Okay, let’s clarify a few things about Critical Theory, a topic I have written on for some time now (see here, here, here,and especially here). Since some have tried to respond to my articles by articulating what they believe to be a kind of Critical Theory-Christianity synthesis, I will try to briefly lay out my underlying problem with ANY critical theory, be it Critical Race Theory, Critical Gender Theory, Critical Legal Studies, or just good-old historical Marxism.
The point that needs to be made is that there is a basic epistemic assumption of all critical theories that I simply reject straight away. I will try to expose that underlying epistemic assumption here, and show that it is incompatible with the idea of Christianity being true. This analysis is not meant to be exhaustive, and each point could be further elaborated upon. Thus, it may not be as precise as it could be. Still I think it is accurate in its basic claims and its reasoning.
Tracing Critical Theory: It Starts With Kant
First, historically speaking, any critical theory just is genealogically descended from Kant. That is not to say we couldn’t find earlier philosophical writings that hint at the basic idea of critical theory (see Giambattista Vico). It is only to say that contemporary critical theory in the West starts with Kant, and Kant’s lasting influence on western thought.
It is only after Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason, that the terms “theory” and “critique” become technical terms. Because Kant turns the capacity of Reason on itself, critically, everything after Kant becomes mere theory. Thus, post Kant, most philosophical views in the West are of this type. And, after Hegel, there is no systematic philosophy ever again (although there are systematic theologies). The most obvious of these later types of philosophy is Marx’s philosophy, which, we should forever remind ourselves, has lead to a whole lot of death and destruction.
So what did Kant say about Reason?
Reason Redefined: From Kant to Hegel
1) For Kant, Reason is not a passive capacity of the intellect, whereby the mind, however difficult the process, comes to grasp truths about the world given the experiences of the senses. This was the classical understanding of Reason: Reason as the guide to truth about the way things are. One might call it a kind of soft empiricism, the view that human Reason takes what is given, processes it through a God-given capacity, and comes to actual conclusions about reality. For Kant, however, his “copernican revolution” was to argue that Reason does something quite different than this. The mind is not passively receiving sense data and then actively considering its features (as per Aristotle). Instead, the mind is active in the very organizing of the raw data of sensory experience and even in the creation of those sensory experiences. Reason constructs, actively, the very categories of our phenomenal experiences. Thus, the very categories of being are, so to speak, up to us. Or, at least, they are dependent on the operations of our minds.
As such, there is no real given of nature. Instead, the “given” is generated in and by the mind: by the ego. Whatever we think the given might be, we cannot actually know it. The phenomena (das Ding fur mich) is NOT the noumena (Das Ding an sich). The mind’s putting together of the phenomena means that the subject is active in the project, and projection, of that which we call “reality.”
However, Kant still argued that this Reason was itself universal. Even though he redefined the role of Reason–what Reason does and how it works–he still believed every mind has the same Reason. Thus every mind works roughly in the same way, coming equipped with the same capacity of Reason. We all reason in similar fashion, even if some do it better than others. There are not Reasons among different people, or distinct Logics that pertain to distinct minds. As far as I can tell, Kant mirrors Descartes in this way.
2) In response to this revolution of Reason, however, Hegel rejects two things about Kant’s view: first, that there is even a noumena to speak of. Hegel thinks that since we cannot know the noumena behind the phenomena, the phenomena that is constructed by our minds, then why even bother positing the noumena? The noumena does no philosophical work whatsoever and, therefore, should simply be dismissed entirely. There is only the phenomena to speak of, only the subjective experience.
Second, Reason is not universal. Reason is not the same everywhere, at all times and for all people. It is not a fixed or “reified” capacity that is always projecting the same categories of being onto the world. For Hegel, Reason is contingent upon temporal succession, upon history unfolding. Thus, the operation of Reason yesterday is not the same as it is today, even if the way reason operated in the past is, somehow, mystically incorporated into its present operations. Nevertheless, the way people reasoned in the past, especially the distant past, is simply not the same as it is right now (e.g. “Whatever is now, is right”).
As such, historical eras, i.e. time itself, alters reason. Now, Hegel thinks there is an objective progression to this historical process, as many classical liberals still do today, and that ultimately humanity will evolve to perfect reasoning (that is the historical dialectic) and that that perfect reasoning, or Rationality, is something like God (absolute Spirit). Moreover, Hegel also thinks he is the only one who can grasp this objective progression (keep this in mind for later). But the main point here is that now there are different ways of reasoning, and that reason itself has changed. For Hegel, there are different reasonings mainly because of history. However, reasonings are not necessarily different because of geographical locations or social features (I think this is right, but I am open to correction).
3) After Hegel, this view of reason (lower case “r”) becomes embedded in the academic culture in the West. This is at least as it applies to what is commonly known as the “continental” tradition of philosophical thought (not so in the concurrent and competing tradition of “analytic” philosophy). Continental philosophy eventually becomes ensconced in American universities, especially on the coasts, primarily via the creation of Sociology departments. One could call this view of reason the “social theory” of reason.
In sum, what is reason said to be like after Hegel? Reason is not a fixed, universal, largely passive capacity of all men, everywhere. It is contingent upon historical development and, as such, subject to changes over time. Reason actively constructs the phenomena of our experience, which we call “reality.” Reason is progressing in time, for Hegel at least, to a culminating point. In other words, reason has a historical telos (probably the only truly Christian idea that is in Hegel).
