Thread by @shrikanth_krish

Just listened to a podcast on Covid with @teasri and @balajis where @balajis used the term -

"Civilizational vaccination"

A fascinating term

Where a civilization remembers a historical catastrophe so well, that it has taken strong lessons from it for a very long time to come

Perhaps the Cultural Revolution represents such a "civilizational vaccination" in the case of China?

With Germany it is perhaps the rise and fall of Nazism - which has vaccinated the German people against the virus of "extreme racial nationalism"

With the West, it is harder to think of such a civilizational vaccine, as the West has been in the ascendant for such a long time

No catastrophes to remember

Perhaps the closest is WW1, where Britain blundered into a war

Creating a climate of pacifism that persists in the West

In India too it is hard to think of "civilizational vaccines"

Maybe the Kurukshetra war of legend serves as some kind of vaccine, which put an end to many cultural practices among brahminical elite that were likely prevalent before that "legendary event"

Al Biruni quotes brahmins around him as saying the Bharata war changed India rather fundamentally

E.g. he says Indians used to eat "cow meat" before the age of vAsudeva. But not since.

Another civilizational vaccine that Indians have had is perhaps the very violent interactions with Islam during the Sultanate period (particularly reminded of Khiljis, Madurai Sultanate, Taimur raids)

Creating a v strong anti-muslim sentiment that still persists in the populace

The experience with the British was more gradualist. Less abrupt, and violent

So Indians don't see the British Raj as a civilizational vaccine. At least I don't think so.