Talk:Frankfurt School/Archive 12

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I post a section headed "Debunking the Cultural Marxism/Frankfurt School Right wing propaganda and somebody who has political non neutral view deleted it. now it is well know that they do have people that don't fall for the idea that Cultural Marxism/Frankfurt School/ new left is left wing at all. so my neutral section NEEDS TO STEY. Torygreen84 (talk) 02:17, 31 July 2017 (UTC)

The problem is that the sources in that section don't pass

WP:RS) going into detail on the conspiracy theory and taking it apart - no part of the section presents it as credible (since no reliable source presents it as credible), so a 'debunking' subsection is redundant. --Aquillion (talk

) 06:12, 31 July 2017 (UTC)

who does The fact checking You from the CIA?, or other Elite News?, who won't report on what gary north said. why can't you be a normal working class man who is Independent from the Elite News. Torygreen84 (talk) 06:34, 31 July 2017 (UTC)

In hopes of moving the conversation forward, I've restored Jobrot's material on academic usage of the term "Cultural Marxism" with respect to the Frankfurt School. I've tried to take into account Ad Orientem's concerns about non-neutral language in the material. JerryRussell (talk) 22:05, 28 July 2017 (UTC)

That didn't take long. RGloucester reverted my edits with the comment "Sources do not support the additions here. Citations to Adorno do not include the term 'Cultural Marxism'...." My reply: while it's true that Adorno didn't use the term 'Cultural Marxism', nevertheless it's important to include citations to Adorno and other Frankfurt School sources, as part of the documentation for the claim. The academic niche usage of the term is documented in the Ritzer citation, as Jobrot and R-HH have explained.

I do see a problem, though. Aside from Sage 1981 which seems rather vague, there's no evidence that this academic and non-pejorative use of the term 'Cultural Marxism' existed prior to the conspiracy theory usage. @Jobrot:, @N-HH:, perhaps instead of claiming that the term originated as an academic niche term, the truth is that academics came up with this niche usage as a more explanatory and useful alternative to the conspiracy theory? Ritzer can be taken as an attempt to explain what the Frankfurt School people were really talking about, as opposed to paleoconservative caricatures of their views. JerryRussell (talk) 23:44, 28 July 2017 (UTC)

Hey JerryRussell thanks for your efforts in pushing the conversation forwards. Just some comments here from me;

Citations to Adorno do not include the term 'Cultural Marxism' - My understanding is that very few people within The Frankfurt School even used the term "The Frankfurt School" to refer to themselves. From the current article:

The term "Frankfurt School" arose informally to describe the thinkers affiliated or merely associated with the Frankfurt Institute for Social Research; it is not the title of any specific position or institution per se, and few of these theorists used the term themselves.

So I don't see that "Cultural Marxism" is any different in this regard. It's merely an informal term that is associated to a set of ideas (much like

WP:COMMONNAME

suggests it can be whatever is most recognizable or common to the topic.

Aside from Sage 1981 which seems rather vague, there's no evidence that this academic and non-pejorative use of the term 'Cultural Marxism' existed prior to the conspiracy theory usage. The first use of the phrase "Cultural Marxism", according to our own Russell Blackford, aka

WP:CITOGEN

.

Apart from that; I have other issues with Blackford's article, namely that it comes from a fairly pungent libertarian stance which falls into some questionable claims such as that the term "Critical Theory" was chosen to "deliberately obscure" the Frankfurt School's "true" mode of analysis.

Between that sort of conspiratorial claim, and the fact that Trent Schroyer's 1973 book is about the DEVELOPMENT of Critical Theory (not Critical Theory per se); I personally take the position that Critical Theory isn't directly Cultural Marxism - it's Critical Theory. There are many Critical Theorists who in fact don't use Marxism as their primary mode of analysis: See Outline of critical theory, and of course The Frankfurt School thinkers were not classical Marxists themselves, they were neo-marxists.

So I think the "Marxism" within "Cultural Marxism" specifically refers to the application of Historical Materialism (aka Marxist analysis) to

Identity Politics are re-written for purposes of ideological convenience as "Cultural Marxism". That historical revisionism, is to my mind, a pretty good indicator that the "Cultural Marxism" conspiracy theory is in play. --Jobrot (talk

) 02:52, 29 July 2017 (UTC)

I will try to explain this as well as I can, for the final time. We can see that Jobrot thinks that "the "Marxism" within 'Cultural Marxism' specifically refers to the application of Historical Materialism (aka Marxist analysis) to

industrialization and massification

of culture and the effects these processes have on human happiness and liberation", then you need to provide sources that say that this is what "Cultural Marxism" is. You can't cite Adorno, because nothing in Adorno can be used as a source for what 'cultural marxism' is, because Adorno never wrote about what 'cultural marxism' is. You can't cite Jane Barker, because she didn't do that either. You can't cite Habermas, because he didn't do that either. You can't use the Kellner piece, which has been dealt with thousands of times, because all it talks about is 'cultural studies', never mentioning 'cultural marxism'. Finally, there is the Encyclopaedia of Social Theory piece, which seems to be the source you think is most viable. However, once again, it does not support the assertion you are making about what 'cultural marxism' is supposed to be. It most patently does not say that "Cultural Marxism originated as a niche academic term describing the Frankfurt School's critique of The Culture Industry". Try and find that assertion in the piece, and you won't find it.

