One of the demands put forth by the Black Lives Matter movement and other groups, along with defunding the police and the dissolution of the nuclear family structure, is the elimination of objectivity. These groups claim there is no such thing as objective truth, that objective truth is a social construct created by white people to keep people of color down. They believe objectivity is a form of white supremacy, and must be rejected in the name of social justice. But this rejection of objectivity undercuts the basis of their movement against racial injustice.
If there is no objective truth, then there is no objective right and wrong. If there is no right and wrong, then on what grounds are people being canceled? If there is no right and wrong, how can we make a claim that slavery or racism is wrong? Or that murder is wrong? Or that the George Floyd’s killing was wrong? How can we say that oppressing people is wrong if there is no right and wrong? But we all know that those things are wrong, because there is right and wrong, and objective truth. And that is not white supremacy. That is the way the world works.
The world owes a debt of gratitude to objectivity. Science is based in objectivity. Science has greatly improved the standard of living of many people throughout the world. It has eliminated much pain, misery and death throughout the world. Scientific discovery works from the scientific method which is driven by objective facts and truths.
Statistical analysis which has revolutionized most industry has done so by injecting a higher level of objectivity in the decision-making process, and thus produced more effective results. So, instead of rejecting the concept of objectivity, we need to make a concerted effort to seek, find and live by the objective truths in the world.
If you look at world history, many of the greatest evils perpetrated have been caused by a rejection of, or at least not upholding the standards of objectivity. Subjective applications of laws have “legally” administered many of the great injustices in the world. Kings, dictators, warlords and Communist premieres, all apply their laws subjectively which is another way of saying unjustly, and thus creating social injustice through the violation of basic human rights.
The founding fathers are being canceled precisely because they did not live up to the objective truths they outlined in the constitution. They applied those truths subjectively. That was the only way they could write “all men are created equal”, and then own other men as slaves. The root of every act of governmental corruption in our country’s history has been caused by our elected officials not upholding the objective standards codified in our Constitution and laws.
People who want to do away with objectivity in reality want to eliminate accountability. That is also the reason why they want to eliminate the police. The police’s job is to hold the citizenry accountable to the laws of the land. The people who want to eliminate the police are the ones’ who do not want to live up to the laws. They do not necessarily want to eliminate the laws. They just do not want the laws to apply to them, only to others.
These groups are not promoting a “live and let live” philosophy. They do not want to live in a libertarian utopian world teetering on anarchy. They are using anarchy to upend the existing governmental, economic and society structures so they can implement their own structure where they have the power, based on their own vision of right and wrong, and justice, where they can hold others accountable to the standards they do not want to live by which in the end will produce the very injustices that they claim they are standing against.
The best and possibly the only way to fix what ills our country and world is to have more objectivity, not less, more police, not less, a stronger family unit, not less, more accountability to objective right and wrong, not less. Elimination of objectivity, and embracing subjectivity will only eliminate injustice because it will eliminate the concept of justice which in turn will create the most unjust world of all.