DRAFT
: political unrest in the US 2021
Post-modernity ideas come out of the late 20th-century scholarship amongst academics who were engaged in western philosophy. In the early 21st century, most people, especially critics, are unaware of the central issues and how they play out in the real world.
For my purposes, post-modernity firstly disputes the Cartesian mind/body split. Descartes’ notion of knowledge as something that cannot come through sensation (that includes reading) and that knowledge must always be true is rejected by post-modern philosophers. Descartes was a devout christian and desperately wanted to prove that god exists, so his thoughts on knowledge reflect this stance.
The second issue that post-modernity takes on is the idea that knowledge must always be true, and that there are absolute truths. The claim to have universal truth is highly problematic – it might be true at this time and in this place, but it is impossible for humans to predict the future and so it might not be true in a different place or time. This means that even what humans take as fundamental truths about nature (like gravity) will not hold up through all time and space. While we like to think that science is indisputable because they use experiments, remember that many scientific ideas have been overturned throughout human history.
People tend to argue that if there is no truth, then you cannot make a statement that there is no truth and this is misreading what post-modernity is all about, and what claims it is making. Post-modernity comes from a standpoint that the real problem is not just that truth is unstable but that thinkers in western philosophy see truth as binary. It either is or is not true. The post-modern approach would say that there is no binary is or is not, but rather both exist. People really hate this and usually start yelling about the reality of your death at this point, because it fundamentally upsets the belief system that forms our world, our society and our institutions in the US.
The US was formed by white christian terrorists and wealthy tax dodgers who attached themselves to christian terrorists to gain power. The entire western system of binary knowledge embedded in US culture has always broken society between two types of people. On the one hand, you have the white, moral, intelligent, emotionally controlled, male citizen on the other you have the black, not-white, immoral, stupid and emotionally and physically uncontrolled, non-male. There is no middle for the white supremacists either you are, or you are not white—[we can think of this in terms of transphobia as well]. The US cultivates identities based on these binary ideas of humanity. chirstianity cultivates these binary identities as well.
At the core of the US’s conservative movements, today is the fight to preserve the US as the white christian nation it was started in the 1800s. Many factors lead up to the current political landscape in which white supremacy is growing more violent and outspoken one factor is that post-modernity is gaining traction in the digital information age. Digital information exchange has revealed, in real-time, the hidden facets of history and exploded the access to knowledge.
As internet access and communication has expanded the rise in white supremacy has become open knowledge. The reasons are many and complex, but the violence and cult-like behaviour of white terrorists seems to be linked to post-modern identity crisis. White supremacy is baked into US culture, the idea that white people are better in all ways is so ubiquitous few white people ever had cause to doubt their superiority. Christianity is also a crucial cultural force in the US, in which many people believe the bible to be literal history and the ultimate truth.
The post-modern is doubly dangerous to white supremacist christian ideology. The idea that identity is binary along racial lines is ridiculous in the face of genetic testing and migration patterns. People are seldom from one “pure” undiluted ethnic stock, and many generations of passing have led people to think of themselves as anglo/saxon whites. The reality of the enslavement of Black Africans in the US is that many anglo/saxon men raped and impregnated Black African women producing children so that the one-drop rule would exclude probably a quarter of those thinking they were white from the front of the bus.
Secondly, christian fundamentalism does not hold up well under historical scrutiny. There is no way to prove that god exists, and there is significant historical evidence to show that the bible is barely accurate historically and that the writings were highly politicized and translations vary wildly. Saying god must exist because there is a bible is the equivalent of saying elves exist because there is a Lord of the Rings. The moral authority that christian fundamentalism clings rests on the existence of god and the truth of the bible, in the post-modern era, this is a difficult position to maintain.
The growth in the cult of Tang and Qanon has several factors, but I think it is important to remember how threatened these ideologies are. Important because when people are faced with the reality that most of the things they believe are incorrect, especially their idea of self, and are raised in a non-self reflective rugged individual culture, they become violent. If you want to fight white supremacy, you need to understand how traumatic having your entire life of believes disproven is. Not so we can feel sorry for the white supremacists, but so we can realize how dangerous they are.
There is a reason why people abuse, torture and kill others beyond money or sex, and that is control. People who find their entire world view disrupted will find themselves losing control. This reaction could be small, like being a white woman on the street yelling at Black people for no good reason. The reaction could be invisible but harmful, like denying someone a job or calling the police anonymously. The reaction can also be catastrophic, like murdering a man for jogging down the street, blowing up a building or trying to take over the government.
melungeon mullins 