The Problem of “-ism” on Forums
It seems to me to be mostly detrimental to label yourself and/or someone you’re conversing with as “liberal,” “conservative,” or any other tag.
I say this because these terms have a variety of meanings and although they give a gist about the prso in question they may just well give the wrong gist. Also, I very much doubt there is a person breathing that is totally “liberal,” or whatever, in every aspect of their life and thoughts.
Do you think announcing about yourself, or another, a certain political inclination serves any real purpose? I ask because although it does seem to help iron out some differences by asking “are you more inclined to X?” - which to me seems a more appropriate and honest way to try and understand someone’s views - but more often than not it turns into mere hyperbolic attacks and sidetracks the heart of the discussion.
I say this because these terms have a variety of meanings and although they give a gist about the prso in question they may just well give the wrong gist. Also, I very much doubt there is a person breathing that is totally “liberal,” or whatever, in every aspect of their life and thoughts.
Do you think announcing about yourself, or another, a certain political inclination serves any real purpose? I ask because although it does seem to help iron out some differences by asking “are you more inclined to X?” - which to me seems a more appropriate and honest way to try and understand someone’s views - but more often than not it turns into mere hyperbolic attacks and sidetracks the heart of the discussion.
Comments (71)
Theism and Atheism, if you're a coherent person, don't really exist either. It just defines where you're inclining to, even though you assure to your interlocutors that your suppositions can be erroneous. Although another problem would occur from there, does agnosticism exists?
Or does compatibilism of determinism and free-will exists? All moderately balanced aspects between each opposing extremes according to you, would be inappropriate.
There are subtle linings of error to that, but I don't really see how: Quoting I like sushi
As an example someone may say that conservatives, in the majority, are homophobic or that liberals, in the majority, are all apologists.
The same thing happens if you question someone’s views. You may agree with them yet they can often resort to thinking of you as “the enemy” - and of course, we all do it to a degree.
My question is whether it is perhaps better not to talk about ourselves, or others, as being this or that unless we treat the term as a “gist” of the position in the said discussion ONLY and seem open clarification by civil means rather than by accusation?
This isn't just a problem with isms, it's a problem with all kinds of words. To mitigate it, sometimes it is better to take the long-winded approach by avoiding labels in exchange for a description of the thing the label is intended to point to. Your writing will become less concise, but your intended meaning will be much clearer.
A good example is a word like "gender", which can lead to ridiculously prolonged miscommunications. Sometimes people are referring to chromosomes, sometimes they are referring to phenotype or to hormonal balances, sometimes to gender roles, and sometimes to personality or to "identity". If we had different words for all of these different meanings there would be less miscommunication, but it will take time for the language market to fill those relatively new gaps.
What happens when one uses descriptors...is that the meaning of the descriptor becomes the main topic of the discussion.
Atheist, agnostic, conservative, liberal...are those kinds of words.
Better not to use them...and instead to describe the position.
Now, after we have established the problem. I would like to address something that was left unanswered.
A middle section of two extremely opposite aspects is inevitable to surface into a discussion by consequential considerations. Evaluating proposed dispositions of each aspect, it is inevitable that people would want the established problem to be resolved by another aspect that's just: moderate, common, the exact middle. For example, atheism and theism = agnosticism. Determinism and free-will = compatibilism. Would that middle section, which is inherently not any different from an ism, be a problem as well?
Do you think they're less of a problem outside of forums?
:lol:
Elucidation?
You’re still talking about “-isms” and I wouldn’t view the terms you frame as antonyms as antonyms. I was clear enough, or so I thought, about still expressing “-isms” in a manner of enquiry but not of “accusation”.
So only because I talk of 'isms' is it then a problem?
You are accusing though, you have concluded that these utilization of 'isms' is a problem and must be addressed to change. If you meant personal beliefs for enquiry and accusation, then my question remains.
I am talking about a specific, standpoint of these mentioned 'isms' though; which is the middle point. So it is not of much difference to isms, but still different.
In a nutshell, let's say that F-ism is often associated with characteristics a, b, c, d, e
You might consider yourself an F-ist because of b and d, which you consider to be two of the most essential aspects of F-ism.
When you announce that you're an F-ist, though, others might assume--"Ah, you believe a, b, c, d, e"
Meanwhile, you might not agree with e, but now the other person has made the assumption that you believe that e, and it can be almost impossible to get them to think otherwise.
