In part 1, we discussed the recent attempted redefinition of “racism” from the Classic Definition(s) to the Kendiangelonian New Definition(s). Here, we take up “social justice.” We will see that the tactic is similar – take an established word/phrase, with a well-established denotation and connotation, then change the denotation while keeping the connotation intact. In this case, the connotation of the “obvious” definition is positive, while the newly-redefined concept is not.
Deductive Definition
The deductive definition of “social justice” is pretty clear: use the definitions of the words separately, then combine them. “Social justice” is justice that is operative in social systems. Arguably, all justice is “social justice” (much like Louis Armstrong’s definition of “folk music” – “All music is folk music. I ain’t never heard a horse sing a song.”) Naturally, there are competing definitions of “justice”: Plato’s order and harmony among competing interests, Hobbes’ universal performance of covenants, Smith’s absence of intentionally hurtful actions, and Rawls’ equality under the law and fair equality of opportunity (which might not mean what you think if you’ve not read Rawls) among others. Any of these concepts, with the caveat that they are worked out in social systems, would be a reasonable candidate for a Deductive Definition of “social justice.”
Whichever definition for “justice” itself is chosen, nearly everyone is in favor of this kind of “social justice” (even if, perhaps, they prefer a different “justice” definition personally).
Inductive Definition
There is another way to define “social justice,” however – look around at what contemporary “social justice” proponents seem to be proposing. This definition seems to be: “Social justice” is brought about by the following 4 steps –
- Examine the outcomes of a social system.
- Identify two groups (preferably biological, hence fixed) – one that has better-than-average outcomes and one that has worse-than-average outcomes.
- Label the first group as “oppressors” and the second group as “victims.”
- Insist that all members of the first group feel guilty, and all members of the second group feel resentful.
Note carefully that no circumstances are actually improved by this process. One group is made to feel guilty, and the other to feel resentful, but no suggestions are offered for improvement.
Note also that it is not necessary (and in fact nearly never happens) that the entire first group has an outcome better than the entire second group. Thus, there are members of group 1 (oppressors) who are actually worse off than some members of group 2 (victims), but group membership is the key to victim/oppressor status, not actual circumstances.
This style of “social justice” is, unfortunately, generally quite unjust (the oppressor/victim labels are normally incorrect in many cases, and might be uniformly incorrect; there might have been no actual oppression/victimhood at all) and antisocial (tending to worsen relations between the two groups, not improve them).
Not everyone is in favor of this kind of “social justice” but its advocates use the positive connotation of the other version of “social justice” to bully their opponents into passivity and acquiescence.
Consequences
In Cynical Theories, Pluckrose and Lindsay detail the shift from what I have called the Deductive Definition to the Inductive Definition. They refer to it as the shift from “social justice” (by which they mean specifically Rawlsian social justice) to “Social Justice” and go into more detail about the (astonishingly rapid) switch from one to the other, as well as a number of additional (and uniformly harmful) intellectual and cultural trends that have been concomitant with this shift. In fact, the full title of their book is, “Cynical Theories: How Activist Scholarship Made Everything about Race, Gender, and Identity – and Why This Harms Everybody.“
As discussed here, they detail the movement from Marxist Critical Theory through postmodernism to Applied Postmodernism, moving through (as described earlier) Postcolonial Studies, Queer Studies, Black Feminism, Critical Legal Studies, Critical Race Theory, Gender Studies, Disability Studies, and Fat Studies (referred to in aggregate as Social Justice Studies). Though these are academic in nature, these are angry, activist academics who have impacted the broader culture in the form of Identity Politics, Political Correctness, Cancel Culture and a host of similar phenomena.
Though the Inductive Definition of “social justice” is applicable to groups stratified on many bases other than race, it certainly has wide applicability in poisoning racial discourse in this country (and in the West, broadly).
My advice in all discussions of race relations is to stick to well-established definitions. Be aware that “Social Justice” is yet another area in which leftists wish to use the same vocabulary list, but a different dictionary.
Alternative approach
The claim is often made that use of the Inductive Definition of “social justice” is necessary to force society to become more just; that is, to improve society by the Deductive Definition of “social justice.” It’s difficult for me to see how this can be true, since the only results of the process appear to be guilt and resentment.
It seems to me that a substantially different approach would be more helpful. I suggest the following:
- Examine the outcomes of a social system.
- Identify multiple groups with better-than-average outcomes and worse-than-average outcomes.
- Study the groups closely to see if there are any non-biological characteristics (behaviors, choices, skills, etc.) of the groups that may contribute to the outcomes that the groups experience.
- Attempt to educate the members of the worse-than-average group(s) and see if they are willing to alter their lives to develop the behaviors, choices, etc. of the former group(s).
- Continue to examine the system to see if those individuals in the latter group who successfully incorporate characteristics of the former group actually improve their outcomes (that is, see if the altered characteristics are factors for success or simply markers of it).
- Repeat.
As you continue iteratively, the gap between the two either vanishes or persists. A persistent gap may indicate that there IS indeed some sort of systemic injustice happening – that some group IS experiencing different outcomes solely because of their perceived group membership and NOT because of any behaviors, choices, etc. At this point, you have found some actual injustice – work to right it!
The alert reader will notice a couple of things about this procedure:
- It’s much slower and more difficult than the procedure typically used today (where one simply shouts, “racism,” “homophobia,” or another fashionable debate-ending term following step 2).
- It’s what activist sociologists used to do before their field was so thoroughly poisoned by postmodernism and lack of rigor.
The disadvantages of this approach are obvious – it’s much, much more intellectually difficult and time-consuming. The advantages, though, are that by NOT short-circuiting the process by screaming, “oppressor!” one can actually improve the lives of people, either by educating them in helpful skills and behaviors, or by locating an actual point of persistent societal injustice which can then be amended, either by educating or persuading society more broadly.
Postscript: following the writing of this post, this essay was published by my Princeton mathematics colleague (and distant mathematical cousin) Sergiu Klainerman. His essay is principally focused on college campus speech codes (primarily at Princeton), but also sounds notes on “social justice” consonant with mine. I heartily recommend reading it in its entirety.