The Marxist Critique of Postmodernism
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- Опубликовано: 26 июл 2024
- In this recent video from the October Revolution festival, Daniel Morley (of the Socialist Appeal Editorial Board) discusses the theoretical differences between the philosophies of Marxism and postmodernism.
Daniel analyses the idealistic limits of various postmodernist concepts and explains - in contrast - why we need a philosophy that helps us to understand the seemingly chaotic world we live in: not for contemplation's sake, but in order to transform society.
"The philosophers have only interpreted the world, in various ways. The point, however, is to change it."
jorden peterson: *implodes*
I'm really glad you guys have decided to tackle the issue of postmodernism and its absurd and abhorrent ideas and helped expose its decline and the reasons for that decline. Excellent video.
Você por aqui! Me recomenda uns canais de youtube de esquerda bons.
Abhorrent ideas like 'maybe we shouldn't spend so much time trying to fix the economic system but rather we should dismantle it completely and replace it with a new, healthier and mutualistic social system' ? Damn, those evil post-modernists am I right?
Did you even watch the video?
So many problems here. Just to name one, some of the people he mentioned ARE MARXISTS. Everything he said about Deleuze and Guattari, for example, can be disregarded. Deleuze's last book he had planned was going to be called "The Grandeur of Marx."
Furthermore, the idea that "social position determines consciousness" is not argued against in postmodernism. Its a prerequisite for even beginning to understand it... if you dont get that, you're lost...
@@HoRostam Just because someone says they're a Marxist...doesn't mean they're a Marxist.
Just want to clarify a comment on Nietzsche "being often seen as a harbinger of Nihilism (8:49- 8:57)": Nietzsche was and still is often misunderstood. He was as strongly against Nihilism as he was against Christianity. He predicted that the "death of God" or a loss of faith in the values of theism, particularly among intellectuals, but also among the general public, would create a void so large that it would cause people to despair into Nihilism, ie., having no values or beliefs at all. He seems to have been right about that. But the man himself was vehemently life-affirming, which is the polar opposite of Nihilism, which, again, he predicted would be the consequence of the death of God.
He even went as far as to claim that Christianity itself is already inherently Nihilistic(Damascus *needed* the belief in immortality to deprive "the world" of value...that with "the beyond" one *kills life*. Nihilism and Christianism: that rhymes, and does not only rhyme. -end of chap 58 in "The Antichrist") and in innumerable other places throughout his work he brings up the idea that Christianity is essentially anti-life, anti-natural, and is "belief in nothing".
Yes, I am really tired of this popular and completely wrong idea about Nietzsche that gets repeated by nearly everyone that isn't a philosopher. I find that Nietzsche was weirdly optimisic and was a strong believer in being creative in creating new moral systems, while also to be skeptical of any new moral system being created. His philosophy was very liberating and he was very interested in coming up with a philosphy that was much more humane.
It reminds me of the Wealth of Nations that gets misrepresented by everyone, the Left and Right both. I think Adam Smith was an idealist (I think because he was very religious) and made him idealise how people would react to the inherent problems and contradictions he would describe in the emerging capitalist economy. He was a strong believer in Unions and government intervention and just common human decency. It was Marx that took the study of Capitalism out of the ideal and describe it in real terms (along with David Ricardo et al)
If everybody misunderstands you, maybe you are slightly ambiguous in your discourse.
@@compagniaelvira No.
Nietzsche was optimistic about nihilism because it is liberating and we are free to choose.... apparently. He thought we should morn the death of God but also liberate ourselves through a sort of self determination. Of course this is a completely unrealistic goal, hence why people try to avoid nihilism eg. David Foster Wallace etc. talking about achieving some sort of zen state of living to protect ourselves from nihilism.
@@thomervin7450 So Nietzsche was clear and straightforward?
"In small amounts, postmodernism creates profound insights; it large amounts, it creates profound idiots."
@Phantom Alpha nah because in large amounts, we produce higher quality of life.
@Phantom Alpha 1 million killed by communism FACT!
@Phantom Alpha imagine thinking socialists are responsible for the world wars
@Phantom Alpha how did this guy even end up on this video 😂
This how a physicist gave postmodernism a hilarious black eye and live to tell about .
For anyone who pays attention to popular accounts of physics and cosmology, quantum gravity is a thing. How could it not be? Quantum gravity is the place where the two pillars of modern physics-quantum mechanics and relativity-collide head-on at the very instant of the Big Bang. The two theories, each triumphant in its own realm, just don’t play well together. If you are looking for fundamental challenges to our ideas about the universe, quantum gravity isn’t a bad place to start.
A bit over two decades ago, quantum gravity also proved to be the perfect honey trap for a bunch of academics with a taste for nonsense and an envious bone to pick with science.
In 1994, NYU physicist Alan Sokal ran across a book by biologist Paul Gross and mathematician Norman Levitt. In Higher Superstition: The Academic Left and Its Quarrels with Science[3], Gross and Levitt raised an alarm about those in the new field of “cultural studies” who were declaring that scientific knowledge, and at some level reality itself, is nothing but a social construct. Unsure whether he should take Gross and Levitt at face value, Sokal went to the library and dove into the literature that they were criticizing. When he came up for air, he was much more familiar with the postmodernist critique of science. He was also appalled at the depth of its ignorance about the subject.
Most scientists respond to such nonsense with a muttered, “good grief,” but Sokal felt compelled to do more. He decided to give postmodernists a first-hand demonstration of the destructive testing of ideas that tie science to a reality that cuts across all cultural divides.
