I wrote: “The effects of the subjectivity and emotionalism that CRT evokes…”
Auntie Antifa said:
“…have been vividly on display.”
It seems to me that at least this is a recognition that subjectivity and emotionalism have been noted. It is a starting-point even if Aunt Antifa herself intends only to reverse the observation/accusation so that my own argument is weakened or debunked.
The interesting thing here is to try and examine the content of the *complaint* that the Yale Shrieking Girl has and the students at Evergreen had — meaning to examine the structure of their arguments and their views with some level of open mind — and avoid an absolute out-of-hand dismissal . . .
. . . while simultaneously examining and considering what if pretty evident as *hysterical contagion*. So, there are two different levels:
The Left-Progressive critique has always been enunciated through rational discourse — if one starts from say Noam Chomsky. I could not imagine a more idea-based approach to talking about social and political systems.
In opposition, Peter Collier and David Horowitz have substantially critiqued a great deal of Chomsky’s political positions (in
The Anti-Chomsky Reader) but strictly through idea-based criticism. It would not be possible to describe their critique as ‘emotion-based’.
But when we come to some of these who are described as Activist Postmodernist critical theorists there is a change. And an aspect of that change can, potentially, be ascribed to what Delgado reveals about the *methodology* — an invitation to bring in highly subjective material as *validation*.
So what I have done — it is really not anything extremist nor underhanded — is simply to *put it out on the table for examination*. But how could I prove it? How could anyone prove it?
So what I would say here is that we would need to refer, again, to the notion of
The Culture Wars. We all know — in any case I certainly know — that people tend to establish positions behind their various barriers and from them to decry what those various others are doing.
The Culture Wars had known and understandable discourses though based in reasonable and articulable political and social positions. And those conversations took place within a general Liberal structure.
But here is where a deviation took place. Note that Richard Delgado's
Critique of Liberalism in
"Critical Race Theory: The Cutting Edge" involves a critique of the Liberal tradition, and though the metaphor is common I would place emphasis on the operative word *cutting*.
It is not hard for anyone examining the praxis-element of Antifa-discouse and BLM-discourse to notice that it has taken a position against ‘systemic’ elements. And certainly the system referred to is Liberalism. How could this be denied? How could seeing this be avoided?
johnmcwhorter.substack.com