Again, Terrapin and I agree. We're on a roll here!
I also think people apply labels to others out of laziness and stubbornness.
They don't want to think someone who ascribes to a, b, c, and d could believe anything but e.
Especially if your entire critique of F-ism depends on your critique of e, it's unnerving if someone says "F but without e" because then you might be forced to give a through d more thought then you had before.
Perhaps some people suggest a middle point.
I do not.
On the question, "Do no gods exist...or does at least one god exist?"...
...I simply acknowledge that I do not know.
I do not set up a continuum and pretend I can determine probability on it.
If "F-ism' is generally associated with a range of characteristics, all of which your standpoint does not exemplify, then you should not present yourself as an "F-ist"; you can't justifiably blame others if you misrepresent yourself.
I think you can blame others when you say "I don't agree with e" and they can't parse it just because you called yourself an F-ist. (I think you can blame them for not being able to learn something that simple, that is.)
A human is can accurately be characterized as a terrestial, bipedal mammal. If I was born without legs, does that make me no longer a human?
E may not be a necessary component of F, even if it commonly associated with it.
In any case it is better to just say what you think without worrying about what ism it might fall into.
If someone can't understand something as simple as saying, "I don't agree with e," then how is that the first guy's fault? It seems like a severe intelligence deficit for someone to not be able to understand the other guy explicitly saying "I don't agree with e."
It's not a good analogy because even if you were born without legs, the general bilaterally symmetry that allows for two legs will be there; it would just be that for whatever reason your body did not develop properly.
So maybe I had the general bilateral symmetry required for e and decided I'd rather have f or g or h. Anything but e! E is the worst.
Here's what I was complaining about:
"Meanwhile, you might not agree with e, but now the other person has made the assumption that you believe that e, and it can be almost impossible to get them to think otherwise."
If the tenets are pretty explicitly set out without variation, sure. Usually they're not.
No, it is the responsibility of the intelligent person not to be hopelessly stubborn about a “first impression” (ASSumption) or preconcieved notion about any given “ism”. The intelligent person knows that they should clarify positions of others before drawing conclusions about a range of views the other didnt state or even allude to.
It is the domain of the half wit, the weak minded and the whiny bitch to demand someone cater all interactions to their lazy and inaccurate conclusions about who someone else is or what they believe.
I think it is, but whatever. The point is that e may not be a necessary condition of Fism. And if you attribute it to an Fist anyway, you need to make a better case for it than "well, you called yourself an Fist."
There is no point claiming that you are some ist if you don't satisfy all of what are generally considered to be the requirements for being that ist. In general it is simpler just to outline your position or argument without any reference to isms at all. Isms are always already stereotypes, and you cannot justifiably blame others for stereotyping you if you identify yourself with a stereotype. With minds of a certain calibre it seems to be always a matter of someone else being at fault if they are not understood the way they demand they should be understood.
I share your distaste for labels, but you were the one that made reference to what intelligent people do. I followed suit. Rich that you then saddled a high horse about it. Doubly rich you went ahead and resorted back to doing so when you referenced a “certain calibre” of minds.
I disagree with you about where the onus lies. If a person refers to themselves as an ism, and another person assumes that they possess any number of traits or beliefs based on their own preconceived notions of what that encompasses then I think tha’s fine, but if the first person then corrects the person about the preconceived notion then the onus is on the second person to adjust their view, not say something like “...but you said you were a so and so ism!” or somesuch.
Now, Im not talking about you specifically here, I do not know what exactly the beef with Terra is. Im making a general point for discussion here. I get the sense you may think I was calling you a half wit or a whiny bitch. You might be I do not know, but that wasnt directed at you specifically.
Yes there's still a problem, because the undefined middle will be subjectively warped according to how we each conceive of the poles (either end of the spectrum).
For example, you stated that agnosticism is directly in the middle of theism and atheism, and while in some sense that is vaguely true, atheists do not see it that way (we see atheism as the refusal to take a positive position, not a denial of one). For most atheists, agnosticism is on an entirely different spectrum (an epistemological spectrum, not an ontological/existential spectrum) because we reject the belief-disbelief dichotomy outright. Agnosticism is one of the most frequently misused words in discourse about gods, so I can hardly blame you for missing its specific meaning. It is actually "the positive belief that evidence pertaining to god(s) is unavailable", and It only becomes important to clarify on the journey towards soft-atheism because as a theist there is no practical difference between someone who denies your god because they believe it does not exist and someone who denies your god because they have no proof or good evidence that it does exist.
