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Show Rationality and the Structure of the Self, Volume I: The Humean Conception 15 assumptions, then (at least for the time being) so much the worse for those assumptions, and for those innocents who, not understanding the implicit rules of the game - the allotted speaker time, the maximum acceptable article length, or the limited market demand for fat, ponderous books such as this one - would attempt to exercise quality control by calling those assumptions into question. The Bully becomes a morally objectionable Überbully with the choice of more insulting or hurtful terms of evaluation, and with the shouting, stamping of feet, or even throwing of objects that sometimes accompanies his attempts to drive home a point. This mere failure of impartiality, selfreflection and self-control shades into unadorned wrongdoing when these tactics of verbal intimidation include insinuated threats of professional retaliation or clear verbal harassment. Suggestions that holding a certain philosophical position is not conducive to tenure or reappointment, or that one will be dropped from a project for challenging received wisdom, or that raising objections to a senior colleague's view is offensive and inappropriate; as well as familiar locutions such as "Any idiot can see that ..." or, "That is the most ridiculous argument I've ever heard;" or, "What a deeply uninteresting claim;" or, "How can anyone be so dense as to believe that ...?" are all among the Überbully's arsenal of verbal ammunition. Philosophers have been publicly and professionally humiliated for having argued a view that, in their critic's eyes, marked them as dim-witted, ill-read, poorly educated, lazy, devious, evasive, superficial, dull, ridiculous, dishonest, manipulative, or any combination of the above. Whereas the Bulldozer prevents you from contributing to the dialogue, the Überbully uses you and your philosophical contributions as a punching bag, trying to knock the stuffing out of them and scatter their remains to the wind. It is tempting to explain this grade of lethal verbal aggression as an expression of arrogance or boorishness. It is better understood as an expression of fear. Like the Bully, the Überbully attempts to demolish you through verbal harassment, not rational philosophical analysis - in clear violation of the canonical rules of philosophical discourse. All we need to ask is why either brand of bully feels the need to resort to these thuggish tactics when the canonical ones are available, in order to understand their brutal performances as an exhibition of felt philosophical inadequacy that expresses fear of professional humiliation. The frequency with which shame and fear emerge in these forms interrogates the suitability of the practice of philosophy to stand as a testimonial to our achievement of the Socratic/Hampshirean "moral virtue of high civilization," thereby as a testimonial to the victory of "slave morality," and thereby as a testimonial to the centrality of reason in the structure of the self. And it explains why my optimism about our rational capacity to transcend the merely comfortable, convenient, profitable, or gratifying is cautious at best. © Adrian Piper Research Archive Foundation Berlin |
