Desperately Seeking a Moralist

In a recent issue of “Unbound”, Janet Halley reviews my book “Caring for Justice”, criticizing it for exhibiting a broad range of the problems she sees in all forms of identitarian legal writing, and therefore worthy of detailed critique. Halley begins her review by listing the representative missteps she finds in both my book and in identitarian politics generally, including, although certainly not limited to, an identification of the site of the subordinated group\u27s injuries-for women, reproduction and sexuality with the site of its ethical lives and insights; a tendency to differentiate and present the interests of subordinate and dominant groups, such as women and men, as inevitably opposed, such that women\u27s injuries work to men\u27s advantage and vice versa; an inclination to substitute the language of harm, injury, and ethics for the language of subordination, exploitation, and the like; and both an unhealthy aversion to politics and an insistence that changing the hearts and minds of the dominant will somehow magically reduce the amount of suffering in the world. Whether or not the list accurately captures my views on these questions, or those of identitarian scholars for whom I did not purport to speak, it is misleading in a more fundamental sense: by the end of her review, it is clear that Halley finds much more troubling sins in “Caring for Justice”, sins that are assuredly much more particular to feminism, to my feminism, and maybe just to this book, than to identitarian politics across the board. Thus, in the bulk of the review, Halley suggests that “Caring for Justice” exhibits tendencies toward both totalitarian[ism] and a slave morality, asserts an ethical view that is infantile, conveys a sense of sexual injury that is panick[ed] (this latter is not just a sin; in Halley\u27s moral ordering, it has all the markings of original sin), shows frightful signs of female- ... supremac[y], is politically paranoid, and, in toto, amounts to something she calls derisively mother feminism. The punishing epithets and psychoanalytic diagnoses flow promiscuously. Whatever else one might say about these charges, I cannot imagine why anyone would regard them as shared characteristics of identitarian scholarship. In this response, graciously invited by the editors of “The Harvard Journal of Law & Gender”, I will address some of these charges, and I will respond in some detail to the thrust of Halley\u27s complaints about the politics of injury. However, what I want to focus on first, albeit briefly, is just one of Halley\u27s characterizations of my work that, on first blush, I found to be extraordinarily peculiar and on one argument of sorts that is built on top of this characterization. I believe that this argument is at the heart of much of Halley\u27s Freudian and Nietzschean lambasting of my work

In Defense of Comic Pluralism

Jokes are sometimes morally objectionable, and sometimes they are not. What’s the relationship between a joke’s being morally objectionable and its being funny? Philosophers’ answers to this question run the gamut. In this paper I present a new argument for the view that the negative moral value of a joke can affect its comedic value both positively and negatively

Moralist und Flaneur oder Hätte Baudelaire Grünbein für Barbier gehalten? : zu Durs Grünbein, "Nach den Satiren"

Durs Grünbein’s cycle of poems “Nach den Satieren” is a tense combination of Roman satire and modern urban poetry. One hears a wise moralist who presents himself as a part of the insane visionary of the evil, which he accuses. Grünbein’s satirist persona is a hybrid: half moralist and half flaneur

An autonomist view on the ethical criticism of architecture

It is a fact that there is ethical criticism about art. Art critics, the general public and even artists point out moral flaws in artworks while evaluating them. Philosophers, however, have maintained a hot debate on the meaning of such criticism. This debate can be understood as a disagreement about the kind of relation between the artistic value of artworks and their alleged moral value. While some claim that moral value can contribute to artistic value (moralism), others claim that there cannot be such a contribution (autonomism). Since at least some works of architecture are artworks, that debate also concerns architecture. A moderate moralist view claims that some works of architecture have moral flaws/merits that bear on their artistic evaluation. In an apparently promising version, the contention is that some moral flaws/merits are aesthetically relevant. In this paper I argue against such contention and defend an autonomist view. Following some taxonomy remarks I distinguish the views in the debate and present two points in favour of autonomism: its simplicity and not having the burden of proof. Then I discuss Carroll’s merited response argument for moralism and I argue that in its best interpretation either it begs the question against autonomism or it is compatible with it. I conclude with some possible objections that may help further investigations on the subject

