We see the word “objective” in front of the word “reporting” or in front of “persepective,” a lot. But I’d like to address the idea of objectivity for a moment because I think it gets tossed around too much without proper consideration.
Nobody is objective. Not the bloggers on this site, not the reporters on any news media, not the academics in any university. We all speak, think, and act from unique positions and extremely varied situations. Being subjective is part of being a living, breathing human being.
I think we should take a moment to examine what so-called objectivity means and see if, after learning the meaning and history of that concept, we still want to use it. I hope we understand that it might help for the better if we all stopped reproducing the fallacy that objectivity exists.
The concept of objectivity has its roots from the European Enlightenment, most specifically Rene Descartes. When Descartes said that man could separate his mind from the material, real world, he opened up the way to scientific knowledge and discovery. Man was now capable of thinking outside of his body and creating universal laws from knowledge untainted by any particulars.
Of course, this meant not “universal laws,” but European laws — to be universally imposed upon everyone else. When Descartes said “I think therefore I am”, that “I” he was talking about was an extraordinarily privileged white European male. Not a woman. Not a Roma. Not a Jew. Not a non-European subject. Colonized peoples were not included in this idea of rational man, and women were simply too emotional to be rational about anything at all.
This is all well and alive today. The idea of “objectivity” is part of this rationalist thinking, but so is race. The idea of race is overwhelmingly embedded in this idea of what counts as a human and what doesn’t.
So let’s consider Descartes’ situated knowledge — where he was coming from; his subjectivity: When Descartes was writing, he was living in Amsterdam, at the time, the strongest capitalist center in the world. His position was one of extraordinary privilege, so it should surprise no one that it would take someone with such a position to believe he was capable of replacing God as the all-knowning subject.
Cartesian philosophy and Enlightenment thought that followed has provided the justification for colonialism, capitalism, racism, sexism — all enlightenmentisms that oppress, disposses, exploit, and discriminate against those who do not fit into the normative framework everyone making claims to “objectivity” seek to be a part of.
So it makes perfect sense to me that those folks who have done the most interesting things and have thought the most extraordinary thoughts in the name of social justice have overwhelmingly not fit into the normative White, Western, Male. None of them considered themselves objective. In fact, they wrote completely against this idea.
This is the history everyone wants to completely ignore when they try to sell this idea of objectivity. This is what keeps the social sciences alive, notwithstanding the evidence that objectivity doesn’t work or exist at all within the social sciences — even though a large number of these academics are making a great living insisting that it does. Speak to any intelligent “hard” scientist about it, and he or she will tell you that objectivity doesn’t completely exist there, either. The very topic one has chosen to conduct experiments on is laden with subjective decisions.
So I’ll admit it, even if no one else writing on or reading this blog wants to:
I am not objective.
Everything I write on here is laced with my ethical-moral positions on how we all should live and let live. It is why I have not one nice thing to say about Israel.
I think we would do better to discuss our moral standings than our non-existent objectivity. I’ll use Benny Morris — our favorite Israeli “New Historian” — as an example. Although he may claim it, he is not an objective player. I think we all know that. But did you know that I find myself appreciating Benny Morris, often more than I do much of the so-called “left” that thinks it’s fighting Zionism?
Benny Morris has been increasingly explicit about his moral standing. His work is laced with his own ethical-moral position on how “Jews” — and only those he defines as “Jews” — should live. He cares about “Jews” more than he cares about anyone else. So while I, on the other hand, think that the way someone lives shouldn’t come at the cost of others, Benny Morris states, “Preserving my people is more important than universal moral concepts.”
When Benny Morris’ work confirmed “academically” what every Palestinian already knew — that Israel, since 1948, has been ethnically cleansing Palestinians in the name of Jewish superiority — it rocked the Liberal sensibility in Israel. But Benny Morris, as he later said, did not conduct this study under what became the commonly understood moral position. When he showed that Palestinians were ethnically cleansed for the creation of Israel, he didn’t say it to show any remorse about it,
A Jewish state would not have come into being without the uprooting of 700,000 Palestinians. Therefore it was necessary to uproot them. There was no choice but to expel that population. It was necessary to cleanse the hinterland and cleanse the border areas and cleanse the main roads. It was necessary to cleanse the villages from which our convoys and our settlements were fired on.
One is not objective when one speaks about race. One is not objective when one speaks about ethnic cleansing. We’re being guided by extremely flawed logic as we talk about how to be objective. The idea that “objectivity” exists is wrong. Objectivity doesn’t exist, and especially not among society. I cringe when I read that word, and I don’t understand why we even use it. Nobody in their right mind could possibly believe anything written on this blog or anywhere else, for that matter, is “objective.” I certainly don’t. I dont believe anything is objective, and I believe it even less whenever someone claims it to be so.
