The Washington post discovers right-wing postmodernism

FWIW,also Josh Marshall’s The Post-Modern President.

That is why when a media outler reports something as fact, riots ensue, and it turns out that it isn’t, we get a bit upset about that.

Yes, Joe. Never mind that Gen. Myers himself said very clearly that the Newsweek article didn’t provoke the riots. Never mind that stories of desecration of the Koran have been corroborated by any number of sources, including those haters at the Red Cross. Never mind that the desecration of the Koran is only looking like the tip of a most unholy iceberg, with a range of horrors that runs up to and includes beating innocent people to death. Just put all that aside and repeat after me: Newsweek lied, people died, and American “conservatives” are simply people who love Truth.

On a lighter note, the Washington Post tells us that two Army analysts who played a central role in the thoroughly debunked, 100% counterfactual BS about Iraqi “aluminum tubes” have actually been given “performance awards” in each of the past three years. Such is the passion for Truth in the Bush administration.

And never mind that Newsweek discussed the story with the Pentagon before printing it.

But about those analysts – I’m sure that Joe will be right on their case, as soon as he can. After all, he’s got a long line of liars to publicly trash, starting with Dubya.

Go to it, Joe.

I just saw a Fox special where the odds of war with Iran were said to be in a range of from 50 per cent to 70 per cent. The war gaming has already been done. No boots on the ground this time.

There seems to be a basic misunderstanding here about what conservatives complain about when they speak of “liberal postmodernism”. First of all, it has nothing to do with the perfectly normal disagreements between conservatives and liberals about facts. As often as not, conservatives and liberals trust different sources, and thus come to different conclusions about the truth. Nor does the “postmodernism” charge have anything to do with the frequent disagreements between conservatives and liberals over the significance of particular facts. Given that liberals and conservatives have different priorities, after all, they will naturally emphasize different sets of facts when making their arguments and constructing their worldviews.

The conservative charges of “liberal postmodernism” are quite a different matter. Some liberals, claim conservatives, simply don’t care about whether certain facts are true are not–to the point of excusing the knowing propagation of falsehoods, for example, on the grounds that the falsehoods in question serve a “larger truth”. The classic example of this phenomenon was the academic left’s rallying to the defense of Rigoberta Menchu, when it was revealed that her Nobel Prize-winning memoir was in fact largely fiction. Many of Menchu’s leftist defenders actually argued that her book told “important truths” irrespective of whether they were factual.

In both the Newsweek case and the Dan Rather “memogate” case that came before it, conservatives have made a very similar accusation: that liberal defenders of the reporters in question declared the reporters’ evidence “fake but accurate”–that is, reliable irrespective of its authenticity. Now, this charge may be false–perhaps most liberals are not in fact defending the reporters in question, or perhaps they are simply claiming that the falsehoods in question are relatively minor, or that there is in any event ample additional evidence to buttress the claims that the falsehoods failed to support. But I’ve yet to hear conservative critics of these reports question the relevance of their truth or falsity. Overwhelmingly, they claim (a) that these reports are substantially false, and (b) that their falsity is an important, relevant fact. Howevermuch one might disagree with these claims–and one very well might–they’re still nothing like what conservatives have come to call “postmodernism”.

Hmm, so when’s Dan Simon going to face these hard truths, I wonder?

Updated 2005-05-29 09:31:

_Thousands of Lebanese and Palestinians held sit-ins across Lebanon after Washington admitted some US guards at Guantanamo Bay detention camp in Cuba had mishandled the Muslim holy book, the Koran._

_… the US commander at Guantanamo, Brigadier General Jay Hood, said on Thursday that investigators had found at least five instances in which guards and interrogators at the base Cuba mishandled the Koran, although there was no “credible evidence” it was flushed in a toilet._

Now let’s hear our truth-loving conservatives talk.

Derrida derider: I made it clear in my comment that I was not assuming the accuracy of the conservative charges of “liberal postmodernism”. And indeed, such blanket charges are bound to be overgeneralizations in any event.

In the particular case in question, I happen to agree with you that the general liberal response to the Newsweek story’s retraction has been, “yes, the particular claim in question may have been inaccurate, but there are sufficiently many credible reports of a similar nature that Newsweek’s specific error hardly affects the left’s overall point.”

With respect to the “memogate” case, I think the conservative criticism applies fairly to what some of the accused CBS news people said in response to the accusations against them, although perhaps not to the overall liberal response to the affair (which was for the most part, quite muted).

