Walk with Alice through Neo-Marxist rhetoric
Some reflections from the other side of the mirror
It seems every day we are shamed to give up what we thought were established shared norms and truths because we are told they are constructed fairytales serving to oppress others. Bewildered, most wonder how it happened so fast. For the Neo-Marxists, the question is why did it take so long?
When Marxist revolutions failed in industrial economies, the theory was revised by adherents creating what is loosely referred to as Neo-Marxism. (Within this substrate there are many derivatives.) The new theorists concluded it wasn't the bourgeoisie’s economic power that stopped the revolutions. It was their power in constructing cultural beliefs, morals, and values the masses were 'conscripted' to follow. A cultural revolution was, therefore, necessary to overcome the oppression. Olds norms needed to be replaced with new norms. But how was this to be accomplished? It would be by inserting the theories in the cultural institutions (churches, schools, etc.) prompting the oft-quoted phrase “the long march through the institutions.” And what has been the weapon of choice? Words.
Neo-Marxism, and all its derivatives, use linguistic, logical inversions, and rhetorically created constructs to create new truths. Reality does not create the “new reality.” Words do. Since Neo-Marxists believe you can create reality by the childlike act of pretending and wishing with language, what better way to assess their theories than through a children's book?
The book selected for this essay is Lewis Carroll’s “Through the Looking Glass’ renowned for its own fantastical creatures, logical parodies, and linguistic tricks with an underlying chess game moving the story along.
The linguistic tricks are key to its selection. While logic and language have been studied since ancient times, by the 1800s linguists became a serious science to be studied. As defined, linguistics is the scientific study of the history and usage of language. Lewis Carroll was surely pushing the boundaries of emerging linguistic concepts to demonstrate their limits and sometimes absurdities to entertain the reader. But what happens when a scientific concept that was to be used to explain the evolution of societies by language is instead used to control them?
Shared Language is Shared Culture
Shared language is essential to building and sustaining a culture. If you go to your local coffee shop and ask for a coffee, you expect a black liquid based on your communication. If instead, you receive a broom, you will be confused. If this continues all day, you will surely become disoriented, breaking down your mental health. Such a disorienting journey is showcased in “Through the Looking Glass” (TLG.) TLG tells the story of young Alice who goes through the looking-glass to reach the other side of the mirror. Once there, Alice embarks on a journey to become queen in the underlying chess game. She meets fantastical characters, who leave her perpetually confused as they speak in English, but in puzzling ways untethered to the reality she left behind. For this, she is continuously mocked for not understanding their ‘languaging.’ But that is part of the fun, for it is after all a children’s story where the child is navigating what is a representation of the adult world.
He Who Controls the Language Controls the Culture
Rational Thought (language) replaces the Divinity
TLG was published in 1871. Though written for children, it has continuously amused mathematicians, philosophers, and of course, chess players since its publication. Another notable book published during this era also proved influential to succeeding generations of readers, scholars, and political activists. It was Karl Marx’s Communist Manifesto, published in 1858. With only a fourteen-year difference in age, Carroll would have been a cultural contemporary of Karl Marx. And both would have been cultural products of their age. While the Age of Enlightenment (17th-18th Century) gave rise to the concepts of naturally endowed rights of man, it also gave rise to rational thought. Rational thought, as it emerged into the 19th Century with the Industrial Revolution and advances in science, placed man as governed by physical laws and not by Divinity. For Marx, religion was an impenetrable ceiling that prevented the uplifting of the oppressed. Like an opioid drug that soothed pain but did nothing to eliminate the root cause, the Poor were encouraged to accept their hardship with promises of bliss in the afterlife. Thus for Marx, religion was a tool used by the bourgeoisie to control the producers (the proletarian.) 1
As industrialization and science advanced in the late 1800s, Divinity and its religious affiliations continued to retreat. Stripping away of God and mysticism during this age was the basis for Nietzsche famously proclaiming, “God is dead and we have killed him.” Many who take this quote out of context, herald it with relish. They are mistaken. For Nietzsche, this realization foreshadowed a dark future. Though an atheist, he feared it would give way to nihilism as morality and meaning became untethered from a belief in divinity which was the foundation of Western culture. 2
The Masters of Language
With the removal of Divinity from man, what is left to be unique? Arguably thought and speech. This must have been the conclusion for Neo-Marxists when addressing the failed workers’ revolution in industrial societies. These revisionists concluded the capitalist system would only be overthrown by a change in culture, and essential to this would be by changing speech. Control the language and you shape thought and thus create a cultural revolution.
