Pseudo-science
Sweden has in the past year had the honor of experiencing the birth of a feminist party, Feminist Initiative (FI). Last week they held their annual meeting, at which was decided who was going to represent the party in next fall's elections. Some members suggested that having a party leader was a sign of masculine hierarchical oppression, and opted for a completely flat organization. In the end, a compromise was reached where 3 women share the role of party representatives. One of them is the old leader of the reformed communist party, who was kicked out of that party because of tax evasion.
As an outside observer, it is sometimes quite fascinating to watch what the media captures of the inner workings of the supposedly inclusive FI. This weekend, after a long debate it was decided that the party should not work for the total abolition of gender as a concept, but should work for abolishing marriage, since it was too normative in the heterosexual and monogamous sense. Allowing relationships with several people of the two as of yet still existing sexes would be an important step in removing the oppression of the current system, that forces men and women to live as couples.
Although it was perhaps not a necessary consequence of forming a feminist party, the fact is that today's FI has been captured by post-Marxists and postmodernists. There is a strong academic presence in the party, both in terms of proposed policies, and as regards the occupational choice of influential members. These include scholars from various disciplines, such as comparative literature, gender science (sic!) and queer theory. The theoretical framework that unites these various scholars is based on the a priori assumption that gender, as well as other roles within society, are exclusively socially constructed, and that it is thus possible for a political force to deconstruct the role and somehow free individuals from the constraints that these various roles create.
Apart from the disturbing political conclusion on the part of FI's feminists - that these roles are socially binding on an individual level, and that thus change can only come about through collective action on a structural level, e.g. through changes in legislation - the legitimacy that FI wants to create by adhering to academic theory shows well what happens when academic or scientific credence is given to dubious theory. The epistemology and ontology of FI's feminism has continuously been disproved. Individuals are not only products of social conditioning, but create their own condition in a continuous feedback process between outside and historical constraints and individual creativity and intention. However, the methodological collectivism underlying FI's policy making disregards this completely, and consequentially, FI can claim with a straight face that gender could somehow be completely deconstructed as a concept.
It is popular among Swedes to express a slightly patronizing worry when speaking of the adherents of creationism and intelligent design in the US debate. How can these religious fundamentalists have so much power over the political debate, when their claims are patently unscientific and absurd? The space given to FI in Swedish media shows that Sweden is far from immune from these tendencies of anti-reason based on a priori assumptions of human nature without empirical support. The question is, what is worse? Forcing children to study manmade stories of how a supreme being beyond man's understanding created everything of value, or forcing children to disregard all aspects of physics, biology, chemistry, economics, philosophy and history, and teach them that everything about them is a result of conditioning that has been decided upon through the political process? For me, both seem to be pretty terrifying prospects.
As an outside observer, it is sometimes quite fascinating to watch what the media captures of the inner workings of the supposedly inclusive FI. This weekend, after a long debate it was decided that the party should not work for the total abolition of gender as a concept, but should work for abolishing marriage, since it was too normative in the heterosexual and monogamous sense. Allowing relationships with several people of the two as of yet still existing sexes would be an important step in removing the oppression of the current system, that forces men and women to live as couples.
Although it was perhaps not a necessary consequence of forming a feminist party, the fact is that today's FI has been captured by post-Marxists and postmodernists. There is a strong academic presence in the party, both in terms of proposed policies, and as regards the occupational choice of influential members. These include scholars from various disciplines, such as comparative literature, gender science (sic!) and queer theory. The theoretical framework that unites these various scholars is based on the a priori assumption that gender, as well as other roles within society, are exclusively socially constructed, and that it is thus possible for a political force to deconstruct the role and somehow free individuals from the constraints that these various roles create.
Apart from the disturbing political conclusion on the part of FI's feminists - that these roles are socially binding on an individual level, and that thus change can only come about through collective action on a structural level, e.g. through changes in legislation - the legitimacy that FI wants to create by adhering to academic theory shows well what happens when academic or scientific credence is given to dubious theory. The epistemology and ontology of FI's feminism has continuously been disproved. Individuals are not only products of social conditioning, but create their own condition in a continuous feedback process between outside and historical constraints and individual creativity and intention. However, the methodological collectivism underlying FI's policy making disregards this completely, and consequentially, FI can claim with a straight face that gender could somehow be completely deconstructed as a concept.
It is popular among Swedes to express a slightly patronizing worry when speaking of the adherents of creationism and intelligent design in the US debate. How can these religious fundamentalists have so much power over the political debate, when their claims are patently unscientific and absurd? The space given to FI in Swedish media shows that Sweden is far from immune from these tendencies of anti-reason based on a priori assumptions of human nature without empirical support. The question is, what is worse? Forcing children to study manmade stories of how a supreme being beyond man's understanding created everything of value, or forcing children to disregard all aspects of physics, biology, chemistry, economics, philosophy and history, and teach them that everything about them is a result of conditioning that has been decided upon through the political process? For me, both seem to be pretty terrifying prospects.
posted by Hugin at 23:30
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