Consider your stance toward Zeus. You cannot prove Zeus does not exist (not without some effort), so you certainly don't "believe in" Zeus, but do you actually believe Zeus does not exist? If you said yes, and I accused you of having no actual proof, how would you respond?
The more controversy there is surrounding a label, the better you would do to avoid it unless you're argument is semantic in nature (i.e: trying to reclaim a word). "Isms" usually point to broad categories of belief, making them inherently ambiguous. It seems like a situational dogma because "isms" suffer severely from the problem of ambiguity, but really it's a fundamental problem of all language.
Post-modern thinkers like Foucault will tell you that "the gap between the intended meaning of the author and the received meaning of the reader can never be fully bridged", but it's not an insurmountable problem (the post-modern clutch has always been melodramatic). We just need to be clear enough...
Well yes, that is where we disagree I think. People don’t pigeon hole themselves via someone elses assumption. That doesnt make sense to me. Rather the one with assumptions, even justified ones, bears the responsibility of any mislabeling of a persons stances. Its them who should maintain a stricter awareness. If its the other way around, we are all at the mercy of other peoples assumptions.
Yes, I agree with that, and with what Terrapin has said.
Its similar to the logic behind my stance on offensive language. If the onus is on the person saying things, we are at the mercy of peoples sensitivity to offense.
I'm with you on that one in a number of conceivable cases, but not in others. I don't agree with casual references to a person or a group of people in racist language, for example. But I'm not [i]absolutely[/I] against the use of that language or any language at all. So long as the context makes it okay, it's okay. It can be okay in comedy or sarcasm or irony or fiction or in talking about the terms themselves or in reappropriation. And if people are still offended regardless, then that's on them. I'm not in the wrong by default just because they're offended. They'd need to be justified.
Good suggestion. If one cannot do this, then they really do not know what it is that they are talking about anyway.
I see problems with self-limiting beliefs. Identification of most any kind is a self-limiting belief. We can trap ourselves with statements like "I am X". We also tend to encourage identification, tribalism, and so on in others when we label them.
And we fail to persuade and communicate when we say things like, "What you Y-ists fail to understand is..." We just encourage a combative reaction and further radicalization and deeper identification with that side. We make ourselves the enemies of those we declare as belonging to an enemy tribe.
Obviously, this is a problem in politics. We get these divides like left versus right. But it happens in philosophical communities as well. We tend to divide along common lines of disagreement. Materialism versus Idealism is an example. I remember taking my first course in philosophy. Our text was called The Philosophical Journey, by William F. Lawhead. I remember it presenting itself to me as a menu of choices I could make as I was forming my first tentative philosophical identity. Here is another fence. Which side do I want to be on? Do I like A or B better? I think I'll join the A-ists and then argue with the B-ists. Here are the available tribes and their beliefs. Do you want to be a goth or a jock? Shitkicker or metalhead?
It seems weird to me that whether a person believes that humans are changing the climate is more a matter of tribal identity than an actual, sincere consideration of evidence.
If I am identified with a position, when that position is attacked, it feels like an attack on me! Instead, ideally, I should hold positions provisionally and welcome better reasoning that might lead me to another conclusion that better conforms to reality or justice. Consider how Socrates suggested that if shown to be clinging to bad ideas, we should accept this and thank our interlocutors for removing our ignorance and bringing us closer to the light. Instead, we think we would like to die before being proven to be wrong or part of the bad tribe! This is what we want: I am right! You are wrong! Notice the "I=good" thing in there.
If, instead, we do not identify with the position, if we simply present it for consideration as one among a number of possibilities, if it is destroyed, we aren't destroyed with it. The ego isn't threatened. I carry the idea. I find it somewhat compelling absent good evidence against it or for a competing idea. But I am not identical with it. So if it gets destroyed by my interlocutor, I can thank that person for improving my understanding, for gifting me their hard-won insight, for removing some of my intellectual barnacles.
But we are so prone to tribalism and identification that this is easier said than done. Nevertheless, we should try. I am trying, more and more, to eliminate "I am X" thoughts from my inner dialogue and speech. That goes especially for "I am an X-ist". I find that I am becoming more flexible. I am allowing myself to really consider the arguments of those that were once my political enemies.
