All this talk of Jim Davidson and Carry On Camping is skirting around the really shocking example of racism as humour, which was Love Thy Neighbour.

Music has sucked for the past 15 years, and Rock n Roll is dead. DAMN YOU PC!!

You kids and your computer games and youtubez are wot did it.

(Though it may have become exhausted in any case. Exhibit A: the stadium filling rock ordinaire of Foo Fighters).

If I'm picking a hill to die on it's not going to be defending Carry On films. But I like the occasional bit of very silly comedy (mostly the old spoofs like Airplane), and I think they have some redeeming features. Mostly I think they serve the point well as to how times have changed. It's not that you can't make jokes or controversial material, it's more that the general attitudes towards women in something like the Carry On series rightfully make people pretty uncomfortable. Portraying those attitudes as normal doesn't work because they very much aren't.

The early black-and-white Carry On films -- in particular Sergeant, Nurse, Teacher and Cabby -- are all right and still stand up well. The later colour films are crude and unfunny. (Except for that one famous line in Cleo which was simply lifted from a '50s radio show written by Muir and Norden and therefore doesn't count.)

Sure, there's certainly a difference, although many people engaged in the study of those topics also consider themselves to be activists. Also, if you find the distinction important than you should find Lind's argument pretty flawed. There's also of course a wide range of ways in which people try to translate ideas into political action.

First, I'm not sure which discipline or "study" you're referring to specifically, but the major social science disciplines are all about 150 years old, give or take. Certain theoretical ideas like "intersectionality" are newer, of course. I don't see any reason to be more skeptical of newer ideas though.

Second, I disagree that there's been no criticism of the social sciences, although it's not clear what you mean by "valid". There's been tremendous amounts of criticism both within the discipline and from outside of it. Criticism and argumentation is what academics do, especially within their own disciplines. An enormous amount of research is concerned either with testing someone's ideas or actively trying to refute them.

Third, with regard to the "Truth vs Social Justice" argument that Haidt makes, there's actually an enormous amount of literature in the social sciences (especially anthropology and sociology) that deals with this problem, going back more than 100 years. See for example Max Weber on Value-Free research. Usually this debate is caste as one between "Science as a value-neutral search for objective truth" and the problem of the researcher's existing values, judgements, and perspective. Feminist authors in sociology also discuss this topic. So, I think Haidt is certainly right that there are potential issues, but you'd be wrong to assume that the disciplines in question ignore them. I also disagree with his conclusion that it's not possible to value both "Truth" and "Social Justice" as organizing principles. The pitfalls he lists are problematic just as much for the researcher who claims to prioritize "Truth" (or Science) as the one who prioritizes activism. It's not as if only social justice advocates bring their personal values with them when they do research.

Fourth, I also think it's a mistake to conflate the fact that there are relatively few Republicans (or conservatives in the usual American meaning of the word) with the idea that there is a lack of ideological diversity or internal criticism. There's lots of disagreements, lots of different theoretical approaches, different conclusions, and plenty of argumentation. Ideological diversity doesn't reduce to measuring party affiliation.

That said, it's perfectly reasonable to ask why there are relatively few political conservatives in the social sciences. It's not reasonable to assume that the answer to the question is epistemic closure within the disciplines, or a general unwillingness to tolerate views that diverge from the mainstream consensus of the discipline.

I'll make an analogy which is imperfect and requires careful qualification, but which I think is useful. Compare this question about the relative lack of political conservatives in social science to a question about the relative lack of theists among scientists:

The belief rates are lowest among physicists and astronomers. We could hypothesize that a part of the difference in belief between physicists and the general public is that membership in the community of physicists includes social pressure towards dis-belief, just like we can hypothesize that the lack of political conservatives in social science is a result of social pressure within the group. I think any sociologist would tell you that this plays some role. To some extent it's built into secondary socialization and group dynamics as processes.

But, in both cases group membership is self-selecting. People choose to become physicists, or to become sociologists. I think you would agree that part of the explanation for the lack of theists among physicists is that physics as a discipline, and the body of knowledge that it maintains, is simply more likely to attract atheists, or at least people who are not traditional Christians, and that this doesn't mean physicists are just too close-minded to embrace theists. Rather, it's that the basic data and organization of the discipline is a challenge to a lot of traditional religious beliefs. Now, sociology is not physics, especially in the fact that the data and theories of sociology involve more subjectivity than a physics model. That is an important qualification to this analogy. But I'd suggest that the best objective data and theory in the discipline is a challenge to a lot of the ideology of political conservatism, especially the belief in individualism and meritocracy. Conservatives are less likely to become sociologists (or to remain conservatives if they do!) in large part because the scientific body of knowledge in the discipline challenges that ideology, just like the scientific body of knowledge in physics is a challenge to traditional religion. This doesn't mean that social scientists can never be guilty of living in a bubble, or being too dismissive of opposing views, or any other intellectual sins, but it does mean, in my opinion, that Haidt needs a stronger argument to support a claim that this is what has happened.

