From a traditionally liberal standpoint, the intellectual inconsistency displayed by Oberlin’s outraged students is frightful. When they harass, they are freedom fighters; when they feel harassed, they are victims of terrorism. One group of students who organized an alternative to the Sommers event warned that any “toxic, dangerous, and/or violent” people would be screened out. “We’re pretty cool,” said one, crystallizing the apparent hypocrisy with a knowing half-joke. “We only bite people we dislike.” Trigger warning indeed!
But rather than mocking Oberlin’s rancorous undergrads, it’s imperative, in spite of it all, to understand them. At stake is not just our niceness or meanness, but our ability to make sense of the world we live in. Fact: We really do not want the culture war to become a fight between demonized, depersonalized, thoroughly “othered” camps.
We hesitate, however, to embrace such forbearance, because traditional liberalism has failed so hard in explaining the source of our mutual rancor. From the standpoint of traditional liberalism—what with its cherished “values” like “openness,” “tolerance,” and “conversation”—there is just no way to access the phenomenon of today’s culture war, or the psychology of its frenzied combatants.
With apologies to liberalism, it’s time to hark back to a much earlier philosophical framework in order to escape the black hole suction of the culture wars.
Join the conversation as a VIP Member