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January 2009

Introduction: The dictatorship of relativism

by Roger Kimball

An introduction our symposium "The Dictatorship of Relativism: Who Will Stand Up for Western Values Now?”

There are no facts, only interpretations.
—Friedrich Nietzsche, The Will to Power

If relativism signifies contempt for fixed categories and [for] men who claim to be bearers of an external objective truth, then there is nothing more relativistic than fascist attitudes.
Benito Mussolini

As a rule, only very learned and clever men deny what is obviously true. Common men have less brains, but more sense.
—William T. Stace

 It wasn’t that long ago that a responsible educated person in the West was someone who entertained firm moral and political principles. When those principles were challenged, he would typically rise to defend them. The more serious ...

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Roger Kimball is co-Editor and Publisher of The New Criterion.


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This article originally appeared in The New Criterion, Volume 27 January 2009, on page 4

Copyright © 2009 The New Criterion | www.newcriterion.com

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