Ann Coulter Versus Postmodernism

Referring to what has been happening lately to Ann Coulter at talks on college campuses, Sean Hannity said on his radio show 5 May, “Something is happening.” He was referring to cultural changes affecting discourse between those of diverging perspectives, and he conveyed the rights' typical sense of bewilderment about these matters. On the television program, Hannity and Colmes, 4 May, Ann Coulter offered an explanation, but she, too, conveyed a sense of bewilderment:

"They're buffeted along by a liberal media, they have liberal public schoolteachers, they go to college, they have liberal professors," Coulter said. “They don't know how to argue, they can't put together a logical thought. ... Liberals – they throw food, they curse."

She was correct as far as she went.

Rush Limbaugh came closer to understanding:

"This was nothing more than a bunch of liberals that can't argue with her, that can't defeat her, can't pretend to play along with her in the arena of ideas. It's a typical liberal tactic – shut it down. If you don't agree with it, you don't want to hear it. And you don't want to hear it, you make sure somebody doesn't say it. And if somebody is gonna come say it, then you come make 'em pay a price for saying it. ... “Isn't it interesting the left fears words more than anything else? They fear words, they fear the U.S. military. Here you have Saddam Hussein – 300,000 to a million people dead and buried in mass graves, rape rooms, torture – that doesn't bother them at all. But what we say about cleaning that situation up scares the ever-living daylights out of them. ... They know they're losing. They know they're in the minority." [Protesters rip 'racist, sexist, anti-gay, right-wing bigot', World Net Daily, 5 May 2005]

Here are the salient details of the incident, as reported in the same article:

• “A University of Texas student [sophomore Ajai Raj] was arrested last night amid F-word-laced heckling and shouting during a speech on campus by WorldNetDaily columnist Ann Coulter, prompting discussion on talk radio across America today.”

• “The booing began early into Coulter's speech, the Daily Texan said, when she told a joke aimed at abortion advocates: "I wonder why those 'I Heart Partial-Birth Abortion' T-shirts aren't selling better." During the question-and-answer session, the booing and heckling became so overwhelming that Coulter said she would have to leave unless the hecklers were silenced.”

• “The noise died down until Coulter addressed the issue of same-sex marriage, which led to the arrest of Raj. After affirming she believed marriage is between a man and a woman, Raj asked approached the microphone to ask a question. "You say that you believe in the sanctity of marriage," the student said. "How do you feel about marriages where the man does nothing but ---- his wife up the ---?" According to the police report, he then ran back toward his seat, making a motion with his hand "simulating masturbation." The campus police hauled him off amid the protests of the very small student Leftist claque.


Another bit of relevant information comes from another, related, World Net Daily article of 5 May 2005 [Heckler wrote for college paper, Ann rips liberals who throw food, curse].

• The University of Texas student arrested after asking an obscenity-filled question of WorldNetDaily columnist Ann Coulter is a former reporter for the college's newspaper, and is said to be defending his actions in more graphic language…."He worked for us for about two weeks, then he just stopped showing up," Robert Inks, managing editor of the Daily Texan, told WND. "He was not acting on behalf of the newspaper [at the Coulter speech]. The guy was speaking completely on his own."

• Ajai Raj, 19, a sophomore whose major is English at the Austin campus, was taken into custody and charged with disorderly conduct after his vulgar question and lewd hand gestures following a speech by the conservative pundit Tuesday night.

• An open letter from Raj posted on DemocratsUnderground.com suggests no remorse for his actions.

I have no regrets. Was I jackass? Yes. Oh, Christ, yes. But here's the question people ought to ask themselves. Did I deserve to be arrested? Did the cops need to rough me up for saying bad words at what was at least masquerading as an open dialogue? Do the people of Texas – hell, of America – feel that "potty mouth" belongs on the list of punishable crimes along with "aggravated assault" and "armed robbery"? ...

Ms. Coulter, Mr. Hannity, and Mr. Limbaugh are knocking on the door of understanding. What they describe is reasonably correct, but none of the description explains any of it. That is what is bewildering them.

What explains what is happening on campuses and those who act like this Ajai Raj is postmodernism. Ann is so right when she attributes the uncouth behaviors to these young adults who “…have liberal public schoolteachers, they go to college, they have liberal professors…” People like this Raj are the intellectual sons and daughters of these liberal professors and are the full embodiment of the ideas broadcast by these professors.

In a few words, why do they not argue or attempt reasonable-appearing discourse? Postmodernism teaches them that ideas have no credence; thought is worthless and totally subjective; that all of life is politics, and the main task of people is to form pressure groups and acquire political power. Political power is all that counts, according to postmodernism. And, congruent with this notion, postmodernists put language into a very special category: WORDS ARE WEAPONS.

To illustrate: As the campus police ejected Raj, his soul-mates were gathering written statements from all who would give them for future "legal use," unspecified. The group doing this fits this entire scenario just perfectly. It was the Austin People's Legal Collective, a group of non-lawyer activists. Their mission statement on their website includes:

We support and will provide materials and trainings for action legal teams during mass political actions. APLC aims to plug into and help create a sustainable radical network that advocates for root changes in society by challenging the oppressive legal system. APLC aims to be a dynamic group centered upon non-hierachical power-sharing and consensus process. We are committed to the fight against global capitalism as well as, but not limited to, racism, sexism, homophobia, transphobia, militarism and imperialism. (emphasis mine)

It's like something out of a novel, something hilarious in a perverse sort of way.


Raj asked a “vulgar question” and followed on with “lewd hand gestures.” Why did he do this, from his perspective? In his own words, he said, “Did the cops need to rough me up for saying bad words at what was at least masquerading as an open dialogue? Do the people of Texas – hell, of America – feel that "potty mouth" belongs on the list of punishable crimes along with "aggravated assault" and "armed robbery"?” These are the words of a mind-numbed robot child of the postmodern Left who gladly takes up words to war with; these are his words of war.

