INTELLECTUALS & THE DIVISION OF LABOR--SARTRE ET AL

[kenneth.mackendrick]

Ralph writes:
... some time ago I discerned a two-stage process in the history of 
bourgeois thought.  The first stage is the triumphant, self-confident 
march of REASON, where rationality is identified with the existing or 
a rising order, and the intellectual has utmost confidence in himself 
as the arbiter of reason.  The second, decadent stage comes when 
the intellectual recognizes that brute force and not reason rules the 
world, and then he does an about-face, mortifying his intellect, and 
masochistically denigrating the very capacity that he has made his 
business to build up.  This is a peculiarly intellectual 
anti-intellectualism....  Existentialism is one outstanding example of 
this stage of decline, which is where Sartre enters the picture, 
following the arch-criminal Heidegger.  (Postmodernism is
> another example).

I take it from this post that what you hate about postmodernism, 
heidegger, and french intellectuals in general is an apparent 
denigration of reason.  However your sweeping statements about 
postmodernism certainly do not do justice to the diversity of writers 
on the subject - as do your comments about existentialism and 
heidegger.  I'm not defending postmodernism, heidegger, or "french" 
intellectualism (whatever the hell that might be) but would simply like 
you to further expand on what makes these "criminals" so criminal?
ken