Profile picture
, 3 tweets, 1 min read
My Authors
Read all threads
People worry about cancel culture as a form of totalitarianism.

They should worry more about the fact that so many leaders of important cultural institutions are either incapable of critical thinking or unprincipled or cowards (because otherwise cancel culture could never work)
The reason I bring this up is because contemporary totalitarianism, even in its more extreme ideological form, is part of a process of disintegration.

Earlier forms (Communism, Nazism) could harness strong pre-existing polities (the old European nations) and exploit their
resources to build totalitarian empires.

Not so for the totalitarians of the affluent-technocratic society. In the ideal-anthropological vacuum of late capitalism, they lust for power on disintegrating institutions, but ultimately the disintegration is going to win.
Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to force a refresh.

Keep Current with Carlo Lancellotti

Profile picture

Stay in touch and get notified when new unrolls are available from this author!

Read all threads

This Thread may be Removed Anytime!

Twitter may remove this content at anytime, convert it as a PDF, save and print for later use!

Try unrolling a thread yourself!

how to unroll video

1) Follow Thread Reader App on Twitter so you can easily mention us!

2) Go to a Twitter thread (series of Tweets by the same owner) and mention us with a keyword "unroll" @threadreaderapp unroll

You can practice here first or read more on our help page!

More from @_CLancellotti see all

Profile picture
Carlo Lancellotti
@_CLancellotti
@clairlemon The question is not so much neutrality but whether the fundamental goal is to seek truth as a value in itself or to seek power.

In the second case, ideas take a purely instrumental value, and "truth" is what brings about "change" i.e. what increases the power of the "party."
@clairlemon In that sense, it appears that many elite departments in the humanities and the social sciences stopped being truth-seeking institutions a long time ago, in order to become "change agents."

(These are all classic Marxist categories, by the way).
@clairlemon What Nietzsche understood, and what a lot of well meaning Western "classical liberals" often do not understand, is that the idea of truth-as-a-value-in-itself stands or falls with the idea of God (in the most general sense).
Read 3 tweets
Profile picture
Carlo Lancellotti
@_CLancellotti
My Sunday thoughts: the question of the moment is whether the protests will push for *reform* or pursue the mirage of *revolution*. I think the jury is still out, but the academic-journalistic complex is clearly pushing in the second direction, which matches their world view.
"Reform" recognizes that we must strive as hard as we can to realize permanent values (e.g. justice) which transcend us, and which we can achieve only imperfectly because evil (e.g. racism) lurks within everyone (original sin) and cannot be ultimately eliminated, only contained.
By contrast the "revolution" thinks that evil can be eliminated, because it resides NOT IN US but in "the system" and the system can be changed by the exercise of power. Thus it expresses a dualistic, non-biblical (gnostic) type of religiosity (modern prototype: Marxism).
Read 7 tweets
Profile picture
Carlo Lancellotti
@_CLancellotti
Sound political action requires a deep perception of human limits (cognitive limits, moral limits, technical limits) and of the many possible effects of our actions.

Having a clear sense of limits and possibilities requires a well-cultivated habit to pay attention to reality.
Such habit is the definition of prayer (Simone Weil).

So, good politics requires a prayerful mind, and our age is the least qualified ever to produce good politicians.
(while at the same time it expects its salvation from politics, to an extent rarely seen before).
Read 3 tweets

Embed code for your website

×
Follow Us on Twitter!

Did Thread Reader help you today?

Support us! We are indie developers!

This site is made by just two indie developers on a laptop doing marketing, support and development! Read more about the story.

Become a Premium Member ($3.00/month or $30.00/year) and get exclusive features!

Become Premium

Too expensive? Make a small donation by buying us coffee ($5) or help with server cost ($10)

Donate via Paypal Become our Patreon

Thank you for your support!