Postmodernism sucks, but it doesn't suck as much as you think it does

 

Postmodernism sucks, but it doesn't suck as much as some people think it does.  This "some people"... hm, I should come up with a name for them.  I'll work on it.  

These are people who fantasize a kind of conspiracy theory about postmodernism.  According to this conspiracy theory, postmodernism is a fad that started in academia, but is slowly spreading into the larger culture as people graduate from these institutions and gain positions in other institutions - especially HR departments, consulting firms, the medical world and especially the mental health field and therapy, the public sector, etc., etc., etc..  And, according to this conspiracy theory, postmodernism is RUINING EVERYTHING!!!!!!

There are many varieties of this conspiracy theory.  Very obviously, there are conservatives who are paranoid about the baneful influence of postmodernism.  Some of them are Fundamentalist Christians, or other members of the religious right, but not all of them.  Jordan Peterson is exceedingly paranoid about postmodernism, but he's far from the first person to entertain these kind of suspicions.  Before him you had people like Allan Bloom and the really histrionic paranoia of Dinesh D'Souza.  Ayn Randian "Objectivists" tend to hate postmodernism as well.  The "Austrian School" of economics (Mises, etc....) and their descendants tend to hate postmodernism, which is a bit ironic, since Wittgenstein is in many ways the forebearer of postmodernism and had something of an influence on his second cousin, Friedrich Hayek. 

Long before the right was attacking postmodernism (or seemed to be aware of its existence), however, there was a longstanding debate between postmodernists and Marxists, and Marxists can be just as paranoid about postmodernism as conservatives are - perhaps more so.  To hear some Marxists tell it (and even some anarchists), if it weren't for those meddling postmodernist kids, we'd have had the revolution by now.  They act as if an academic conspiracy of literature nerds is the only thing standing between us and the end of capitalism.

And then there are milquetoast liberals who decry postmodernism, usually in a tone that is a mixture of condescending care and grave concern.  You know, your Arthur Schlesinger, Jrs and your Jonathan Haidts. 

We cannot, of course, forget the popular science writers and analytic philosophers who rail against postmodernism.  And then there are the voices crying in the wilderness, the uncategorizable intellectuals like Camille Paglia. 

All of these people make postmodernism seem really dangerous.  But the truth is, postmodernism is anything but dangerous.  It is not a conspiracy, and it will not cause the breakdown of society.  In fact, it has no power at all.  The truth is that postmodernism is really boring and lame and annoying.  The only danger it poses is that it will turn a person into an unbearable conversationalist.  But it poses this threat not only to its adherents, but also to its opponents.


See also: my article on Why Postmodernism is Annoying

and also also: my article on Liquefactionism


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