Reason Socialized & Psychologized: From Marx to Marcuse
4) With Marx, however, reason now becomes contingent not only upon historical processes but upon material conditions. It is material, or economic conditions that determine how people reason about the world. Thus, if one changes the material conditions, one changes how people, individuals and groups, “construct” the world of “reality.” Basically, if you change the material conditions, you change the thoughts of the man under those conditions.
5) The Frankfurt School is next. In the work of Herbert Marcuse (see Marcuse’s Eros and Civilization), this social view of reason becomes synthesized with Freudian psychological concepts of regression, repression, and oppression. However, the only way to determine, given the ever-changing nature of reason, what movements in history are regressive versus progressive, oppressive versus liberating, is simply to declare yourself, or your group, as the enlightened group capable of making that kind of moral determination. Remember what I said about Hegel above, that he alone knew what the “objective” progression of history was like.
In short, the new critical theorist simply asserts that he has the ability to adjudicate, in a normative way, the moral quality of historical events. Thus, there are the “awakened” ones, the critical theorists, and there are those who disagree with them. The ones who disagree are simply in the dark. They exist in a moral and intellectual slumber. We might say that the advent of 1960s critical-theory-inspired sociology marks the rise of the liberal “intelligentsia” class in the United States. Those who accept and propagate “theory” declare themselves to be the ones capable of making moral judgments over societal movements, events, attitudes and orientations. Marcuse said as much in his 1977 interview with Bryan Magee, when he admitted, on the one hand, that the feminist movement has “radical potential” for social liberation (and should therefore be embraced), while admitting, on the other, that the “feminine qualities” associated with that movement are entirely socially conditioned.
So, who has the right to say which socially conditioned qualities are good, bad, or ugly (or liberating or oppressive), all of which are socially conditioned concepts anyway?
The critical theorists do.
Why?
Because, they say so.
6) ALL critical theories after Horkheimer, Adorno and Marcuse basically accept this view of reason. In addition, via fiat, they also adopt the role of acting as social judges and jury members (and, at times, executioners). For these, reason is just not a thing in the world. It is not a universal capacity possessed by all people. Reason is historically and socially contingent. It actively constructs our experiences based on our material and social characteristics and traits.
There is “white reasoning” and “black reasoning” and “gay reasoning” and “queer reasoning,” and “male reasoning,” and “female reasoning,” and “disabled reasoning” and “ableist reasoning,” and, well, you get the picture. This view rejects everything that might be called “essential” or “fixed” or “universal,” and it does so as means to gain power or privilege over others. On this view, the greatest oppressors in history would have to be Plato, Aristotle, Augustine and Aquinas. Oh, and Jesus. In fact, anyone who consistently holds this view of reason, should reject Jesus as an oppressor, and not a liberator or savior. In fact, I think one critical race theorist already made that quite clear.
Now, this assumption about reason can be held by people who are themselves not terribly immoral, malevolent or even arrogant (well, maybe they are all arrogant). It can be assumed by those who may have good intentions and a decent “heart.” It can be believed by men and women who might genuinely desire to do right things. But that doesn’t mean the assumption is right! If one doesn’t believe me on this point, I would recommend reading Angela Harris’ excellent article “Race and Essentialism in Feminists Legal Theory,” and ask oneself the question of why Harris opens this article with a reference to Jorge Borges’s “Funes the Memorius.”
You’ll have to use actual Reason to figure that out. But, I for one, am confident you can do it.
Conclusion: There is No Christian Critical Theory
7) Long story short: if you are an anti-realist about essences, which all critical theorists that I, at least, have read are–because they assume the above Kantian/Hegelian view of reason–then ALL you are left with are expressions of the individual or group will. And we know where that usually leads. Perhaps, if one were a strict biblicist and a divine command theorist, one could pull off some kind of synthesis here. However, none of these people are those and no one has done that.
In sum, this is why Robin DiAngelo, call her a critical race theorist, a whiteness studies theorist, a con-artist (I don’t care), can write a book so bad as White Fragility, and get away with it. Robin DiAngelo’s success was predicated on us living in a culture where reason is treated as an individualized, fluid, active thing that tells us nothing about the real world. In short, reason has become emotion. Thus, emotional rhetoric aimed at the moral sensibilities is the only means by which political and social change is thought possible. But it, nor anything like it, is a rational piece of literature.
And so when I write things like “anyone who apologized for being white between 2019-2022” should be removed from their leadership in churches, seminaries or Christian schools, or when I indict those “who fell for Critical Race Theory,” as I did here, what I am really saying is, if you were a Christian professor, pastor, seminary president, etc., then why on earth did you accept any of the above assumptions to begin with?
Those who fell for critical theory should have known better. They should have known better than to assume the Kantian framework of Reason, or the social construct theory of knowledge that followed it and upon which all these theories are based. Regardless of what you want to call them: Law in Context theory, Postmodernism, Critical Race Theory, Whiteness studies, whatever, these are all incompatible with Christian belief.
The point being that the responsibility is on those who accepted the false epistemic paradigm to begin with, and, so doing, went on to make dumb statements like “I will always be a racist,” even though they knew that they really weren’t racist, and who suppressed the fact that their love for and friendship with “black or brown people” was actually genuine and true.
And you know who you are.
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