On Cynical Theories

 Yesterday I finished reading Cynical Theories: How Universities Made Everything about Race, Gender, and Identity - And Why this Harms Everbody by  Helen Pluckrose and James Lindsay and highly recommend it. 

The authors do a fine job explaining the origins of Critical Theory in the Postmodernists of the '60s (especially Michel Foucault, who after reading this I'm adding to my list of 'authors whose baleful influence are the cause of the current mess' (so far him, Marx and Gramsci), and how these ideas were refined in subsequent decades leading to Critical Race Theory, Gender Theory, Queer Theory and so on. It is a good guide to the key academics in these fields whose writings have been influential, and what they are all about. 

After finishing this I now understand where the woke left is coming from and how they see the world- especially in terms of everything being about power and oppression. It was especially interesting how the original postmodernists were essentially nihilists whose disillusionment with marxism lead to them deconstructing everything, while the current activists are using their ideas to push for a Marxist revolution. Perhaps they should be called 'postmodern Marxists'?

My only major criticism is that the book only briefly describes the effects o all this, with a few examples of cancellations but and only brief descriptions of why this stuff is all nonsense. I'd suggest the book works best when read in conjunction with Douglas Murray's The Madness of Crowds', which covers these topics in more detail but doesn't have the background information. 

Both of these books also IMO have the problem in that they don't have much in the way of solutions, Pluckrose and Lindsay end with a list of suggestions for arguments to counter the SJW's but earlier on they admit the futility in attempting to argue with these people. They also don't really cover what the goals of the SJW-left are apart from 'fixing injustices' or the role of bureaucracy and entrenched interests in perpetuating pressure groups and organizations once their original goals had been met (e.g how once gay marriage has been achieved Stonewall could have said 'job done', but that would have put a lot of people out of work so they re-orientation into pushing the trans agenda).

Overall though this is an important book for anyone wishing to understand the current situation and how to counter the current trends.