Related posts:
- US Bias Against Palestine
- Finally Fatah Gets it Right
- Qaddafi: One State Solution
- Zakaria: Closeted Palestinian-Supporter?
- At Last
Wow, a professional student says that bloggers aren’t objective…
A pretentious post if I’ve ever seen one.
Posted by livinginabubble | February 22, 2009, 4:01 pmNobody is objective. Not the bloggers on this site
You mean everything you’ve told us to date was a biased LIE?! I believed you. I trusted you. And now I come to my home on the web and find my sense of identity and self – formed over eons of reading my beautiful KabobFest – disintegrating into a savage sewer of shit!
I will never forgive you. I will never forget. 2/22 is a Black Sunday, for all time – the Day Kabob Fell From Grace.
Posted by Anonymous | February 22, 2009, 4:21 pmOh my Gosh! You spoke what was on my mind today in this blog post. Thank you for finally speaking the truth, I wish other people, bloggers, reporters–everyone! will follow suit.
Posted by Saleema | February 22, 2009, 7:22 pmhaha *laugh* at first 2 retarded comments.
Really guys, if your going to make a joke try to be funny.
Posted by Arayus | February 22, 2009, 9:10 pmObjectivity probably makes little sense anyway. If we all understood and respected everyone else’s opinions mankind would never have come out of the cave.
The way we relate to people like ourselves and put them first is a survival characteristic given to us by nature. Rather than trying to change human nature it would be saner to avoid the globalism, the excessive mass migration and the constant interference in other people’s cultures that only create conflicts. Respect is best fostered from a distance.
PS Have you ever heard an Australian aborigine make a racist comment about an Eskimo? I rest my case.
Posted by xoggoth | February 23, 2009, 4:16 amReally, really well put.
I’ll declare it too – though not in a post because there’s nothing eloquent left to say – I’m not objective either, nor do I want to be. I try my best to look at conflicts from all sides, to a point, and I’m certainly more objective about some issues than others.
Rather than objective, let’s say…open-minded.
Posted by Jillian | February 23, 2009, 6:35 amI’d much rather people took a stand more. A real, fervent stand…. whatever it may be.
Posted by Nadine | February 23, 2009, 11:09 amThank you, Nadine.
My thoughts exactly.
Posted by Proud, Zionist Jew | February 23, 2009, 4:04 pmAll rational human behavior, individual or organizational is depicted as a continual cycling through four tasks : observation, orientation, decision and action .
The winner will be who repeatedly observes, orients, decides and acts more rapidly and accurately ; efficiently and effectively than his opponent , by doing so he fold his opponent back inside ; making his reactions totally inappropriate to the situation at hand
OBJECTIVITY is a variable component not a destiny
There is no commandment that cannot be broken, including the ones I give and those the prophets spoke.
Posted by riskability | February 23, 2009, 7:02 pmyes. objectivity is a flawed concept.
Posted by الفلسطينية | February 23, 2009, 8:12 pmYou make a good point about objectivity, QuiQui. But the problem your camp has is with lack of fairness and honesty. And there’s no excusing that.
Posted by programmer craig | February 24, 2009, 12:09 amTo the first two comments: to say “I am not objective” is not the same as saying “I am not telling the truth.” That is the point of QuiQui’s post– truth is more inclusive than what is called ‘the objective.’ The European concept of objectivity asserts and imposes its own monopoly on the truth on other people.
Furthermore, to say that there is no objectivity is not to say that everything is “relative.” It doesn’t mean everyone’s opinion is equally true or valuable. It just means there are different ways of seeing and approaching things. So, for example, house numbers and addresses– who do those exist for, and why are they the only landmark we can use when sending mail? Why can’t I address something to “Marcy, who lives near the bridge behind the large oak tree,” which would be a perfect description to people who are familiar with the area I’m in? A postal service can’t deal with that because it doesn’t have that local knowledge so it requires forms of “universalization” and re-naming and re-labeling… a whole new system of seeing. But it’s obviously not the only way to know the world, and it’s only “objective” because they say it is, not because there is anything inherently valuable with that system.
Posted by Yaman | February 24, 2009, 11:55 amKabob isn’t reporting videos like this. I wonder why. Remember when we heard about Hamas breaking legs of Fatah collaborators in Gaza? It’s all so neat and clean in black and white letters. Behind each pair of those broken legs is a human being.
Watch for yourself how acts the Palestinian government of Gaza.
Posted by Anonymous | February 25, 2009, 11:06 pmIt's been almost two years since QuiQui wrote a post. Did she fall for another Oaxacan revolutionary and lose herself down there?
Posted by Victor_Shikhman | January 4, 2011, 8:51 pm