Cynical Theories Intro + Chapter 1

 I recently started to listen a Joe Rogan podcast here and there, for reasons that are probably obvious. One of the episodes I listened to was with James Lindsay. I thought some of his ideas and arguments were really interesting and I wanted to learn more about them, so I looked up this book of his, coauthored with Helen Pluckrose. 

The intro acknowledges that the culture war is divisive, pushing the left further left and the right further right. This book, while no excusing any of the craziness on the right, will focus on the craziness of the left. The reason given is that the left used to be associated, rightly, with the word 'liberal', "open to new ideas, and tolerant of the ideas and behavior of others; not bound by traditional thinking; broad-minded. synonym: broad-minded." With cancel culture and the vitriol for anyone who questions any part of the latest gender ideology, it's not hard to see how they have forgotten their roots. The authors' argument is that the modern left has aligned itself not with modernity but with postmodernism, and in so doing has "given rise to one of the least tolerant and most authoritarian ideologies that the world has had to deal with since the widespread decline of communism and the collapses of white supremacy and colonialism." 

A special distinction will be made throughout this book, between social justice and Social Justice. Social Justice will refer to 'wokeism', "a very specific doctrinal interpretation of the meaning of "social justice: and means of achieving it while prescribing a strict, identifiable orthodoxy around the term." On the other hand, social justice will refer to the lofty ideal that basically everyone shares, although we realize that opinions on specifics and possible strategies will differ. I enjoyed this quote, "The movement that takes up this charge presumptuously refers to its ideology simply as "Social Justice" as though it alone seeks a just society and the rest of us are all advocating for something entirely different." It's also how I feel about BLM. The organization and it's leaders are a dumpster fire of hypocrisy and corruption, but to criticize or contradict them in any way is to say that black lives don't matter, which no one wants to say, besides maybe 50 crazies in the whole country. Social Justice is identity politics, political correctness, cancel culture, and self-censoring to avoid said cancel culture. 

Social Justice uses words in new and confusing ways and they use the new definitions to bully people to get confused by the newspeak so that they'll go along. It's nearly impossible to defend your position when your adversary is changing the dictionary on you. This book aims to be an interpreter, enabling you to define and stand for your principles and opinions instead of self-censoring. A way to argue against Social Justice without arguing against social justice. 

Some other distinctions to make note of: theory vs Theory. Theory will be used to denote "the approach to social philosophy that stems from postmodernism. Also, liberal vs. Liberal. Lower case liberal will denote the definition given above of open-mindedness and tolerance. Liberal will be similar to leftist, what the heretofore "liberal" has become. 

This book aims to show how postmodernism evolved into modern wokeism, and with postmodernism's deconstructive tendencies aims to deconstruct "the old religions" which include actual religious and secular ideologies as well as modern systems like science and philosophical liberalism. 

"This is not a book that seeks to undermine liberal feminism, activism against racism, or campaigns for LGBT equality. On the contrary, Cynical Theories is born of our commitment to gender, racial and LGBT equality and our concern that the validity and importance of these are currently being alarmingly undermined by Social Justice approaches." Lest you still doubt the good intentions here, because so often anything anti-woke is labeled as far right extremism, I'll share one of James' tweets from today. "...there is going to be a moment when the frustration caused by the Woke Left causes people to embrace the evil Right in desperation. It's already beginning. That must not happen." So no, James isn't interested in converting you to a confederate flag waving right wing nut. But there are so many aspects of wokeism that are dangerous and/or outright ridiculous, we would be well served to know how to counter them. 

Chapter 1: Postmodernism 

Postmodernism originated in the 1960s with a group of French philosophers. It was characterized by radical skepticism. Healthy skepticism seeks proof and reassurance, is careful about drawing conclusions without sufficient evidence and experience. Radical skepticism, on the other hand, questions whether we can even know stuff, doubts the possibility of obtaining objective knowledge. When the way to obtain knowledge and the way you discuss knowledge are shaped by your culture, how can it be pure and objective? These radical doubts about the structure of thought and society make it ultimately a form of cynicism, hence the title. Postmodernism rejects both modernism (an intellectual movement that predominated through the late nineteenth century and the first half of the twentieth) and modernity (the epoch known as the Modern period, which began after the end of the Middle Ages and in which we (probably) still live). It prides itself on plurality, contradiction, and ambiguity. 