As envisioned by the definition of linguistics, words and their definitions should be organic and follow an evolutionary path within a culture. But what happens when an appointed person chooses to usurp the recognized definition? Alice’s encounter with the mercurial linguist ‘Humpty Dumpty (HD) highlights the concept of controlling speech. It is the same HD of the familiar children’s nursery rhyme and Alice repeats the lyrics to herself as she approaches him. She attempts to exchange pleasantries with HD; however, their interaction proves difficult. He uses words and concepts seemingly plain in definition but are used in ways that leave her confused. In explaining the benefits of receiving ‘unbirthday gifts’ as opposed to a birthday gift, which yields only one, he triumphantly states, “There’s glory for you!” Alice responds, “I don’t know what you mean by ‘glory.’ To this HD exclaims, ‘ Of course, you don’t-till I tell you. I meant ‘there’s a nice knock-down argument for you!” Alice dutifully objects that this is not the definition of glory. To which HD proclaims with scorn,
“When I use a word, it means just what I choose it to mean-neither more nor less.” Humpty Dumpty
Confused Alice asks, “The question is whether you can make words mean so many different things”
“The question is which is to be master - that’s all”
This is the fundamental question of our time. Words have been broken away from what had been linguistic norms of a shared culture. Diversity now means selectivity based on specified criteria. If words can create womanhood by bringing forth thoughts into words, men can literally wish themselves into women. There are now gynecologists advocating that if a man presents himself as a woman at their office, the doctors must abide by his words and to question them, is a violation of the Hippocratic oath.3 Like pee in a pool, this toxicity spreads easily to other areas. This is how you have academics posing as Native Americans, with no such ties, receiving all the financial benefits while true Native Americans are called racists for questioning the charade.4 So in true irony those who were to benefit from agreed-upon protections are now cast out and wolves prey on anyone who dares to enter while still believing in pre-established norms.
Punishment First then the Crime—or better still punishment and no crime
In another famous passage, the character known as the White King has imprisoned his royal Messenger. The Messenger has been imprisoned though he has yet to commit a crime. To such a predicament Alice asks the White Queen, "Suppose he never commits the crime?" To which she responds, "That would be all the better, wouldn't it?" While Alice can not deny the logic, she continues, "Of course it would be all the better but it wouldn't all the better his being punished." The Queen queries to Alice, "Were you ever punished?" Alice dutifully acknowledges she has but only for ‘faults.’ The Queen concludes, “And you were all the better for it, I know!” Alice answers, “Yes, but then I had done the things I was punished for and that makes all the difference.”
“But if you hadn't done them that would have been better still; better, and better, and better.” (White Queen)
Can you not sense that we are living in 'looking glass' logic? How often do we imprison our thoughts for possible future crimes of wrong speak? Prohibiting wrong speech was the objective of Herbert Marcuse in his influential essay, Repressive Tolerance.
“This liberating tolerance would involve the withdrawal of toleration of speech and assembly from groups and movements on the Right, and the aggressively partisan promotion of speech, groups, and progressive movements on the left.”5
His objective has been fulfilled. We are now like the messenger in the King’s prison keeping our words locked up. We now have the Cybersecurity Infrastructure Security System, and fitting within that acronym is its offspring Cognitive Infrastructure (translation ‘your thoughts.’) It used to be that bad thoughts were between you and your God. Now it is soon to be between you and your government.
Deception by Design
Deception by design lures you to do something you would not do if you fully understood the other’s meaning. This is illustrated by the White Queen offering Alice a position as her lady’s maid for “[t]wo pence a week, and jam every other day.” Alice demures neither desiring the money nor the jam. The Queen counters but, “it’s very good jam.” To which Alice replies, “Well I don’t want any to-day at any rate.”
“You couldn’t have if you did want it,” the Queen responds. “The rule is, jam to-morrow and jam yesterday-but never jam to-day.” Confused Alice queries that there must come a time when it is ‘jam to-day.’ But alas, it is never jam to-day as the Queen explains. It is jam every other day and today can never be an ‘other day.’
