Do Free Societies Need Postmodernism? A Debate

Postmodernism is necessary for a politics of individual liberty.

That was the topic of a public debate hosted by the Soho Forum in New York City on June 17, 2019. It featured Stephen Hicks, a professor of philosophy at Rockford University, and author Thaddeus Russell. Soho Forum director Gene Epstein moderated.

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It was an Oxford-style debate, in which the audience votes on the resolution at the beginning and end of the event, and the side that gains the most ground is victorious. Hicks prevailed in the debate by convincing 34 percent of audience members to change their minds.

Arguing for the affirmative was Russell, whose 2011 book, A Renegade History of the United States, argues that cherished American freedoms come from the selfish desires of ordinary people. Renegade University, founded by Russell, offers courses on diverse subjects from postmodernism to the history of martial arts.

Hicks argued for the negative. He's the executive director at The Center for Ethics and Entrepreneurship. He is the author of Explaining Postmodernism: Skepticism and Socialism from Rousseau to Foucault (2011) and Nietzsche and the Nazis (2010).

The Soho Forum, which is sponsored by the Reason Foundation, is a monthly debate series at the SubCulture Theater in Manhattan's East Village.

Music: "Modum" by Kai Engle is licensed under a CC-BY creative commons license.

Produced by Todd Krainin.

[thadiussean]

"post-modernism doesn't care about being right or wrong"
"medical scientists were wrong" as opening statement.

[Civilization]

The postmodernist convinced me that postmodernists should be thrown in a asylums

[mjbull]

"I never speak the truth. I am telling stories."

That is as good a reason as any to ignore you.

[ChrisBakerauthor]

Stephen Hicks exists, and Thaddeus Russell doesn't. Stephen wins.

[-bo]

"I never speak the truth, I'm telling stories"
If Thaddeus thinks he's just playing around with his own ideas, then that's fine, he can live in his own solipsist world. His whole argument is a glaring non sequitur to move from "we have made mistakes or changed our mind about how things are" to "we can never know what things are." Thad mistakes a "universal" and "eternal" Platonic conception of truth and assumes that since omniscience is impossible, then any truth must be impossible. It is a quite banal argument really.

[danielkeesee]

Reasoned Thinking vs. Quasi-intellectual Slam Poetry: The Debate

[amadeusdebussy]

I also agree with Russell that classical Marxism is incompatible with PM, but the fact that many PMs consider themselves Marxists should tell you something about one or perhaps both of those ideologies.

[porchtime]

I went to grad school in literature. All I read was French postmodern philosophy. Why???? I’ve read all that Peterson supposedly hasn’t and it doesn’t change that he’s right about it.

[RichardThePear]

Electroshock therapy became ECT, and ECT saved my life. Science does improve and get better. But only if you avoid the idiocy of postmodernism.

[ShikiByakko]

"The shape of the earth keeps changing according to science"
The shape has never changed, scientific understanding of the shape has changed, but earth's shape was always the same.

[design]

Russell: "Jordan Peterson doesn't know what he's talking about! Grrr, Jordan Peterson, grrrr!"
Russell: *proceeds to validate exactly what Peterson says about Post-modernism*

[rottdogg]

Post Modernism reminds me of when I was a teenager and we would get stoned and think about deep subjects we had no knowledge of and think we had made great discoveries...….
but in reality we were just stupid stoned kids.

[amadeusdebussy]

"You were burned at the stake if you didn't believe the earth was flat."
OK, I would ignore anything this man has to say about history.

[cmichelle]

Michael malice put it best on his recent pod with Thaddeus. Postmodernism is college stoner talk.

[entengummitiger]

Turns out, bone measurements are used in today's forensics to determine the race of skeletons

[mandywhorwal]

Postmodernism: Nothing is true except for everything I say.

[TKRDRJ]

Stephen was OBJECTIVELY better dressed than Thaddeus.

[JacobSammer]

Thaddeus sounds like my son who just took a class in post modernism at our community college.

[bagamias-hula]

Hey look, a relativist making absolute claims! Lol

[stevecaldwell]

Russell employs every bad debating tactic in the book: straw man, appeal to emotion, reframing, conflation - intellectual weasel.