WWII shook Europe and their faith in progress, and made them nervous about technological advancement. Disillusionment with both Marxism and the liberal governments that allowed fascism to take hold. In the wake of this disillusionment came American civil rights movements, feminism, LGBT rights, etc. Some began to question science for its role in enabling the war and the evils these movements fought against. When war rationing was over, people were able and desirous to consume much of what had been denied to them for so long. This lead to fears among some that society was degenerating and becoming more consumerist, capitalistic, and hedonistic. These are some of the conditions that opened the door to postmodernism. Postmodernism is notoriously difficult to define, which can be a problem when discussing it, but also makes sense for a way of thinking that doubts the possibility of objective knowledge and views language as self-referential instead of inherently meaningful. Since the book is aimed at the actionable derivatives of postmodernism that affect us today, a few basic principles and themes of postmodernism are presented, rather than a thorough explanation of its history and what is and isn't postmodernism. 

First, two basic principles. Principle one is the skepticism toward the possibility of objective knowledge. In other words, everything you know is a product of your culture, the way you've been taught to see the world, your language and the ways your people talk about truth and knowledge. This is called cultural constructivism. 

Principle two is that political society is formed of systems of power and hierarchy, and it is these systems that dictate what knowledge is. Those in power structure the language and social norms in order to retain their power. The language of science and the language of morality- of absolute truth and right- are intertwined. Those in power dictate what is both scientifically and morally right, thus exercising control, perpetuating their power structure. They believe that science is as corrupted by bias as any other quest for knowledge, just as tainted by cultural perspective. It occurred to me that this view of postmodernism is the greatest conspiracy theory, perhaps just because that phrase is being thrown around a lot right now. 

So I would summarize the two principles in this way: The enlightenment taught us that knowledge is power. Postmodernism believes that power dictates knowledge. 

One note, before moving on to the four themes. I was confused how postmodernism could be born of a disillusionment with Marxism, while often being called Marxist. I found this quote helpful. "In postmodern Theory, power is not exercised straightforwardly and visibly from above, as in the Marxist framework, but permeates all levels of society and is enforced by everyone, through routine interactions, expectations, social conditioning, and culturally constructed discourses that express a particular understanding of the world." Belief in the second principle just discussed, postmodernists feel and ethical imperative to deconstruct these hierarchies of self-perpetuating power. This is their urge to problematize things. Have you noticed that just about everything is "problematic" these days? I have. When everything is problematic, destroying everything becomes heroic. 

Now for the four themes. First, the blurring of lines, boundaries, and distinctions. Since objective knowledge is culturally constructed and therefore not really objective at all, the common definitions of categories are also suspect. Gender theory is a good example of this, as well as the "healthy at any size" aspect of fat acceptance. (Obviously encouraging kindness toward all, regardless of size is good. I'm speaking of the denial that carrying extra weight is unhealthy.) 

Second theme is the power of language. Things once seen as objectively true become constructs of language. These constructs are sometimes called "discourses (ie Foucault) or "language games" (Wittgenstein). Derrida was especially influential in his focus on language and his idea of "deconstruction". He argued that words don't have definite meaning, they play off of each other but are incapable of referring exactly to things in the real world. Language is unreliable. (Your truth, my truth). The marxist/postmodern obsession with power hierarchies permeates their thoughts on language. The word "man" only has any meaning when considering it's opposition (and superior status to) the word "woman". Importantly, Derrida argued that the speaker's intended meaning was no more real than the hearer's interpretation. If you say something and someone gets offended, there is no room for saying that no offense was intended, that your motives were pure. The offense on the part of the hearer is an integral part of what you said. This follows Roland Barthes' concept of the death of the author. "In practice, deconstructive approaches to language therefore look very much like nitpicking at words in order to deliberately miss the point." 

Theme three is cultural relativism. You can't criticize other cultures or judge their morality, because you aren't part of their system, you haven't been brought up with their discoursed, their "knowledge". If you try to criticize your own system, you can only do so using that system's own discourses, and therefore your standing affect the validity of your critiques. If you are in a position of power, the language of that position self-perpetuates, so your argument loses validity. Therefore, cultural critiques are only useful as weapons in the hands of those seen as "marginalized". 

Fourth theme is the loss of individualism and universalism, the rejection of both the person and humanity. The individual is only a product of social constructivism, formed by the discourses of it's society. Likewise, the universal is impossible, just as is objective knowledge. How is this possible, to reject both individuals and humanity as a whole? By focusing on sets of people, sub groups, positioned in same way in the power hierarchy. (Read: identity politics). You are not an individual, and your connections with all of humanity are tenuous at best. You are your category. You are a woman (or now, a "menstruator") or you are LGBTQ or you are a POC, etc. 

Some believe that postmodernism is dead, that it ended in the 90s or with 9/11. This book argues that it didn't die, but rather evolved. That it simply became more actionable and more goal-oriented, and that as such it became more weaponized.