In general, “liberal postmodernism”, as a rhetorical strategy, was only ever used rarely, and even then primarily for reassuring the faithful in the face of facts which challenged the validity of core liberal beliefs. (The Rigoberta Menchu case was one, as were several racial incidents of the early nineties–the Crown Heights and Los Angeles riots, and the O.J. Simpson trial.) As a strategy for winning a debate with opponents, the “truth depends on perspective” tactic is a complete loser, and liberals have no trouble recognizing that. The rise of loud conservative voices in the American public square has thus rendered “liberal postmodernism” untenable.

That’s also why “conservative postmodernism” simply doesn’t exist (yet). Conservative points of view are routinely sharply challenged by loud, articulate voices on the left, and have been for decades. The “conservatives out there who actually care about old-fashioned things like objective truth” hear those challenges, and will not stand for the “truth is independent of facts” argument.

But perhaps you (or John) have links to substantiated instances of conservatives claiming that the accuracy of specific facts is simply not relevant to their “greater truth”, or some such formulation? Certainly, the Newsweek case is no example–the argument is about whether specific claims are true or false, and whether those claims are significant or insignificant. I have yet to hear a single soul, conservative or liberal, claim, for example, that whether Americans desecrated the Koran at Guantanamo depends on one’s point of view.

Oceania was at war with Eastasia. Oceania had always been at war with Eastasia.

I think the claim that darwinism is just a theory and the faith based/reality based line are examples of post-modernism from the right.

I just saw a Fox special where the odds of war with Iran were said to be in a range of from 50 per cent to 70 per cent. The war gaming has already been done. No boots on the ground this time.

For those of you keeping score at home, “No boots on the ground this time” is this year’s “We will be welcomed as liberators.”

You’ll want to remember that about a year from now, when Rumsfeld is saying “I don’t recall anyone saying anything about no boots on the ground….”

I think the embrace of postmodernism on the right is more clearly in evidence in relation to science-based issues: climate change, evolution, stem cells and so on, and also on economics. In all these cases, there’s a clear view that truth is relative, and that what matters is what you want to believe.

Surely you don’t mean that statements of the form, “so-and-so’s political bias is causing them to get their science all wrong” are proof of postmodernism–heck, I see claims like that all the time on Crooked Timber. Or have you actually seen a conservative assert that science can’t hope to shed light on the truth or falsity of, say, global warming claims, or the predicted effects of specific economic policies, through objective research?

Now, the various species of creationists do say something a little bit like that. But if taking the side of religion against science constitutes “postmodernism”–well, then, the inquisitors who tried Galileo for heresy were remarkably ahead of their time.

Again, I’m not denying that there are lots of conservative positions that deserve plenty of criticism from liberals. But those criticisms should be based on carefully thought-out specifics, not blithe invocations of vague labels like “postmodernism”.

The most blatant recent “postmodernist” quote in wide debate might be the infamous:

“We’re an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you’re studying that reality … we’ll act again, creating other new realities … We’re history’s actors … and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do.”

Some people have taken that as some sort of religious statement. But it’s always seemed to me to be a proclamation of raw power, that the world is as they say it is, because they will enforce their view of it. It’s postmodernism established by the contrapositive!

Well, now for some actual quotes that show just how greatly The(tm) Right(tm) loves the truth. Here‘s one:

_Both sides of this argument are well-trod, and I’ve got better ways to spend my time than in an incessant pissing match with such empathetic paragons of the universe as yourselves …_

In other words, when your arguments are found to be bogus, just accuse the other side of being too closed-minded to accept your bogus arguments!

And this (visit the first link):

_It is often argued that a student would not develop fully if faculty were grossly lopsided by race or gender. … Doesn’t this apply to political orientation?_

Yeah, a student wouldn’t develop fully if faculty were grossly biased towards objective truth. But wait! “Objective truth” is an oppressive concept! Everything is an opinion! Diversity! Diversity! Diversity!

And, last but not least, this:

_Think this will render all the palaver about fillibusters, Iraq, red-blue divide, social security and so on irrelevant: Reports coming out of Qinghai suggest H5N1 infections in humans and birds are out of control …_

Oh, OK. Bush lied, people died… but that’s all just palaver!