Agreed. For me, its about intention. Whats the intent of the language? Thats what makes the difference to me. Is the person intending offense?
People simply assume that they know what the others think. Why listen or engage in a discussion then?
I completely agree with you that people don't pigeonhole themselves via someone else's assumption they pigeon hole themselves via identifying their standpoint with some ism or other. And sometimes they do something even worse, they carelessly and misleadingly pigeonhole themselves by identifying their standpoint with some ism that they don't totally agree with, rather than simply giving an account of their own standpoint or preemptively making it clear just what part(s) of the ism they don't agree with, and then they complain if people are too stubborn or perhaps too suspicious to revise the initial misleading impression they were given.
I am not, by the way, excusing those who are too inflexible, suspicious or stupid to revise their viewpoint in the presence of good evidence that it had been mistaken.
If reason is and should be slave to the passions then you cannot be in the wrong (in matters that are not empirically decidable) if you feel you are right. On that RIASBSTTP view they don't need to be justified for any sense of being offended by your view, either.
You know that I'm a moral relativist. Do I really need to explain how that works again?
Should we assume people mea offense or give them the benefit of the doubt? For myself this is a matter of personal judgement, but I like to think I’m open enough to consider that they mean something different and so (if in a balanced mood!) I will fish for clarification directly or indirectly so as not to antagonise ... and I have to admit sometimes antogonising does help the discussion (but it’s generally a last resort for me and hardly ever seems to produce a positive outcome.)
Note: I am not talking about NEVER asking what these terms mean and think it is a highly productive activity to explore the nuances of meaning within a philosophical context. I’m simply opposed to declarations forced on myself, or others - by myself or others - unless it is presented as a “gist”.
I am not saying such problems are ONLY present on forums either. It is quite clear that terms such as “communism,” “capitalism,” “liberalism,” “conservatism” and “socialism” are bandied around as if they are simplistic wholes in order to defeat the opponent in a discussion - or rather to drive the discussion off the rails and end up rolling in the dirt while the destination of the discussion remains a distant dot on the horizon.
As an example of an “-ism” let us look at a quote from wiki regarding “fascism”:
In the above there are ideas that are not absolutely disgusting in and of themselves. Generally speaking the movement gained popularity because it had sensible elements to it that made some practical sense at the time. The elements that are sensible within this scheme are the ideas of “self-sufficiency” and “the rejection that violence is automatically negative” - the issue not address is the limitation to such ideas which is where public opinion was hoodwinked leading to a basically simply and sensible view being taken beyond its immediate aims (self-sufficiency and the ability to protect citizens by violent force if necessary).
Of course I am not suggesting “fascism” is a good idea! Haha! :D yet it reminds me of what happened in a recent discussion on the subject of SJW’s and why the term now has a negative connotation, or even why some people mistakenly assume saying “nationalism” without consideration of the historical landscape surrounding this term.
We find more and more of late (or so it seems to me?), on all fronts, that people attach the label of “socialism” to one nation that suits there position but not to another that doesn’t (be it for OR against socialism as a force of good/bad). The goes for practically all other political perspectives.
I’m just asking if it would serve a better purpose if we were to discuss political issues and hold off, as best we can, from attaching some arbitrary label to someone else’s view as being X or Y and if we REALLY felt the pull to be too strong to ignore to announce this to the person in a none combative way (as an inquiry into a better understanding).
Note: I am writing this not as as someone who is seeing the mistakes of others, but as someone who is seeing the mistakes in others because I make the same mistakes myself - it is a reminder to myself that I’m an idiot and more prone to unfounded judgements of others than I’d like to admit and blind to them due to some weird psychological defense mechanism (being human I think it’s called?) that twists my thoughts into believing I err less than others.
You’d have to expand on that for me given that it tells me very little about what you think. This is not as big an issue regarding the OP though as I am more concerned with political terminology than with philosophical perspectives or “ethics”.
One of the big problems with labels or descriptors has to do with whether the label or descriptor is being self-applied or applied FROM someone else.
In political discussions I am often labelled a "liberal" because I mostly favor a progressive agenda. But I insist I am NOT a liberal...which is a label. I am satisfied to offer my views on anything...and prefer that those views not pigeonhole me with a label.