This is just an incredibly stupid statement.

Like (a) art can't exist outside the MSM, (b) the MSM needs a "safe space" away from protests and boycotts.

It's like M.Gibson couldn't get his Jesus movie green lighted by the MSM because of protests and threats of boycotts. We'll never know how that art would have turned out... oh, wait, he made it anyway !!!1! You're ****ting me... never mind. LMFAO !!!1!

WN, I'm not sure Haidt's arguments are how you've rephased them, [edit: or mine, for example, I didn't say there is no criticism, or that the issues regarding political diversity were ignored], or that he would dispute much of the self selecting that goes on in the social sciences, but he probably would disagree with the diversity of criticism it permits, especially over the past 30 or so years, since the diversity gap has skyrocketed in the field.

More to the point are the fields informing social justice, at least those that have been most influential to the movement of late, Critical Theory* and offshoots like Critical Race Theory. Would you dispute this is one of the most important set of ideals behind the social justice movement today? Is it not fairly young in both academic study (almost all of wiki's references are less than 30 years old, but I realize that could be meaningless) and newly being promoted by activists to reform the system politically?


* on a side note, wiki dates critical theory back to 1930's as Marxian, there's that guy again.

I don't know what you mean by the "diversity of criticism it permits", but I'd suggest that the widening of the gap over the last 30 years has as much to do with polarization of political ideology as it does academics becoming more stridently ideological. Note that plenty of academics have always been stridently ideological :P Anyway, I agree with him that diversity is valuable and I certainly don't think that social science departments should be intolerant of conservatives. But I think his analysis of lack of diversity as a problem is pretty exaggerated.

Critical theories are fairly prominent but not exclusively so, and I think a lot of the most commonly known theoretical ideas associated with social justice are not really specific to critical race theory per se. "White privilege", for example, is certainly an idea critical race theorists embrace but I don't think it really originates or is based specifically in CRT, and again not in any way that meaningfully depends on the "Marxism" of the Frankfurt school. Everyone borrows ideas from everyone else.

As a general rule, it's good practice to cite recent work over older work, unless you're specifically discussing intellectual history for a reason. Especially for anything relating to empirical data. The age of citations doesn't tell you much about the length of time over which ideas developed. I also still don't see why activists relying on modern theoretical ideas is somehow worse than them relying on older theoretical ideas. Also, people have been trying to reform the political system for a lot more than 30 years. There are new ideas, and old ideas, and new ways of framing arguments, and old ways of doing so.

Wait, mongidig thinks crybaby liberals were the people putting the cuffs on Lenny Bruce?

Point being, the combination of not having been studied very long, (looks like CRT got started in the 80's: http://www.habermas.org/critraceth01bk.htm) along with it being primarily "advanced by a group of progressive, often liberal and sometimes Marxist jurists," makes it sound like any criticisms have't really had much time or occasion to filter through the full political spectrum, or even close to the center of American political thought.

So such strident advocacy of it's primary tenets sort of seem faddish to me, and more to the point, they seem to be coming out of far left field to practically everyone who hears about them for the first time by some activist screaming at him about his "white male privilege."

Can you not see how those things combined (ie, unknown bizarre concepts to most people combined with them not necessarily being all that, well, true*) seemingly being forced down the public's throat with public shaming could work together to form all sorts of bizarre backlashes, trolls and even help to add momentum to counter-movements like the alt-right?

* I figure you'll hit me on this, but I don't know how else to phrase it. Well vetted? Well accepted?

I will comment on only the above.

What kind of diversity? I assume this would entail the type of concepts, conjectures, and hypotheses that are promulgated by the various social science departments that are then submitted for testing and research and also submitted for grant money from various government agencies and/or granting institutions. If this is so then a preconceived bias is always inherent and the political leanings and affiliations of the scientists may have a profound effect on the whole process. This can be a problem; whether person X has exaggerated this problem or not is an open question.