Chamfort, doctor of morals : the maxim and the medical aphorism in late eighteenth-century France

The increasing prestige of medicine as a science, accompanied by the social rise of the doctor, in eighteenth-century France is well documented. What I would like to argue here, however, is that there exists a correspondence between the establishment of medicine as an independent field of study in eighteenth-century France and the increasing use and influence of an autonomous form of medical discourse, namely, the aphorism, in this period. This is not so much a question of the language used by the more renowned doctors of the day but of a form of discourse deeply imbued and associated with medical practice. (It is nonetheless true that certain famous physicians combined medical and literary roles. For instance, Theophile Bordeu intervenes significantly in Diderot's Le Reve d'Alembert, and Vicq d'Azyr, Marie-Antoinette's doctor, was elected to the Académie Française in 1788 in a sort of social consecration or medical discourse, implicitly incorporating his medical figure and figures into the socio-linguistic norms of 'le bon usage’ promoted by the Académie itself.) Yet what interests me particularly here is the insinuation of the medical aphorism itself into other fields of late eighteenth-century discourse, notably those of literature and politics, the traditional domains of the maxim

Chamfort, doctor of morals : the maxim and the medical aphorism in late eighteenth-century France

The increasing prestige of medicine as a science, accompanied by the social rise of the doctor, in eighteenth-century France is well documented. What I would like to argue here, however, is that there exists a correspondence between the establishment of medicine as an independent field of study in eighteenth-century France and the increasing use and influence of an autonomous form of medical discourse, namely, the aphorism, in this period. This is not so much a question of the language used by the more renowned doctors of the day but of a form of discourse deeply imbued and associated with medical practice. (It is nonetheless true that certain famous physicians combined medical and literary roles. For instance, Theophile Bordeu intervenes significantly in Diderot's Le Reve d'Alembert, and Vicq d'Azyr, Marie-Antoinette's doctor, was elected to the Académie Française in 1788 in a sort of social consecration or medical discourse, implicitly incorporating his medical figure and figures into the socio-linguistic norms of 'le bon usage’ promoted by the Académie itself.) Yet what interests me particularly here is the insinuation of the medical aphorism itself into other fields of late eighteenth-century discourse, notably those of literature and politics, the traditional domains of the maxim

Does Contract Law Need Morality?

In The Dignity of Commerce, Nathan Oman sets out an ambitious market theory of contract, which he argues is a superior normative foundation for contract law than either the moralist or economic justifications that currently dominate contract theory. In doing so, he sets out a robust defense of commerce and the market-place as contributing to human flourishing that is a refreshing and welcome contribution in an era of market alarmism. But the mar-ket theory ultimately falls short as either a normative or prescriptive theory of contract. The extent to which law, public policy, and the-ory should account for values other than economic efficiency is a longstanding debate. Whatever the merits of that debate, we conclude that contract law does not need morality as envisioned by Oman—a fluid, subjective, and seemingly instinctual approach to the morality of markets

Bewitched, Bothered, and Bewildered: Reflections on Art, Fundamentalism, and Democracy

This philosophical lecture explores the tension between art and morality, beginning with the opposing viewpoints—aestheticism and moralism—that one should trump the other. As exemplary case studies, several controversial art exhibits—works that fueled the culture wars of the 1980’s are examined to identify the concerns of advocates and critics. This leads to deeper reflections on the artistic assumptions of religious fundamentalism, the role of art in a democracy, and the possibility that artistic exploration can be a form of moral action

Does Contract Law Need Morality?

In The Dignity of Commerce, Nathan Oman sets out an ambitious market theory of contract, which he argues is a superior normative foundation for contract law than either the moralist or economic justifications that currently dominate contract theory. In doing so, he sets out a robust defense of commerce and the market-place as contributing to human flourishing that is a refreshing and welcome contribution in an era of market alarmism. But the mar-ket theory ultimately falls short as either a normative or prescriptive theory of contract. The extent to which law, public policy, and the-ory should account for values other than economic efficiency is a longstanding debate. Whatever the merits of that debate, we conclude that contract law does not need morality as envisioned by Oman—a fluid, subjective, and seemingly instinctual approach to the morality of markets