Sokal had a hypothesis: Those applying postmodernism to science couldn’t tell the difference between sense and nonsense if you rubbed their noses in it. He predicted that the cultural science studies crowd would publish just about anything, so long as it sounded good and supported their ideological agenda. To test that prediction, Sokal wrote a heavily footnoted and deliciously absurd 39-page parody entitled, “Transgressing The Boundaries. Toward A Transformative Hermeneutics of Quantum Gravity.”[
The paper is worth reading just for a belly laugh. It promises “emancipatory mathematics” at the foundation of “a future post-modern and liberatory science.” “Physical ‘reality’,” it declares, “is at bottom a social and linguistic concept.” He embraces the notion, seriously proposed by some, that logic itself is invalidated by “contamination of the social” When he showed it to friends, Sokal says, “the scientists would figure out quickly that either it was a parody or I had gone off my rocker.”
Sokal submitted his paper to a trendy journal called Social Text. Understanding the importance of ego, he freely and glowingly cited work by several of the journal’s editors. For their part, the folks at Social Text were thrilled to receive Sokal’s manuscript. Here at last was a physicist who was “on their side!” After minor revisions, the paper was accepted and scheduled to appear in an upcoming special “Science Wars” edition.
The bait had been taken, but the trap had yet to be sprung. That came with a piece by Sokal in Lingua Franca that appeared just after Social Text hit the stands, exposing “Transgressing the Boundaries” as the hoax it was.
Parody sometimes succeeds where reasoned discourse fails. Sokal’s little joke burst free of the ivory tower on May 18, 1996, when The New York Times ran a front-page article entitled, “Postmodern Gravity Deconstructed, Slyly.”The Sokal Hoax became a hot topic of conversation around the world!
Reactions to Sokal’s article were, shall we say, mixed. The editors of Social Text were not amused, to put it mildly, and they decried Sokal’s unethical behavior. One insisted that the original paper was not a hoax at all, but that fearing reprisal from the scientific hegemony, Sokal had “folded his intellectual resolve.” It was lost on them that had they showed the paper to anyone who knew anything about science or mathematics, the hoax would have been spotted instantly.
As most scientists did: When I heard about it, I busted a gut!
I still laugh, but the Sakai Hoax carries a serious message. In addition to diluting intellectual rigor, the postmodern assault on science undermines the very notion of truth and robs scientists and scholars of their ability to speak truth to power. As conservative columnist George Will correctly observed, “the epistemology that Sokal attacked precludes serious discussion of knowable realities.” Today, from climate change denial, to the anti-vaccine movement, to the nonsensical notion of “alternative facts,” that blade is wielded on both sides of the political aisle.
Sokal gets the last word. Quoting from his 1996 Lingua Franca article, “Anyone who believes that the laws of physics are mere social conventions is invited to try transgressing those conventions from the windows of my apartment. (I live on the 21st floor.)” of society in terms of “progress” has been made obsolete by the scientific, technological, political and cultural changes of the late twentieth century.
In other words postmodernism is like a religion ( as religion is defined) with a touch of chaos theory thrown in along with the glorification of our ancestors ,the unreasoning Neanderthals …..
I admit to be far more conservative in my political orientation, but it is reassuring to see even those on the more traditional left standing up against the deconstructionist, pessimistic postmodernist agenda rampant in academia and the media establishment.
Those are some marxist, not sure if you would call them traditional left LOL
Why do you think deconstructionism is pessimistic? Understanding the subjective value of our social systems enables us to change them in a more beneficial way for our society. I don't know mate, but that sounds really positive and hopeful to me.
But then again, you seem to be mistaking post-modernism as a form of nihilism. it says a lot about what your views are that you actually believe the "media estabilishment" is on some post-modern agenda.
@@emmagoldman5382 The current Critique of culture is highly postmodern. The current leftist MSM has that intertwined.
Andrew Penny The modern MSN is predominantly corporate shilling and shallow appeals to the oppressed classes. Do you genuinely think any of them care about these issues? Its all just pandering to an audience that will net them more monetary gains
@@Red_Anon I imagine that they care about power and they will use what ever is convenient to get it. But using destructive tactics is only going to make the world worse. Its not a battle of Pepsi vs Coke anymore its a battle of morality now
I've always thought that postmodernism should be relegated to the fashion and entertainment industries . Postmodernists would not be able to promote and practice their lunacy without the material necessities . the primal screams and absurd behavior of the homeless are coping mechanisms to alleviate temporarily their suffering
Gotta love all these comments of "he's wrong on ___" with no further elaboration. Really contributing to the discussion in a meaningful way guys, verrrry convincing
He's wrong on "postmodernists reject science and rationality" because he doesn't explain how? Or who does it? Or why? And if they do, then why are they wrong?
Lyotard based his work "The Postmodern Condition" on Language Games, an idea by Wittgenstein that became a "method" as well as philosophical basis for later works. The other big idea came from "Knowledge-power nexus" by Focualt. And finally the theory of cybernetics which is becoming a reality in 21st century. I hope that you will also talk about these ideas and if there is anything about it in written or oral form, please let me know.
