Theos-Talk Archives (April 1997 Message tl00143)

Titus Roth wrote:

> Sometimes we are so used to a truth being used for some nefarious agenda that
> the truth and the agenda become confused with one another. We then avoid
> speaking about it and become "politically correct".

	Over the last several months, I have been doing some additional
research, which has only reinforced my opinion that "political
correctness" is inherently untheosohpical.

	In the late 19th century, a philosophy called "postmodernism" was
created. It started out as a method of criticism of the written word.
Based on the fact that nobody is truly objective, it was used to analyze
writings and recognize where the prejudices lay. But, like a child given
a hammer, the postmodernists started applying their philosophy on
everything. And, although a hammer is a very useful tool, applying it to
a dirty window to make it clearer is not a useful solution. And although
postmodernist thinking is a useful tool for things with clear
subjectivity, the lower the amount of subjectivity involved, the less
useful it becomes. Yet, many postmodernists feel that even if every iota
of objective evidence says one thing, it can still be wrong. One
philosopher, Jacques Derrida, theorized that what we consider objective
is actually the result of arbitrary constructs of language, and that for
every aspect of what we consider objective reality, there is another,
equally valid aspect that has been quashed by a tyrannical majority.

	The key to all this is the belief that we create our own reality. In
Communism, the concepts of postmodernism became integrated into the
political system. Communism was the ideal system of government,
therefore those living under a communist system were living ideal lives.
To say, or even imply otherwise was therefore politically incorrect.
Because Lysenko's genetics were more in keeping with Communist politics
than Mendel's, Lysenko's genetics were made the basis of agricultural
policy in the Soviet Union. This caused disasterous crop failures in the
Ukraine. Hundreds of thousands of people starved to death in the most
fertile area in the world, in the name of "political correctness".

	The ideas have even been applied to science and mathematics. 2 + 2 = 4
is not a mathematical fact, but a burden that the Eurocentric male puts
on the community at large. In truth, 2 + 2 can equal anything. In
radical postmodernist philosophy, there is no such thing as expertise.
One person's opinion is as good as another's, regardless of training.
Those who go to school to learn science are chumps. Of course, I would
like to see a postmodernist go off a cliff in a plane that was designed
by an untrained engineer who used her "intuition" to design the plane.
Yet, in modern education, we have systems in place that place intuition
at a higher level than knowledge, in the name of "self-esteem".

	What this all comes down to is that radical postmodernism, and
political correctness in particular, comes from not just that we create
our own reality, but that reality is a creation of the EGO. And
therefore the individual ego is the most important aspect of reality.

	Now, certainly, theosophy allows for individual beliefs. But I would
also daresay that the overwhelming majority of theosophists would
consider any theory of reality that considers the ego precedent to be
inherently untheosophical.

	Bart Lidofsky