Look at these descriptors of the offending student: “a sophomore whose major is English at the Austin campus.” Nothing here is accidental. As a sophomore, he is caught in the maturity-immaturity abyss between the teen years and adulthood, developmentally speaking. That he is an English major should surprise no one. Postmodernism infests the liberal arts and humanities departments of America’s colleges and universities. Yes, postmodern adherents may be found in the sciences and other factual data professions, but they are far less numerous because those departments are still under some sway of Enlightenment ideas. And, the University of Texas, particularly at the Austin Campus, is just about as LEFT as is metaphysically possible. Raj's approach to his job on the student newspaper is typically negligent: he lives on feelings and the impulses of the moment, much as a grasshopper does; he regards himself as too superior, because of his superior feelings, to be held down to some capitalism influenced scheduling and responsibilities.

Welcome to the "American Weimar culture" [see Exposing America's Fifth Column: Nazism, Communism, Islam (Parts 1 and 2), also includes review of Ominous Parallels], brought to you by postmodernism [see Deconstructing the Fifth Column Left and Review: Unholy Alliance: Radical Islam and the American Left, and see end note to this article].

By “Weimar culture,” I refer to the era of the German government from the end of World War One to the ascension of Hitler; the post-war German government was located in the city of Weimar. This period saw the emergence of a culture in Germany devoted to unreason, of irrationality still staggering even to our minds, numbed by our own current culture in America. It was the climax of the war on the Enlightenment which Germany originated with Immanuel Kant and his successors, and which prepared the German culture and the minds of Germans to accept Hitler as good and right. What characterized this war was the incessant assault on the concept of REASON, all its antecedents, and all of the subsequent concepts which depend on the validity of reason. This war spanned from the last quarter of the 18th century through Hitler and is still going on today. Only, today it's headquarters is the USA.

There is no better source for easily understanding postmodernism that Dr. Stephen Hicks’ 2004 book, Explaining Postmodernism, which we have reviewed extensively. Readers may consult this review for principles and details, which we need not repeat except for a few elements needed for clarification (also see endnote to this article).

"Postmodernism," as a term, refers to the dominant academic philosophy which is strongly influencing contemporary culture. As a philosophy, it is the culmination of nihilism, the end stage of nothing, which postmodernists worship. They call it “nothingness,” a nonsense term which tries to make nothing be something while being nothing. Postmodernism seems to me to be the end stage of the collapse of modern philosophy, the stage of death.

Raw physical force dominates postmodernism because there is nothing left after reason has been rejected. This was the state of the Weimar culture just before Hitler, and this is the state of our culture today, a little over 70 years later.

Of course, these intellectual offspring of postmodern “liberal” professors do not formulate arguments, just as Ann Coulter and many literate people experience. They not only cannot, but they do not want to. Epithets and slogans are fully sufficient for these aconceptual creatures. Words are weapons, and they live this principle fully. This Raj, who verbally assaulted and then vulgarly gestured to Ann Coulter, marshaled his very best and only responses: swear words, nasty tone, and vulgar gestures. His mind is of little use to him.

This is what Ms. Coulter is not understanding, nor is Mr. Hannity or Mr. Limbaugh. They are still trying to parse and dissect these people in rational terms. It cannot be done. Postmodernists constitute a new paradigm and require a non-standard means of evaluation. For instance, these postmodernist people eschew reason, so they cannot be reasoned with. They are carbon copies of the German university students who so strongly supported Hitler. Intellectually and spiritually, they are fifth column partners with all of the overt and covert jihadists. Like CAIR, they insist on their "civil rights.” They are totally narcissistic, however. They are concerned with THEIR rights, but not anyone else’s rights.

These postmodernists need to be expunged from our universities as well as their disciples before they make the entire culture like them.

Coulter, Hannity, and Limbaugh--along with so many on the Right--sputter and stop, and seem to be at the end of their thinking whenever they invoke the term "liberal." That is not good enough. It no longer explains. Once upon a time, "liberal" described people like me, who advocate individual rights and capitalism. Socialists co-opted the term to mean "socialist-without-saying-so." Now, "liberal" has become almost meaningless because the liberals of today are nihilistic, anti-American, anti-reason, anti-individual rights, anti-life and anti-man. They are postmodern nihilists who no longer seek just some socialist "nirvana" but the destruction of values, all values, and all valuers.

The first step to eradicating postmodernism comes from self-education which leads to identifying its advocates correctly, and that includes naming them for what they are. Then we must stop these academician spreaders of the disease of postmodernism and their administrative enablers. We must take back our colleges, universities, secondary, and primary schools. Parents, alumni, and ALL funding sources can carry the day, if they will.

Ann Coulter and those fighting for and against the same issues can be much more devastatingly effective by coming to understand what they really are up against. "Liberals" doesn't "cut it" anymore.

There is just nothing like getting to fundamentals to understand issues and then integrate them into your knowledge to make this knowledge effective.

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A little more detail about Postmodernism: The dominant ideas of postmodernism which is decaying our own country and Western civilization match the dominant ideas of Weimar Germany. Objective reality has been replaced with the erroneous notion of reality being whatever we WANT it to be. Truth, like reality, is totally subjective; language is a tool to pressure people into giving you what you want, not to communicate and to serve as the medium of thought. Reason is dead. Morality means following your feelings because there can be no objective morality. Like truth, what is moral for me is not moral for you. Politics is pressure-group warfare of feminists, minorities, the old, the young, the poor, the environment, and so on. All of these groups must struggle to establish socialism and to defeat capitalism and its representatives, including white men, the wealthy, and, above all, America.