The postmodernist 'language game' is a way of claiming nothing is truth-apt, which is another way of saying everything is truth-apt, because at the end of the day, they still call for legislation and claim things to be the case but through a subjective or relativist lens. These probabilist tyrants do not say, “nothing is true so there are/can never be rules”, they are far from it, what they actually say and do is more in the lines of “there are no truths, but our theories are more probable/applicable/righteous/egalitarian than yours so they are the case and/so do as we say” and when you question their imposition they say “there are no truths so you can’t question us on the grounds of truth”. They will only argue on the grounds of rationalism (though they claim not to, their a priori games are pure rationalism) and theory because this is a realm that can be manipulated to one’s will. The way of this postmodernist rejection of truth is an exaltation of theory in the face of a claimed impossibility of truth to use rationalism as an excuse to impose arbitrary claims, which in themselves serve the same function as a truth claim would. So in a very sneaky way, they are claiming hidden truths. A truth claim is a pass to claim something “is the case” (argumentative truth) or a pass to legislate (impositional truth), so when these people who claim there aren’t truths claim that something “is the case”, then what they are doing is identical to claiming truths. Thus when they legislate through these “rationalist theories” they are pretty much imposing their hidden truth claims. The value-fact gap is arbitrarily bridged at play here, they secretly claim something is true but then turn around and say “we aren’t saying anything is true, but we are going to impose this because this is the ‘rightest’ of the possibilities” and you turn to them and say “well, there are truths and your ‘right’ doesn’t qualify, they say ‘no there are no truths’ but our theory is right (more probable). They won’t ever argue on the grounds of binary truth, only probabilities and unless you set the logical premise that your concept of truth is binary, you will lose the argument even if you win it. Their metaphysical “fact-value bridge” fluiditises every claim ever made including theirs, but more importantly yours. Hence they use the “materialistic” observations to claim the “rightest” interpretation about feelings, values, power structures, identity, offense, equality, mental states and any suprasensible concept under the sun while claiming that their claims are not truths (neither are yours) but “more right than yours”. The problem is there is an abyssic gap between empirical/materialistic observation and suprasensible claims (mental states, theological claims, aesthetic values, ethical values etc.). Statistics and postulated probabilities are not proof to truth that something was/is or will. There is one other system that uses such an exaltation of an arbitrary framework to impose truth claims and legislation thereof and that is religion. But as we said, while religion claims their bogus truth in an explicit way, the postmodernist/leftist concept of probable truth fallacy is not claimed outright as “truth” but “probability” in a very insidious way gilded by “rationalism”. Yet the implications of their "probability" claims are identical to truth claims.
Very Awesome I am African American and now I understand how Marxism differs from postmodernism. The Body- spaces all that stuff makes more sense micro aggressions no solutions just victims and oppressors. Black Lives Matter seems to conform to the identity politics you describe.
It is important to realize that postmodernism differs from Marxism because Jordan Peterson makes the false ignorant claim that they are the same thing even though it is clearly from this video that they are very different.
Very glad to hear this Michael.
@@albertfromgc5599 post modernism rescued Marxism from the historical toilet where it belongs by redefining crap as economics.
Around 1:00, while reeling off negative attributes of "postmodernists", you mention a seeming obsession with differences. Are you not aware of the connection between many postmodern philosophers with post-structuralism, which was a reaction to structuralism, a philosophical movement which saw the world as being only defined by the ways in which things differ from each other, and how postmodernism as partly a reaction to this philosophical movement must necessarily address those same topics? You seem to discredit your authority on the subject which you are speaking about quite quickly. Derrida even criticized binaries as arbitrary human constructions which create hierarchical differences between things.
Is there any official transcript or prepared text of these remarks? I want to take notes on this critique using something more definitive than the text auto-generated by RUclips.
Excellent.
Thanks for sharing this. Needed it.
Well put, comrade!
Marxist must reject post modernism
It's funny that Roger Scruton had exactly the same critique and associated it with Marxism!
There is much confusion about this and it clearly is deliberate. There is nothing " marxist" about post modernism. That is precisely the point of this video. To put it on its historical context, and bottom line, the 1920S Frankfurt School and then the mid 70s French academic/philosophers who invented post-modernism where desillusioned communist party members or stalinists. Their interpretation of marxism was highy mechanical ( Stalin's revision of marxism and his Two Theories ) and anything but dialectical. The trouble now is that right wing academics such as James Lindsay for instance who are busy debuking the post modernist Radical Critical Theories on gender, race and intersectionaslity etc... are deliberately conflating marxism with post modernism. This is the height of intellectual dishonesty. Helen Pluckrose on the other hand is slightly more honest in that she recognises marxism is about dialectical materialism and has its own metatheory, and is totally separate from Post Modernism. She often qualifies Post Modernism a being " pseudo-marxist ". In other words, this deliberate confusion between marxism and post modernist identity politics serves one purpose and one purpose only: diversion from the environmental and social challenges ahead and accentuate divisions within all forms of real or potential organised opposition to the status quo.
I have not viewed the whole video yet but from your introduction I suspect that you have not provided the context in which Post Modernism arose.
The wake of the World Wars and the failure of Soviet Communism are significant markers and launching points for the Post Modernist discourse.
great stuff
This guy has a very backwards view of Nietzsche's philosophy
fantastic video
I listened to this right after engaging a PoMo adherent. Yep. This pretty much summed up the dialog.
Could you make a video discussing the differences between capitalism and mercantilism?
something to do with who owns the means of production ?
A critical stage in the development of a national bourgeoisie.