Self-applied labels makes lots more sense to me. If a person tells me they are "an agnostic" (liberal, conservative, atheist, theist) I have an idea, within boundries, of what they are trying to communicate.
Not so when someone says (often "accuses") someone else of "being."
Giving labels to other people and then attacking the worst stereotypes of the followers of that "ism" is an easy method to circumvent actual discussion. It's quite luring to do this. Just think your own actions if you, as a mostly progressive person, would have to make small talk with a person who would start with saying "I voted Trump in the last election".
Nobody starts small talk with a stranger like this anywhere. If the other person is totally on the opposite side, the situation is awkward. Of course it shouldn't be so, if we truly would be open to ideas of others and respect each other.
Right on the button, ssu.
One of the reasons I am at a Philosophy Forum right now, is because these days, any political discussion tends to quickly go off the tracks.
So you or others might consider R intelligent where
(1) S says, "I'm an F-ist,"
(2) R associates the belief that e with F-ism (because it's a common enough association),
(3) R asks S about their belief that e, or comments about their belief that e,
(4) S says, "Oh, I don't believe that e,"
(5) R keeps talking about S's belief that e
?
If you might consider R intelligent in that situation it would explain a lot.
You didn't indicate an understanding of moral relativism in your reply, because you claimed that I couldn't be wrong, when obviously under moral relativism I can be wrong, [i]relative to others[/I]. They [i]do[/I] need to be justified, relative to my ethics. If, by their ethics, they don't need to be justified, then that's on them. I don't go by such an ethics, because to me, justification is important.
You completely missed out the relativism part of moral relativism, so it's pretty funny that you are giving out the impression that you know more than me about it.
Maybe one day you'll get it. Keep trying. :up:
It's fairly simple, in spite of the fact that some people seem to have great difficulty grasping what it entails and what it doesn't entail.
It simply means that I am of a stance whereby what's right or wrong is only so relative to the judgement of a person or a group of people or an organisation, or relative to a moral system. And I reject the alternative, which is moral absolutism, whereby what's right or wrong is so absolutely, not relative to anyone or anything.
It's not rocket science, eh? I probably wouldn't even have needed to explain that, because, well, you see, there's this thing called Google...
But I get that in some cases there can be a problem of ambiguity, so I get where you're coming from with your anti-ism-ism, but this doesn't seem to be a case in point. I'd say that just because some people don't get it and that there are various common misperceptions about it, that isn't the fault of this particular -ism, it's the fault of those people.
The “someone elses assumption” IS the identification of the “ism”. You seem to have missed the point, perhaps I wasnt clear.
The person hears the “ism”, and pigeon holes the person according to the assumption of what that “ism” is. This is backwards, the onus is not on the person being pigeon holed.
I think granting the benifit of the doubt is preferable as well. It is better to assume a miscommunication rather than that the person is too stupid to understand you for example.
To your points about nuance and the way “isms” are misused: I think its worth looking at specific instances. In general Ive noticed a trend towards words losing their meaning, not just “isms”.
Thats a bit different than what I was saying, as you are offering a correction to someones label. You are telling them soecifically that you are not liberal. They should believe you unless they have good reason not to, such as if you cannot describe what makes you NOT a liberal (just as a general exemple).
Note: I quick google search would show you that there is not ONE position in “moral relativism” ;)
Much like when someone declare something like “I believe in God” I have gist of what they mean, but I’d have to probe further to understand their perspective. I’m certainly not against probing into “-isms” such as materialism, relativism, nihilism, anarchism, or such, but I hold off with these when it comes to political discourse as people all to quickly view you as absolutely “liberal” or “capitalistic” simply because a particular view in a particular context has been expressed.
Ideas surrounding “morals” would tend to be bandied around, in the respect I’m talking with politics, in more “theological” discussions. Not that I’m saying these items don’t span across multiple discussions only that I’ve personally found that each point of discourse requires due care and attention to the use and application of certain terms.
Thanks! I would probably have never noticed this about more “religiously” inclined discussions unless you’d brought up moral relativism.
Maybe one day you'll get it. Keep trying. :up:
If you are a moral relativist that says that moral judgements can be wrong or right relative only to individuals, then your judgement cannot be wrong relative to yourself, only to the judgements of others. But your judgement being wrong relative to the judgement of others really means nothing, since your judgement is by definition right if you hold it, according to the notion that moral judgements are answerable only to the individuals holding them.