Assertions like this, about what so-called 'cultural marxism' is, require sources. None of the sources cited say anything about what 'cultural marxism' is, and so do not support the assertions made. If you want to say what you've written, you need to find a source that says it, not make up original research based on

WP:SYNTH. Of course, what we really find when we look at that Encyclopaedia of Social Theory source, for instance, is that 'cultural marxism' was simply a niche term used broadly to refer to Marxist approaches to cultural in general, not to any specific school of thought, not to any specific theory. This is what the deletion discussion found to be the case, and it's true. The term, in this form, is such a niche usage as to be irrelevant, nothing worth writing about, nothing worth an article, and nothing independent of the existing articles on the subjects it is meant to cover. We must adhere to deletion discussion result. The only reason why this is continuing to be discussed is because of the conspiracy theory, not for any other reason. Stop feeding the flames. RGloucester — ☎

05:48, 29 July 2017 (UTC)

You can't cite Adorno, because nothing in Adorno can be used a source for what 'cultural marxism' is, because Adorno never wrote about what 'cultural marxism' is. No, you would be citing Adorno for writing about the application of Historical Materialism to the Culture Industry, which for instance Adorno writes about in this chapter of Enlightenment as Mass Deception[1]. But as I note above The Frankfurt School didn't use the term The Frankfurt School either - yet obviously there's an article that uses that term because OTHER sources (secondary and tertiary sources) use that term. The policy for this is

WP:SECONDARY

:

Do not base an entire article on primary sources, and be cautious about basing large passages on them.

WP:PRIMARY

and from

WP:SECONDARY

-

Wikipedia articles usually rely on material from reliable secondary sources. Articles may make an analytic, evaluative, interpretive, or synthetic claim only if that has been published by a reliable secondary source.

WP:SECONDARY

(emphasis added)

...so the claim that Adorno works within the tradition of Cultural Marxism to analyse the mass production of culture is not

WP:SECONDARY and perhaps most importantly; Wikipedia:Combining sources

as it fits under most suggested applications of that policy, namely: Combining an advanced and introductory source, combining sources to offer a broader view, recognising when two sources are on the same topic, and decisions on the organization of material.

By the way Kellner most definitely does use the term "Cultural Marxism" in relation to The Frankfurt School. Saying specifically under the heading "The Rise of Cultural Marxism" that "Gramsci’s critique of the dominant mode of culture and media would be taken up by the Frankfurt School and British cultural studies providing many valuable tools for cultural criticism." and it's Trivial under Wikipedia:Combining sources to say that The Frankfurt School critiqued mass media. It's what they're known for. Anyways, the term is used 10 or so times in the Kellner source [2], and Kellner is described on his Wikipedia page as being part of the ""third generation" of critical theory in the tradition of the Frankfurt Institute for Social Research, or Frankfurt School and in cultural studies in the tradition of the Birmingham Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies".

Likewise George Ritzer does indeed state that ""a large number of theorists throughout the globe used cultural Marxism to develop modes of cultural studies that analyzed the production, interpretation, and receptions of cultural artifacts within concrete sociohistorical conditions that had contested political and ideological effects and uses." - and it's that "within concrete sociohistorical conditions" that is

WP:OR as it's coming from the sources. This seems to me to be listed under the heading of Trivially simple interpretations of Wikipedia:Combining sources

.

As always, I'm arguing from policy, and I respect that you do the same... and we must respect

WP:OR: "Rewriting source material in your own words, while substantially retaining the meaning of the references, is not considered to be original research." --Jobrot (talk

) 07:58, 29 July 2017 (UTC)

As ever, this is all getting very wordy, and bogged down in looking for very precise and somewhat speculative definitions. The concept of "cultural" Marxism as academically defined is quite broad and diffuse, but is relatively simply and fairly consistently explained in the sources I cited and quoted above, as well as in the Kellner piece, as published in the Ritzer-edited encyclopedia. These should be the basis for any definition here (although it's questionable how much detail about non-Frankfurt school matters should be packed into this page). As for the argument that the Kellner piece doesn't mention cultural Marxism. What? It has a heading using the term, mentions it 11 times and defines it in the opening paragraph ("employed the Marxian theory to analyze cultural forms in relation to their production, their imbrications with society and history, and their impact and influences on audiences and social life").

The fact that people later often described as being "cultural" Marxists did not use the term themselves is irrelevant. That is how these things work: Michelangelo and Titian did not describe themselves as "Renaissance" artists; these categories and classifications are created later to describe and categorise trends and periods, often quite general and vague ones. They also do not have to apply to rigid groups with fixed membership or rigid schools of thought to count as real things. N-HH talk/edits 08:47, 29 July 2017 (UTC)

As to my suggestion that the paleoconservatives were the first to use the term "Cultural Marxism", I clearly was mistaken. Schroyer 1973 has an entire chapter (pp. 199-223) dedicated to his survey of the topic. I have the sense that his definition was perhaps a little broader than later authors. He said it was "a new form of crisis theory" which implied that "as advanced industrial societies developed, the individual was more integrated into and dependent upon the collectivity and yet less able to utilize society for active self-expression." He wrote that "Theorists such as Lukacs, Marcuse, Habermas, Lefebvre, and others, have all emphasized the combination of enforced dependence, cultural manipulation and growing political powerlessness that derives from the dynamics of industrial society."

I don't see any reason why Blackford's article isn't a viable source for the claim that Schroyer seems to have coined the term, and that Wiener recognized Schroyer as such. The Conversation is a reputable publication with a quality control process, Blackford is a qualified author, and the specific claims to be documented are not from Wikipedia. Blackford might have a COI if he tried to self-cite, but any other editor can endorse the quality of the source. Jobrot, while I respect your concern that Blackford might have a libertarian bias, I don't see that as a reason why he can't be used as a reliable secondary source for claims that can be easily verified in the primary sources (Schroyer and Wiener) as well.

