GM 17 September: Lyotard vs. Maya Angelou.

Realism…when it is launched by the political apparatus, the attack on artistic experimentation is specifically reactionary: aesthetic judgment would only be required to decide whether such or such work is in conformity with the established rules of the beautiful. Instead of the work of art having to investigate what makes it an art object and whether it will be able to find an audience, political academicism possesses and imposes a priori criteria of the beautiful, which designate some works and a public at a stroke and forever. (Lyotard: What Is Postmodernism? 41)

What Lyotard is saying is that, hey, this whole control thing is going to bleed over into our everyday thought, control the way we think, for the good of us all: unity. The “mind” police at work.
There are so many examples of the “mind” or “thought” police in our everyday society; we don’t even notice them anymore. It’s called “PC” or “politically correct!” Some have their good points, maybe. Look at smoking. I don’t smoke, never have, but I couldn’t give a care if you smoke or not, just don’t blow it in my face. I don’t care what you do to your body as long as the state doesn’t have to pay for your health related smoking problems; or, have to pay for your funeral. But I don’t see why we have to take anti-smoking laws to such extremes.
Another “PC” issue which, for the most part, is very positive, but has its extremes is environmental laws. There are some real nuts out there and if you don’t believe try walking along Melbourne Beach some evening during turtle nesting season with a flashlight and you’ll have the SWAT team down on you. These two items may seem trivial now and, if you’re an anti-smoker or pro-environmental that’s okay too. I’m with you, it’s just that I don’t like militant anything. But, it’s really the “mind” or “thought” police that bothers me and I’ve seen examples of it even at Rollins.
This past spring, the well known American poet, Maya Angelou was a speaker at Rollins. I admire, respect, and love Ms. Angelou’s work. She’s a power presence and her performance, her voice, that evening was magnificent. I was in awe of her until: she made the statement, which I’ll paraphrase here, that if, for example, she’s in a room where the “N” word is being used; she would get up and leave. Well, I don’t blame her, so would I. But, then she went on to say that the “N” word should never be used again, especially by authors, writers, poets, speakers, etc., anywhere, at anytime, and, that we as a society should not allow it to be used. Well, at that point I wanted to get up and leave. I was in shock that such a great and, I thought, open-minded person would make such a statement, a statement, right out of the “thought” police hand book. Ms. Angelou was applauded by her Rollins audience that night, she had unity. Taken to the extreme, Ms. Angelou had a dangerous unity that evening, which is Lyotard’s point, falling within the “established rules of the beautiful.”