Flusser: The Western universal level became thus truly 'universal,' although in a tyrannical sense of the term

"The Western cultural system is the result of the revolution caused by the invention of printing, which disrupted Catholicism's cultural system, with relatively little feedback from other contemporary systems, although of course some Eastern and African elements did penetrate the West.  But the West's discursive dynamism, especially as far as scientific models are concerned, was responsible, in its later stages, for what is called 'Western Imperialism.'  During the nineteenth century, the Western cultural system dominated the Earth and disrupted all other cultural systems, without being itself very much informed by them.  The Western universal level became thus truly 'universal,' although in a tyrannical sense of the term, and at the same time the popular level of Western Civilization became slowly disrupted[...] and degraded into folklore." -- Vilem Flusser