tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2197051945822486684.post602902487187876416..comments2024-03-29T18:17:34.956+11:00Comments on Thinking Out Aloud: Beliefs as status markersLorenzohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00305933404442191098noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2197051945822486684.post-16809330991740818832010-07-08T18:40:17.972+10:002010-07-08T18:40:17.972+10:00There is a certain shared well of deep rage indeed...There is a certain shared well of deep rage indeed: but the shift from class to obsessing over various forms of ethnic, racial and related notions of identity is part of what happens when the radical Enlightenment retreats--the Counter-Enlightenment advances, as I note <a href="http://lorenzo-thinkingoutaloud.blogspot.com/2010/01/as-radical-enlightenment-retreats.html" rel="nofollow">here</a>.<br /><br />Of course, why is one so desperate to define oneself against the surrounding society? Because that gives status, and status how it counts--in relationship to members of your own society.Lorenzohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00305933404442191098noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2197051945822486684.post-92218438671322826992010-02-15T16:04:51.019+11:002010-02-15T16:04:51.019+11:00Lorenzo
If you were to compare the university und...Lorenzo<br /><br />If you were to compare the university undergrad course outlines in 1985 and 2005 in say, sociology, history, anthropology, and - to the extent they existed - all the 'Studies' course called 'New Humanities' you would find a marked move away from issues of economics and class to an almost pathological obsession with <i>race</i>. This is particularly weird as the racial cosmopolitanism, diversity, and quite successful <i>integration</i> in Australia simply did not exist in 1985.<br /><br />I think what has happened is that left-wing ideology was basically built on Marx, and its political project was <i>socialism</i>. With the collapse of the Soviet Union, the Left was without a messiah, a structure, or a project. But rather than behave like psychologically-adjusted adults, and shrug their shoulders saying, "oh well, we were wrong" they merely substituted a white/non-whites dialectic for the bourgeois-proletariat dialectic, and haven't looked back. That is why we see these blogs seething with anger and threads with hundreds of ranting posts at every pick-up of even a whiff of an "offensive racial slur". They're nuts!Peter Pattonnoreply@blogger.com