Funny how postmodern philosophy has been crucial in informing the fields of critical race theory (intimately concerned with the real effects of race and its construction), gender theory (intimately concerned with the real effects of gender and its construction), and postcolonial studies (intimately concerned with the real effects of colonialism and possible strategies to express and formulate subaltern responses to a hegemonic world). Glad to see you’ve never actually read these philosophers, or at the least never thought to look into their scholarly lineage, which is especially prevalent in academia (yes, even in the USA) concerned with real world struggles.

Postmodern philosophy is making people passive and creating division. People don't even know what gender or species they belong to.

​​@@gavinyoung-philosophyI wasn't even alive when colonialism existed. Keep your white guilt pushing for yourself.

@@binky777 Colonialism still exists. Learn your history.

​​​@@gavinyoung-philosophyPostmodernism is just puppets for Maoism and dictators. Look what happend with the academics in Iran and China after the revolution. Did the people get the freedom they where promised?

A very interesting and cogently-put comment! Your summary of both Butler and Baudrillard is very accurate. Your reticence regarding Baudrillard is also something I share. He does tend to be polemical and hyperbolic, therefore being perhaps a bit dramatic at the expense of precision regarding emancipation when it’s really needed. From my readings of Baudrillard, it seems that he’s simply too nihilistic himself to hope for emancipatory potential, at least when it comes to movements, schools of thought, or anything institutional (recall that in the last chapter of Simulacra and Simulation entitled “Nihilism”, Baudrillard firmly identifies himself as a nihilist). I definitely think Baudrillard’s theory leaves one feeling as if one is gasping for air, constricted in one’s ability to express agency, and I find that Baudrillard’s approach to the breakdown of identity and freedom is a helpful tool, yet it does not account for the fullness of reality. I do find that Deleuze and Guattari help escape some of the nihilistic pits Baudrillard finds himself in. Frankly, I’ve read several of his works and only rarely come across him discussing gender in any capacity (one passage in Fatal Strategies comes to mind); maybe he just didn’t find it a particularly worthwhile subject? I wish I had a better or more complete answer, but I think any Baudrillardian conception of the future of identity will be fraught with uncertainty, intense ambiguity, and paranoia regarding the emptiness of contemporary life.

​@@gavinyoung-philosophy Thanks for the clarification! And I totally agree, it's also nice to hear others sharing similar feelings towards Baudrillard who think there is definite potential to take his theory further than he did because he definitely has some good and unique points. I intend to get into D&G relatively soon to equip myself with more creative ways of thinking but at the moment I find Baudrillards style of writing whilst at times difficult, it's mystic and poetic style (fiction-theory style) captures the coldness of the digital and globalised era in a very personal way.

@@gavinyoung-philosophy Also I wanted to add, Baudrillard is unique (to me at least) in his accounts of globalisation, media and technology/internet and I don't know any other philosophers who account for these topics as he does. If you know any other philosophers who do please share as I believe we need more theories on these subjects.

@@Soni91763 Consider Marshall McLuhan if you’re into media studies. He basically founded the discipline of media studies and is where Baudrillard got “the medium is the message” from in S&S. Also consider Byung-Chul Han as I’ve heard that he may delve into these topics a bit. Also you’re totally right about his writing style; it can be cumbersome, and yet it is very unique and able to capture contemporary life rather well.

Thanks so much for your kind words! Glad they’re of some use

Thanks for the kind words :)

Thank you for watching!

Maybe, but has not all great art created its own future through its creativity and power? Cannot theory be the same way? If we only follow the world like a predictive algorithm, are we not doomed to spiral into a black hole?

@@gavinyoung-philosophy No. It comes form skill, a proper use of theory, and outside funding. No, only theory that can be useful, ie to make predictions retain any value. Also no , you can make a Hegelian dialectic about which humor is effected by what kind of skull shapes or you can do something of value.

@@anilin6353 You seem to have proved my point. Hegel wasn’t creative, he was creating a mechanistic and totalizing system that depended on having basically exhausted the limits of the philosophy of history and the dialectic. In doing so, however, he took an idealist turn that ruined his potential. I never said to ignore the world by any means, simply that theory can play with creativity, fiction (so much of what we treat as real are in fact fictions), and the fact that philosophy is not predicative. Philosophy isn’t supposed to tell us a history that already is destined to happen, but to use thought to create a future not yet possible - and therefore not predictable.

