This is straight from the Wiki-page on Rorty which I was exploring last night...
With respect to confronting religious fundamentalism in a university setting, Rorty says:
“It seems to me that the regulative idea that we heirs of the Enlightenment, we Socratists, most frequently use to criticize the conduct of various conversational partners is that of ‘needing education in order to outgrow their primitive fear, hatreds, and superstitions’ ... It is a concept which I, like most Americans who teach humanities or social science in colleges and universities, invoke when we try to arrange things so that students who enter as bigoted, homophobic, religious fundamentalists will leave college with views more like our own ... The fundamentalist parents of our fundamentalist students think that the entire ‘American liberal establishment’ is engaged in a conspiracy. The parents have a point. Their point is that we liberal teachers no more feel in a symmetrical communication situation when we talk with bigots than do kindergarten teachers talking with their students ... When we American college teachers encounter religious fundamentalists, we do not consider the possibility of reformulating our own practices of justification so as to give more weight to the authority of the Christian scriptures. Instead, we do our best to convince these students of the benefits of secularization. We assign first-person accounts of growing up homosexual to our homophobic students for the same reasons that German schoolteachers in the postwar period assigned The Diary of Anne Frank... You have to be educated in order to be ... a participant in our conversation ... So we are going to go right on trying to discredit you in the eyes of your children, trying to strip your fundamentalist religious community of dignity, trying to make your views seem silly rather than discussable. We are not so inclusivist as to tolerate intolerance such as yours ... I don’t see anything herrschaftsfrei [domination free] about my handling of my fundamentalist students. Rather, I think those students are lucky to find themselves under the benevolent Herrschaft [domination] of people like me, and to have escaped the grip of their frightening, vicious, dangerous parents ... I am just as provincial and contextualist as the Nazi teachers who made their students read Der Stürmer; the only difference is that I serve a better cause.”
– ‘Universality and Truth,’ in Robert B. Brandom (ed.), Rorty and his Critics (Oxford: Blackwell, 2000), pp. 21-2.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
5 comments:
If the goal is the eradication of bigoted believes wouldn't it be more effective to focus exclusively on those beliefs rather than discrediting ones entire philosophical framework? I would be more likely to embrace an inclusive Christianity than become an atheist?
One part of Rorty's wording that I don't care for is the "frightening, vicious, dangerous parents" part. It is strong polarizing language indeed. Then again, he may very well have been subjected to greater extremes of conduct and higher degrees of pressure from fundamentalists throughout his career as an academic and professor, than others might expect to encounter.
On the whole, it's not that I don't see the Jesus story as being beneficial in some ways. I think there is value in his moral teachings (though I'll be the first to admit I have no special expertise there...)
I think that many professors, and I'll include myself among them insofar as I identify and sympathize with them, see Christianity as such a hang up. Something in the way. I understand taking lessons from Christianity—I can even try to understand how one might come to decide that Jesus is the best role model we've ever had (though instinctively that just seems so provincial). But it's a non-sequitur that Jesus is the son of God etc. Where does that come from? I mean really where??
The faithful say, through religious experience, or epiphany, or whatever.
My only explanation for it is that it's ingrained in our psyches. It's among the most archetypal of stories. But I see it for just that, and have a real easy time imagining how we got to this point still obsessed with the Jesus story.
At what point is 'Christianity' just a word for "people who follow the moral teachings of Jesus," and not a word for people who think Jesus was son of God?
Atheism is a term that becomes tiresome, is loaded and somewhat polarizing (I'll readily admit). I think a lot of people use it because of its power. (They wanted a stronger word to express their disbelief than 'agnostic'.) I use it in this sense: a lack of belief in God. By 'God' I mean any supernatural entity that may have created us, and continues to oversee earthly affairs etc.
Nebulous spiritual concepts, and wonderment, and reverence for Nature etc. (are important exercises for me, as you probably know;) But these can hardly be compared to beliefs stemming from the Abrahamic tradition, right? For one they don't prescribe anything concrete.
So what of these concretes? Why should those 'sacred' doctrines of the Abrahamic tradition (any one of them) be given any special status (aside from their being really old). What makes them 'sacred'?
Forgive the grammar please.
I appreciate all your thoughts on this. I happen to really like many of Rorty's ideas. I'm not in the mood to get into the deity of Christ stuff here. Furthermore, the word sacred probably means something different to me than most. Here is my point: bigotry is awful. Rorty, God LLC, and myself are all in agreement here. Rorty's admission of trying to undermine his student's beliefs is well stated and well intentioned. If we can all agree that bigotry is awful and should be fought then why not work together. There are many traditions within Christianity that accept gays, believe in equal rights, support feminism, etc etc. I had a philosophy professor who was a self proclaimed atheist. When he saw that I was fascinated by the subject rather than try to squash my faith he encouraged me to read Alvin Plantinga and other respected theist philosophers. He wanted me to be a critical thinker, like he was, but he did not want me to think like him. I have great respect for that. I think people in positions of influence like Rorty would before effective to encourage students to get away from bigotry within their current framework of belief. I think it is the role of the professor to get students to think critically. I'm not suggesting that religious philosophy deserves equal time in academia. That's silly. I'm just suggesting that we may do more to move away from bigoted thinking by meeting people where they are. Plantinga and Rorty both believe in evolution, a big bang, an ancient universe, etc. I am willing to bet that many of these students don't. While Rorty may get a few to see his light, it seems that many more would throw the whole thing out and walk away discounting the whole experience.
I want to work with you crazy atheists to beat hate. In this I believe we are both doing the Lord's work.
Thanks for the reply. Im holding my daughter with one hand and iPhone typing with the other so I'm not checking my grammar etc. Hope I don't discredit myself!
Not at all. Thanks for these thoughts, Bret. Valuable stuff. And what talent! (holding baby and iPhone typing)
Post a Comment