The same goes with moral judgements being relative to communities. If judgements are relative to just one community then their rightness or wrongness can only be a function of the general opinion of the community in question. But any judgement may not be unanimous in which case its rightness or wrongness will be relative to what? A majority? How much of a majority?
So, it would seem that the idea that judgements can be right or wrong under moral relativism is problematic. I can't see how it would work; but perhaps you can explain to me how you think it would work. This really belongs in the 'Morality' thread, but what the hell? Most threads seem to routinely go off topic, anyway. :grimace:
You're no different. In practice, it is no different. So what you're saying doesn't work as a criticism. Give me an example of a moral judgement of yours whereby you judge something to be right, but it is more meaningful that others judge it to be wrong. You can't. You go by your own moral judgement. It wouldn't make any sense to do otherwise. If you traveled to some place where murdering children was judged to be right, you know full well that you wouldn't go by their judgement.
Quoting Janus
First of all, and in light of what I previously quoted above, I hope you're not presenting a false dilemma here, whereby you're making out as though either a) all moral judgement must be relative an individual, or b) all moral judgement must be relative to a community. Because it can be either: an individual or a community.
And it is not even that limited, either. I am highly flexible with regards to the relativism part of my moral relativism. There's no problem here. Just decide the context. Relative to an individual? A community? A majority? A minority? To x number of people?
Quoting Janus
Uh, no? But you tried. I'll give you that much.
Quoting Janus
Fuck it, right? The philosophy of fuck it strikes again.
So, why wouldn't it work, now that your objections have been met?
This is simplistic and not apposite because I acknowledge that my moral judgements are determined by how I understand general positions on whatever is being judged as well as my own conscience. I also acknowledge the socially constructed nature of my moral feelings. So, I don't say my judgements are relative only to my moral feelings; if my feeling yielded a judgement that was contrary to the rest of humanity, for example if I felt that it was right to murder people, then I would consider my feeling and the judgement associated with it to be wrong.
And to deal with your silly example about a society who believed the wanton killing of babies is good, I would not agree with that being right even relative to that community because it would be contrary to the judgement of the rest of humanity and I would have to think that the whole community was brain-damaged by in-breeding or something in the water or something like that, and that their belief in the rightness of wanton bay-killing was a sign of profound moral degeneration. I doubt there have ever been any communities like that in any case. In some hunter-gatherer communities babies who are not robust enough are routinely killed, but that is a matter of the survival of the community, and I see nothing wrong with it.
As I've said again and again, I judge things to be right or wrong relative to the almost universal cross-cultural opinion about their rightness or wrongness. Where there is no such almost universal opinion, in matters which are of much less moral significance, like whether one should have sex before marriage, whether it is OK to do illegal drugs or whatever other minor moral matter, then of course I will follow my own thoughts and feelings. So, just how would you say my position differs from yours?
Except that, in practice, you don't, so you're just deceiving yourself. You're merely choosing as an example a judgement which, in reality, you don't have. When it comes to your actual judgement, you abide by it without exception. So I have no reason to believe it would be any different if you believed that it was right to murder people.
Quoting Janus
It's not a silly example. It's silly to call it silly, because it shows the obvious fault in your position. Your position is inconsistent. You suggest that morality is defined by herd-morality or humanity or whatever, yet whenever you're presented with a counterexample going by your own criteria, you deny it or undermine your own position.
Quoting Janus
Yes, and that's entirely unnecessary. You don't need to repeat what your position is over and over again, you just need to get yourself out of the pickle you've put yourself in.
Quoting Janus
No, you will do so regardless. That's the part you fail to realise and deny.
Quoting Janus
It doesn't in practice, like I said. We both follow our own thoughts and feelings, and we both happen to agree over the big issues like murder.
I generally agree. Better to state and defend a position on a specific topic rather than to hand someone else a broad brush with which to paint you.
Good post (of which this quote is only a small part).
The general downside of this liminal position is that it lacks the quality loyalty, and loyalty has value. Declaring an ‘ism’ is in a sense making a promise to uphold whatever values that ism represents. If they’re good values it would be a shame to betray them.
Oddly though, the liminal position is still a position. It may be best for philosophers to not align themselves with any ideology, but that in itself expresses an ideology.