A brief reply to Prof. Lebron appears at the end of this post
My critical commentary, yesterday, has clearly struck a chord. I've heard from an unusually large number of philosophers (including many whom I usually don't hear from!) expressing appreciation for my taking the poorly done piece by Manne & Stanley to task; many had harsher verdicts than mine, though the general tenor of the response is well-captured by this message from a philosopher:
Just a quick note to say I thought your piece on Manne and Stanley on the events at Yale was really outstanding. I hate seeing this growing phenomenon of groupthink on the Left obscuring the clear commitment to the fundamental principles of Liberty that the previous generations fought so hard to establish and protect.
Thanks for being a voice of clarity and sanity in these increasingly heated times.
I don't think "the Left" deserves to be tarnished with responsibility for this phenomenon: the narcissism of mindless identity politics is just that and little more. The actual Left has its eye on bigger issues.
In any case, Jason Stanley tried to get a substantive discussion going about my response on FB, but, alas, that didn't work out too well, rather predictably. The always deranged and not very smart John Drabinski (who informed me he's a white guy from Idaho, so he has a special capacity to detect racist rhetoric!) essentially accused me of being a racist, which several of the usual cattle predictably "liked." In that same FB thread, I pointed to Brit's work on group polarization and the Internet. This led one Black professor in a cognate field Black grad student [who shares the same name as the full professor] to assert (alas, his post is now deleted, so I can't quote the comment verbatim) that it was ironic that a "white male philosopher" (allegedly me) in a 70% white male discipline with an almost entirely white canon was complaining about unreliable belief formation processes due to insularity on the Internet. (This also pleased the mindless herd, who thereby confirmed the substance of Brit's point.) I should note that this grad student does not know me or anything about me, but apparently believes he holds a license to stereotype with abandon. But it's clearly worth stating why this kind of response is so contemptible: first, because being "white" tells us almost nothing about the philosophies of Plato, Aquinas, Descartes, Hume, Kant, Marx, Nietzsche, Adorno, Foucault, Kripke, etc.; and, second, because most of my beliefs--including beliefs about nonsense like the grad student's smears--were not formed primarily by engagement with "white" philosophers (in that regard, I'm sure I'm not alone). The only good news is that the evidence is now mounting that these kinds of displays are largely confined to the margins of the profession, with their volume amplified by cyberspace. What's unfortunate is that a small handful of those not on the margins are actively encouraging this stupidity. (For the benefit of those reading with malicious intent: faculty in cognate fields are on the margins of the profession; tenured philosophers at top PhD-granting programs are not.)
ANOTHER: Before I even posted the preceding, Jason Stanley "unfriended" me on Facebook! This was surprising, since Jason's original response to being criticized was to thank me for a "substantive" engagement. Well, that was short-lived! (A few days ago, he also thanked me for this post, and I warned him he would not be happy with my reaction to the absurd piece criticized above.)
I have unfriended a lot of folks over the years, people I'd not met who seemed a bit creepy or off; that I should get a whole bunch of friend requests out of the blue in the last couple of hours from philosophers (especially philosophers of language) now makes sense (thanks to them for their "solidarity" as it were). I certainly don't begrudge Jason his decision, given the hole he has dug for himself: he is the prime example of a (currently) non-marginal member of the profession who is encouraging nonsense (or as one of his FB friends said, referring to the Chronicle piece, "execrable crap"). As he "explained" on FB: "there is an unbridgeable gulf between what is old, dated, shrill, and frightened, and what is new, open, and interesting." (Note the use of "shrill," the traditional right-wing insult for those on the left!) There's also, apparently, an unbridgeable gulf between what is "only slightly younger, pandering, and anti-intellectual" and the views of slightly older and better educated people on the left. Jason may well be on the right side of Ivy League history, but he's on the wrong side of everything that matters for the integrity of academic life. A real shame.
What are adults elsewhere to conclude from all this? A generation ago adcademic philosophy was unusual in the "humanities" as a discipline that had actual intellectual standards (an actually Wissenschaft) that did not depend on passing a test for moral and political purity. That is now under attack, as is obvious. But there is substantial resistance to these developments, and the outcome is unsettled.
AND ANOTHER (11/17): Another apt letter from an untenured philosopher (and thanks to others who have written as well):
I just wanted to say I saw your response to that article and was very happy to see it. I approached their article with every intention of allowing it to change my mind, and was just so disappointed in the straw man it set up and the absurdly false equivalences it made. It set up an apparent paradox to solve, but there is no apparent paradox. There is no apparent paradox between employing free speech and trying to suppress the free speech of others. And there is no evidence at all in the article that the students in question aren't trying to suppress it. All that evidence is just ignored in favor of generalizations about problems that minorities face in society at large. As if this is what were at issue.
I am trying my best not to get distracted by these things since I have so much to do, but I just want to say I really appreciate you publicly pointing out what is so wrongheaded about this piece....
