Written by Jeremy Watkins-Quesada
As I
write this piece I am one part relieved to be blogging again; relieved to be
pitting my abilities against an opponent outside the elite class of
intellectuals and academics via what is now a conference paper. Yet, at the same time, this drop in level infuses
bits of anxiety and frustration in me, as it is not apparent to those who've a
right to know who's leading them. Many, too many, Xicana and Latinx Chicana
and Latina females--girls and women alike--are being led into personal disaster
if they don't become woke aware of who is attempting
to lead them and where or in which direction they are in fact being led.
Let's consider the following anecdote.
In his
book 'Is God a Delusion?', Philosopher Erik Reitan (a former member of my
master's thesis committee) offers an anecdote in which an unnamed colleague of
his (I think I know whom, lol) walks into his office with what appears to be a
student essay in their hands. The topic of the short essay (if I recall
correctly) is an exposition or explanation of Aquinas's philosophy of religion.
The colleague hands Reitan the essay and asks him to read it before assessing
the unnamed student's performance via a letter grade. Reitan agrees to this
arrangement. As a quick aside, let me say that (i) Reitan is a liberal
Christian, and, as for me, (ii) I am a non-religious progressive,
and (iii) My thesis was not on religion, but rather it was on collective
responsibility. I put all of that out there to dispel any
ideas that would stand to presume I am somehow espousing religious or
conservative ideologies. Everyone Not everyone who disagrees with some
ideologies espoused by some on the left is a conservative or
fundamentalist or a "Nazi" of some kind. In fact, one could argue it
is analogically speaking the other way around. But I digress.
Anyway,
as the story goes, Reitan completed his read of the brief exposition by
subsequently adjudicating a letter grade for what appeared (according to his
account) to be written by an undergraduate. Consequently, and if I recall
correctly, Reitan's verdict was grade the effort something like a 'D+'. You may
be asking: Why?
Reitan
recounts the overall explanation of Aquinas's ideas by the paper's author as
being of poor quality to the extent that they were characterized by the misinformation of
a less than erudite student of philosophy. That is, the (up to this point)
nameless author in question lacked a greater understanding or knowledge of what
Aquinas had to say concerning a particular subject, say, the existence of some
object or event we'll call X. As all of us
stateside have learned during the foregone year and some months, misinformation
can be damaging, namely when it is being used to promote an ideology, a line of
belief that has yet to fulfill its obligation to the onus of proof. The
act of spreading misinformed or underdeveloped beliefs, namely when
communicating these opinions as facts, is a deceitful if not entirely dangerous
thing to do. Some examples come to mind, e.g., manifest destiny and pizzagate.
Recall,
whereas the second noted example almost got innocent people killed, the first
example got many upon many killed as well as well...you know the rest...click
the link if not. Now, you may be asking: What the actual hell, Jeremy! Why turn
a discussion about a poorly written essay authored by a poorly informed student
into something analogous, if not equal, to the awful events noted above? Who but
the professors in question will ever read the misinformed opining of this
individual, right? Wrong. The poor explanation from Aquinas's belief
about X was not actually an essay at all, let alone one written by an 18
year-old college freshman. Rather, it was an excerpt written by Richard
Dawkins in his best-selling book 'The God Delusion'. Roughly, the
God Delusion is a book aimed at attacking religion and belief in God. I,
myself, have read both books. What is more, I have also read a few other books
as well as countless scholarly articles on the subject. All things considered,
I say the onus of proof lies on BOTH those who like Reitan
hold a belief in God or Gods and those like Dawkins whose non-belief renders
them atheists. To be clear, what I am saying is that the question we've all
been asked from time to time 'Do you believe in God?' is not the simple
question many, too many, seem to believe it is. Then again, many other 'seemingly'
simple questions really aren't. Putting the God question aside for another
post, I want to raise a similar situation I am having with one Gloria Lucas and
her Nalgona Positivity Pride (NPP).
This week I am going to take to task one of Lucas's contribution to Sovereign Bodies, which I and the rest of us here at La Resistencia hold as being very problematic, that is, insofar as it is full of misinformation. Unfortunately, Ms. Lucas has been given opportunities to permeate or spread her misinformation on popular platforms and even in at least one college classroom. By the end of this series, we will reach out to the platform givers in question and ask them why. Why would they entrust such great responsibility in the hands of someone who--as we'll show--is not ready to lead insofar as she merely a purveyor of 'fake epistemology' or fake knowledge. We also aim to reach out to Lucas herself, though she has already blocked our Tumblr account based on similar efforts to open up discourse. Recall, an earlier post (when we thought we had time to begin this series initially) in which we discussed some similarities she and her body positivity cohorts bare to POTUS 45. All things considered, look out for my reading and subsequent grading of Lucas's Historical Trauma, Racism and Eating Disorders in the U.S. Spoiler alert, there are no connections made between these things yet, and it seems to me she has not even read the scholarly articles she cites therein.
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