The Critic Magazine

Wake up to reality!

Wokeness is not really an intellectual position at all, it is more a form of wish-fulfilment

“‘WHAT IS TRUTH?’ SAID JESTING PILATE, and would not stay for an answer.” The opening sentence of Francis Bacon’s celebrated essay “Of Truth” stands like a declaration of intent at a foundation moment of our culture.

For asking the question, “staying” (waiting) for the answer and having the freedom to pursue it wherever it leads and however uncomfortable the destination might be is the key to the astonishing achievement of the western tradition in the last four or five hundred years.

The quest for “truth” has, however, been notable largely by its absence from the discourse of our universities in the last few decades. The fact was brought home to me by a

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