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Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900) was a powerful anti-philosopher.  He says in this brief excerpt that facts do not exist; only interpretations do.  He writes: Everything is Interpretation: … Against those who say “There are only facts,” I say, “No, facts are precisely what there is not, only interpretations.” We cannot establish any fact in itself. Perhaps it is folly to want to do such a thing

This is called perspectivism, and an interpreter of postmodernism describes the practical outcome of it. We have lost the ‘real world’ and the ‘apparent world,’ he [Nietzsche] thought, and it follows from this eerie situation that there are no facts, only interpretations. With that breathtaking claim we broach the doctrine that Nietzsche called ‘perspectivism.’ It is a shorthand for a group of different doctrines – that truth is perspectival, that logic is, that knowledge is, and so on … There is no absolute, Nietzsche declared: being is always becoming and ‘being human’ is fluid rather than fixed.

This hyper-skepticism can be summed up in one word: postmodernism. It has worked its way into the cultural water we drink and air we breathe.

Christian universities and high schools have accepted perspectivism as if there are no objective truths out there, but only our competing worldviews.  So they teach “Worldview Studies.”

2. Destroying the essence of marriage and gender differences

postmodernism is hyper-skeptical of essences.

If you can find the definition of a pencil, then you have discovered its essence, which distinguishes it from other objects like a pen.

in a debate over same-sex “marriage,” one advocate for redefining marriage proclaimed: “Marriage has no essence!”  In other words, it’s open to reinterpretation and redefinition.  Perspectivism.

take postmodernism to its deeper outcome, it also says human sexuality is fluid, not fixed.  There are no clear gender differences.  The essence of maleness and the essence of femaleness is being shattered.

Humankind used to have an essence: a rational soul.  Christianity added that the essence is a contaminated rational soul.  We don’t even need a biblical text to reach that conclusion, which is deduction.  We can observe humans over the centuries.  That’s induction.

Postmodernism, however, denies humankind’s essence.  So why not overlay it with the (naïve) ideology of wishful thinking?  The West has a secular, easygoing, live-and-let-live outlook, so surely everyone else does.

Postmodernism says key concepts, like justice and rights and even God, are up for grabs like a loose ball in basketball.  Meaning is fluid and playful, and the context and original intent do not limit those foundational truths. So judges, growing up in this postmodern environment at the university, cut the Constitution loose from its original and historical context and interpret it as a living document, subject to the modern, evolving zeitgeist.  The Constitution says whatever they intend per their politics, not what its authors originally intended.

For postmodernism, science (or cause and effect) has no firm foundation (see Hume).  If we have no secure knowledge, then why not overlay and shape it through political ideology?

reject ancient hyper-skepticism, against which Aristotle fought, that has recently morphed into postmodernism.

Expose who many liberals really are.  They’re amoral, anything-goes postmodernists.  Use it as a pejorative.

explain postmodernism, so students can figure out that they are being swept along by hyper-skepticism.

The main thing is that that there really are essences.  Marriage has an essence, and there are essential differences between maleness and femaleness.  Humanity itself has an essence that places it above other mammals.

 Hyper-skepticism is a minority viewpoint.

Don’t deny the obvious that you can see with your own eyes.  Your five senses are an accurate source of common sense

Be confident in this: the real world – which really does exist and can be objectively known without our mental games and interpretations – must come before ideology.