Discussion about this post

User's avatar
Clever Pseudonym's avatar

Hey, never mind the Pluckrose/Lindsay hoax, the same exact thing happened a quarter-century earlier with the Sokal Affair, with the exact same results.

I know the whole "Woke is religion" thing gets thrown around a lot and can get tiresome, but if not exactly religion Critical Social Justice and its foundational dogma of the Blank Slate are at the very least sacred beliefs for the modern post-60s academic, most esp in anything adjacent to the Humanities.

I think part of this is that "there shall be no enemies to the left" is the ultimate commandment for all educated/upscale/urban liberals that extends from careers to social life etc, but liberal academics of every stripe seem congenitally incapable of disagreeing with any Leftist statement, even if the statement demands that they denounce themselves and their own areas of study.

Some time in the past generation or two Leftists captured morality for anyone not specifically conservative (by proclaiming themselves Official Defenders of the Oppressed) and thus have programmed everyone on their side of the aisle to believe that disagreeing with them is morally suspect and some type of bigotry.

Also, I know the author was looking for a prior example of outgroup bias/ingroup hostility to balance out the argument, but the Jewish Kapos were in an extreme struggle for life, at every moment with every decision they could have been murdered; whereas the modern white liberal is safe and prosperous, yet exhibits an ingroup hatred that may just be unprecedented in all of human history.

Expand full comment
Michael Caplan's avatar

Thanks for the post. It would interesting, as an appendix to this survey with a different yet related goal in mind (and one that's of particular concern of mine), to ask how many people would agree to racist, stereotypical and demonizing statements about Jews if the term "Zionists" were substituted. Among leftists and academics and the cultural elite, the results would, I'm certain, be illuminating - for those with eyes to see.

Expand full comment
43 more comments...

No posts