Why the Band? A Belated Introduction

You can never introduce something until you know what you are introducing. 

The tenth post seemed a good time to pause for a moment and explain more clearly what this blog is, and the point of the Dismantling Postmodernism series in general.

Sir John Tenniel, The King and Queen of Hearts inspect tart in courtroom, from the 1865 edition of Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland. 

"Begin at the beginning, the King said, very gravely, and go on till you come to the end: then stop." Sensible words, but typical of Carroll, they hide deeper complexities. An idea undergoes many changes in coming to realization, as possibilities come into focus. 

Blogging about Postmodernism was such an idea, but there was no way to tell what it would look like until it started. Any introduction would have been obsolete after the first few posts. Not that the Band has a set path - it is still developing - but it has reached a point where some things can be explained. 









What is the point of this blog? More specifically, why does a voice that speaks  for the dignity of the individual and the value of tradition produce long posts filled with the tiresome, irritating jargon that that the whole rotten Postmodern culture was built on? This question deserves a serious answer. 

Many people are aware that contemporary universities tend to be havens of leftist intolerance and indoctrination, and that certain "ideas" coming out of academia are connected to the overall assault on Western culture that has being going on for decades. What is less clear is how "theoretical" texts that read like gibberish hang around year after year, and why they have been effective in undermining empirical observation and human freedom. 

John Martin, The Bard, circa 1817, oil on canvas, 127 × 102 cm, Yale Center for British Art, New Haven

Postmodernists and cultural Marxists realize that the way to destroy a culture is to erase its values and traditions. This is done through "theories" that incoherently question the validity of human experience, and gullible souls that believe the theories despite the incoherence. 

Martin's painting shows a dramatic scene as the last of the Welsh bards defies the approaching English. This is simply an older version of the destruction of a people through the erasure of its culture. 









Most just dismiss contemporary academic jargon as bullshit and move on, which is not wrong, since that is, for the most part, an apt description. The problem with that is that it misses the corrosive influence that this "thinking" has. To fully grasp this, it is necessary to understand  the false pretenses hiding behind the facade of Postmodern theory, and how they metastasize into incoherent aphorisms that spill into the so-called real world. 

This blog will not be for everyone. It offers an alternative for those interested in moving beyond dismissal to understanding why philosophically the emperor has no clothes, but wisely wishes to avoid slogging through endless meaningless pages of the Postmodern library .

The Band pulls back the curtain for the reader who wants to know WHY Postmodernism is philosophical nonsense 

Martin Whatson, Behind The Curtain, 2015, mural for Smashed Canvas event, Miami. 

Dragging back the gray, oppressive veil of Postmodernism reveals the colorful, diverse history of human experience beneath. 

Unfortunately, there is no "simple" way to untangle this. To begin with, Postmodern texts are written in a deliberately confusing, even impenetrable, way, which is what leads to their angry dismissal as garbage in the first place. But this is also the source of their power, because within academia, their incoherence masquerades as profundity. Writers like Foucault can't be clearly understood because ultimately they don't make sense, but their impenetrable style makes it impossible to see this clearly. It is you that ends up feeling stupid in the encounter, not the text. Because of this, these sources are converted to "summary" form - if incoherence could be given concise, coherent summation - in a process that the Band likes to call Textbook Learning.

Textbook Learning is The Band's term for the misrepresentation of incoherent Postmodern theory as straightforward facts. Distillations like "Western culture is oppression" can be presented as it it were as clear as the inverse square law. 





Textbook aphorisms needn't make sense when they gain authority through another form of academic alchemy that the Band refers to as The Philosopher's Name 

The Philosopher's Name describes how a theory that is clearly wrong retains credibility by having a famous name attached to it. 

For example, Foucauldian





The result is that cohorts of students leave universities with their heads filled with nonsense that seems convincing because their cultural studies prof. put it on the syllabus. At the higher level, successful academics have parlayed a mastery of this cant into prestige and influence, even though those listening to them have no idea what a flimsy foundation this supposed authority rests on. 

Jackson Pollock, Number 1, 1950 (Lavender Mist), 1950, oil, enamel, and aluminum paint on canvas, 7’ 3” X 9’ 10”, National Gallery of Art, Washington

Postmodernism has been successful because it is so confusing that it resists critique, while layer upon layer of equally confusing commentary form a web as difficult to untangle as a Pollock painting.

 



Some technical language and framing is unavoidable if we are to unravel this splatter pattern on a level that rises above angry dismissal. There are concepts that have to be defined before they can be exposed. The important thing is not to get caught up in the empty verbal mazes that present Postmodernism's greatest defense. The texts ultimately have no meaning, and consider standards like logical consistency to be subjective Western oppression. Any attempt to debate them on their terms will end in frustration as you chase them through endless chains of meaningless allusion. Consequently, the source texts go unexamined because they are so painfully incoherent, while almost any absurd position can be promoted in their name. 

A brief metaphor:

MMA has taught us that in a fight between relatively well-matched opponents like Stephen Thompson and Rory MacDonald, the contestant who can maintain their preferred distance tends to win. Here, long range clearly favors lanky karateka Thompson.

    
A.B. Frost, Brer Rabbit gets stuck in the Tar-Baby, from Joel Chandler Harris, Uncle Remus: His Songs and His Sayings, 1895

Postmodern theory resembles the tar baby of Afro-American folklore that was used to trap Brer Rabbit when he attacked it. No matter how hard he tried, he just became more stuck to it's gooey surface. Attack Postmodernism directly at its distance - close range - and you will become equally entangled in its meaningless fog.