And in case others do not know the whole grant money process usually goes through a peer-review process, to see if it qualifies for research or how much funding should be granted. Especially through the NSF, for example. There is a whole board of money dealers that must be satisfied. In academic parlance the good old boy network has much influence. Having submitted grants myself, I am at least somewhat familiar with the process (for the physical sciences, anyway). It is impossible, humans being what they are, that the process is without bias, and insider shenanigans. The degree that this influences science and research can be substantial and is somewhat hidden, especially from the public.

Well, I'm pretty sure this is something social scientists could study. Take a buncha undergrads, split them up into halves... one half are the persuaders, one half are their targets. Split the persuaders into subgroups. Some subgroups use technique A ("forced down the target's throat"), some subgroups use technique B (whatever isn't that). Rinse & repeat... see if there is a statistically significant whatever.

Until somebody does that, you're talking out your ass. What you are doing is to presume to give tactical advice to IRL activists. You're also being terribly patronizing. You're telling folks that you know how to do their shiz better than they do themselves. All this from a background of ignorance, typing away on your smart-phone.

Of ideas. Viewpoints. Biographical background (on the basis of ideas from standpoint theory).

Absolutely. It is a problem. Not just with political affiliation but with all kinds of preconceptions tied up with the cultural and intellectual background of researchers. And not just for social science departments, or researchers concerned with social justice activism. You can relate all this back to Kuhn's idea of theory-laden observation, even. Good scientific methodologies (here especially in social science) should try to acknowledge this problem and consider how to mitigate it.

It's almost certainly a matter of opinion that can't be resolved definitively, but I've only offered my opinion and tried to justify it.

This sounds like a sincere thought, but I'm only offering some hypotheses here that will most certainly be proven wrong, or incomplete. They were formed from reading and observations of all sorts of "regular" people who say the same things. I'm glad you're here. You seem to have a lot of knowledge about social justice that might contribute, and as someone who seems so baffled as to how the term SJW came to be so commonly used, it sounds like you might learn something too.

Well, I'm not at all baffled as to history of the usage of the term. I already quoted and linkeed this shiz over in the other thread. The term even has it's own Wikipedia page. Cliffs: it came from GamerGate.

I'm baffled as to why you'd call me baffled, however. Maybe you didn't actually read that other thread ??

Oh, you're baffled alright... and baffling!

30 years is actually a long time to absorb criticism. And there's always been plenty of that. "Political correctness" was a hot topic 20 years ago, too. With regard to your last sentence, I don't think the goals are acceptability at the center of American political thought. It sort of sounds like a fallacy of moderation. The goal is to point out social problems and agitate for change.

Sure. Ideas can be fads. On the other hand, the specific conceptualization of "microaggressions" may or may not survive forever or turn out to be particularly useful. Maybe it's a fad. Acknowledgement of the existence of inequality and concern about it is not a fad.

Counter-movements and backlash are, I think, inevitable in this context. I don't think it's reasonable to expect to find a way of talking about these issues that eliminates backlash. But, I've also said on a few occasions that I think academics are bad at political framing, and that framing matters. It's one thing to be critical of the way certain messages are delivered and work to refine them. It's another thing to believe that social justice movements elected Trump (or created the alt-right). I think that's a pretty silly conclusion. There is no way of demanding social and cultural change that's not going to be contentious. That's how change happens. Activists can and should think about how to be more effective, but they aren't responsible for the reality of cultural backlash and they will never eliminate it just by changing tactics.

Here's where I mostly disagree with you. I have a real disagreement with the methods used by some illiberal parts of leftist thought and political action, eg Castro, Lenin, Marx, Chavez, etc. Some critical theorists (eg Herbert Marcuse) fall into this camp as well, at least intellectually. But I don't think that peaceful protests are illiberal. If someone wants to boycott or publicly shame some person or company, then I don't think they are using immoral tactics. I can disagree that the person/company deserves the boycott/shaming, but that doesn't change my views about the morality of the tactics being used. You seem to think these tactics are immoral as well. Why? For instance, would you say that when these tactics (boycotts and public shaming) were used during the civil rights era to pressure politicians and businesses to stop discriminating against black people that it was wrong to do so?

Second, you've claimed that this approach to racism, sexism, privilege, etc. helped elect Donald Trump because it collapsed the distinction between outlier racists/sexists and normal people, causing Republicans to ignore all claims of racism/sexism. I think that's wrong. But if you do accept it, it seems to me that you are making the exact same mistake in reverse, collapsing the distinction between leftists who really do reject liberal norms of social and political engagement, and the liberals/leftists who do still accept these norms. So when the next Democrat nominee for President actually doesn't believe in free speech, press, or so one, we'll know who to blame. You personally.

