Arthur Chrenkoff "loses his innocence"

. . . I was sixteen and a half years old when I arrived in Australia in November 1988. I had so many other things to do with my time (like learn the language, for starters) that the political reality did not hit me straight away. It dawned on me slowly over time: my old Polish world-view was a sham. Or at least half of it was. The part about the overwhelming majority of my fellow residents of the Evil Empire wanting freedom and democracy was still right. The part about the West being full of... well, Westerners, wasn't.

You can imagine my shock and disappointment upon discovering that only a minority of the inhabitants of the Free World were truly committed to the ideas of liberal democracy, capitalism and anti-communism. Another minority was in various shades and degrees opposed to, or critical of, one or more of these concepts, and the group in the middle was largely indifferent and disinterested - not quite alienated from their own society, but too busy or too bored to fight against its enemies.

My innocence was truly lost.

Why are so few truly appreciative of the bounty of freedom and prosperity they're sharing in? I thought to myself. Why are so many hostile to their own society and so open to the visions of the enemies of democracy and liberty? Why do so many think that the West is worse or at least no better than the "prison of the nations" that most of my fellow prisoners wanted to escape from?

Read the further reflections of Arthur Chrenkoff.