Words of ‘equity,’ inclusion, and fairness are sold as progress for society. We are told if we just accept these words and their definitions all will be well. But like a deceptive contract, the true intent is in the small print, or worse hidden behind vague terms that you cannot understand by historical usage.
Neo-Marxism and Mysticism
The true irony of the current linguistic narrative, and its many iterations, is that though their proponents are often atheists, their theories are steeped in mysticism. The Climate Change rhetoric is a prime example. When assertions are made that humans are no different than any other species… thus we must act to limit ourselves for the protection thereof, a paradox is created. While seemingly of the world, they are simultaneously assuming godlike status of omnipotent importance. Such proclamations are reminiscent of Jesus dying on the cross to save others. By willing us to sacrifice ourselves to save others, be it plants or animals, are they not saying we are gods?
Mysticism seems inevitable to the human experience no matter how hard Neo Marxists try to escape it. The danger lies in their belief that by their thoughts and words, they are the gods.
Crashing the Rhetoric
At the end of Alice’s journey, she is crowned queen and seated at a banquet held in her honor. She is seated among those who bewildered or ridiculed her along the way with their confusing logic and rhetoric.
Their absurd nonsensical behavior continues prompting Alice to say, “I ca’n’t stand this any longer!”
She seizes the tablecloth with both hands: one good pull, and plates, dishes, guests, and candles came crashing down in a heap of the floor. Turning to grab the Red Queen, who she believes is the cause of all the mischief, Alice finds the she has shrunk to the size of a doll and running all about. Catching hold of the Queen she says, “I will shake you into a kitten, that I will.” And as she does, the Queen does indeed turn into the black kitten that is Alice’s pet. For this is a children’s story, and her adventure was just a dream.
We are not so fortunate. We are not in a dream. We are in a nightmare. But like the character in the story, we have more power than we realize. Those who profess the Neo Marxist rhetoric tell us they need to be in charge of the language because they are the only ones intelligent enough to understand it. Left unsaid, is that as they made it up, like Humpty Dumpty, they are the only ones that know what the words mean.
Closing Thoughts
“You have to start with the truth. The truth is the only way that we can get anywhere. Because any decision-making that is based upon lies or ignorance can’t lead to a good conclusion.”
—Julian Assange
Philosopher Gad Saad believes to test a linguistic or philosophic theory you have to go to its extreme. A few years ago a female student questioned the harm in addressing someone by their preferred pronouns. He answered by asking, “Should the receptionist at an obstetrician/gynecologist's office ask the prospective patient their sexual identity?’ The student responded that was an absurd example for surely the patient would be a woman. The young woman, who must have proudly thought of herself as a progressive, would now be deemed regressive for her thoughts.
That is the problem with Neo-Marxist rhetoric. There is no stopgap for when it goes dangerously too far because it is based on rhetoric - words inserted here and there to obtain objectives whether rooted in reality or not. This is not to say that I believe Neo-Marxist theories are the true problem we face. I do not. Some of the inequities observed by their theories are valid. But the real problem is that it is being used as a tool for those who wish to exert their power. Fredrick Hayek wrote in his seminal book “The Road to Serfdom” that the communist and fascist parties in Germany during the 1920s drew upon the same population. Some adherents would go left and others right. But both theories follow a parallel path to totalitarianism with the worst of us rising to the top like toxic cream.
To delve into this area on a deeper level, James Lindsay has developed an entire platform called New Discourse devoted to explaining Neo-Marxism and its various derivatives.
Cline, A. (2019). Karl Marx on Religion as the Opium of the People. Learn Religions. https://www.learnreligions.com/karl-marx-on-religion-251019
Hendricks, S. (2022). “God is dead”: What Nietzsche really meant. Big Think. https://bigthink.com/thinking/what-nietzsche-really-meant-by-god-is-dead/
Gad Saad, discussion on his YouTube channel
Jacqueline Keeler on "Pretendians" | Conversations with Peter Boghossian
Repressive Tolerance | Encyclopedia.com. (n.d.). https://www.encyclopedia.com/social-sciences/applied-and-social-sciences-magazines/repressive-tolerance