If RGloucester has any concerns about Jobrot's reading of these many academic sources, perhaps he could offer a reading of his own? Simply suppressing the material from Wikipedia is not an adequate solution. JerryRussell (talk) 16:36, 29 July 2017 (UTC)

There is no 'suppression' of material. I will try to make this very clear. My concern is not that the Frankfurt School theorists did not call themselves 'cultural marxists'. My concern is that citations to Adorno, cannot be used to support a definition of the term cultural marxism, because he did not write on that subject. None of the sources cited above 'define' the term 'cultural marxism' as a coherent subject, and so cannot be used as sources for such a 'definition' as the one provided by Jobrot, ie "The term Cultural Marxism originated as a niche academic term describing the Frankfurt School's critique of

industrialization and massification of culture and the effects these processes have on human happiness and liberation". If you want my own reading of the relevant material, I'll give it. This is the reading that was accepted in the deletion discussion, by the way. It's very simple...'cultural marxism' is occasionally (rarely) used in a broad sense to mean any marxist approach to culture, from Marx's own views onward to every other marxist theorist's views. This broad term does not imply a coherent subject that can be covered by an article, nor does it imply a coherent encyclopaedic subject. It is simply a simple way to say 'marxist approaches to culture', 'marxist theories on culture', &c. We've got articles on all these things, from cultural studies to critical theory, &c. There is no coherent subject of 'cultural marxism'...none of the sources provided claim such a thing. The only reason, again, that anyone is discussing this matter is because of conspiracy theory, which is a coherent subject that is defined in reliable academic sources. Trying to purport that all of these random sources somehow support a monolithic 'cultural marxism' as some kind of ideology of critique or any such thing is a nonsense, because they don't. The only people that try to weave such a narrative are the conspiracy theorists. RGloucester — ☎

17:11, 29 July 2017 (UTC)

It is simply a simple way to say 'marxist approaches to culture', 'marxist theories on culture, We've got articles on all these things, from cultural studies to critical theory,' - neither of those articles are on marxist approaches to culture. I'm starting to question the accuracy of your knowledge of these subjects. I was hoping for a more policy-based argument. --Jobrot (talk) 00:44, 30 July 2017 (UTC)

There is no coherent subject of 'cultural marxism'...none of the sources provided claim such a thing.No, the sources do define a coherent subject. It's certainly distinct from Marx's own views. It's not "monolithic" but since when is that a problem?

@Jobrot:, @N-HH:, I suggest a three step process: (1) arrive at a proposal for the revised text at some side location, such as Jobrot's draft at his sandbox, suitable for inclusion in this article. We can presumably never satisfy RGloucester, but it might be possible to create something that would be acceptable to a broad cross section of editors. (2) Float an RfC to test consensus for the revised text. (3) The revised text could become the basis of a DRV. My sense reading the deletion review of the old article, is that the text at that time had many shortcomings. Even so, the deletion was hotly contested, and certainly left open the possibility that a better text might prove acceptable even as a stand-alone article. JerryRussell (talk) 21:55, 29 July 2017 (UTC)

I don't want to get involved in this as there's too much confusion involved, from people trying to navigate themselves through the history of Marxist thought for the first time to those who seem to think acknowledging the serious use of the term – post-Marx btw – is analagous to accepting some kind of modern conspiracy theory. The definition as used in academic discourse provided is clear. It's up to others what they want to do with that, including if they want to ignore it, which they seem to want to. In the meantime, WP will remain a wholly confusing source for explanation of political issues and trends. N-HH talk/edits 22:04, 29 July 2017 (UTC)

• If the definition is clear, what's the definition? I'd like a word-for-word quotation from a proper academic source. That is to say, "Cultural Marxism is..." RGloucester — ☎ 23:18, 29 July 2017 (UTC)

You're playing a language game, also if you're not well versed enough in the source material you shouldn't be working on this page. As per my argument above we don't have to have some perfect word-for-word definition, in fact we're meant to re-write FROM the source material, staying as close as possible to the intended meaning, and using quotes. Part of that is making policy-based arguments on talk. As per

The Culture Industry

which he describes as being when:

Films, radio and magazines make up a system which is uniform as a whole and in every part. Even the aesthetic activities of political opposites are one in their enthusiastic obedience to the rhythm of the iron system.

Critiquing that system with quotes like:

"The ruthless unity in the culture industry is evidence of what will happen in politics. Marked differentiations such as those of A and B films, or of stories in magazines in different price ranges, depend not so much on subject matter as on classifying, organising, and labelling consumers. Something is provided for all so that none may escape" -Theodor W. Adorno, Enlightenment as mass-deception

and

"The Culture Industry not so much adapts to the reactions of its customers as it counterfeits them."