Dan Simon, look right here:

_Complete concensus in the scientific community??_

_Wasn’t the last time that happened was when Galileo was almost excommunicated for suggesting that the Sun does not go around the Earth?_

…and later, by the same goon:

_It seems completely intellectually vapid to attribute any opposition to the anthropogenic climate change theory to being “employed by oil companies”. It is not like those pushing the “global warming” theory don’t have anything to gain from it. There are billions of dollars going into this research. Clearly there is an incentive to make it seem as bad as possible in order to keep getting grants for more research, etc._

Yeah, it’s all about agendas! Who cares about the raw data?

Bi: The first part of that excerpt does, I agree, carry a whiff of the postmodernist critique of the scientific method. The rest, though, is merely a claim that a particular set of scientists is politically biased in a way that causes it to do bad science. As I pointed out previously, That’s a charge that non-postmodernist leftists make all the time–including here at Crooked Timber–on a different set of subjects (gender differences, for instance, or the evolutionary roots of human behaviors). It’s not a critique of science itself, or of the notion of scientific objectivity–just a particular claim about a particular group of scientists.

In any event, I’m sure you don’t want the left’s opinions judged on the basis of some anonymous left-wing commenter’s response to a posting on a conservative blog somewhere. If “right-wing postmodernism” is a real phenomenon, it’s surely left a more convincing paper trail than that.

dan simon: see the creationism debates, and gilkey’s _creationism on trial_ is still good for this, despite its age. many creation-oriented scientists want mainly to argue that evolution (they focus on darwin, but afaict, their target is really evolution and the big bang, not natural selection) is at best a theory, not a “fact”, and a poor theory, at that, because all the science we have is unreliable (e.g., carbon dating only works if you assume the conclusion, namely, that everything is old; a massive flood could have so folded everything over and around as to create the fossil “record” we have now, even if it were only a few thousand years old, etc.). again, gilkey is brilliant on this, and that book is eminently readable.

BM: Creationists come in two flavors. There are the ones who openly admit that they trust the Bible, as they understand it, over the scientific evidence. As I pointed out before, calling them “postmodernists”, when they are in fact religious literalists–a tradition that goes back many centuries–empties the term “postmodernism” of all meaning.

Then there are the ones (such as the “intelligent design” supporters) who jump up and down and scream that they are right because their science is better than that of the Darwinians. They’re obviously wrong, of course–and ridiculously easy to refute–but their crappy pseudoscience bears no trace of the postmodernist’s arched brow at the mere mention of scientific objectivity. On the contrary, they themselves claim the mantle of scientific objectivity–even if falsely–and hence openly and firmly oppose the postmodern position of doubt as to its existence.

Bi: You’re perfectly entitled to believe that liberal scientists who embrace the theory of evolution and reject claims of gender differences in mathematical ability are completely justified in doing so, whereas conservative scientists who embrace some flavor of creationism or lend credence to claims of gender differences in mathematical ability are blinded by political bias or stupidity. After all, your belief–right or wrong–implicitly accepts the legitimacy of the scientific method, the possibility of scientific objectivity (even if only some achieve it), and the ability of objective scientific research to arrive at objectively correct conclusions.

The same applies to conservatives–whether they’re right or wrong–who lend credence to “creation science” or gender differences in mathematical abilities, and dismiss Darwinians and believers in gender equality as politically biased. Being wrong, or even stupid, doesn’t make you a postmodernist. The careless slinging of such dismissive labels as “postmodernist” simply detracts from the important arguments about how to do good science, and what the results tell us.

incidentally, dan, i agree with you almost entirely on this: “Being wrong, or even stupid, doesn’t make you a postmodernist. The careless slinging of such dismissive labels as ‘postmodernist’ simply detracts from the important arguments about how to do good science, and what the results tell us.”

i just don’t think the label “postmodernist” (or postmodern, which is, of course, different) has to be dismissive. it can actually be a helpful descriptive term, imho.

peace

Dan Simon: by the way, you’re still a ritualized troll.

Correct me if I’m wrong Dan, but my impression concerning the Rigoberta Menchu debate was that what most people were really arguing about whether there had been a genocide in Guatemala committed by a government that Reagan had defended. The answer, of course, is yes. It’s true, I gather, that many lefties were fooled by Rigoberta Menchu and might have been reluctant to believe she was a liar. It’s also true that many conservatives were fooled by Ronald Reagan and reluctant to believe he was a liar. There was a little bit of postmodernism on both sides of that debate. In the end, I think the lefties who were right about the genocide and wrong about Rigoberta were closer to the truth than people who believed Reagan when he defended Guatemala’s human rights record.