Sad to see the spread of an ideology that can't or won't recognize that one can attempt to constructively criticize the actions of members of historically oppressed groups without discounting the history or present reality of that oppression (though often the language of oppression, violence, etc are cheapened beyond recognition). All kinds of people make terrible mistakes, including the kinds who have been historically oppressed. And certainly the kinds who are highly privileged and feel they must always be making a great show of their uncritical solidarity with whatever feelings or demands that these groups (or those who pretend to speak for them) have or make. In acting this way, they do the people they pretend to support a great disservice.
Anyway, thanks again for your valuable work.
AND ONE MORE: I've never gotten so many FB friend requests in a 24 hour period before! My general practice has only been to friend people I've met in real life, or have had an extended professional relationship with, even if only virtually. So please do not take offense if I do not add you; I hope I will have the opportunity to meet all of you in person at some point. Thanks for your good will.
ANOTHER GOOD LETTER: This from Philippe Lemoine, a PhD student at Cornell, who kindly gave permission for me to post this:
I was busy this weekend making sure that everyone I know in Paris was okay and responding to nonsense that people have posted on Facebook about the attacks, so I didn't have time to read the post you wrote in response to Manne's and Stanley's article about Yale until today, but I wanted to thank you for it.
I think the points you're making are rather obvious, but it's nice to see someone articulate them so clearly. I'm also pleased to learn that you have received such a favorable response to that post, though perhaps it doesn't make me as optimistic as you about the state of the profession.
I honestly never doubted that most people in the field were on the same line as you on that issue, as on many others, but as I'm sure you know a determined minority can still do a lot of damage if the majority let them. And, unfortunately, I'm not convinced that many of the people who contacted you to congratulate you would be willing to do so publicly.
More generally, I'm appalled by the cowardice of academics, who often won't stand up for what they think even when they are already well established.
AND MORE: A philosopher without tenure who asked for anonymity (for the obvious reasons, given the climate of fear Jason has helped create):
I’m sure I’m not the first person to point out that Jason Stanley seems to be something of a propagandist in (what I take to be) the ordinary sense: someone who disseminates one-sided, emotionally manipulative, dishonest material for a cause. That piece he co-authored for The Chronicle seems to be all of the above – dishonest because he knows very well that there are attempts going on to suppress and punish speech. If it comes to that, he may qualify as a propagandist in his own (peculiar) sense: someone whose rhetoric tends to undermine the very values that it invokes.
I thought this was a very accurate observation, which I had not thought of.
REPLY TO PROF. LEBRON: (1) The graduate student who dismissed me as an insular white guy (see above) has the same name as a full professor in a cognate field, whom I had thought (mistakenly) had posted the insult (I thank Chike Jeffers for correcting my mistake); I will not name him, but I did revise the post after being corrected (I stand by the judgment that his dismissal of me based on my race and the alleged insularity of the "white canon" was "stupid"); (2) Prof. Lebron omits any mention of the string of insults and invective to which I was subjected on Facebook by John Drabinski and others, to which I responded, though Prof. Lebron quotes my responses only selectively; (3) Prof. Drabinski has a long history of hurling wild (and sometimes defamatory) accusations and insults my way; "deranged" is among the nicer things I might say about him; (4) the reference to "mindless identity politics" was obviously a reference to its manifestations on blogs and social media, not to the actual philosophical work done in this area.
I do encourage readers, once again, to look at Brit's work on group polarization on the internet, it is instructive.
LEBRON REDUX: There were a few good replies at the site of Prof. Lebron's non-response. For example:
Stanley claims that the [Facebook] post [in which Leiter was attacked] was “sadly deleted” (read: he deleted it himself) due to extreme rhetoric. He then selectively re-posts it. Apparently the “extreme rhetoric” occurs when Leiter calls Drabinski a “fucking clown.” First, that must only sound extreme if you follow the conversational norms of an 11 year old. Second, Leiter is responding to Drabinski’s claim that Leiter is a racist. As a response to Leiter’s actual critique of Stanley’s piece, that charge is absurd; indeed, it is offensive, insofar as foolishly tossing around accusations of racism is itself a serious moral wrong.
In all the huffing and puffing about facebook thread norms, rhetoric, and insult, I have yet to see something that would really be amazing, given the times: a point by point response by Stanley and Manne (or someone else who can be serious) to the legitimate criticisms Leiter has raised.
Whether or not it was intended to do so, the above piece by Prof. Lebron does not constitute a serious response. He claims that objections to “mindless identity politics” is akin to criticizing the project of social justice writ large, which is patently ridiculous. This is the same type of move to which Stanley and Manne resort in the Chronicle piece, namely, claiming that everyone who fails to agree with you is not on board with social justice. To hear Stanley and Manne tell it, anyone who disagrees is effectively a National Review subscriber.
Overall, this is an argument internal to the Left about how to best protect and foster values that the Left has traditionally defended. A sliver of internet activists and philosophy professors is now claiming a monopoly on these values. To indulge in a bit of extreme rhetoric: I call bullshit.
Justin Weinberg, who, of course, posted Lebron's nonsense, but officially disapproves of "bad behavior" on the Internet, did (in keeping with his usual practice) let through comments calling me, inter alia, an "ass," Bill O'Reilly, "brian fucking leiter" and so on--all posted pseudonymously or anonymously. Hypocrisy, thy name is Justin!
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