I'm not trying to say everything said here is wrong. But, as someone who is a qualified engineer, I don't understand this talk of a 'post-industrial society'. Certainly the idea that we live in a post-industrial world is completely false - as where has all the doubling of the greenhouse effect come from over the last 30 years come from otherwise? And as far as countries like the UK - yes a lot of traditional industry has gone, but still millions of people are having to work their butts off in modern industry, which includes the service sector. There is a shortage of engineers and scientists in the UK - part of the big cry to get more women into stem fields is due to this great shortage. I think the world is more industrialised than it has ever been.
Thanks. Very interesting. I think at times, though, you make a straw man of postmodernism (and liberalism) in a similar way that you claim the postmodernists do to Marxism. Also, you seem to claim that postmodernists are just useful fools for capitalism (or perhaps even knowingly complicit), but then how do you explain that right-wing intellectuals often lump together postmodernism and marxism as if they are almost the same thing? The new flavour of the month, Jordan Peterson, for example, is always ranting about 'post-modernist neo-marxism' as if it actually means something.
One last thing. You are very young, and so you have no personal experience of how classical Marxists tended to look on feminists, anti-racists and gays in the late 60s and 70s. We were basically told not to worry our pretty little heads about our oppression because it would all come right after the revolution. If many of us personally rejected (and still reject) Marxism, it was at least partly because it rejected us.
I was thinking the exact same thing. I agree with most of his critique about the common traits of “postmodernism” (over-emphasization on the subject, discourse, relativity…). Yet, it seems to me he is generalizing and simplifying postmodernists in the same way they do with Marxism. The result is that we end up with “mechanical versions” of each other’s critiques of Capitalism. Also generalizations are unfair, Foucault had a point and he proved it; Baudrillard, Lyotard, Deleuze and Guattari.... had very speculative intuitions based on the works of other people… yes, full of gaps and inconsistencies. What annoys me is the fact that they tried to cover these inconsistencies with arcane language, obscuring more than clarifying the message.
However, I think postmodernism was a necessary step to return to Marx’s dialectics. Feminist theory and Identity politics have taught us to be more multisided analyzing the terms “class”. The social construction of “women”, the importance of reproductive work (totally neglected in Marx’s Capital) and the synergies between colonialism and the capitalist system. So for me it’s not enough to say that Stalin, Mao or Kim il Sung betrayed the true spirit of scientific Marxism, after the experience of these chauvinist versions of socialism we can appeal simultaneously now to the proletarian (as the unifying class) and to the different minorities of the world (as the multidimensionality of class). That is the real dialectic, single and multiple at the same time.
Jordan Peterson is a moron whose statements are contradictory and nonsensical.
You answered your own question. Think about it.
What follows is not a comment on anything else u or the lecturer said (i've only watched ten min); it's meant to be one plausible explanation, which is found throughout history;
it's the Right who make a straw man of Leftist ideas and movements by not only categorizing the most absurd fringes under the same labels (Left/Red/Liberal/Commie/Extremist/Feminist, etc.), but also spending the most time highlighting and attacking the most absurd, including inviting them on their shows to debate while presenting them as representatives of the Left.
The result is the public is presented with caricatures or repugnant individuals as subsitutes for ideas and feelings they may readily agree with (if they had access and understood vs being inundated only by propaganda)
What someone else mentioned is also true; Peterson is often moronic, nonsensical, self-contradictory and inconsistent
@@Izanur3 You absolutely cannot say that Stalin, Mao and Kim Il-sung were chauvinists. Also, how do you Trots think that world revolution would happen? Honestly, history has not shown one single instance of Trotskyism producing results, while several of what you call “chauvinist” socialist countries actually have managed to start the process of building socialism in their countries, some of who survived, others who were overthrown.
I personally believe that trots are so invested in theory that they are disconnected from reality and keep dreaming about their world-revolution, while actual real socialist countries are already paving the path for world socialism.
No arguments were made
Whenever 'Postmodernism' is in a title, be it pro or contra, I don't expect any. Did you?
It strikes me as being very late in 2017 to still be having this conversation, better suited to 1995 perhaps. There are also some wild, wild characterisations of certain movements, though they are of course convenient for the argument.
Hello, is there a french translation of this video? thank you
What about the increasing numbers of people being driven by Capitalism into the ranks of the Lumpenproletariat? Anxiety and its "identical cousin" depression are the illnesses of our age and now the largest causes of disability in the Western world. When "mental illness" is discussed as a sane response to the insanity of Capitalism, you provide a growing multitude an opportunity to find meaning in their struggle against it, a struggle that can be personally empowering and transformative.
The Lumpenproletariat may not hold the most revolutionary potential, but in light of the current situation with the pandemic and what is sure to be the resulting long term socioeconomic ill effects, Socialists who all too often hold a similar but more subtly expressed contempt as their right wing counterparts may want to reassess their attitudes.
Anxiety and mental illnesses are not uniquely the product of our capitalist and/or Western World.
个人感觉后现代主义实质上只是再把希腊那几个哲学家和德国那几个哲学家换个方式再重复一下的“弗兰肯斯坦”，而当下的世界不止这一个弗兰肯斯坦…
Excellent lecture overall. But an extremely biased characterisation of the Communist Party of France. PCF never said the revolution will happen on its own accord and that one doesn't have to do anything. That is, sorry to say, absurd. There was a time when PCF was known as "the party 75,000 martyrs". That's hardly a party that can be described as "doing nothing".
I am not a Marxist but you were the first critics of woke. Well done.
