The Enlightenment as Idealist Feeding Frenzy

Commenting on the most persistent of the Enlightenment Underground’s thematic questions, Orla Schantz recently had this to say,

“The easy answer to “Why do people desire their own repression?” is, of course Kant's own in his essay: that it is the laziness of not being mature that seems appealing, letting others read the books and tell you what to believe, letting the doctors determine what your diet should be, etc.

But it is also appealing to us today to go all Freudian and/or schizoanalytical in our attempts to answer the question - which I don't really find that interesting.”

Orla’s comment refers primarily to these two passages from Kant’s essay, Was ist Aufklarung?

“Enlightenment is man’s release from his self-incurred tutelage. Tutelage is man’s inability to make use of his understanding without direction from another.”

And,

“Laziness and cowardice are the reasons why so great a portion of mankind, after nature has long since discharged them from external direction ( naturaliter maioernnes), nevertheless remains under lifelong tutelage, and why it is so easy for others to set themselves up as their guardians. It is so easy not to be of age. If I have a book which understands for me, a pastor who has a conscience for me, a physician who decides my diet, and so forth, I need not trouble myself. I need not think, if I can only pay—others will readily undertake the irksome work for me.”

It is clear that Orla correctly reported how Kant explains why people do not seek release from their self-incurred tutelage. As I am inclined to agree with Orla that what Kant was talking about when he spoke of “self-incurred tutelage” and what Wilhelm Reich was talking about when he spoke of “desiring one’s own repression,” is very similar, if not exactly identical, I am willing to accept that Kant’s answer might be entertained as an answer to Reich’s. What I want to probe further is whether this is a very good answer to Reich’s question, whether it exhausts the matter at hand, and whether we can use Kant's answer in any way to penetrate the political and social problems we face today.

Kant’s simple few words reflect the sea change – the revolutionary change—in the way that Enlightenment men (and yes, that is “men”…Let’s be clear about that—very few Enlightenment thinkers were addressing themselves to women, and I don’t think there’s much doubt that Kant wasn't,) view themselves, their relationship to society and to the cosmos, and frame what is important to them, and even how they will go about what’s important. I want to examine is what Kant is assuming here—what he is taking for granted, so to speak, and whether we do well, or poorly, ( or otherwise,) to follow suit. I then want to look again at the question of “ why people desire their own repression,” to see how much, if anything, we can learn about the constraints of the question itself.

The first and the most violent note I want to draw attention to in these words is their emphasis upon the individual and the individual’s responsibility for his own condition. Men are responsible for not making use of their own understanding – as they say, “ they’ve ( the "men" of Kant's time) got no one to blame but themselves.” There is no external oppression or force placed upon Kant’s contemporaries, he thinks, holding them down and keeping them from realizing this possibility that they have of thinking for themselves. They are released from the direction of nature, ( they have been “long since discharged from external direction ( naturaliter maioernnes )); even though Kant recognizes that there are some people who set themselves up as ‘guardians’ for others, Kant does not think that this ‘guardianship’ and whatever it entails are sufficiently befuddling or forcefully-oppressing to such an extent as to provide an excuse for one to “ not to be of age.” The onus is on the individual for that—failure and shame rightfully belong to those who have not successfully cultivated an ability to make use of understanding without direction from another.

Please note also that whoever it is that Kant is thinking of when he says “ man’s release” or “man’s inability” or “mankind” ( and as I’ve said, it definitely isn’t women he’s thinking of so much,) he feels no need to specify. He may really be thinking of European Caucasian males who own property and have received an education, but he speaks in the generic, as if he COULD BE addressing European “people of color” ( they did exist in Kant’s time,) rural or urban peasantry, the dispossessed, the disabled, or really anybody. Kant is speaking as if he is saying that ANYONE who has not achieved the ability to use their own understanding without external direction is responsible for this being the case. My opinion is that Kant is thinking in terms of some “universal” condition where no such “universal” condition is appertaining.

I don’t want to go into great detail about this, but what Kant is overlooking seems staggering to consider. Europe in 1784 ( the year Kant wrote his essay,) was a place of great upheaval and deprivation, a place of violence and exploitation. In many ways, conditions were not much better for many masses of people than they had been during the middle ages. There was great poverty -- many people didn’t have enough bread… And I mean “bread” – the stuff you bake in an oven—to sustain themselves. Certainly people in this condition can’t have been concerning themselves overmuch with whether they were thinking for themselves or not – or even if they were, how realistic would it have been for Kant to believe that they could achieve that goal on their own? Kant really proceeds to think as if these people – probably the vast majority of people alive at that time—don’t count. It is almost as if they don’t exist.

Even though I am trying to restrict myself to two small passages from one short essay, I cannot comment completely in one post. I am sorry – I guess there will need to be several of these.