Likewise you have Richard Hoggart with his criticisms of the same industry within his seminal work The Uses of Literacy (1957). To quote two sections of that page:

Main article: The Uses of Literacy

Massification of culture

The Uses of Literacy was an attempt to understand the changes in culture in Britain caused by "massification". It has been described as marking a "watershed in public perception of culture and class and shifted academic parameters".[3] Hoggart's argument is that "the mass publicists" were made "more insistently, effectively and in a more comprehensive and centralised form today than they were earlier" and "that we are moving towards the creation of a mass culture, that the remnants of what was at least in part an urban culture 'of the people' are being destroyed".[4]

The "drift"

In his study Hoggart looks at pulp fiction, popular magazines and newspapers and the movies and finds in all of these, "drift". He documents the break-up of the old, class culture, lamenting the loss of the close-knit communities and their replacement by the emerging manufactured mass culture. Key features of this are the tabloid newspapers, advertising, and the triumph of Hollywood. These "alien" phenomena have colonized local communities and robbed them of their distinctive features. Hoggart's attack is not on popular culture; rather it is on mass culture which is imposed from above. "Popular culture" being self-created has a fundamental integrity and evolves according to its own laws and dictates, not as a result of the mass media.[4]

Likewise you have Raymond Williams in Problems in Materialism and Culture with chapter titles like "Means of Communication as Means of Production"... do I really have to continue? It's fairly obvious that Cultural Marxism is the Marxist critique of

WP:SYNTH this is the most moderate and concise definition to use going from combining the Primary and Secondary sources. It's a usage which prohibits too broad a definition of the term. I don't want Wikipedia to claim things like "It's anyone who read Marx and then commented on culture" - I don't count post-modernists under Cultural Marxists specifically because they're not labelled that way by the sources... and that's what we should go from. That's what this discussion should be about - THE SOURCES. --Jobrot (talk

) 01:52, 30 July 2017 (UTC)

I'm very well acquainted with the source material, thank you. I did not ask for another wall of a text. I asked for something very simple: a definition of "cultural marxism" from a reliable source. If this is an encyclopaedic subject, you'll be able to find one. I can find an equivalent definition for just-plain 'marxism' easily, and the same can be said for 'western marxism', and for other such terms. Why can't you find one for your 'cultural marxism', I wonder? RGloucester — ☎ 02:16, 30 July 2017 (UTC)

When you ask "If this is an encyclopaedic subject" I hope you're aware that one of the sources we've been referring to in the discussion is "The Encyclopedia of Social Theory" (emphasis added).

"I'm very well acquainted with the source material, thank you." - I honestly don't believe that's the case at this point. Just today you've claimed that Cultural Marxism "is simply a simple way to say 'marxist approaches to culture', 'marxist theories on culture'" and that "We've got articles on all these things, from cultural studies to critical theory," - when in fact neither of those articles are on "marxist approaches to culture"... and that is in fact something I've already pointed out yesterday... and if you read the page I linked to (Outline of critical theory) you can see directly that your claims are incorrect.

In fact I haven't seen a policy based, or source based argument from you in some time.

WP:GOODFAITH

has its limits, and I'm starting to seriously question the accuracy of your knowledge on these subjects. If you're not going to bother getting involved, if you're not going to bother interacting with other editors, if you're going to be lazy and reply within minutes of a lengthy post with a short glib reply that simply isn't appropriate (had you read the post, which is the second one I've made answering your question), or in other cases where you show a wanton lack of understanding of the source material; then you can hardly expect your views to be abided by on these matters.

Interfacing with the source material, making a cogent argument, backing it up using evidence, the sources, and policy is what should be done on talk pages (as per

WP:Talk)... and frankly I haven't seen anything like that from you lately on this subject. As I said the other day; I was hoping to see policy and source based arguments from you. I have not. --Jobrot (talk

) 00:44, 30 July 2017 (UTC)

Critical theory and cultural studies are two examples of 'marxist approaches to culture', or applying the marxist analytical lens to culture, though both came to expand beyond Marxism. I'm not sure what you're contesting about that. I've had enough of your original research, and I'm really not interested in your long-winded diatribes. It's very simple: find secondary sources that support your assertions, or stop. You've yet to find one. You can do all the 'inferencing' and 'inferfacing' you like on your own time, but that doesn't mean that Wikipedia is a

WP:SOAPbox for your views. RGloucester — ☎

03:27, 30 July 2017 (UTC)

The sources that Jobrot has been kind enough to provide, do give definitions. Perhaps they're not quite as clear and focused as when Jobrot says "Cultural Marxism is the Marxist critique of

The Culture Industry

". For example, in the first paragraph of Ritzer's article about Cultural Marxism, we find: "Many twentieth-century Marxian theorists, ranging from Georg Lukacs, Antonio Gramsci, Ernst Bloch, Walter Benjamin, and T.W. Adorno to Fredric Jameson and Terry Eagleton, employed the Marxian theory to analyze cultural forms in relation to their production, their imbrications with society and history, and their impact and influences on audiences and social life. Traditions of cultural Marxism are thus important to the trajectory of cultural studies and to understanding its various types and forms in the present age." Similarly, in his chapter about cultural Marxism, Schroyer 1973 (p. 199) explains that he is writing about "a new form of crisis theory" which implied that "as advanced industrial societies developed, the individual was more integrated into and dependent upon the collectivity and yet less able to utilize society for active self-expression." He wrote that "Theorists such as Lukacs, Marcuse, Habermas, Lefebvre, and others, have all emphasized the combination of enforced dependence, cultural manipulation and growing political powerlessness that derives from the dynamics of industrial society."

In both cases, I see a sort of operational definition, that Cultural Marxism is what Cultural Marxists write about. But it's distinct from general cultural studies, because it's from a specifically Marxist perspective. (I don't see any reason why capitalists can't participate in cultural studies, or even critical theory.) And Cultural Marxism is to be distinguished from "structural Marxism", which was largely the focus of earlier Marxists. JerryRussell (talk) 03:33, 30 July 2017 (UTC)

It's not a

WP:SECONDARY. --Jobrot (talk

) 03:52, 30 July 2017 (UTC)

Please read your 'combing sources' essay, not that it has much relevance. It says "Any wikipedia policy or guideline takes precedence over any essay. Therefore the editor who wants to combine sources should refrain from doing so, if met with objections. This may mean leaving information out or trying to find a different single source that fully supports the desired compound statement". Let's follow

WP:NOR

. However, I don't even think that the 'definition' you provided is supported by the two sources, synthesised or not. The sources simply do not say anything about the 'culture industry', which is a term specific to the Frankfurt School, and you've not got the leeway to make that association.

