“At this moment, the liberal basis of most progressive movements is impeding our ability, individually and collectively, to take action. The individualism of liberalism, and of American society generally, renders too many of us unable to think clearly about our dire situation. Individual action is not an effective response to power because human society is political; by definition it is built from groups, not from individuals. That is not to say that individual acts of physical and intellectual courage can’t spearhead movements. But Rosa Parks didn’t end segregation on the Montgomery, Alabama, bus system. Rosa Parks plus the stalwart determination and strategic savvy of the entire black community did.
Liberalism also diverges from a radical analysis on the question of the nature of social reality. Liberalism is idealist. This is the belief that reality is a mental activity. Oppression, therefore, consists of attitudes and ideas, and social change happens through rational argument and education. Materialism, in contrast, is the understanding that society is organized by concrete systems of power, not by thoughts and ideas, and that the solution to oppression is to take those systems apart brick by brick. This in no way implies that individuals are exempt from examining their privilege and behaving honorably. It does mean that antiracism workshops will never end racism: only political struggle to rearrange the fundamentals of power will.”
Lierre Keith. – From the Essay Oppression and Subordination.
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10 comments
August 30, 2017 at 5:50 am
tildeb
Post Modernism at it worst.
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August 30, 2017 at 7:58 am
lovetruthcourage
Wise words
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August 30, 2017 at 8:52 am
tildeb
No, society is not built from groups. It is built from and by real individuals. Society as a group label can be dismantled into constituent labeled groups of ever receding/constraining definitions referring back to the larger group, but one always ends up back at the individual. That individualism is the real foundation of any society.
This belief in groups as real things is a very real and dangerous problem that arises when too many individuals begin to believe that groups are the real things when they are not. The individual is real. If we care about shared individual liberties and equality rights including equality of opportunity, then we must never, ever, forget that groups are artificial constructs with artificial boundaries. (An individual can belongs to a never-ending series of groups, some of which may overlap and even conflict!).
If we act on this belief in groups (which is why Post Modern thinking is a disaster dealing with reality), then we must never, ever, forget that we are empowering actions to be imposed on individuals. This has a cost. It is the imposition that contains real effects and so it is the imposition by real people with deeply misguided beliefs in group identities that then produce polices and laws that are imposed on real people to the detriment of shared liberties and equality rights. This is how one moves directly away from shared individual liberties and equality rights in law. This is not progressive thinking; this is regressive.
Post Modern thinking is an attack at the deepest level against the essential foundation of the Enlightenment, the essential values by which Western liberal secular democracies operate, by the consent of the governed. That consent is based on the individual, recognizing in law that the individual is the one possessing liberties and rights. PoMo thinking is diametrically opposed to this basis, to shared liberties and equality rights and tries to switch liberties and rights to group membership. This misguided belief in Post Modernism to be ‘progressive’ is in action totalitarian. That’s why It is rotten to the core and must be fought by anyone who thinks anyone deserves liberty and equality in law.
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August 30, 2017 at 3:43 pm
Meg
@arbourist is everything okay? Your email address isn’t posted anymore. I need to ask you about something that has nothing to do with politics and I don’t know if I have the right address.
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August 31, 2017 at 4:21 pm
severeves
Hey Arb, I have a question for you. I’ve had a major disagreement with some other leftists as it relates to feminism and male entitlement, and seeing as how you’re the most radical feminist I know of, I thought I would ask you your opinion on whether or not this is offensive:
I posited that many of the cultural and social institutions that exist in society were put in place by men to control women. That men have a deep-seated biological fear of female freedom due to sexual selection, and this fear has manifested itself throughout society historically in the form of things like marriage, arranged marriage, criminalization of adultery among other things. I also feel that as more and more social and cultural barriers to female liberation give way, there will be more reactionism from the bottom 90% of men due to sexual selection, and that this reactionism is due to sexual inadequacy. Further, I posited that these men aren’t needed in society and that a socialist society would have ensure that such selection works in ways conducive to a healthy genome, and that it is the prerogative of such a society to remove inferior male specimens (which is the bulk of the human male population) from society. I feel that these inferior male specimens, unconsciously and sometimes consciously aware of their own sexual inferiority and fearing being sexually selected out, are society’s driving force behind female social disempowerment.
I was accused of eugenics, fascism, and reducing women to their base biological components.
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September 2, 2017 at 8:18 am
The Arbourist
@tildeb
The building block of society, of course, is the individual. As unit of effective action within society though, the group or the community is more effective in promoting change in society.
Much of what you say applies over several categories, and I do believe in the truth value of at least some of what you say. What is confusing me though is your thoughts seem to be directed toward a particular part – the politics of identity – and then lumping post-modernism into that same category.