Very interesting. If you or others could comment on a question, I would be appreciative. You critique identity politics in the negative as part of political division and essentially atomization of society. It appears that the foundation of identity politics is the Marxist idea of class struggle between the oppressor and oppressed. Historically, the oppressor and oppressed was essentially the bourgeoisie and the proletariat. The new identity politics takes the same general oppressor and oppressed idea and marries it with Postmodernism to create various classes of the oppressed through intersectionality theory. Generally, the oppressor is characterized a European, or white European, or white male European. From your lecture, it sounds as though you, as a Marxist, reject the appropriation of the class struggle as it is applied to intersectionality based classes of oppression. Is that correct? Or is there a better way to understand your perspective on this topic? Thanks in advance for the thoughts.
Hi!
Comrade from sweden here so not 100 procent sure I understand your question. But if i understand it correctly I would say that yes, marxism rejects the way that intersectionality analyses classtruggle or the classoppression, because it puts it on a moralistic ground.
Marxists are not interested in the workingclass because they are "the most" oppressed, or anyting like that, we are interested of course in how different oppressions work and functions and interrelates, but the working class is of a particular interest because it is the only group that have the power of changing society. When the workingclass strikes society stands still.
tytheherbguy
Marx chose the working class because he thought they had the most potential for effecting a change in social relations.
I don't know if that is still true. One wants to ask: what *is* proletariat now?
That's a great question. What our comrade was referring to was the fact that postmodernism asserts there are massive differences in the oppression different groups experience. Because they are so different anyone from outside of the group doesn't understand what the oppression is like or where it comes from. So how that works out among IdPol groups is a lack of recognition that their struggles are intertwined and a lack of coherent strategy to overcome struggles. Coalition isn't a priority especially when the oppression Olympics (proving who is more oppressed thus more virtuous) begin between groups. But Marxists would argue though there are differences in the oppression they all serve the same purpose: to continue capitalism by dividing the working class. When we recognize how our struggles are interlinked we can then move forward attacking the racist, sexist, queerphobic, and xenophobic structures that harm us all with a coherent socialist program. So there isn't worry about appropriation but that it leads to ineffective organizing by ignoring the overall system that created these other oppressions to begin with.
@@mattgilbert7347 Karl Marx described the early days of industrial capitalism circa 1830s when the vast majority of people were either wage earning factory workers or peasants. In today's society, the vast majority of people in the Westerrn World and key developing countries - such as China - are still wage earners. Just because those wage earners drive a car or have a mortgage does not mean the proletairat has disappeared ! in fact, the opposite is the case. All it takes to expose the precarity of the modernn working class is a financial crash. Remember 2008 ? The next and emerging banking crash is likley to be the last one as there will be no rescue plan this time round from governments and billions of people will face absolute poverty.
@@nicolehaydock554 It's a question of class consciousness.
The lecturer literally does not know what he is talking about.
Also, if you're going to critique something then please at least look it up and ffs please define it prior to critique. There's literally dozens of videos on RUclips by academics defining it quite sensibly.
Doxa, not dogma. Other than that great summing up of woke politics. Thank you for putting this out there.
Please watch "A Critique of Stephen Hicks' "Explaining Postmodernism"", covers a lot of same points.
That book is literally an ignorant caricature.
As soon as he said Nietzsche was a harbinger of Nihilism, I had to stop.
Larry N "seen as being" ... its kinda true.
i like nietzsche, hes no nihilist
That is the position of most nihilists. www.philosopher.eu/texts/nietzsche-nihilism/
Nihilism and belief in objective reality are not mutually exclusive, which postmodernism is, generally makes me respect nihilism more. Maybe I have a biased opinion against postmodernists, I imagine the stereotypical tinfoil hat lunitic who needs constant reassurense the world around them exists, is that how people deal with their late 20's early 30's existential crisis?. It's odd to see my Marxist rivals agreeing with me on how unproductive and useless postmodernism is. Just for the wrong reasons. The enemy of my enemy is my friend.
This is actually an embarrassment. He continues to claim that postmodernists attack straw manned versions of marxism well not even being able to name drop postmodern thinkers accurately. I consider myself a Marxist but if this is the only kind of critique we can offer the postmodern theorists have already won.
Yeah i wish he took it more seriously
towards the end of this, a marxist prof addresses the claims that identify politics is a product of Marxism.
ruclips.net/video/8Mlkj2HS-q4/видео.html
we are saint elmo's fire, goodnight!!!
Someone doesn't understand deleuze lmao
Perhaps there are ways to make postmodernism cogent enough as a concept for a critique of postmodernist thought to be possible- this largely ain't it.
I cannot understand why both side should hate each other.Why both the critique of postmodernism and marxism cannot be right?
Most of this was good, but he fundamentally misundestood Anarchism, he seems to talk about "anarcho" capitalists and hyperindividualism. This is a North American and Western European subversion of anarchist theory, which mostly agrees with communism and socialism in how economics are viewed but disagree on strategy and a fundamental distrust of centralized power (but still believe in solidarity, which is why anarchists fight alongside communists, but the Soviet Communist party would kill off and suppress... and in Stalin's time, alongside other communists). Saying this is anarchism is quite bizarre to me, since it is almost the exact opposite of what anarchists believe fundamentally, and somewhate undermines his very good poits. Otherwise, it was very good.
they only killed off counterrevolutionaries, which came from all political ideologies.
spot fucking on
How can you not turn postmodernist after going through this?
Do you mean how can you NOT turn against Post Modernism after listening to this critique of it ?