In response to Mr Russell, I would say that that sentence is clearly not a 'definition' in any true sense. First of all, it doesn't clearly say what 'cultural marxism' is. It simply says that many Marxist theorists, spanning across an entire century, used Marxist methods to analyse culture. We know this, but this in and of self does not imply the definition that Jobrot provided. It certainly does not do what you say it does, labelling the relevant theorists as 'cultural marxists'. It is completely vague, and is simply an appearance of the 'broad definition' of the term 'cultural marxism' to mean any Marxist analysis of culture forms in relation to their production. As has been indicated before, this association is not commonly accepted in academia (see

WP:DUE), and is a niche usage without basis to support an article independent from articles about the theorists and the theories themselves. Such an article, if based on the sentence you believe to be a definition, would simply consist of a list of assorted 20th century theorists, and nothing else. That's not what the text that you and Jobrot introduced into the article implies. RGloucester — ☎

15:53, 30 July 2017 (UTC)

Hoggart is targetting mass culture, and specifically - the tabloid newspapers, advertising, and the triumph of Hollywood. which sounds like the Culture industry to me. So to my mind the concepts line up, even though the individual terms/labels don't necessarily... however the headings often do in that The Frankfurt School and Birmingham School are often found together in the sources under headings like "The Rise of Cultural Marxism" or just plain "Cultural Marxism"... and they both have in common the fact that they were critiquing mass culture from a neo-marxist perspective (with the only slight difference being the Frankfurt School's elitism vs the Birmingham School's desire to valorize working class British Culture (hence British Cultural marxism).

Anyways, I see the similarities.

I quite like that Kellner limits the era of the critique of The Culture Industry (what I believe constitutes Cultural Marxism) to a specific time period: "During this period, mass culture and communication were instrumental in generating the modes of thought and behavior appropriate to a highly organized and massified social order. Thus, the Frankfurt school theory of the culture industry articulates a major historical shift to an era in which mass consumption and culture was indispensable to producing a consumer society based on homogeneous needs and desires for mass-produced products and a mass society based on social organization and homogeneity. It is culturally the era of highly controlled network radio and television, insipid top forty pop music, glossy Hollywood films, national magazines, and other mass-produced cultural artifacts" as I think that further limits the conspiracy nuts. It also suggests that Stuart Hall's Encoding/decoding model of communication can be seen as the end of the "Cultural Marxist" era of critiquing mass communications (in that it's no longer so centralized). --Jobrot (talk) 17:00, 30 July 2017 (UTC)

RGloucester says that my sources provide a vague 'broad definition' of the term 'cultural marxism' to mean any Marxist analysis of culture forms in relation to their production. I agree that's what the sources are saying, although I also agree with Jobrot that the vast majority of this literature is concerned with mass culture and the culture industry. It's also true that this is a niche usage within academia, and that the paleoconservative usage is far more widely known. But the question at hand is whether the academic niche usage is noteworthy enough to be given its own section within this article. I think so, both because it's the historically original usage (as Jobrot demonstrated) and because it's a respectable and academically useful terminology.

As I mentioned before, I think it's premature to discuss whether 'Cultural Marxism' should be the topic for its own article. First we should agree how to represent the topic within this article. Later on, perhaps we can go to

WP:DRV to discuss creation of a stand-alone article. JerryRussell (talk

) 00:04, 31 July 2017 (UTC)

I just noticed an interesting thing about the Kellner article. I'm talking about the one which RGloucester maligned as Another example is a 2004 essay by Douglas Kellner, called "Cultural Studies and Cultural Marxism", which these SPAs and IPs like to use. These two works are the main sources for the IP and SPA arguments. It was written long after the conspiracy theory had emerged. It is not a peer-reviewed journal article. It was never published anywhere. It is a personal essay of 15 pages long, that only exists on the internet because he has released it personally for free. Actually, folks, it's the exact same article as the one published in the Ritzer encyclopedia! Please compare: [3], [4] And of course, Kellner also describes the practitioners of cultural Marxism as "cultural Marxists". JerryRussell (talk) 00:48, 31 July 2017 (UTC)

I noted that in passing above. Plus even if it were not the case, per

WP:SPS the piece should never have been dismissed on the basis it was self-published. As for the description "cultural Marxist", Googling the term in Books with the names of people often associated with it, eg Gramsci, Jameson, EP Thompson etc, throws up lots of good examples of its use as a descriptor in serious academic writing (again, the fact they may not have used the term or self-described as such is irrelevant). Add all that to the definitions of the term in multiple encyclopedias and other reference works cited previously, and it's hard to see why this has all dragged on for so long and so unproductively. N-HH talk/edits

09:13, 31 July 2017 (UTC)

ps: I also dislike the use of the term "niche". It's the serious, objective and original use of the term, and we shouldn't necessarily privilege the more recent polemical and pejorative use of it, primarily in US political discourse, any more than we would, say, when it comes to the term "fascist", which is a term of political science but which is also flung around a lot these days much more loosely as a general political insult. N-HH talk/edits 09:37, 31 July 2017 (UTC)