Identity politics, post modernism, and neo-liberalism I think could all be reasonably thought of as different heads on the same hydra, but the terminology surrounding each classification is hard to delineate.
So when I see you criticizing “Post-Modernism” I’m thinking about the body of work from the likes of Focault and Jacques Derrida. I’ve only read one of Focault’s books and gone as wikipedia deep on Derrida. But it seems like there is a lot going on there and your arguments are not really tuned to disputing their work.
The case against idpol, I can see much more clearly and agree for the most part.
What concerns me is the focus on the individual because, under the guise of neo-liberal thought we are depoliticising our societies, undermining the benefits of collective action and atomizing people in society.
Individuals in society that are isolated and that hold up individuation as the highest freedom essentially are non-players on the societal and poltical stage. I get whiffs of the libertarian ethos – most which are complete shite – wafting through this aspect of neo-liberalism because hyper-focus on the individual invariably boils down to ‘fuck you, I’ve got mine’ and thus, at least in liberal democracies, an implicit acceptance of the status quo and thus beneficial for the elites that run our society.
I’m curious as to how you categorize your thoughts on these issues as I’m still trying to get a handle on the various categories being discussed (idpol, pomo and neo-liberalism) because there seems to be a great deal of overlap between them and a lack of clarity in their definition.
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September 2, 2017 at 8:57 am
The Arbourist
@severeves
Well, if the opinion in question offends men and makes them defensive, usually its on the right track with regard to effective feminism. Just as rule of thumb.
So far so good. i.e. Patriarchy.
Fear? That characterization could be a bit shaky because in a biological context one would expect to be talking about hard wired evolutionary behaviours; for example the fight or flight response or the climbing response while drowning – pretty much anything that happens automatically the ‘lizard part’ of our brain.
The fear you describe is past any of biological basis and would seem more properly rooted in the social construction of our society.
You mean men having to treat women as fully autonomous human beings and not just as a means to sexual pleasure and reproduction? Having to strive to meet women them on a equal level and treat them with the same fundamental respect they have granted to their brethren for generations?
This isn’t sexual inadequacy in question it is the loss of the dominant position in social hierarchy.
The genetic pool of information benefits from diversity. It is what makes our species resilient against the many biological challenges we face. When we superimpose our notions of ‘desirable genetic traits’ or good traits we have already left the biological realm and are firmly into the human constructions of what is good and what is not.
This segment sounds much like MRA speak, and invokes the notions of the involuntary celibates or ‘incels’ as they like to call themselves. This group seems to be under the erroneous notion that they are somehow owed access to the female body and to be in a relationship with a female.
It is some pretty fracked up shit, as no one owes anyone anything in society. Most ‘incel’ arguments are vehicles designed to blame women for the problems that men have – especially ones that have trouble with the idea that women are their equals and should be treated as such.
I can see where your detractors are coming from, and to avoid those criticisms, I would avoid conflating socially constructed ideas with biological ones as it was that premise that was most at fault.
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September 2, 2017 at 2:51 pm
severeves
Thank you very much, Arb.
I’m obviously no biologist/anthropologist so it was a ridiculous suggestion coming from myself…I was really just putting ideas out there…but ideas that went against a “materialist conception of human history” so I should’ve known what kind of reaction to expect.
I do need to be more careful – obviously there is no excuse for male entitlement. I wasn’t trying to indirectly blame women’s lib or suggest it’s somehow bad for society, nor would I suggest that reactionary men (basically 90% of men) are somehow excused because they’re acting on biological impulse. I don’t necessarily believe these things, either, I was just pretty much thinking out loud – that social norms are enforced by biological impulses. I’m not at all qualified to have that discussion and should stick to stuff I know more about.
I’m not at all familiar with MRA speech, either, but I know what those guys are about and the last thing I want is to mirror their talking points. So thank you very much for your input.
I’ll have to be more careful with what I say in the future.
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September 2, 2017 at 3:03 pm
The Arbourist
@severeves
Jaquing-off? :)
Controversial statement to assert. Endpoints include male justifications for rape (e.g. It is a male biological imperative to spread their seed…), and other anti-social, yet still patriarchally condoned behaviours.
It may be safer to say social norms are informed by biological impulses – implying there is a correlation, but not necessarily a 1 to 1 correspondence which quickly gets you into the bullshit of evolutionary psychology and what not.
You are welcome.
Relevant Readings – A Brief History of Misogyny and Delusions of Gender.
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September 5, 2017 at 6:07 pm
severeves
Awesome – I’ll check them out.
Not to sound patronizing, but even though I disagree with you on some things, I can’t deny you know your stuff and you’re very cordial – I could learn a lesson there myself…it lends credibility to one’s positions. Thanks again. I’ll stop by in the future…good stuff.
Later.
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