Oppressed Fatbodies
On Social Constructivism
According to those Woke true believers – those steeped in the academy – all things seemingly fall under the category of “social construct.” But what is a social construct, and how does it interact with the real world?
According to those Woke academics all things can be brought under the concept of a social construct, as they deny outright the existence of a knowable shared objective reality. This is at the heart of the Postmodern ideology that sets it apart as a more lethal Marxian ideal: a rejection of any right and wrong based on the further rejection of any way to come to know that is, or is not, real. Under this formulation all things must be treated as equally right, as any one person’s perspective is no more comparable to reality than any others (it is from this that the phrase “ways of knowing” springs).
Yes, it really is that simple, and that insane. No, you are not missing some fundamental component of this formulation that makes it make sense. There is no rationalizing this along traditional, conservative, American, or Christian lines. Either you believe, incorrectly, that there is no basis for discovery of objective truth, and therefore no basis to compare idea systems, or you’re not truly Woke.
There is one more important part of this that must be added for broader understanding. It does not need to be added to understand the formulation above (I wasn’t lying before, it is that simple), but it does follow from the formulation in weaponizing the idea. Namely, if language is not, as Josef Pieper would say, a tool with which to communicate what is real and true, then what is it?
According (again) to the Woke the only purpose of language is the manipulation of power. The truth of a thing – being indiscernible by virtue of Woke constructivism – matters not at all. All that does matter is using language to take for oneself what one can. This is what they erroneously accuse society of doing to them, and this is precisely how they use language in turn. This is, because of their convenient rejection of any basis for knowing what is true, their license to lie, cheat, and steal their way to power wherever they find it.
Therefore, we find that the common Woke usage of the phrase “social construct” is best understood not academically, or as a well-considered argument, but rather as an accusation of the existence of linguistic manipulation of power dynamics (unjustly), and the creation of a false box in which to contain those who’s power one seeks to usurp.
Fat people are at risk of Covid morbidity and mortality? Nope, merely a linguistically created box of fatdom in which society places those fatbodies – and further attaches the concept of poor health with no basis in reality – in order to oppress them. In inflicting such oppression society may actually cause the negative health outcomes experienced. Fatbodies aren’t unhealthy because they’re fat. Fatbodies are unhealthy because they are oppressed by the social construct of fatdom. So, fatbodies need not become skinny-bodies to be healthy – they simply must overthrow their oppressors: society. Within this broken revolutionary lens there is no conceptualizing the true oppressor here: gravity.
Of course, the entire perspective of social constructivism and Postmodern relativism here is a broken one. We absolutely can use language to confer knowledge of the real, objective, and shared world. Even if we do this imperfectly – which we do necessarily due to a personal lack of knowledge – we can achieve a better understanding of things by communicating towards that end. This can be seen not just in interpersonal communications, but also sociocultural attitudes and concepts of knowledge, learning, science, and reason. Reality itself exerts selection pressures on ideas (memes) and the behaviors they bring about that result in those not conforming to reality – specifically by increasing the fitness of the individual, or society to flourish – to cease being of reality.
Rebellious (against reality) ideas are taken out of very existence by their inability to conform to it. This faulty paradigm, like so many things, is thoroughly refuted by the infinitely simple truism that “you shall know them by their fruits.” Those successful people, societies, and cultures are exhibiting ideas that accord with reality more closely than those weighed down by Wokeism.