The wood cricket does not like water. However, something unusual happens when one eats the Gordian worm's egg. The egg hatches, producing a parasitic infection that alters the makeup of the cricket's brain, causing the cricket, which is naturally opposed to water, to jump into the water and drown itself, allowing the worm to escape into the water, mate, and reproduce.
Postmodernism is the Gordian worm of rational and logical thought. Once embraced, the postmodern worldview creates a distaste for facts, belief consistency, reason, and science.
Modernism is the belief that fact and absolute truth exist and are discoverable. Contrariwise, postmodernism is the belief that fact and truth are the domain of the individual and, therefore, never absolute and always fluid.
Modernism says, "I can look through the window into the yard, observe nature, and come to certain conclusions about what I see and what exists." This was the age of empiricism.
Postmodernism says, "I can look through the window into the yard, observe nature, but there are discolorations and irregularities of which I am unaware; therefore, I can't be certain about or what is true." This is the age where belief contradictory to evidence and fact is allowed and defended.
To put it simply, modernism says 1+1 equals 2, and postmodernism says, "1+1 is not necessarily two. It might be 3. What do you think?"
During the age of modernity, society, civilization, invention, industry, education, technology, civil rights, women's rights, human rights and more advanced and thrived. It taught us to value free speech, liberty, academic autonomy, free enterprise, justice, human dignity, equal opportunity, and undeniable fact. It was not an age of perfection but a season of significant progress.
During this new era of postmodernism, with its aggressive rejection of truth and logic, all the above has been stunted and, in some instances, reversed. Thought police have passed laws to legislate speech at the loss of free speech. Now, personal feelings matter more than fact or truth.
Geert Wilders, one of the most popular politicians in the Netherlands, was charged with proposing an end to 'non-Western immigration" – labeled the crime of 'group insult' against Islam. His offending remarks were made in response to a direct question about what his party would do in its first days in office. In his defense strategy, Mr. Wilders submitted a list of 18 witnesses. The Amsterdam court rejected 15 of them. Are you shocked? Mark Steyn states, "It's easier to make the rules up as you go along." What the spokesperson for the Openbaar Ministerie (prosecutor's office) said was shocking. "It is irrelevant whether Wilders's witnesses might prove Wilders's observations to be correct. What's relevant is that his observations are illegal." [i]
Geert Wilders crime was telling the truth! I guess in the postmodern world, silence is golden.
Under postmodernism, social agenda trumps human dignity. Instead of fighting for the life of the unborn, the fight is for the mother's choice to abort the unborn, labeled as 'reproductive rights.'
Peer into the human resource departments, employment agencies, and staff hiring meetings and listen. The question isn't who is most qualified. The conversation is no longer about equal opportunity but equal outcomes.
To say such things, although true, is to risk the outrage of others. This is why censorship by social media platforms is applauded, and Elon Musk (an unapologetic advocate for free speech) is hated.
Is it any wonder our postmodern world is saturated with violence and frustration? When the tongue is shackled, the soul is grieved. Embracing postmodernism has created a world "warped by outrage and resentment."[ii]
Universities, which should be bastions of free speech and the free exchange of ideas without fear of threat, are not. As Sad Gaad, a Canadian marketing professor at the John Molson School of Business at Concordia University, says, "domains that should be reserved for the intellect are (now) … retreats for the emotionally fragile."[iii] Outrage against opposing ideas has become the norm. There is no dialogue, only demands to ban and cancel.
Steven Pinker, Johnstone Family Professor of Psychology at Harvard University, writes: "Universities ought to be the arena in which political prejudice is set aside and open-minded investigation reveals the way the world works. But just when we need this disinterested forum the most, academia has become more politicized as well—not more polarized, but more left-wing."[iv]
Pinker says that postmodernism has degraded academia so much that empirical inquiry has become nearly impossible, stating, "The leftward swing of social psychology has compromised the quality of research." [v]
I hope that you will notice I am not quoting Christians. My resources are not talking heads within my echo chamber. This corruption of knowledge, study, thought, logic, and reason is noticeable to anyone not wearing blinders.
Look closely at the makeup of the groups and agencies crying for diversity. Their beliefs and values are shockingly homogenous. Every chorus they sing is in unison. Creative thought is only allowed within their approved boundaries; therefore, the intellect of the adherent is limited. As John Stuart Mill said, "He who knows only his own side knows little of that."
Critical Theory and postmodernism's push against empiricism, science, and obvious fact hasn't made the world safer or happier. Instead, they are turning the world back into a more dangerous one. "Genocide and autocracy were ubiquitous in premodern times, and they decreased"[vi] in the era of modernity. Postmodernism is rapidly erasing the advances of civility that were gained in modernity.
We live in a transition where what has been believed now conflicts with what is believed. It is an unholy marriage.
Modernism is the bride, and postmodernism is the sociopathic groom who is engaged in the grandest game of gaslighting history has ever known.
Watch how this groom reacts when he is told that science has proven there are only two genders.
Notice the condescending arrogance and mockery he expresses when told that one may change and alter one's appearance, but gender is an unchangeable reality. No one born with a X chromosome has or will ever give birth.
Observe the response when his wife says, "The most qualified should be hired regardless of ethnicity or gender."
Listen to him justify the October 7 attack of Hamas with the wave of a hand while beating his fist on the table, condemning Israel's defensive response as genocide.
He speaks of concern for children worldwide with feigned compassion and furrowed brows. Still, he says nothing against the mutilation of America's children at the hands of the transgender community.
He does not see his illogic. He does not believe he is wrong. He is convinced he is right, and he thinks his wife is ignorant, hateful, stupid, and ill-informed because she disagrees.
I am not transgender, but I am that wife.
[i] Steyn, Mark. “The Absurd Trian of Geert Wilders,” Macleans’, February 18, 2010, https://www.macleans.ca/general/%20/the-absurd-trial-of-geert-wilders/. (accessed 8/12/2024)
[ii] Saad, Gad. The Parasitic Mind: How Infectious Ideas Are Killing Common Sense (p. XII). Skyhorse Publishing. Kindle Edition.[ii]
[iii] Saad, Gad. The Parasitic Mind: How Infectious Ideas Are Killing Common Sense (p. 27). Skyhorse Publishing. Kindle Edition.
[iv] Pinker, Steven. Enlightenment Now: The Case for Reason, Science, Humanism, and Progress (p. 372). Penguin Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.
[v] Pinker, Steven. Enlightenment Now: The Case for Reason, Science, Humanism, and Progress (p. 373). Penguin Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.
[vi] Pinker, Steven. Enlightenment Now: The Case for Reason, Science, Humanism, and Progress (p. 397). Penguin Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.
Comments