Cultural relativism is an objectively incoherent doctrine.
Let me define potentially ambiguous terms at the outset: by “cultural relativism” I mean the idea that it is wrong to cast judgment upon the culture of another nation or ethnicity. By objective, I really do mean objective: it is not up for dispute; the facts demonstrate it in the same way that they demonstrate that AU is located in Washington, D.C.
Cultural relativists are caught up in a sort of maddening “this-sentence-is-false” paradox: by declaring all values relative to circumstance and undefinable by any outside standard, they have themselves erected a singular criterion of judgment. And proponents of such a doctrine will find that they are forced to declare cultures backwards that do not recognize its validity.
Indeed, one is hard-pressed to find a more ethnocentric culture than Islamic civilization. And yet, what is heard from the lips of the relativists? Eruptions of anger over the fact that Islam declares itself the one proper path? Of course not. It’s nothing but self-flagellation; criticism that the West cannot accept that a belief in Islamic cultural superiority is just “part of their culture.” But this is completely incoherent.
Equally bizarre, cultural relativists are usually the quickest to combat the purported evils of sexism, racism and homophobia in America. But what on Earth is a cultural relativist doing judging how society looks at homosexuality or the role of women? American culture is a culture just like any other. Indeed, the only culture that seems not to get a free pass is one’s own.
Looked at through this lens, it is easy to see that cultural relativism is merely a benign form of imperialism, one that falls prey to the same sociological phenomena its proponents so decry: by internalizing the concept that foreign cultures are “the other,” unequal and wholly patronizing standards of judgment are used to assess them, rather than the same ones that are used to evaluate one’s own culture. And because the cultural relativist is able to cast aside nagging questions about whether other cultures truly can be backwards in some respect, he is able to play the role of parent or superior, in his own benign, patronizing little way. The real message of relativism is not “Don’t judge him; his standards are different,” but rather, “Leave that benighted fool be; he doesn’t know what he’s doing.”
Unless he wants to live in philosophical limbo, then, the cultural relativist thus has three choices: (1) Evaluate American culture by the same criterion of judgment and proclaim, “That’s their culture, stop judging it!” when someone criticizes sexism or homophobia; (2) start criticizing Islamic culture with as much vigor as Robert Spencer and Ayaan Hirsi Ali for its intolerance, sexism and homophobia, or (3) admit the incoherence of the doctrine and concede at long last that there are clear standards of judgment that can be applied to all cultures. There are no other alternatives.
Alex Knepper is a sophomore in the School of Public Affairs and a classical liberal columnist for The Eagle. You can reach him at .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).
25 Comments
Snarky
Nov 2 at 2:53 AM
Wow, the single best author in all of the Eagle-dom. Nice Job Alex!
JJ
Nov 2 at 11:38 AM
Spot on. All cultures are not equal. Not at all.
Alex
Nov 2 at 4:21 PM
Well done.
Reminded me of a good quote by Thomas Mann: “Tolerance becomes a crime when applied to evil.”
nope
Nov 2 at 8:10 PM
“Eruptions of anger over the fact that Islam declares itself the one proper path?”
wait, because Western religions don’t claim to be the one true faith, right?
Alex Knepper
Nov 2 at 11:46 PM
Nope—
I don’t like Western religions, either. I’m a hardcore atheist. However, I’m consistent in my beliefs. The cultural relativists are not.
Also, Islam is far more vigorous about it nowadays. Tomorrow, Christianity might be the main problem worldwide from a religious standpoint; today, the threatening religion is Islam.
Alexa
Nov 3 at 12:57 AM
You know Knepper, it’d be easier to take your right-wing rants more seriously if you weren’t always trying to shoehorn your bitter Islamophobia into each and every argument you make. Whether it’s cultural relativism, free trade, or Columbus Day, everything you have to say comes back to Islam. Really, I’m starting to think you’re a closet Muslim.
David
Nov 3 at 3:47 AM
So is Michael Bloomberg rewriting New York City state laws to be able to run for a third term equal to Hugo Chavez doing the same thing in Venezuela?
JJ
Nov 3 at 11:22 AM
Is there any chance that you can express your backlash of Islam in front of Muslims instead of indirectly saying it to the public, Knepper? Your criticism of Islamic Culture is equally weighted with a Muslim backlashing the West.
Alex Knepper
Nov 3 at 1:23 PM
Alexa—Whenever I rant about Islam, I get a torrent of people calling me “Islamophobic.” When I rant about Christianity, nobody says that I’m “Christophobic.” Why is this?
