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Comment by apocalypstyx | Hacker News Reader

I sometimes think about part of Fredric Jameson's remarks on one of the distinctions between modernity and postmodernity being an atemporality, that under postmodernity there is only the ever-present now. And I wonder if things like this are part of that, that we technically still recognize time, in the sense that we know we get off at five o'clock, but at the same time inherently don't recognize that in a sort of broader context, so people are forever what they were, are, always was, will be. So under such strictures, such makes a certain sense, in descriptive terms, that there is no what someone was but only what they are.

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Thank you, apocalypstyx - your comment is insightful and useful in analyzing certain present-day trends.

Bit of a tangent, I remember reading a comment regarding old art's propensity towards showing past as nearly the same as present. Take medieval christian paintings - while depicting scenes from era way past and cultures far removed, they were typically depicted with then-current clothing, equipment, housing, etc. It's only during renaissance (hopefully not mixing that one up?) that people commonly understood past & other societies were significantly different from the present, with different customs, culture, technology, etc. Accompanying the awareness was ongoing research into how the past actually was; what were the possibilities and limitations; what was the culture and what drove people to certain choices, however misguided they may seem in the hindsight.

Through your comment I realize we are in process of losing the ability to clearly delineate the past, and to hold it as imperfect, but necessary, stepping stones to the present day. And perhaps also to run effective, objective research into the past, without feeling the urge to nudge it into direction of a preferred narrative.

True post-modernism should also dissolve a staunch moral evaluation framework thus dampening outrage. What we have is some mix of modernism (rejection of classical thought) and fundamentalism (harsh judgement with black and white morality).

I'm not sure that dissolving a staunch moral evaluation framework necessarily results in a dampening of outrage. Absent an objective moral framework what is left is a subjective moral framework that is not debatable and thus cannot be externally challenged as "correct" or "incorrect." If my own unassailable framework is the only vaguely truth-like metric by which to measure anything, it seems to me that outrage is the perfectly predictable response towards anything with which I disagree since anything that does not agree with my moral framework is not moral.

is should but society would dissolve if it actually happened. the moral backlash is a backlash to the beginning stages of the amoralism - atheism, freedom of thought and sexuality have ripple effects on traditional social structures that are built on concepts of restriction and standardisation.

where do you put your pent up hate without being hurtful? you attack the people who are perceived as hurtful first

The way I see it, post-modernism has enabled the outrage machine in the first place, by dissolving the borders between fact and fiction and dismissing context in any form. When everything is interpretable in any possible framework truth, reason and nuance become just another straw in the haystack and not something individuals should strife for.

You suggest we don't have true post-modernism, because it is not critical enough of the own operating moral framework. I counter that with: post-modernism is essentially only 'tried and tested' anti-modernism, but it doesn't come along as religious outrage like in the old times, but dressed in the form of moral outrage machines, that can be triggered by any form of non-conformist behaviour in any possible framework -- the frameworks have become interchangable, the operational mechanisms work like they always have.

If I understand correctly, one of the things that postmodernism says is that all speech is about power, not truth - that all claims of truth are really assertions of power.

It's not just that the border of fact and fiction has been dissolved. The question is not even considered relevant, because the statement isn't considered to be about truth in the first place.

"Everything can be interpreted in any possible framework" only in the sense that they will interpret your statement in the framework that makes it look the worst. Why will they do so? Because their interpretation of your statement is not about finding truth, but about their assertion of power. That is, these people are operating consistent with their philosophy.

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