First time I agreed with a Marxist
Rex Marx has been defamed and vilified for many many years. Many who identified themselves as his followers committed horrific atrocities and this only served to reinforced the establishment's condemnation of Marx. But when you actually sit down and read Marx for yourself, something most self-styled "Marxists" often never bother to go) you will discover that he a very humane and intelligent revolutionary. He once exclaimed that he, himself, was not a Marxist because he was so exasperated by some of those who claimed his as their intellectual guru. I just happened to come across an article written by Marx in 1861 about the causes underlying the American civil war and I found it extremely sensible and well informed. Marx was a figure who stood in the direct tradition of the Enlightenment and the age of reason.
Steven Yourke Shut the fuck up liberal
@@syourke3 And yet, by some divine coincidence, the very states you claim to have committed "horrific atrocities" were the ones that have been the most successful in alleviating poverty, in producing actual rivals to imperialists around the world, and in actually threatening the power of the bourgeoisie everywhere. It's very typical of western leftists to dictate how Marxism "should be done"
there is no final answer, there is only steerpike assassinating every blob of existence
X-cellent.
I don’t agree with your synopsis of neitzsche
what is life but the longest suicide ssuicide note in history
as the white geese rise
i wonder what's going to happen next
Johann..... (stands for b'ark
Starting out with a total strawman of postmodernism, because we don't have enough of those already.
i just feel like this is a complete misunderstanding, intentional or not, of postmodernism
And i think youre a fucking idiot
@@blktarhero3337 no, she's not. this lecture is extremely half-assed, designed to make the audience feel like they can pretend to have an opinion on things they will never read or engage with seriously. this is why i often call myself a marxist, but i have zero marxist friends because they'll all self-rightous, lazy and impatient with complexity
Mariana M incorrect
I’m not extreme in anyway. I am a Christian but also a union carpenter. I don’t reject in totality socialist ideas. To the extreme and the attempt to take the movement global is what is what I question. Wouldn’t the socialist reject capitalism being spread globally? I’m to tied to the idea of individual liberty. We can decentralize govts and live in smaller groups communities and self govern as we desire. A fundamental American ideal. Which has been all but destroyed by globalization (for lack of a better way of saying it). I wouldn’t want a Marxist/Socialist nor a Fundamental Christian/Muslim/Jewish federal govt in America. The basic principles of freedom in America should continue to be defended so people can be what they want with no dominant ideology beating down the minority ideologies or groups. The freedom to adopt what works for you and your community makes sense. Very complicated to truly analyze the overall picture, so many variables. Academically, everything can sound like a great idea.
This is very interesting, especially coming from someone who looks like a nineteenth century French anarchist. I didn't like the way you skirted over the issue of the so called lumpen proletariat and mental ill health (though post modernist notions on the subject are no doubt bollocks) the left has an unforgivably backward attitude to both of these intertwined issues, and it's one that may cause more problems further down the line than you may imagine... there are models of peer-led communities for addiction issues, ex-prisoners and people with mental health problems, that are both emancipatory and revolutionary... the only reason that I feel that we have to do these things ourselves is due to the almost complete silence of the left on these massive topics, that cross over into so many other inter-connected issues. You create class hegemony by grasping the realities of the broader class, and the lessons we can give you; you alienate us when you expect us to think that striking white colar workers are ever going to understand, or provide, the solutions which we need. Don't expect us to look up to you for leadership when we should be looking across at each other for a broader understanding of our potential as a class.
Articulate Chav Who exactly are you speaking for? The lumpen proletariat, the drug addicts, the convicted criminals, or the mentally ill? Or all of them? And what have these various groups of marginalized people got to do with a discussion about post modernism and Marxism?
^ 1) Steven, he was writing, not speaking. I'd be nitpicking if format did not matter - but, alas, it does - as medium formulates the message (consciously, or not).
2) Several "...."s aside, it is plain enough that he was writing from his P.O.V., as his content is formatted and addressed to the speaker in the video. The hypothetical 'us' used later in AC's paragraph refers to anyone formerly identifying as "of the left", but is now disenfranchised due to (superficially, or not) IdPol. RUclips is, after all, a (relatively) open, however controlled, format.
This chap must learn to respect his opponents when he is trying to indulge in reductio ad absurdum. His critiques should avoid "this must be laughed out of intellectual circles" sort of statements for him to be taken seriously.
I’m confused. Doesn’t the manifesto say that no one worldview should be held above the other? No policy over another, no religion over another, no individual distinctions above another? Correct me if I’m wrong, or give me a counter argument, but this sounds exactly like post modernism. To say that no viewpoint should be held over the other is to say that no one viewpoint is better or more accurate than another, and therefore there is no objective viewpoint. Postmodernism is contradictory, and Marxism is as well, because it claims everyone is the same while at the same time enforcing an overarching system, implying that not everyone is the same, the Marxist’s system is better, and therefore they should have the power to enforce their system.
Marxism is cosplay for these kids. nothing quite as postmodern as enacting the logic of your own scapegoat. this is how capitalism ends. not with a revolution but a simper
the owl of minerva flows beyond the sweet sweep of gulls
the workers of france will unite
so f*cking wot
People really need to stop with this "we need to stop laughing the post modernists and really try to understand them" nonsense.
Them and Anarchists don't deserve that much.
Wouldn't it be "A Marxist Critique" rather than "The Marxist Critique"?