And yes, Islam bothers me. Like all religions, it’s a cancer. Today, Islam is the most prevalent religious cancer blighting humanity. Yesterday, it was Christianity (which has today been tamed). We need to tame Islam in the modern world just like Christianity was tamed by the Enlightenment and the Industrial Revolution.
Alexa
Nov 3 at 3:16 PM
Because of the obvious power differential between Christianity/Christians and Islam/Muslims in Western societies (and your textbook fear of Muslims). As the much more dominant majority, Christians receive such prejudiced criticism differently and require less defense than do more socially vulnerable religious minorities.
Leaving that aside, your comments all conflate Islamic theology with the supposedly monolithic culture of its adherents. Such demonstrable ignorance makes me wonder what qualifies you to critique a doctrine which strives first for understanding.
JJ
Nov 3 at 3:27 PM
While you say that Islam bothers you, I feel that you should try directing your anger towards Muslims to see how they would react.I am not saying that Muslims should be repressed, but this fear of Muslims, or any religious, should be directed to the right crowd. Don’t generalize all Muslims into one category. This is the reason why we have this tension between America and Islam, because there are those who don’t add more effort into isolating the troublemakers from the victims.
In my opinion, the anger shouldn’t be to the religion. Instead it should be towards the people who commit to acts of terror and violence. Even I am concerned about the extreme actions of people who share the same religion as me.
JJ
Nov 3 at 4:03 PM
Don’t be a dick, you aint JJ, JJ. I’m JJ. I’m Alex’s friend. I agree with this article and the gist of his point. Pick a new tag name you poser.
AJ
Nov 3 at 4:53 PM
Sorry man. Lets not turn this into a curse crossing discussion
JJ
Nov 3 at 6:32 PM
I fiercely covet my posting initials.
Alex Knepper
Nov 3 at 7:48 PM
Yeah, I didn’t *think* that Josh would actually be saying that…
My fear has to go to the religion rather than the individuals, because when you remove the religion, you get rid of the religiously-motivated terror. I’ve read hundreds of pages of Ayman al-Zawahiri’s writings; they’re highly coherent and, on the whole, theologically sound. The religion itself isn’t especially valuable; it hasn’t really contributed much to civilization. And it’s not an accident that there is no Christian, Jewish, or Buddhist equivalent of al-Qaeda, Hamas, Hezbollah, or even the Muslim Brotherhood.
The last time I went back and forth with a group of Muslims on campus about this, it ended badly; they started defending the status of women in Saudi Arabia and it got bad.
Anti-culture
Nov 4 at 12:33 AM
Very persuasive stuff, Alex. However, this might make more sense if you tried to make an argument against something that exists. Nobody to my knowledge identifies as a “cultural relativist,” and nobody uses that term except for right wing fascists such as Tom Tancredo. I think that if you talked about American liberals, Democrats, or even “political correctness,” some of this might have some weight. But as of now, it looks like your just trying to veil your massive hatred of brown people.
As for me, I think all states and all religions on this planet are abhorrent, but not equally so.
Alex Knepper
Nov 4 at 12:58 AM
“But as of now, it looks like your just trying to veil your massive hatred of brown people.”
If all else fails, use unfalsifiable armchair pseudo-psychology!
Voice of Reason
Nov 4 at 1:58 PM
Admirably done Sir Alex, another straw man successfully slain.
EC
Nov 4 at 2:50 PM
I think there should be some distinction between recognizing differences in culture and cultural relativism. Now of course we should not take on an “anything goes” mindset towards cultural practices, and we should not let culture justify wrongdoings. That being said, we have to recognize that human differences can be attributed to culture. Human existence is elastic - we have the capacity to attach ourselves to a variety of different cultures. What I don’t understand is why there has to be any leveling or ranking of culture at all? This seems like a terribly complex task to rank cultures by “good”, “fair”, and “poor”. Not to mention the fact that the subsets within each culture are so numerous - in American culture, perceptions differ between someone that lives in rural Mississippi and someone in Los Angeles. Why can’t we just recognize the existence of differences, but still be critical of evil and work toward justice? It seems like you are lumping a huge and diverse religion into something that devalues the way that Muslims display their identity - which may be different for each individual.
Cat
Nov 4 at 8:19 PM
Alex -
Islam itself is an extremely peaceful religion, just like Christianity is at its core. They both preach a lot of the same things. Unfortunately, man has interpreted those teachings in a manner that benefits them politically or personally. The reason the Catholic Church was “tamed” was because of the emergence of the nation-state, thereby stripping the Church of its formal political and military strength.
