Clare Hall Ashby Lecture 2022 - Professor Susan Neiman: Why the Left is not Woke

[@62426637]

I welcome Nieman's blow for clarity. THe distinction between traditional /rational/Enlightenment Left and the recent Woke variants is absolutley necessary. If you favour the original "positive" meaning of the word Woke, then the new Nabobs of the Left could be described as thinking of themselves as woke and then contaminating the concept with currents of postmodernism.

[@daffyduck4674]

Given that the term ‘Woke’ has been reduced to a meaningless boo word by the right and this has been grabbed up by elements of the radical left to pretend that there aren’t really deeply concerning aspects to the ideas underpinning many other of the today’s activist movements the clarity of this talk is really welcome, particularly in the clarity of her arguments. Sadly the same can’t be said of most those critiquing her which indulges the worst aspects of academia, the kind of dancing on the head of pin mudding of the waters or straight up strawmanning that achieves little but reversing the clarity the original talk brought. Appeals to distant literal definitions of Woke does nothing but avoid addressing the very questions Neiman looks to answer.

[@iancanon8648]

XX Xs an

[@TheSapphire51]

Very impressed. Crimes against humanity not just against one particular group.

[@janklaas6885]

📍2:06:50

[@timtaylor8406]

That glass of water seems to fill itself unseen behind the lectern

[@TJ_USA]

This is very good. But she appears to have entirely missed the point of evolutionary psychology, suggesting that it is reductive, concealing some essential "reality" about power and how the world "really" works. I do not believe it makes this claim in any way. This is the same mistake made by those people who thought that Richard Dawkins book was about how human selfishness drives all human evolution. It is a very elementary error.

[@explrr22]

Agree. My guess is the realization that a theory can be used to launch a new challenge, gets equated with that being its fundamental purpose or intent. Although I found myself more sympathetic to her criticisms of postmodernist figures and the theories, it suffers from a similar flaw of shame and guilt by association.

[@davidlane6758]

Yes, that was my only major quibble with her otherwise brilliant talk.

[@uncleskipsprairiejustice9367]

Guess I'm not alone in regard to her view of evo psych, although I'd say there are some people in evo psych who have made some crackpot claims in recent years. I think it's a remnant of an old debate about sociobiology, which raised a lot of Left wing hackles, but which in the long run, proved EO Wilson, at least partially right. Wilson was no reductive bio determinist. He was a great humanitarian and did brilliant work on social animals (ants in Wilson's case). You don't have to believe we are all prisoners of our hormones and genes, when you accept that these things exert profound influence over mentality and behavior. Yeah, men are primed for breeding and fighting, but we have higher cognitive function. As adult humans, we can honor our instincts but manage them so that harm is minimized.

[@uncleskipsprairiejustice9367]

If altruism etc didn't come from biology, where did it come from? Where does everything come from? Outer space? Where does culture come from? And BTW nobody says that primate behavior is a 100% perfect fit as a model for human behavior. She's oversimplifying.

[@patharvard]

Also, not so impressed.

[@daffyduck4674]

It was the strength of their counter argument wasn’t it…

[@patharvard]

@@daffyduck4674 She offered a lot of historical context for her thesis. However, many of her perceptions of contemporary social issues and politics are askew. Therefore, her conclusions come out half baked. For one thing, we have seen in the US, with the Twitter Files and, in the UK, with the Lockdown Files and with other revelations, that both the Establishment political right and the Establishment political left have comparable authoritarian tendencies. The powerful have become allies in manipulating the public in an expanding campaign to stifle dissent and sustain their rule. The solution is not for the left to win more elections. The solution is for the people to come together to reclaim their independence from a corrupt and incompetent ruling class.

[@daffyduck4674]

@@patharvard I’m unclear what any of that has to do with a critique of the ideas which underpin the so called ‘social justice left’ (who regularly display their own authoritarian tendencies) and was the topic of her lecture. Your last sentence is with all due respect a very long bumper sticker. Who are ‘the people’ what does ‘reclaim their independence’ actually mean, do it on the basis of what ideas? Marxist, Fascist, Libertarian??? It’s easy to condemn a ‘corrupt ruling class’ but given any ‘ruling class’ would include passionate advocates for BLM, Trump & De Santos it’s a bit meaningless.

[@patharvard]

@@daffyduck4674 Reclaim their independence by reducing the power of monopolistic political parties, corporate lobbyists and the imperialist, military industrial security state. Reclaim their independence by reducing the centralized power of the authoritarian managerial classes that have become unaccountable to the demos. Allow people to communicate without state and media censorship so that the public engage in meaningful political conversations that aimed to achieve, through negotiation and compromise, shared objectives. To guide the reformation of the political process, instantiate many of universalist humanistic principles (that Neiman favors) which largely transcend ideology.

[@doviejames]

@@patharvard I am curious what you mean by an "establishment political left" in the US. Who are you refering to specifically? It would be abusing the term to describe the folks who run the Democratic Party as "leftist". Nancy Pelosi, Barack Obama, Chuck Schumer? War mongering neo-liberal centrists at best. And obviously corrupt, as you rightly point out.