Omgosh, I just realized you're not the other commenter. Your little icons have the same color and I didn't register further than that. Please forgive my snark!

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"Ordinary people" are quite capable of understanding that racism is bad.

And surely it makes no sense to place more importance on someone who lives 100miles from me rather than 1000miles. Even the "ordinary person" would be able to understand that both of these persons are equally deserving of basic human rights and decency.

In fact the "ordinary person" can even understand that their own child and a complete stranger have equal rights.

What you're perhaps more importantly speaking to is personal responsibility: I have a personal responsibility toward my family that I do not have toward a stranger. That has nothing to do with how the law should deal with my family vs. strangers to me however. The law and philosophy need to treat all persons equally. "Ordinary people" do understand that.

>you are denigrating the Human.

How in the world do you get that from anything I said?

>Accusations of -Ism's (and the assignment of any kind of moral weight to such accusations) is the last refuge for the incompetent.

So now you just don't think racism exists?

Hey, so a few things.

>my main contention is the one that can be found amongst post-modernists and traditionalists alike, that Capitalism (Capital, TechnoCapital, etc.) is a corrosive force that destroys barriers, particularity, specificity.

I think this is completely incorrect on many levels. First, barriers, limits, particularity, specificity will always exist. The question is not whether or not they exist, but rather: in what form?

Do you really think that borders and particularity are being wiped out? Do we not live in an age of rampant perspectivism, identity politics, reviving nationalism ("my country first!"), etc.? Are national borders not being strengthen? Is there not growing intolerance of immigrants and refugees? Are more and more countries not building walls? I believe the paradox of globalization is: the freer the movement of capital, the more restrictions on the movement of labor (or, at least labor from the global South countries).

>post-modernists
>
>It deterritorializes and detemporalizes the human experience. I do not think these are good things, and should be combatted when possible.

I find it funny that capitalism (in the form of neoliberalism) has actually strengthened and flourished in the post-modern era. I think that the post-modern emphasize on particularity actually strengthens, not harms, capitalism. Each asserting their particularity against everyone else creates division, isolation, impotence, etc. We end up divided rather than united. Capitalism thrives on this. We are fundamentally forgetting Marx: "workers of the world unite!"

When we see the world through particularity, we become alienated from workers in other countries, men become alienated from women, straight individuals from the LGBTQ community, etc. Each pursues their own self-interest in opposition to the others. We become divided and alienated and cannot engage in collective action. Capitalism thrives on such conditions.

>I am told to relinquish my particularities for the universal

I never said this. I said to "de-emphasize" particularity. I do not believe it is possible nor healthy to relinquish all particularity. We are always particular; however, we can have different relationships to the moment of difference. For example, I can be a Canadian while still existing in unity and recognizing identity with those from other countries. Or, I can be a Canadian who is threatened by and opposed to those from other countries. In the former, I would recognize particularity and universality, while in the latter, I would be so entrenched in my particularity that I neglect the dimension of universality. Consequently, the particularity of the other becomes a threat to my own particularity.

>I don't think there is a Universal that has been stripped of metaphysics, so these Universals will carry with it always the unexamined premises (or bias, or baggage, which ever word you prefer).

I disagree with this. There are many different conceptualizations of universality. Many theorists now theorize universality as "lack". That is, universality expresses itself through absence, exclusion, or lack. For example, all the various nations exist against the background of the universal system of nation states. However, there are also refugees. Refugees are an expression of those who are excluded from the universal.

I think the theory goes something like this: universality only exists through the particulars and particulars only exist against the background of universality. Particularity and universality exist in a dialectical relation, so to say. Therefore, to recognize the universal involves recognizing which particulars are excluded from participation within the universal.

In this conceptualization, universality is nothing that can be imposed, enforced upon people, nor expanded through imperialism. Rather, Nazism and neoliberal capitalism are forms of particularity that are forcefully imposed upon others and falsely presented as 'universals'

I recommend reading chapter two of this book:

http://cup.columbia.edu/book/universality-and-identity-politics/9780231197700

McGowan, a Marxist and Hegelian, explains it way better than myself. However, while I do find the theorization of 'universality' as merely an absence, I am not sure if I fully agree. I have not developed my thoughts on the subject enough to take a strong position in the debate / conversation.

>the more meaning and weight it carries with each person of that way of life. And since I believe this, it behooves me to search out and to create more particularity, more specificity in our world. It creates meaning, it creates a multiplicity of meanings.

I disagree here as well. I believe meaning can be cultivated in both particularity and universality. It is not restricted to one or the other. Rather than "either / or", I believe it is "both / and".

Many definitions of 'universality' involve the well-being of the whole. Therefore, those who find meaning in fighting for the well-being of the whole / collective are finding meaning in universality. In contrast, many definitions of 'particularity' define it, at least in certain aspects, as the pursuit of individual well-being. Thus, some characterize particularity as an egoism in opposition to the collective well-being. Furthermore, these theorists believe that such self-interestedness is vain and unfulfilling. Personally, I think we need to find a healthy balance between the two.

>the fight against Capitalism.

Personally, I think the best way to combat capitalism is to embrace collectivity. The more united we are, the more we can undertake collective action. If we want to alter our economic system, we need to act collectively. Revolutions are the perfect example of this. Unions are another example. In both, there is large scale collective action.

In contrast, each pursuing their own self-interest results in the most extreme form of capitalism. Margaret Thatcher literally stated that "there is no such thing as community, only individuals". Thatcher, like the post-modernists, was an extreme particularist who hated universality. Consequently, capitalism flourished, unions died, and collective action has become largely impossible.

Lastly, capitalism is upheld by individuals not caring about each other. When we care for each other, diminish our egotistical pursuits, and focus on the well-being of the collective, capitalism fails. It is our egoism that upholds capitalism. Capitalism would collapse if everyone in society was a minimalist hippie.

Hey mate, what did you think? Do you have some agreements with me? :D