[cnd78A]

> The solution, then, seems to be holding people in power accountable, no?

The problem is that this is an extremely difficult step to achieve, because it does not simply depend on the will of the people. It depends on cultural evolution. Human beings are not naturally rational; like other species, we are driven by evolutionary processes that are often irrational and self-interested.

Most countries—and, more specifically, the majority of their citizens—have not yet reached this stage of civilizational development. The French are far from it, and I believe the Germans are as well. Despite belonging to the generation that emerged from a relatively recent period of cultural barbarism, Germany is currently supporting what is considered as the greatest genocide and one of the gravest sets of war crimes of our time. So I would not overestimate the level of civilization of a population whose majority appears unconcerned by what I see as such an obvious moral failure.

In my view, one of the roots of human barbarism is the tendency to overestimate either human nature itself or the moral achievements of one's own culture.