Cancel culture: Did Dostoyevsky predict the culture wars?
The Story
The Times
3.9 • 1.6K Ratings
🗓️ 14 April 2022
⏱️ 28 minutes
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Summary
Whether you like it or not, these days everyone seems to be enlisted in the culture wars. But why does the debate seem so angry and intolerant? Can we find some answers in novels written 150 years ago?
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Transcript
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| 0:34.3 | These days, everyone seems to be enlisted in the culture wars, whether they like it or not. |
| 0:41.3 | To instruct our kids, they should be one of these genders. |
| 0:44.3 | But that isn't the point. The fact is that people identify in different ways. |
| 0:50.3 | You are a white privileged male. You have nothing to do with it. |
| 0:54.3 | I can't help but I am. I was born like this. |
| 0:58.3 | He was like, you're a skeptic of his day, taking on the establishment. |
| 1:02.3 | He was like owner and slave trade. |
| 1:04.3 | There is no justification for statues that immortalise slavery. Immortalise. |
| 1:11.3 | Things change, of course, and change creates uncertainties. |
| 1:15.3 | But why does the debate seem so angry and intolerant? |
| 1:21.3 | Well, one of my colleagues thinks we can find some answers in novels written 150 years ago. |
| 1:28.3 | Never had they believed so unswervingly in the correctness of their judgments, |
| 1:32.3 | their scientific deductions, their moral convictions and beliefs. |
| 1:36.3 | Entire centres of population, entire cities and peoples became smitten and went mad. |
| 1:41.3 | All were in a state of anxiety, and no one could understand anyone else. |
... |
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