Mick Hartley

MIT philosophy professor Alex Byrne on The Phantasmagoric World of Judith Butler. He's not at all impressed with her new book, Who’s Afraid of Gender? Worth a read for the detail, but here's his conclusion:

In Butler’s phantasmagoric world, the oceans are boiling, bisexuals lie dying in the streets, and the empty shelves of school libraries gather dust. On a hillside, J. K. Rowling stands between Vladimir Putin and the Pope, the papal cassock flapping in the breeze. The trio gaze with grim satisfaction at the devastation below, under a glowering sky.

Plagiarism aside, there are many reasons to be irritated with Who’s Afraid of Gender?. One is Butler’s delusional insinuation that gender-critical feminists have engaged in “bullying” and “censorship campaigns”, when they and their sympathizers have so plainly been on the receiving end. (Butler signed the censorious 2017 open letter denouncing the feminist philosophy journal Hypatia for publishing Rebecca Tuvel’s paper on transracialism.)

Another is Butler’s claim that her opponents “refuse to read the material under dispute”. In serving up this dog’s breakfast of a book, Butler shows that she is the one who has not done the reading.