Yes, that was already addressed above. There are very few examples, at all, of this term being used. It is used in the works of a few writers in this way, not in the vast majority of academic works that deal with this subject. For that reason, it must be given

WP:UNDUE weight. This is not a mainstream academic opinion. If the definition truly is what Mr Russell says it is, then the term really has no relevance, as it is once again, too vague to define a coherent subject, which is what was clearly stated in the deletion discussion. RGloucester — ☎

15:35, 31 July 2017 (UTC)

The current section on this really needs wholesale rewriting, and not just because of the issues identified above. It's very scrappy and confusing, and misdefines "cultural Marxism" as discussed above from the outset: it is not a term used simply "within cultural studies"; nor is it limited to referring to simply a critique of profit-driven and mass culture. As noted, it's a broad concept, about the shift away from classical Marxism and economic determinism. Then there's far too much about what some on the modern US right think about things, which is not significant for a serious page on the Frankfurt School (precisely because it is all a bit bonkers; the detail should be on those individuals' pages, not here). I would also prefer to drop the term "conspiracy theory" from the heading. Yes, in some cases, it amounts to that, as attested in sources, but there is also the more serious usage we have been discussing and the fact that even when use pejoratively, it's often just a throwaway insult. So, as a broad suggestion, based partly on some of the sources cited above:

• Cultural Marxism
• The term Cultural Marxism is often used in academic writing to describe trends in Western Marxism in the 20th century, led by members of the Frankfurt School and others, including the Birmingham School in the UK, to focus on culture and ideology as much as on economics and to develop Marxist theories of art and literature. Building in part on the work of Antonio Gramsci, many cultural Marxists also moved away from orthodox Marxist assumptions about economic determinism, under which the cultural and ideological "superstructure" of a society was simply seen to reflect the economic "base" and modes of production, and acknowledged that cultural forms could develop semi-autonomously. Since the late 1990s, conservatives in the United States have also used the term, pejoratively, to criticise what they see as an activist ideology that threatens mainstream American society and moral values by promoting minority rights, multiculturalism and the permissive society. A conspiracy theory propagated by American religious paleoconservatives such as William S. Lind and Paul Weyrich directly implicates the Frankfurt School in what they claim was a deliberate and calculated plot to undermine western values.

That needs expanding and direct citations, but any content here needs to be far less detailed and also to focus more on the Frankurt School's (real or alleged) part in all this, as this is the page about them, not about cultural Marxism per se, whatever it refers to, or about the ravings of the fringes of the American right. N-HH talk/edits 09:21, 1 August 2017 (UTC)

Sounds like you want to fully justify the conspiracy usage in the broadest possible terms. I don't support that. You've gone too far in the 'legitimating' direction now. I'd like to cover both sides of the topic (the actual academic usage AND the modern alt-right conspiracy theory usage), but not at the expense of each other. I now find myself agreeing with RGloucester that your version of the concept is too broad. I mean I can't think of anyone who went on from The Frankfurt School to develop "Marxist theories of art and literature" - I can barely picture what that would entail (Socialist realism?).

I think you should probably look into some of the more conspiratorial claims around the term "Cultural Marxism" - get a better understanding of that side of things... and keep in mind that Wikipedia is justified in having pages and sections on conspiracy theories... and that their titles often come close to their real-world counterparts (eg. September 11 attacks/9/11 conspiracy theories, Rothschild family/Rothschild family#Conspiracy theories. But yeah, no sale here! --Jobrot (talk) 16:24, 1 August 2017 (UTC)

I have no wish whatsoever to justify the conspiracy theory, or to dispute that it exists and is described as such. Where on earth did I give that impression? Nor did I say that the Frankfurt School wanted to develop Marxist theories of literature and art (although they did, of course, analyse culture from a Marxist perspective); I said "cultural Marxism" was, in part, about that. The phrasing is based on that found on p344 of Perspectives in Sociology, cited above, not something I invented off the top of my head or "my" personal version of anything. And it means a focus on analysing culture through Marxist ideas. It's not complicated, or inaccurate. As I stated above, it's the current version which is full of garbled inaccuracies and an overemphasis on things that have nothing to do with what serious sources say about the term, let alone the Frankfurt School, and it needs sorting out. N-HH talk/edits 16:55, 1 August 2017 (UTC)

That's funny, because when I search the text of Perspectives on Sociology (6th edition) it doesn't return any usage of "Cultural Marxism": https://books.google.com.au/books?id=__uPCgAAQBAJ&printsec=frontcover&dq=Perspectives+in+Sociology+6th+Edition&hl=en&sa=X&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=Cultural%20Marxism&f=false

I have no wish whatsoever to justify the conspiracy theory, or to dispute that it exists and is described as such. Where on earth did I give that impression? - here: I would also prefer to drop the term "conspiracy theory" from the heading.

And it means a focus on analysing culture through Marxist ideas. It's not complicated, or inaccurate. - I find it a complicated subject, and I find your description of it inaccurate, can you provide any examples of "Cultural Marxist" analysis of art? At anyrate it appears we have two conflicting ideas about the term, I've only ever seen it applied to The Frankfurt School and The Birmingham School. That's what was argued in the AfD on the subject.

