JERJ~
Y
L.
MAR.TIN
IV. Conclusion: The Transformationist Vision and Its
Consequences
653
Although the postmodern critique of objectivity has been put in the
service of leftist causes, it seems more akin to fascism in its roots. How
could the postmodernist resist the following logic:
In Germany relativism is an exceedingly daring and subversive theoret–
ical construction. .. In Italy, relativism is simply a fact....
Everything I have said and done in these last years is relativism by in–
tuition.
If relativism signifies contempt for fixed categories and
men who claim to be the bearers of an objective, immortal truth.
then there is nothing more relativistic than Fascist attitudes and activ–
ity.
From the fact that all ideologies are of equal value, that all
ideologies are mere fictions, the modern relativist infers that every–
body has the right to create for himself his own ideology and to at–
tempt to enforce it with all the energy of which he is capable.
The quotation is from Benito Mussolini and expresses a central idea of
the postmodernists - that, since contending beliefs represent contending
interests and there is no rational way
to
adjudicate between them, the
ultimate arbiter is power. For postmodernists, it is primarily verbal
power, control over words and images, but power nonetheless.
As Mussolini understood, ideas have consequences. If the great intel–
lectual achievements of civilization are taught solely as instruments of
oppression or are simply thrown out of the curriculum to make room
for more "empowering" materials, they will be lost. Older transforma–
tionists who themselves received a traditional education think that this is
a misplaced fear. They continue to teach - and often to love teaching -
Shakespeare even if their love is expressed in clever unmaskings of his pa–
triarchal imperialism. They assume their students will also continue to
read Shakespeare and to share their joy. But young African-Americans,
for example, may not see the point in reading those they have been
taught to see as their oppressors. What will the older professor say
to
persuade them? That they need to know the tradition the better to resist
it? Will that be a compelling reason to young people who have already
been "empowered"?
The most serious problem is that the postmodern argument for mak–
ing the university an agent of social transformation protects itself from
criticism, not only theoretically, but institutionally as welL The early
steps of the postmodern argument may be questionable, but only grant
them, and the remaining steps - including political correctness, critical
pedagogy, speech codes, and denial - follow. Rejecting the principles