 

John Martin, Lucifer on the Burning Lake, 1825-27, mezzotint from Milton's Paradise Lost t

However, from the correct distance, Postmodern theory can be identified, contextualized, and knocked out. The Band doesn't wallow in the swamp of confusing non-arguments designed to thwart and demoralize an honest reader. Rather, it situates them in their larger intellectual and cultural contexts and identifies the basic errors that they are built on.


The persistence of Postmodern ideas, despite their fundamental emptiness, is only partly due to their confusing nature. Within the academy, their acceptance is taken as a sign of membership in the intellectual elite, where their incoherence can posture as profundity. In this environment, the smug hatred for traditional culture can be palpable, and angry dismissal of their jargon as bullshit only fuels their sneering disdain while they indoctrinate another class. Why does this nonsense not go away? Because it is nonsense, only no one can see clearly enough because the texts make no sense, and universities made it the coin of the realm. It isn't the failure of philosophy that matters here; it is how a failed philosophy became the basis of  social standing within the nation's trusted thought leaders.

But the problem is deeper.

Pieter Brueghel the Elder, The Alchemist, 1558, engraved by Philipp Galle, National Gallery, Washington
Alchemy, the pursuit of of a method to transform substances occupied highly intelligent individuals in a futile endeavor that had intellectual prestige, but no consequence for the outside world. Sound familiar? 

Universities are not only involved in transmitting spurious ideas for personal gain, they also focus extremely talented people on obscure projects that keep their powers of reasoning out of the public sphere. You don't hear from smart, hard working academics because they are busy pouring over arcane equations or Sumerian poetry, and the more serious they are, the less time they have for politics. Faculty in the substanceless cultural Marxist disciplines where Postmodernism spawned have a lot more free time for "social justice". Their courses are also less demanding and attract the students least well equipped for critical thought. The irony is that their freedom from the demands of actual knowledge production frees them to spend the intellectual credibility built up by honest, committed scholars on the most dyscivic ideas. In other words, the thing that the university does well empowers the thing that causes the most cultural harm.

Gustave Doré, "Him the Almighty Power Hurl'd headlong flaming from the ethereal sky...", engriving from Milton's Paradise Lost, 1866

Concluding the martial metaphor, the only way to rectify this is to expel Postmodern "thought" from its unearned position of influence. And the only way to do that is to expose its deceptions to the light and drive it back into the darkness from whence it came.















The Band draws on years of combined expertise studying, teaching, then tearing down Postmodern illogic in some fairly lofty academic circles. At various points, it became apparent that there were better gigs to be found elsewhere, but that time was not completely wasted if it can pull back the curtain on these confusing "scriptures". This is not about personal gain. 

Consider:

This blog is not copyrighted, there are no ads, and there is no author to cite

If these posts are of use to you, a link is courteous, but much less important than spreading the truth. 

The format is unusual by design. For all the Postmodern babble about "discourse", their theoretical corpus consists of remarkably similar texts for something that purportedly reveals the true nature of human experience. By using pictures, diagrams, numbers, and other media along side words, the posts demonstrate how stunted their perspective really is. Graphical representation makes it difficult to hide incoherence. The "findings" fabricated by sociologists of science are exposed next to even a cursory glance at mathematical operations. The breadth of the material world dwarfs critical theories of science. Humor lances pretentious posturing. And there is an entire human yearning transcendence that exists outside the realm of reason. 

Thomas Cole, Scene from The Last of the Mohicans, 1827, Metropolitan Museum of Art

Postmodern ritual seems small before the grandeur of existence  

The core incoherence of Postmodern theory means that there are no logical precepts to challenge; just an endless fog of impressions and subjectivity. Direct assaults either bog down in verbal quicksand or wander through endless pointless digressions. As a multi-media blog, however, the Band can proceed in short posts that address a specific issue without having to be comprehensive, but accumulate over time into a larger disassembly of the entire rotten edifice. Postmodernists claim to have the ultimate Truth - that there is no objective Truth - but their efforts are actually a tiny subset of a depressing human tendency to believe that finite minds can apprehend ultimate reality. By correctly placing this in context, then isolating the basic assumptions and errors at its heart, the entire house of cards collapses. 

It is important to remember that Postmodernism has gotten as far as it has because it is confusing and meaningless, which makes it frustrating and demoralizing contend with. But if it had any substance, the annoying obfuscation would not be necessary. This fatal weakness can be exploited with awareness, because once exposed, the false claim to authority vanishes and you can step confidently through the illusion. 



At present, the posts are focused on problems with Postmodern theory and representation, but will move into visual culture quite soon. Postmodernism as a term first came out of architecture, and had had a huge impact on the arts, so this needs a closer look. After that, we will see where the road leads. Topic suggestions are also welcome. 

Why "Uncle John's" Band?

Uncle John's Band is a song by the Grateful Dead, an American band that came of age during the same period that Postmodernism was slinking out of the classrooms of France. Much like the larger philosophical movement, the Dead benefited from a cultural inheritance they proved unable to preserve. 

The musical roots of the Grateful Dead were steeped in American heritage - rock, bluegrass, folk, blues, country and western - and the vivid iconography projected a magical realism shot through with nostalgic Americana. 

Some of the imagery is striking, even haunting. 

Yet at the same time, the Dead led their followers down a path of self-centered hedonism that undermined the very culture that gave them their appeal in the first place. Postmodernists have debased and degraded the West for long enough. The Band is tired of seeing our heritage dragged into the toxic sludge of relativism. Uncle John's Band is a nice song. And the imagery is fantastic.

We're taking them back...