Professor, now Senator, Kristopher Wells wrote a PhD thesis about his own identity, and is an activist rather than an intellectual. I took the trouble of reading it. (3,000 words, 15 minutes)
Wells is yet another example of a scholar who *cites* Foucault without seeming to realize that he is doing the exact thing Foucault so incisively critiqued. Gender ideology is one big incitement to discourse, a behemoth of power/knowledge that grows the bureaucracy.
Actually I doubt Wells cares a fig. He got what he wanted: a plum post in the state apparatus. the governmentality printer go brrrrr.
Like so many, Wells likes Foucault's polemical direction (gay rights, on the left of everything), without thinking with his premises. I've often thought that the core of insight in Foucault could usefully be disentangled from much excess verbiage and a certain amount of fiction.
That feels like an act of masochism, requiring some heavy drinking at the very least.
Well argued, quite unlike senator Wells’ thesis. At first glance I understood his Phd thesis to be 3000 words and 15 minutes which confused me a bit.
I presume it’s more than 3000 words although it’s clearly not worth spending 15 minutes on.
Thanks for the note. I normally put the length and time of my own posts at the top; I find it helpful when others do this.
The Professor's thesis was 90,000 words, and I read it over a couple of days.
Wells is yet another example of a scholar who *cites* Foucault without seeming to realize that he is doing the exact thing Foucault so incisively critiqued. Gender ideology is one big incitement to discourse, a behemoth of power/knowledge that grows the bureaucracy.
Actually I doubt Wells cares a fig. He got what he wanted: a plum post in the state apparatus. the governmentality printer go brrrrr.
Like so many, Wells likes Foucault's polemical direction (gay rights, on the left of everything), without thinking with his premises. I've often thought that the core of insight in Foucault could usefully be disentangled from much excess verbiage and a certain amount of fiction.
I've just discovered your substack: more to read!