The Koran has been interpreted by an extremely small percentage of Muslims as a justification for their acts of violence against the innocent. I think that suggesting that they be “tamed” is an absolutely ridiculous and ignorant comment.
“The religion itself isn’t especially valuable; it hasn’t really contributed much to civilization. And it’s not an accident that there is no Christian, Jewish, or Buddhist equivalent of al-Qaeda, Hamas, Hezbollah, or even the Muslim Brotherhood.”
Please clarify what you meant by “the religion itself isn’t especially valuable”, because the way I understand it, you basically just stated that the beliefs of hundreds of millions of Muslims are unimportant and have not contributed to humanity.
And there is no equivalent to those religious-based terrorist groups TODAY, but there certainly were throughout history. The Jewish people were, like every other group in the area during the time, extremely militaristic and engaged in countless battles in the name of their God. And Christians?! HA. Men that fought in the name of Jesus Christ starting in the 4-5th century CE and continuing throughout the Middle Ages killed thousands, if not millions of people. The Crusades, the Spanish Inquisition, and the Salem Witch Trials are all historical examples of Christianity being misconstrued and used to cause violence to non-believers.
I know you’ve stated that you’re an atheist, but I think that a certain level of respect should be given to people’s religious beliefs, just as in the same way others should respect those who are atheists.
Alex Knepper
Nov 4 at 9:08 PM
The reason, Cat, that the Qur’an has been successfully used by radicals is because the Qur’an—one coherent book, written by God, delivered by Muhammad (in other words: not like the Bible)—is a pretty violent book. There’s a game I play with my copy in which I flip to a random page and see if there’s something about the torment awaiting the infidel or the dictates to go slay the infidel in some way.
In Muhammad’s farewell address, he declared that he was “ordered to fight until all men say that there is no God but Allah.” Thus, the division within traditional Islam between the Houses of Islam, Truce, and War. All major schools of Sunni thought agree on the necessity for jihad, and one—the Salafi school—even endorses offensive jihad! The rest can use defensive in a very broad manner.
“Please clarify what you meant by “the religion itself isn’t especially valuable”, because the way I understand it, you basically just stated that the beliefs of hundreds of millions of Muslims are unimportant and have not contributed to humanity.”
That’s essentially correct, yes. It’s an unfortunate and tragic fact, but I’m not going to sugarcoat it to make people feel better. I would say the same thing about most Christians. There are exceptions in all camps of course—Ibn Sina and Omar Khayyam are obvious examples that come to mind—but overall, yeah, religion is a social cancer.
I know that there were Christian militants throughout history. That’s why, above, I noted that yesterday, Christianity was the major religious evil of the world. Today, it is Islam. I’m on the front lines against Islamofascism today, just as I would have been on the front lines against Christian fascism yesterday.
AJ
Nov 4 at 11:54 PM
I believe she is talking about religion as its facts and creeds. Values are derived from those terms, and since values are created based on individual interpretations, a reason why Christianity has many denominations, and why there are extremist groups such as al-Qaeda.
As I said, the problem isn’t with religion, it is with individuals. You have one group that advocates peace based on the Koran and the Bible, whereas others incite violence and hatred based on the words. I understand your reasoning that religion is more of the problem than individuals, but religion cannot spread without people.
Alex Margolis
Nov 5 at 12:10 AM
I’m tired of all this talk about a “religion of peace.” If Islam is a religion of peace, then what religions are religions of violence? Peace is a relative term. What is it about Islam (or any religion) that makes it a “religion of peace?” Preaching certain things? What about the bad and violent things it preaches?
Christina
Nov 5 at 2:09 AM
Cultural relativism? I do not think that word means what you think it means, AK. Or maybe the definition has changed since my last CAS class (last semester), but as I recall it was less about moral judgments and more of a methodological tool or heuristic device.
Which is a pretty far cry from a “doctrine,” by the way.
It is humorously apt that you describe it as “benign imperialism,” given its roots in early (often, morally spotty) anthropological research. I can only assume that you did this accidentally.
I think what you meant perhaps was “social constructionists,” but even then, something is only incoherent if *you* don’t understand it. ‘Incoherence’ is always subjective.
From Wiki: Cultural relativism is the principle that an individual human’s beliefs and activities should be understood in terms of his or her own culture.
JS
Nov 11 at 5:40 PM
I truly enjoy intellectual musings, arguments and people’s attempts to share them with others publicly. But really, this is what you have issues with? Still? At least you got the subject of your argument right this time. Last year you mistakenly used the term “multiculturalism.”
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