The statement: "It is, for instance, pretty suicidal for embattled minorities
to embrace Michel Foucault, let alone Jacques Derrida. The minority view was
always that power could be undermined by truth" implies a view of power in
which power is something separate from and opposed to "minorities", who
(as a reward for their powerlessless) have access to "truth" -- which,
as we're all supposedly know, is either coextensive with Goodness (which, in
turn, is coextensive with meekness and not mucking with power) or Goodness'
reward. But this "minority truth", if it is worth anything, is just as much
tied to power, the will to power, as any "official" truth. Ryan's (or Sokal's)
view is the one that F himself summarizes in LCP: "Popular movements, on the
other hand, are said to arise from famines, taxes, or unemployment; and
they never appear as the result of a struggle for power, as if the masses
could dream of a full stomach but never of exercising power." In this view,
truth appears as something to consume, an apple offered by the goodness of
Nature for the thirsty tourist, uncultivated by the human hand and having
no part in any human struggles, except to occasionally embarrass those who
are Evil because they wield power. These views, as "serious" social ideas,
are laughable, in a manner that owes nothing to the existence of Foucault,
let alone Derrida. I think they would be just as laughable to, say, Marx.
-m
to embrace Michel Foucault, let alone Jacques Derrida. The minority view was
always that power could be undermined by truth" implies a view of power in
which power is something separate from and opposed to "minorities", who
(as a reward for their powerlessless) have access to "truth" -- which,
as we're all supposedly know, is either coextensive with Goodness (which, in
turn, is coextensive with meekness and not mucking with power) or Goodness'
reward. But this "minority truth", if it is worth anything, is just as much
tied to power, the will to power, as any "official" truth. Ryan's (or Sokal's)
view is the one that F himself summarizes in LCP: "Popular movements, on the
other hand, are said to arise from famines, taxes, or unemployment; and
they never appear as the result of a struggle for power, as if the masses
could dream of a full stomach but never of exercising power." In this view,
truth appears as something to consume, an apple offered by the goodness of
Nature for the thirsty tourist, uncultivated by the human hand and having
no part in any human struggles, except to occasionally embarrass those who
are Evil because they wield power. These views, as "serious" social ideas,
are laughable, in a manner that owes nothing to the existence of Foucault,
let alone Derrida. I think they would be just as laughable to, say, Marx.
-m