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24 May, 4 tweets, 2 min read
On now.

Liz Truss made a speech in which she scapegoated Foucault.

Do Foucault's ideas pose a real danger to social & cultural life in Britain? (No).

Or is he a "bogeyman" deployed by some politicians to divide & distract us from real issues? (Yes).

bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m0…
Matthew Goodwin. Ha ha ha ha! 'Universities are full of lefty Foucault-loving bastards! Why would people think about such fripperies as inequality, homophobia, racism & sexism?' I suppose if you hate nuance, critical thought, & know fouc-all about Foucault, he might have a point.
Not a bad show. In fact, Foucault has been claimed by neoliberals as well as 'radicals'. No doubt every right-wing free-market gobshite crank will see it as yet more evidence of the 'anti-British anti-woke identity politics snowflakes' at the @BBC destroying western civilization!
Here's a #THREAD of Foucault quotes I made shortly after Liz Truss spouted her profoundly misleading, stultifyingly ill-informed & pig-ignorant culture war guff about Foucault:

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More from @docrussjackson

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25 May
On Friday, anti-democratic right-wing populist nationalist authoritarian PM with a long history of racist comments Boris Johnson, is meeting with Putin ally Viktor Orbán.

Under Orbán's leadership, Hungary has experienced democratic backsliding & a lurch towards authoritarianism. ImageImageImage
Orbán's populism, social-national conservatism, soft Euroscepticism & advocacy of what he describes as an "illiberal state" have attracted significant European & international attention & criticism from domestic & foreign leaders, including Angela Merkel, but praise from Johnson. Image
Orbán has gradually undermined the rule of law, established tight control over the country’s independent institutions, adopted a new constitution & fundamentally changing electoral laws & the system of campaign financing.

Johnson's 👏 Govt 👏 is 👏 doing👏 the 👏same.#NotADrill Image
Read 7 tweets
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22 May
Impartial & sensible Paul Dacre, lined up by opportunist liar Boris Johnson & the the @BBC-hating Tories to be the new @Ofcom & thus BBC regulator, attacked the BBC as a "monolith" pursuing "cultural Marxism" - a far-right antisemitic conspiracy theory.😳

theguardian.com/media/2007/jan…
The ever nuanced & professional Paul Dacre - incidentally with *zero* experience in broadcasting - said the @BBC "which glories in being open-minded, has become a closed-thought system operating a kind of Orwellian Newspeak."

Oh the irony. ImageImageImage
In another nuanced & impartial critique, Paul Dacre was critical of David Cameron's alleged "sidelining of Thatcherism & his banishing of all talk of lower taxes, lower immigration & euroscepticism (which) are all part of the Tories' blood sacrifice to the @BBC god." ImageImageImage
Read 6 tweets
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21 May
“The British right hopes to emulate the success of the US right in convincing the public that the main organs of news & opinion are gripped by a left-wing conspiracy…[their aim] is to alter the definition of the ‘middle ground’, moving it to the right" - Peter Wilby, 2007. Image
In 2004, a think tank Director outlined 'three things the Right needs to happen:

undermine the @BBC’s credibility

create a Fox News equivalent/talk radio shows/bloggers etc to shift the centre of gravity

end the ban on TV political advertising.

The author? Dominic Cummings. ImageImage
New television channels plan to offer British audiences a more partisan & even more right-wing interpretation of the news.

@stevenjbarnett & @JulianPetley ask "Who will ensure they play within the rules?" in 'Why @Ofcom must find its backbone':

journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.11…
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20 May
The manufactured "war on woke" is a distraction designed to keep voters divided. Under cover of COVID, wealth has been transferred from poor to rich on an unprecedented & unimaginable scale, eroding democracy & resulting in hardship, conflict, mass death & environmental collapse. ImageImageImage
Of the $9TRILLION injected by central banks into the world economy over the last year, $8TRILLION has finished up in the pockets of billionaires, of which there are just 2,700. This wealth could solve many of the enormous & urgent problems facing humanity.
ft.com/content/747a76…
It's almost impossible to imagine just how much $8 TRILLION actually is. For example, it would:

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💰Buy 400,000,000 cars costing $20,000 each

💰Buy 40,000,000 homes costing $200,000 each

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18 May
"The first person who, having enclosed a plot of land, took it into his head to say this is mine and found people simple enough to believe him, was the true founder of civil society" - Jean-Jacques Rousseau, 1755, 'Discourse on the Origin of Inequality'.
Rousseau posits that the original, deeply flawed social contract, which led to the modern state, was made at the suggestion of the rich & powerful, who tricked the masses into surrendering their liberties to them & instituted inequality as a fundamental feature of human society.
At the end of the Discourse on Inequality, Rousseau explains how the desire to have value in the eyes of others undermines personal integrity & authenticity in a society marked by interdependence.

In 'The Social Contract outlines the basis for a legitimate political order.
Read 21 tweets
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18 May
Interesting, balanced & nuanced article by Neil McLaughlin: 'The Jordan Peterson Phenomena: Why Fromm’s ideas and public intellectual vision is essential for responding to reactionary populism'.

fromm-gesellschaft.eu/images/pdf-Dat…
I'm not going to summarise the whole paper, but McLaughlin attempts to account for the popularity & influence of Peterson in a respectful way.

While critiquing Peterson's intellectual status, he offers interesting insights & calls for fairer & more measured critique of Peterson.
McLaughlin is a scholar of the work of Erich Fromm - a controversial German social psychologist, psychoanalyst, sociologist, philosopher, & democratic socialist. Fromm was a German Jew who fled the Nazi regime & settled in the US. His influences are similar to those of Peterson.
Read 12 tweets

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