You know nothing about the first Frankfurt school. This was not 'cultural marxism'. Did you learn it from right wing videotubes?? This is a history of ideas done with a metaphorical tank.
cultural marxism actually meant marxist cultural studies before the right wingers applied their own meaning to it
Exactly! Frankfurt school was a critic of the irrational in capitalist "rationality", its even doubtful to put it under postmodernism. IMT have not understand a shit.
It's true that western "Marxists" of the frankfurt school were less interested in the economic aspects of Marx's work. This probably has to do with their adoption of hegelian and kantian idealism and rejection of dialectical materialism. In short, in Marxist terms, they focused less on the base and more in the superstructure.
@@roberthoffenheim7861 The failure of the German Revolution ( 1918-1919 ) might explain why the fundmental revisiom of marxism as developed and implemented by Stalin was possibly inevitable.
3:34 3:49
Nihilism and belief in objective reality are not mutually exclusive, which postmodernism is, generally makes me respect nihilism more. Maybe I have a biased opinion against postmodernists, I imagine the stereotypical tinfoil hat lunitic who needs constant reassurense the world around them exists, is that how people deal with their late 20's early 30's existential crisis?. It's odd to see my Marxist rivals agreeing with me on how unproductive and useless postmodernism is. Just for the wrong reasons. The enemy of my enemy is my friend.
the fuck is "intellectual imperialism"?
without understanding the general laws of nature subconsciously man couldn't have started to produce food through agriculture!?
It's either ironic or revealing that a rare example of someone being able to articulate the thinking behind postmodernism is also someone doing so to underline how much bullshit it is.
For 45 minutes it was very dragging for me but then you finally start describing your own view. As I interpret you, marxism as a big theory is just a framework to research and think about overarching human concepts within which you can productively work and postmodernism as a framework is incredibly dishonest towards itself and therefore useless for working within it. It's fair but then again I could come up with a lot of criticism and among it the most important aspect is the critique of historical materialism
post modernism; stands for private message
Oh, someone said if you scratch a PMist you all too often find a sexual sadist or other pervert seeking legitimization. Oh, what an odd thing to say.
How I read it ( literally too) Postmodernism calls into question the powers of reason, asserts the importance of nonrational forces such as sensations and emotions, rejects humanism and the traditional philosophical notion of the human being as the central subject of knowledge, champions heterogeneity and difference.
“The Postmodernists' tyranny wears people down by boredom and semi-literate prose.”
-Christopher Hitchens
“Hell hath no fury like a coolly received postmodernist.”
-David Foster Wallace, Girl With Curious Hair
Postmodernists get the wall.
You could also just say: "I have never read anything written by the post-structuralists and do not intend to, because I believe that Marxism has all the answers for me."
This.
I'll read them when they directly or indirectly feed, clothe, house, vaccinate, and educate hundreds of millions of people as Marxists have done
@@dogeyes7261 what are you talking about Baudrillard and Foucault have accomplsihed so many things like :
Marxism is called the immortal science for a reason, look at how well it explains things, look at all it has accomplished, post-modernism has just spun its wheels and provided soft approval for the status quo for over half a century.
Why not get specific about what he’s getting wrong and correct it instead of the No True Scotsman act? As someone who all this is totally new to, I’m the kind of person a good counter argument could potentially sway. But if I have to choose between this well articulated takedown and your “nuh uh you’re wrong” and nothing else that’s not much of an alternative
This is an excellent introduction but the optimism at the end was totally misplaced. Far from being a defeat for postmodernism, the Corbyn faction in the Labour Party have been totally captured by postmodernism. Rebecca Long-Bailey endorsed "Trans woman are Women" and the smearing of LGB Alliance as a hate group.
I'd be interested to hear Daniel Morley go a little deeper than this introduction.
They are a hate group
@@jprole8508 LGB Alliance ? Evidence?
Nice balanced take 😒
Post Modern Neo Marxists... 😂😂😂😂
This descends into literal nonsense after about the 9 minute mark, I'd be a little embarrassed as this guy if I knew a video like this of myself were floating around
The first ten min prove this guy doesnt understand post-modernism. Its not am ontological structure to apply, or an ideology to adopt. Its a set of tools used to identify trends and critique or deconstruct ideas, culture, systems, etc.
Then what's an ideology if it's not a set of tools to analyse society, and conversely? The distinction you make seems articficial to me.
Post Modernism rejects any notion of knowledge based science and any attempt to reach some kind of objectivity in understanding history. It stemmed from desillusioned communists following the failure of the 1920's German Revolution followed by twenty long years of Stalinist "revisionism" which ended up with the Germano-Soviet pact of 1939. The very concept of a socially constructed reality has taken us back to Hegel. Time to get back to basics and re discover Karl Marx and Frederick Engels "The German Ideology" ...
france: the greatest country in the world
also the most irelevant
The French Revolution of 1789 ?
This wasn’t a post modern criticism it was a defense of your political position. Why not consider post modernist thoughts from a non dismissive perspective and then talk about a way thats more useful? I dont think you captured post modern thought here, you just talked about how its misused which renders this talk irrelevant and self centered.
Total Rubbish the lot of it. it doesn't work. none of it, by the way, needs to be rubilet from scratch.....
We don't need any philosophy whatsoever; after all Marx said this:
"Feuerbach's great achievement is.... The proof that philosophy is nothing else but religion rendered into thought and expounded by thought, i.e., another form and manner of existence of the estrangement of the essence of man; hence equally to be condemned...." [Marx, 1844 Paris Manuscripts.]