I don't think this effort is going anywhere. Looks like we're at loggerheads again. --Jobrot (talk) 17:50, 1 August 2017 (UTC)

I also think the part after "Since the late 1990s, conservatives in the United States" definately belongs more so under the "Conspiracy Theory" heading. --Jobrot (talk) 17:53, 1 August 2017 (UTC)

Your search seems to be missing some pages. I found the quote and the reference to cultural Marxism online from the UK, and I'm not making it up. The entire text is based on sources I have cited time and again. It should not be controversial that this broad, slightly diffuse concept is what academics mean when they refer to cultural Marxism. As for "analysis of art", yes, people write whole books about the idea. As for conspiracy theory, yes I said it could be lost from the [sub]-heading – for very specific reasons, which I explained. I still don't think btw that it needs a sub-sub-heading, but that's obviously not set in stone. I clearly talk about the "ravings" of the US right and include a sentence describing the conspiracy theory. It's impossible to see how anyone could suggest I am trying to validate the theory. And finally, just because you've "only ever seen" a term applied to two things, doesn't mean it is the only way it is applied. Plenty of others have been cited in these ranging discussions – including Gramsci, per the proposed text (see here and here for examples in texts). We are going round in circles, because no one who knows what they are talking about (you admit yourself that you don't), or without preconceived political points to make, is willing to engage sensibly or constructively on the topic. N-HH talk/edits 18:07, 1 August 2017 (UTC)

you admit yourself that you don't [know what you're talking about] - hey either point out where I say "I don't know what I'm talking about" or stop being such an asshole. Saying a topic is complicated; isn't the same as going "I don't know what I'm talking about". You're not very good at forming a consensus BTW. Bit too much of an attitude problem I suspect... just because you've "only ever seen" a term applied to two things, doesn't mean it... and oh so condescending too. Good luck with your proposed changes, you'll need it -

WP:SALT... and your proposed text looks a whole lot like an attempt to recreate what was deleted. --Jobrot (talk

) 18:27, 1 August 2017 (UTC)

Saying "because you haven't seen something, it doesn't mean it doesn't exist" is not condescending, but a statement of logical fact (and I have provided citations that show it does exist). This should be no more complicated than working out, following simple and sourced definitions, what serious academics broadly mean when they talk about "cultural" Marxism. The details of Marxist theories are indeed complicated; the basic terminology sometimes applied to them are not. And let's not forget you accused me, totally spuriously and due to an inability to read what I said properly, of justifying a right-wing conspiracy theory just now. I have expended thousands of words with you as you flip-flop and express your own confusion on this topic (including just now, and previously on my talk page), while others act similarly obtusely, and I don't think it's unfair for me to query your competence or indeed the general idiocy of most WP contributors. N-HH talk/edits 20:24, 1 August 2017 (UTC)

"or indeed the general idiocy of most WP contributors." - alright, I think I see why your additions to this discussion have never resulted in a constructive outcome (it's due to violations of

WP:GF

on your part). What you just said was totally inappropriate and runs counter to any constructive purpose you might have here.

As far as I've seen THE SOURCES, only ever use this term to apply to - in order of how often it's applied to them -; E.P Thompson, Gramsci, The Birmingham School and The Frankfurt School (and it's mostly applied to the latter two, for whom Gramsci is a distant inspiration). If you want to make it into some broad attempt to create a Marxist culture, you can find somewhere else to do that, as that doesn't fit to the intentions of the thinkers the term is applied to... and note, all those listed pre-date discourses like Post-Modernism and Critical Theory. Those discourses are not "Cultural Marxism" (hence having their own terms). "Cultural Marxism" is in that sense, bracketed, historical and specific. It's mostly applied to The Frankfurt School prior to Critical Theory. It's not some over arching attempt to take over or recreate academia or culture. --Jobrot (talk) 02:58, 2 August 2017 (UTC)

The way this article currently stands seems to say that all criticism from the Right can be categorized as "conspiracy theory." Is the intention here to express that all criticism of the Frankfurt School's ideas from the entire Right half of the political spectrum can be summarily dismissed as "conspiracy theory" or is that happening by accident?

There is now an acknowledement on the page of academic use of the term "Cultural Marxism" before Lind, and a series of assertions that amount to any and every use of this term by anyone on the Right as being a "conspiracy theory." If an acadmic uses the term in a friendly, approving context then it is legitimate but if anyone on the Right uses it then it's a "conspiracy theory"? Double standard much?

Are there any examples of anyone on the Right ever using it in the same sense as academics and criticizing Frankfurt School ideas from the Right in a non-"conspiracy theory" context, or is the claim that "Cultural Marxism is a conspiracy theory" just being used here as a rhetorical device to dismiss all criticism from the Right? --BenMcLean (talk) 15:02, 9 August 2017 (UTC)

Are there any examples of anyone on the Right ever using it in the same sense as academics and criticizing Frankfurt School ideas from the Right in a non-"conspiracy theory" context - none that I've seen, they always avoid using quotes in order to mischaracterize the school (reducing the whole Frankfurt School to a misinterpretation of Marcuse is fairly commonplace). This is because the right are interested in holding to the term "Cultural Marxism" - but are not interested in The Frankfurt School's or The Birmingham School's anti-capitalist critiques of mass produced culture. It's now common on the right to simply replace the term "Cultural Marxism" with "Critical Theory" or worse "Post Modernism" - regardless of the fact that Critical theory has a greater breadth of influences than mere Marxism, and that The Frankfurt School opposed Post-Modernism. So it's a bit of a linguistic game that flys in the face of academia on purpose (that purpose being to create the guise of an organized academic plot - rather than an extremely slow grass-roots cultural change that has been growing since the term egalitarianism was first associated with modern democracy and civilization). --Jobrot (talk) 04:34, 10 August 2017 (UTC)

My understanding is that "Cultural Marxism" refers to The Frankfurt School's critiques of mass consumerism as created by The Culture Industry - and that "British Cultural Marxism" refers to The Birmingham School's critiques of mass consumerism, but using the concepts of massification and drift as key concepts.

