is a genetic filth accumulated in one’s blood by the mean of racial mixing, the less he or she will be likely to derive pleasure from taking showers and from keeping its dwellings clean – the objective reality fully substantiates the validity of this conclusion.