"One has to 'leave philosophy aside'...one has to leap out of it and devote oneself like an ordinary man to the study of actuality.... Philosophy and the study of the actual world have the same relation to one another as onanism and sexual love." [The German Ideology.]
And we certainly don't need 'dialectics', either; here is why:
www.anti-dialectics.co.uk/Why%20I%20Oppose%20DM.htm
Where I I have demolished this theory from a Marxist angle.
I'm pickle rick
@@helmsylvanian Good for you.
You do realize that good ideas don't have to include violence right?
Not even 4 minutes in and we already have this guy throwing out bullshit strawmen
“T-THEY REJECT SCIENCE TM THEY REJECT PROGRESS, REASON AND KNOWLEDGE”
Dysphoria is an imaginary condition and transwomen are human females. Nice one.
Postmodernism is apolitical, Never in postmodernist philosophy does it tell you, your not allowed to push for a Marxist political system, if what you want is a Marxist political system go for it.
Pretty good but there's no such thing as "stalinism," and the idea that there is has been a major success for reaction, more than for any "anti stalinist" left
"The Revolution Betrayed " and "Stalin : An Appraisal of the Man and His Influence " by Leon Trotsky.
Stalinism is a revision of dialectial materialism and internationalism as evidenced with the deeply reactionary and disastrous " Socialism in one country".
Sorry but an overbearing bureaucracy cannot manage an entire economy nor should it, it needs the input of the workers without fear of reprisal. Workers democracy is essential to socialism.
@@nicolehaydock554 both are garbage.
@@knossos574 liberal poppycock
i'm willing to bet he's a leninist
this guy is talking like jordan peterson but with every mention of christianity replaced with marxism
Marx is not God and dialectical materialism is simply a tool of analysis, not a religion.
@@nicolehaydock554 whatever you say
An ism's criticism of another ism. Wow so refreshing these halfwith arguements
I disagree with both philosophies
Wouldn't be the first
Sorry, but Bakunin was 100% correct about the lumpenproletariat. The 1917 and 1949 revolutions are proof that the revolutionary forces do come from the most down-trodden, in this case the peasantry that rose up at a time when both nations were still primarily feudal. It was Marx who was incorrect about it being the workers in an industrialized nation like Germany that would lead the revolution. Was the speaker trying his own post-modernist version of "there's no objective reality"? Nice try with the weak ass smear attempt on Bakunin tho bud!
Lmao yes sure 1917 proving Bakunin right, that must be why the bolsheviks led it and not the anarchists.
@@turtlecraft7996 - The only thing the Bolsheviks lead, was the counter revolution against the real Soviets (made up of collective agricultural councils) that made the revolution possible and a success. The authoritarian Bolsheviks, (in typical Marxist fashion), were simply power hungry political opportunists and charlatans that betrayed the revolution (including Trotsky murdering anarchists in Moscow that had supported the revolution), the moment they saw the opportunity to seize power for themselves and instituted State Capitalism.
That's funny because there were an actual counter-revolutionnary army called the white army that the bolsheviks' red army had to fight during this exact period but hey I guess Makhno had the drip.
@@turtlecraft7996 Makhno fought and defeated the White armies in the Ukraine, helping the Bolsheviks, then the Bolsheviks betrayed him, like every other revolutionary, but nice try. You Marxists and your love of historical revisionism. Re-write the bits you don't like to suit your ideologically driven, authoritarian nonesense.
@@syndicat4847 Well that's up to you if you don't revise your enfantine version of history where Makhno could somehow be an anti-'authoritarian' while a commander of an army in the civil war, and where Lenine and Trotsky were merely 'authoritarian state-capitalists'(if that means anything).
The bolsheviks never persecuted the anarchists for being anarchists, but rather only when there were a threat to the revolution. Makhno's army was basically formed by peasants who wanted to fight against the grain requisitions, and I think it's obvious enough why these grain requisitions were vital for the survival of the revolution.
Call it a betrayal, but taking down Makhno's army was a question of life or death.
Odd set of imprecise smug generalisations, peppered with the buzz words of a tired Marxist discourse. It reminded me of my student days, when some privileged self aggrandised middle class cadre, like this young man, spoke earnestly and reverently about the imminent revolution, and angrily railed against the threat that my “bourgeois” education represented. This guy is a parody of himself, with his nostalgic posters contextualising his pseudo Trotsky appearance, with that vague hint of bewilderment that anyone could have the temerity question a philosophy such as his: a philosophy which was forged in the class struggle of the late 19th century, but was already largely irrelevant by the early 20th Century, but regardless insinuated itself on Russia, China and North Korea et al, wherein its revolutionary adherents embraced genocide, police states, the actual and real oppression of the working class. This guy’s a clown, and an intellectual fraud. His attack on postmodernism is imprecise, poorly referenced, (the first 20 min aligning post modernism with a whole range of thinkers who “were not post-modernists”. When he finally arrives at Lyotard, he misrepresents the argument for cheap laughs for his “right on” champagne socialist audience. Pathetic, truly pathetic. In the West, Marxism, as a political creed, was out manoeuvred by the right in the 70’s and 80’s, when the proletariat were seduced into home ownership, zero hours contracts, share ownership et al in the age of Thatcher and Reagan. Their is no “socialist appeal” and the capitalist end game grinds on with them and the argument of zealots like this, as an anachronistic irrelevance, still “celebrating” the October revolution. Rant over.