INTELLECTUALS, reason & al.

[kenneth.mackendrick]

Ralph,

As always your thoughts are provocative... but really - "this crap about critical 
theory being male, or was it white and male, this is all p.c. foolishness..." and your 
disregard for possible theological strains in critical theory really demonstrate 
something insidious.  Despite your earlier disdain for Richard Rorty you seem 
fairly hell bent on repeating his mistakes: You wrote - "When you have something 
to acomplish and know where you are going, you're not afraid to take a stand or 
worry about the inevitable incompleteness of human understanding as an excuse 
for shying away from bold declarative statements."  Come on.  Have we learned 
nothing from Horkheimer's critique of pragmatism?  The critique of ideology is 
perhaps THE foremost theoretical-practical tasks before us!!!  Let us not forget that 
changing the way the world is also involves in changing the way we think.  This 
so-called idle prattle that sets you off is terribly important - the conscious 
self-critique of reason demands it (ie. the enlightenment must question itself, 
perform an immanent critique if you will, of itself and our pedagogical relation to it). 
 If we don't learn our lessons now, and learn them quickly, about how ideas 
influence our actions and dictate our thoughts, then all could be lost - perhaps all is 
already lost.  The relentless tirade that you console yourself with - attacking the 
hackademics and tearing down the ivory towers - and saving the students of 
america on-intellectual-line is a laudible one - but not one that should be tackled at 
the ignorance and expense of other worthwhile pursuits - like the detection of 
bullshit (which it seems your razor-radar has pinpointed in france) within critical 
and hegelian-marxian theory itself.  The discussions concerning class, race, 
sexuality, gender, religion, theology, etc. within the thoughts of the Frankfurt School 
theorists is important - especially if this stuff is going to be appropriated for other 
purposes.  The final word must not be the final word.

And sure, I'm keeping my sense of humour - I'll bite my words when my words 
have unfairly bitten and i admit my comments are often somewhere in close 
proximity to mars (with the divine probe) - but i'm just trying to carve my way in the 
world without drawing too much blood.

cheers buddy,
ken