I don't think shaming is wrong on it's own, but it is quite a blunt instrument, a strong appeal to emotion, not reason. That's why it's best used on your dog. When backed by coherent thought, eg, everyone agrees you shouldn't kill a person, or beat up a child, then it's probably fine. But I think it should be reserved for such cases where the arguments are strong and accepted by most of society.

When shaming is used by groups of ideologues with questionable (or at least not very well accepted) reasoning, eg, like the Church tries to claim a fertilized egg is a human being, and then shames women for killing babies, then it is a terrible thing to do, and it causes a pretty harsh backlash. Rightly so.

Have you not noticed how many questionable things are being shamed today in the name of social justice? I've posted links to hundreds of people who've lost their jobs, Justine Sacco was a fairly public case. Ask me for more. I'm assuming you've seen all the shaming that goes on in P over anyone who takes a position a bit un-PC, or just against the grain, doesn't that seem a bit much? And you've already conceded the illiberalism.

I'm not collapsing the distinction at all. I've praised Well Named, for example, for his reasoned approach, and many others. Would that we had more Well Nameds, I doubt we'd have such troll in our highest public office. I'm not trying to put all the blame on the crazies on the left, if that's your worry, there's clearly enough crazy to go around.

I'm getting confused. The OP is poorly reasoned but PC caused Hitler by creating the circumstances where Trump could be elected?

Fair enough, but if the ideas are only accepted very far from the center, then you should expect them to be rejected by a pretty substantial majority of society. It seems like it might make more sense if you imagined this sort of thing happening on the far right, or the religious right, and how it would be received.

I agree. But we're witnessing how these concepts are being absorbed into the public consciousness right now in real time, and the "criticisms" are many, here are a few, and it doesn't look good so far.


Well, I blame the internet, mostly. My cousin is very nice, and we've have great discussions about social inequities, and her scholarly opinions are very well received (she has a degree in AA studies, and a PhD in History, dissertation about black migration through Missouri from the deep south, or something like that :P), but this Thanksgiving when I asked her what she thought about the way social justice was being framed on the internet, twitter, the alt-right backlash, etc, she barely new what I was talking about, because she doesn't do that stuff... she's kind of an old, I guess. I think she'd be horrified.

What you're doing here is mixing up two very different things: ends and means. Shaming as a tactic is ideologically neutral. If you feel shaming as a tactic is immoral (or whatev), you are saying it's immoral regardless what end that tactic was used for. I'll give you two examples.

1. Lot's of peeps feel it's immoral to kill as a tactic. These peeps don't say shiz like "when killings is used by groups of ideologues with questionable (or at least not very well accepted) reasoning, then it is a terrible thing to do". They condemn killing as a tactic period, regardless of how sound or well accepted the ends may be.

2. Blockading a building is a tactic. As a tactic it's ideologically neutral. I feel that Project Rescue was a group of ideologues with questionable and not very well accepted reasoning. As someone who has helped blockade a few buildings myself... I'd be a fool and a hypocrite to spew that it was immoral for Project Rescue to blockade abortion clinics.

If the study's parameter was in reference to just undergraduate students accepted into public universities (I will assume public instead of private) then this would be useful for that specific, and that specific only. However, Fold'em was discussing the general population. Therefore, the methodology would have include that general population in the US, and be randomly selected from that general population. Otherwise you are comparing apples and oranges. A very basic methodology mistake.

How am I mixing them? I said shaming is neutral... and it basically comes down to the ends.

Remember Justin Sacco? You see the problem with shaming isn't really the injury it does, deserved or not, ends or means. The problem is with the people who do it. They tend to absolutely love it. Like that twitter mob who destroyed Sacco's life only needed a plausible excuse, and once they were convinced of her "evil racist intent", once they fed off each other's self-assured condemnations, they feasted on her calamity.

THEY should be ashamed, not just because they were wrong, but because they thought they could be the judge, jury, and executioner. This is what is happening all day long with the social justice movement. So many "SJW's" think they know way more than they actually do about the world, about who's the victim, and who deserves to be punished, and it seems like you guys are too stuck in your books to realize how **** up things have become, and what a well-deserved backlash it has generated. Oh, cry me some white tears Foldn, said the unbearable ****tards who created Trump. I'm sticking to my thesis, yall. Like I became an atheist because of this sort of crap, but lately I've been feeling sorry for Christians!