It used to be that the idea of Truth was based on the premise of objectivity, that is, there is a reality to nature and the world around us, and our individual freedom does not extand to disregarding or altering that reality because it conflicts with our will or dreams. I may claim that I can fly, but if I actually try to act on that premise I’ll end up in a mental ward—if we still had any. (More likely I’ll end up in a tent on the street in San Francisco, or splattered on the sidewalk from jumping off a tall building.) Recall once again the great Sokal hoax, in which physicist Alan Sokal got published an article claiming that physics itself was a “subjective social construct,” by saying “anyone who believes that the laws of physics are mere social conventions is invited to try transgressing those conventions from the windows of my apartment.” Somehow none of the editors who published his fake article were willing to take up his challenge.
But today we live in a time when even human biology is a social construct, such that people can change their gender simply by saying so. I’ve started calling our time “the Age of Proprietary Truth,” in which people believe they can have their private “truth” that should be just as binding on the rest of us as the truth of gravity. So a commonplace phrase today is “my truth,” or “living my truth,” which ranks up alongside other progressive cliches such as “the side of History,” as though History was self-conscious, and whaddayaknow, its consciousness happens to coincide with whatever the Democratic Party platform is at the moment. Hegel be praised!
John wrote this morning about Rose Montoya, the trans “woman” who bared “her” artificial breasts and caused even the Biden White House to be embarrassed, though it is hard to see why based the consequent logic of Proprietary Truth they have deliberately endorsed. Montoya has doubled down, invoking “living my truth” in zir defense, and I suspect leaving the White House defenseless if any reporter other than Peter Doocy decided to probe the matter:
P.S. Is Rose Montoya related to Inigo Montoya? I can see Indigo saying right now, “You killed Pride Month. Prepare to DEI!”
[Hat tip: RS.]