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I'm so sick of postmodernism -- I know anybody reading this journal is probably sick of my being sick of PoMo.
Today I read a particularly vile piece of trash called "'Singing Our Way Out of Darkness': Findley's Anti-Censorship Argument in Headhunter." It's a Postmodern treatment of it, and I've never seen the Postmodern hypocrisy laid more bare.
Starting with Stanley Fish's book there's No such thing As Free Speech, and It's a Good thing, too, Mark Cohen makes a typically PoMo assault on "liberal values" (Linda Hutcheon, bearer of the sacred flame of Postmodernism since Michel Foucault died, takes "liberal values" as one of her favourite targets as well).
From the conclusion:
Honestly, does censorship ever work? Canada's gay and lesbian bookstores are being eaten up by the cancer that is Canada Custom's obscenity rules -- rules supported by academics who suggested certain kinds of books were harmful. Has the banning of hate literature actually stopped hatred? Did the fatwa on Salman Rushdie bring an end to his career? How many people had never heard of Rushdie before the Ayatollah dropped the world's biggest bit of advertising into his lap?
And why is it that so many of my favourite books always make those 100-most-challenged books lists?
On another subject, I was still hoping for a bit of feedback on this paragraph, here. It's a protected entry, so you have to be logged on to see it...
Today I read a particularly vile piece of trash called "'Singing Our Way Out of Darkness': Findley's Anti-Censorship Argument in Headhunter." It's a Postmodern treatment of it, and I've never seen the Postmodern hypocrisy laid more bare.
Starting with Stanley Fish's book there's No such thing As Free Speech, and It's a Good thing, too, Mark Cohen makes a typically PoMo assault on "liberal values" (Linda Hutcheon, bearer of the sacred flame of Postmodernism since Michel Foucault died, takes "liberal values" as one of her favourite targets as well).
From the conclusion:
An overly rigid adherence to an absolute anti-censorship position is what causes liberals, often to their own consternation and clearly to the detriment of their societies, to support the right to free expression of the most heinous of hate-mongers and pornographers. As with most difficult moral issues in our society, the blind application of principle must give way to judgement. Judgement based on tests [Whose tests? Cohen's?], such as the one measuring the risk of harm [How do you measure the harm caused by a book? Maybe if it's thrown...], should be exercised in order to draw lines in a wise manner across a spectrum of menace.Well, Cohen, you've convinced me. I'm going to start going out and burning books right now. Starting with all your work. And Fish's. And Foucault's...
Honestly, does censorship ever work? Canada's gay and lesbian bookstores are being eaten up by the cancer that is Canada Custom's obscenity rules -- rules supported by academics who suggested certain kinds of books were harmful. Has the banning of hate literature actually stopped hatred? Did the fatwa on Salman Rushdie bring an end to his career? How many people had never heard of Rushdie before the Ayatollah dropped the world's biggest bit of advertising into his lap?
And why is it that so many of my favourite books always make those 100-most-challenged books lists?
On another subject, I was still hoping for a bit of feedback on this paragraph, here. It's a protected entry, so you have to be logged on to see it...