@@gavinyoung-philosophyI think you are accepting a teleological notion in "to use thought to create a future not yet possible" that is at odds with postmodernism.

@@friendlyfire7861 Why need that be teleological? Creating something new need not be teleological, it’s just circumstantial and emergent.

I’m on your side man😂

Just because it’s complicated to you doesn’t mean we haven’t made any progress since the enlightenment. Contemporary philosophy has had to learn how to cope with and dismantle many harmful notions such as rationality, race, or scientific that have had horrific sociopolitical consequences. Most philosophers would disagree with your sweeping and uncharitable generalization.

​@@gavinyoung-philosophy No personal offense should be taken by you for what i'm about to say, because there is none intended. This is a more broad observation/critique instead intended for philosophy/philosophers in general. It is a critique of what it's become. It recognizes that you personally had no say creating in its current sorry state, but are instead just an invested participant. With that caveat & a swearing warning out in front.... -Philosophy- wandered into complete tripe somewhere in the 1800's. It gave world it's last few supernumerary nuggets of vestigial wisdoms, crawled up it's own ass and died. What has shambled on it's place has features reminiscent of the sport of cricket mixed with hermetic mysticism & fan fiction communities. It is little more than yogisms hidden behind esoteric language. A game furiously played working by obscure, slightly ridiculous & entirely arbitrary rulesets requiring extensive initiation to discern who's winning & why. Every player clearly believes that their actions are of vital importance to the world yet ostentatiously refuses to provide any proof of relevance or merit or utility mistakenly believing that such should be self evident. Philosophy lost the plot during the gilded age, and has been furiously covering for its absence of objective value/utility with presuppositional drivel & ontological bluster ever since. A small community of egoists all contending for a prize only they value. In some ways it reminds me of MENSA. Just full of arrogant people fooling themselves into thinking their isolation is a mark of superiority rather than irrelevance. Philosophy played out the last of it's innovative utility to the public with Schopenhauer & Nietzsche's flavors of couture miserablism. Proceeded to get lost in endless hall of self reflectiive mirrors couched as dialectics but having more true kinship to superstitions invented to flatter it's specific champions delicate egos. It no longer seeks truth. Just demands validation. Again, nothing personal. This isn't an attack on you, though I know it may feel a little like it. It is just my frank assessment of the state of what has become little more than a hobby for egoists who like to argue endlessly over trivial ephemera.

It’s not a matter of giving up rational or thoughtful discourse, but rather dispensing with “rationality” as a qualifier to coherent discourse. Rationality, as I mentioned, has been used to disclude and oppress various minority groups on the grounds of imposed categories. As such, Baudrillard’s conception of theory’s relationship to the world is aimed at eliminating the problematic recourse to a rational, coherent, exhaustible world that leads us to such uses of rationality.

@@gavinyoung-philosophy How do you give up rationality and still have coherent discourse?

@@Catachumen Insist on “rational” as a fluid and made up concept just like race, for example. Don’t use rationality as a bar by which to selectively decide what discourse is relevant and what can be written off. Contest rules of discourse by examining on their own turf.

@@gavinyoung-philosophy Why not just accept God is real and then you have an objective basis for the existence of morals, logic, reason, truth, love, and beauty? Everything is not relative and you will only think that way until someone comes to steal your things.

@@Catachumen I’m not a theist. Can’t just think objectivity into things🤷‍♂️

Cool painting, huh?

@gavinyoung-philosophy I appreciate dadaism But this is especially ugly

@@fortunatomartino8549 It’s Dadaism; it’s not supposed to be attractive, it’s supposed to be transgressive and a conglomerate.

@@gavinyoung-philosophy In a word ugly

@@gavinyoung-philosophy In a word, ugly

agreed, only someone out of touch with reality could believe this shit 🤣.

@@calebwalle5330 👍

​@@friendlyfire7861 His theory is basically what Plato discusses in the Divided Line, when, upon learning of mathematical truths, man can either use these truths to move our of and away from the cave and closer to the One, or, use this theory to control the world (thereby biting yourself to it). That's why Plato says education is literally "turning around." There is no truth possible in the world, for ours is the plane of perception. To accord "truth" to dreams is just how modern man lives.

@@anhumblemessengerofthelawo3858Yes, basically it always comes back to the Greeks. It's kind of the Pareto principle of philosophical insight.

Maybe its just not for you