[woko]

That is post-modernism [1], the tendencies of our era. Boghossian's commentary [2] published in 1996 is still relevant these days, though it would need to be put in context.

> Postmodernists like to respond [...] that both claims can be true because both are true relative to some perspective or other, and there can be no question of truth outside of perspectives.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postmodernism

[2] https://as.nyu.edu/content/dam/nyu-as/philosophy/documents/f...

[claudiawerner]

> Postmodernists like to respond [...] that both claims can be true because both are true relative to some perspective or other, and there can be no question of truth outside of perspectives.

I wonder who the 'postmodernists' mentioned here are; for example, Foucault, who is often grouped under that umbrella, went to pains to say that just because multiple readings are possible, it does not mean that they are all valid from a single point of scrutiny.

It's also rather strange that the talk of 'postmodernists' is as if it's an academic movement rather than the state of the world today (e.g. see Azuma's analysis of otaku in Japan as symptomatic of the postmodern condition; the increasing reliance on trope and categorized personalities in modern media compared to the grand narratives of modernist literature). Theorists of postmodernism tend to argue four fronts: why we're living in a postmodern world, how we got here, and what that means for meaning (political, religious, cultural) and how to deal with that.

The people who usually decry 'postmodernism' are in general perfectly happy to live in the world that word describes, with its media and piecemeal, disconnected consumption and purchase of images and simulations lacking any real narrative. Even more absurd is the tendency for some of the same people to resist narrative (e.g. "no politics in video games").

[GoblinSlayer]

Whether truth is relative or not has no effect on politics, because truth is simply not a concern there. The point of political claims is political interests, not truth, so they can't be defeated by walking and talking about truth.