Tyranny of relativism?
Sim Kwang Yang
The new Pope, before he was elected Pope, warned the world against the “tyranny of relativism”.
It must have been a very unpopular remark, especially in the European and North American worlds, as well as those parts of the rest of the world that have been invaded by the notions of modernity - or as is so often claimed, the notions of post-modernity.
We all know the drill. The relativist credo is that there is no absolute Truth, with a capital T. There are only small relative truths. Truths are relative to the individuals who hold them, and to the spatial-temporal-historical-cultural circumstances under which such truths are uttered and acted upon.
|
I could point out that the assertion “there is no absolute truth” itself is meant to be the absolute truth, and so absolute relativism is a self-contradiction in terms. There is something strange in the act of making a linguistic proposition. To say that “everything I say is a lie” is self-defeating logically. It makes no sense.
Logically, people who believe in the absoluteness of relative truths ought to keep silent. You just believe in it and do as you wish, according to your whims and fancies, since all truth claims are but personal preferences, like choosing between an apple or an orange.
Pointing out that any belief in the absoluteness of relativism is a self-contradiction in terms is no use though. The believer would simply modify his stand by saying thus: there is no absolute truth, except this one.
In any case, what is logic anyway? It is generally accepted that logic is the set of iron rules of thought, still based predominantly on Aristotle’s Laws of Identity and Excluded Middle. We need these rules for understanding mathematics and science, to make sense of our concepts and our thinking process, and to communicate with others through language.
Determine the limitations
Unfortunately, the efficacy of logic itself is in doubt. We have no reason to believe that the world, as the fascinating Other, works logically. Certainly love, sex, hate and death are not logical. All religious beliefs and divine revelations are illogical.
It does not mean that logic is useless. It does imply that logic has its limitations. The problem is determining those limitations.
Is this line of enquiry better left to the leisurely ivory tower of academia, rather than the general readership of malaysiakini?
I think not.
Implicitly at least, malaysiakini does profess to be a democratic forum, where readers can participate in healthy debates on important issues of the day. It is indeed a rare and precious bit of public space, a window of opportunity for the nurturing of a civil society in its infancy.
I am sure the founders and the leading lights within the malaysiakini organisation harbour the fervent hope that, given this limited but fertile garden, the seeds for the freedom of expression will sink deep roots within our Darwinian media jungle.
So far so good. Here, on the flickering pages of malaysiakini, you can find a deluge of diverse views, ranging from ultra-conservative perspectives on religion, politics, culture and race, to some ultra-radical narratives that would shock the most tolerant of our usually staid traditional society.
Still, subscribers and supporters of malaysiakini grumble in private about the quality of the input that goes towards the content of these virtual pages. Some views here are unreadable, they complain.
Virtue of tolerance
I sigh with resignation whenever I hear such grouses. But then I am sure much of what I have written here must unfailingly appear to be unreadable to many readers. It seems like a fair price to pay in this noble experiment in freedom of speech, to live with people whose views we deem to be repulsive, juvenile, barbaric, offensive obnoxious, dangerous and downright fascist.
Are we therefore compelled to extol the virtue of tolerance, as the bottom line of democracy? Unfortunately, while tolerance works to preserve harmony in most cases, it is an unsatisfactory virtue. It is a condescending attitude; it amounts to thinking quietly like so: I think what you say stinks like the cesspool, but I will live with the stench as my human condition.
In short, tolerance does nothing for a joyous meeting of the souls of men and women, towards a kind of congenial solidarity to be celebrated through the act of communication.
Besides, where do we draw the line in our toleration. Do we tolerate evil in its various forms? Do we tolerate pornography as a form of free expression? Do we tolerate also racist remarks aimed at inciting hatred and bloodshed? And who is to say what separate good from evil in this relativist universe?
Here I should invoke the ghost of Plato’s dialectic from the cobweb of our history of ideas. We should perhaps ask: if we find the views of some people totally exasperating and unworthy for public consumption, is it merely because these people disagree with us, or because these views - irrespective of whoever expresses them – are in themselves simply unsound, ill-thought out, and therefore bad.
A devotee of relativism would easily assert, consciously or unconsciously, that good and bad, as well as truth and untruth, are just matters of personal preference, that may have arisen from a number of contingent factors. It may have something to do with one’s upbringing, one’s life experience, or simply one’s state of indigestion at that particular time.
If that is the case, then there is not much point in argument and debate. You just express what emerges from the nadir of your being, and if the others do not like it, they can go fly a kite. In any case, we can always agree to disagree. Why, you can even quote Voltaire’s immortal words to Rousseau: I may disagree with what you say, but I will defend with my life your right to say it.
Superficial and redundant
It all sounds very liberal, very modern, and very progressive, and it works most of the time, at least on the level of personal relationship. Without this minimum decorum of mutual respect, members of the same family would be up in arms against one another, and old friendship would vanish overnight.
Applied to public discourse, however, this principle is not so much wrong as it is anaemic.
For one thing, it is insufficient in taking account of our most deep-seated need to communicate with one another, not merely about the mundane things in life, but in matters of profound importance. In fact, it makes communication rather superficial and redundant. If all we can do is to agree to disagree, for truth is relative, and there will never be any possibility of consensus, than all speech acts are reduced to a monologue and a soliloquy.
Then people say things but do not really speak; they hear but do not listen. Alternatively, they pretend to listen, only because they are awaiting their chance to say their piece next. Eventually, you have to wonder: what is the point of speaking your mind if nobody is listening anyway? One may as well keep permanently silent.
There is another downside to the relativist universe.
It is fine and dandy as long as we can walk away from an argument, agreeing to disagree, while triumphantly cursing others in the silence of our hearts the stupidity of our opponents, and the nit-wits of the world in general. As I said, this tactic works, and it may even make us feel good about ourselves.
But in grave matters affecting everybody, such as those crucial issues in the political domain, How would crucial conflicts of opinions be resolved, when the possibility of communication has been negated by a universal agreement to disagree, thereby making the act of speech redundant?
I will tell you how. When truths have been relegated to the privacy of the heart only, the solipsism of personal conviction or the vagaries of emotive preferences takes over from any need to justify oneself to others. The conflict is then beyond public mediation, through discussion and dialogues. The logical consequence is the settlement of public disagreement by force, either through the barrel of a gun, or through the coercion of the law by the dictate of a brute majority in a democracy.
In short, those who believe that truths are merely relative would unwittingly affirm the dictum that might is right, something that human civilisation has been struggling to disapprove for eons on end.
What we hope to see in malaysiakini is healthy debate, unlike the debates that go on in the Parliament, or in the oppressed official press. Again, what constitutes healthy debate is subject to discussion and debate. After all, what you consider to be unhealthy, can be very healthy to others.
Fortunately, we often know what something is not, even if we do not know what it is. We may argue till thy-kingdom-come about what justice is, but we know that ethnic cleansing is unjust. Even the ironic knowledge of our ignorance is a sort of knowledge, to serve as the point of departure on what constitutes the ethics of healthy communication.
For instance, we know now that personal attacks, second-guessing other people’s motives, and appealing to blind authorities are all unfair argument. What we need then, is some form of understanding, if not total consensus, on the conditions for meaningful communication.
Otherwise, the freedom of expression would merely lead to the anarchy of the silence of the heart in private, and the rule of brute force in various forms in public.
