The Ego Trick (baggini, Julian) / quote 76 of 254
Postmodernists as intellectual dipsomaniacs
However, with this comes the promise of a liberation. If the self is constructed, then may we now take over the task of construction for ourselves? We can create ourselves, become the authors of our identities, writing as many of them as we want, not limiting ourselves to a singular identity. Everyone really needs to calm down. Postmodernists seem to me like thinkers who have tasted potent conceptual liquor and, lacking all moderation, have become intellectual dipsomaniacs. Drunk on the rejection of totalising narratives, they fail to notice they have simply replaced them with a different one: the narrative that understands everything in terms of constitution by language and power. Taken to its logical conclusion, postmodernism itself would simply be one narrative among others, constituted by the discourses of its time, and no more worthy of respect than any other system of thought.