The Hunger Games, A Conspiracy Theory, And A Real Estate Tycoon
The Gauntlet Has Been Thrown Down By E Kyle Richey: A Response to The Postmodern World
My point that I proposed to Kyle Richey was not that of disputing whether Donald Trump was in fact a postmodern president, but more a reflection of the current cultural milieu. I made a point that Trump is a baby boomer and not Gen Xer, which allied by his time in college from 1964 to 1968, before the proliferation of postmodern theory in academia, that he would be more familiar with the cultural manifestations of postmodernism rather than its core tenets. I garner to bet that he has not read the works of Derrida, Lyotard, and Foucault in any meaningful sense and thus would only be aware of the principles of postmodernism through second-hand sources. I would make the comparison that the common college-educated boomer would echo such sentiments such as “that’s your truth,” and the growing level of acceptance for pluralism, that most would be unaware that they have absorbed some key tents of postmodernism through their daily interactions with their community at large.
In this, I propose that Donald Trump is more of a product of our postmodern culture than one who is a card-carrying deconstructionist. I would also expand that this is a by-product of what Trump is; a keen marketer of his personal brand and fierce opportunist. These characteristics would lend towards a utilitarian approach towards which philosophical principles he would incorporate into his worldview; that which wins the next big score. So, I would say that Trump has absorbed whatever postmodern proclivities has through that which has already been incorporated in modern-day capitalism. He has taken in postmodernism through a long food chain and like his beloved fast food, he is most likely unaware of where the ingredients of his worldview originate, he only looks at the gestalt of the utility of his premises, and they most likely change in order to meet his most important need: to win.
To conclude, Trump was as much as a postmodernist as was my mother, she would have been totally unfamiliar with the premises engaged by postmodernism, but she surely did absorb much through the culture she absorbed through the popular entertainment she consumed. While Obama was an unapologetic postmodernist, he was also a GenXer, raised into the tradition through academia, and when we get another GenXer in office (which probably won’t happen - we will be skipped for the upcoming millennials) we will become keenly familiar with what a postmodern president is. A president that will carry the tradition of postmodernism in the same manner in which Trump played the media. And Kyle, I know you are going to use the fake news angle, but the whole fake news phenomenon was already old hat on the internet long before Trump announced his candidacy, and Trump merely used the phenomena to win over voters.
…drops mike
Thomas Doane