To further this distinction, The Frankfurt School's Cultural Marxism is considered anti-popularist, and elitist in that "Adorno and Horkheimer especially perceived mass-produced culture as dangerous to the more technically and intellectually difficult high arts." - where as The Birmingham School was concerned with "more positively valorizing traditions of working class culture and resistance" [5] and so is seen as more working class and less elitist.

Does anyone have any other understandings of these two terms, and particularly the distinctions between the two? --Jobrot (talk) 04:21, 14 August 2017 (UTC)

It doesn't really matter what anyone's "understanding" is, nor do we need to keep fumbling our way through like this. The question is how the term is defined in serious sources. I have cited and quoted on multiple occasions such definitions, eg here, which clearly show the term is quite a broad one, referring to a series of trends, but nonetheless has a fairly consistent and well-understood meaning. The concept is not defined by or limited to individual and specific opinions propagated by either Frankfurt or Birmingham thinkers, nor is there a fundamental or taxonomical difference between "British" and "other" cultural Marxisms: the former is just cultural Marxism as it appeared in Britain. N-HH talk/edits 10:04, 14 August 2017 (UTC)

I'm not talking about the generalities you are. I'm talking about the actual schools the label is associated with. There's a reason they are academically linked. --Jobrot (talk) 16:24, 14 August 2017 (UTC)

You explicitly asked about the meaning of the terms "cultural Marxism" and "British cultural Marxism", and about the distinction between them. It's the title you gave this section. I tried to answer those questions as posed, by pointing out that they *are* general terms and that nor are they discrete concepts with a substantive or fixed distinction, or dependent on or even necessarily always directly related to the Frankfurt or Birmingham schools respectively, as you tried to suggest. If you weren't talking about the generalities of those terms, but about the ideas of the schools themselves, you should have asked a different question or framed it differently. And of course the Birmingham School per se is not the topic of this page. Finally, I'm not even sure how this is about improving the content here (which is a necessary task). Might you not be better off at Quora? N-HH talk/edits 17:02, 14 August 2017 (UTC)

@

WP:CIVIL

, i.e. avoid name-calling and condescension? Thanks.

I agree that the definitions of CM in the sources are quite broad. But, N-HH. wouldn't you also agree that Jobrot's analysis of the characteristic thrust of works by the Frankfurt School and Birmingham School is also basically correct? Not that I know anything about the Birmingham school. But I have read Adorno's Dialectic of Enlightenment and of course it's about mass consumerism & the culture industry, as Jobrot says. However, furthermore: having reached that tentative conclusion, we can't put it in the article unless we can identify a credible secondary source that supports it. JerryRussell (talk) 02:10, 15 August 2017 (UTC)

I'm asking because I feel there will eventually be a need to separate the section into subsections. Which I attempted to do earlier. All in all the current section is becoming quite long. Currently the section is mostly dedicated to how the term has been abused, not how it's been associated with The Frankfurt School and Birmingham School critiques of consumerism and mass-culture (which in my view is its original and correct usage).

The conspiracy theory usage has come up in the media recently with the director of strategic planning for the National Security Council - Rich Higgins accusing left wing progressives and Islamists of "interoperating" to destroy western civilization, but it's also been used previously by prominent individuals and publications such as by Australian ex-primeministerial candidate Mark Latham, separately by Cory Bernardi in relation to Australia's Safe Schools program, by another Australian senator blaming crime on immigrants, in an attempt to boycott the release of the StarWars remakes, in relation to the Rio-Olympics ect, ect..

So yes, we may have to cross this bridge at some point by having a "current events" section, and I suggest we have specifics on the original schools of thought and what makes them "Cultural Marxist" rather than just having some grab bag catch-all definition of "Anything to do with Marxism and culture". We're meant to stick to the meaning and intentions of the original sources we use, not distort them by broadening terms beyond all recognition.

Anyways, it's something to consider. --Jobrot (talk) 03:03, 15 August 2017 (UTC)

This article currently describes cultural marxism explicitly as a 'conspirancy theory'. This is one extreme POV on what cultural marxism is. Moreover, the same can be said about e.g. neoliberalism (see e.g. Neoliberalism: From New Liberal Philosophy to Anti-Liberal Slogan, Taylor C. Boas en Jordan Gans-Morse, Studies in Comparative International Development (SCID), Volume 44, Nummer 2 (21 februari 2009), p. 137-161). It seems like Wikipedia suffers from a strong bias, in this regard. 84.25.79.88 (talk) 15:24, 16 September 2017 (UTC)

Claims about other articles are not relevant to this article

.

We do not have to create artificial balance between opposing views when there's a clear academic consensus on a topic. Ian.thomson (talk

) 17:35, 16 September 2017 (UTC)

Such claims are relevant insofar that they show a more fundamental bias in Wikipedia.

There are, by the way, more than enough scienctists that use the term cultural marxism to define the application of marxist ideas to cultures. In my own country, The Netherlands, I could mention e.g. Sid Lukkassen (expert on the subject), Paul Cliteur and Eric C. Hendriks (specialist on China and maoism). I'm sure American Wikipedia-contributers could easily add some American scientists as well.

84.25.79.88 (talk) 17:47, 16 September 2017 (UTC)

IP84, thanks for sharing your views. We just had a lengthy discussion on this issue (above) which died out for a lack of energy, and failure to find consensus. I completely agree with you, and encourage your participation. JerryRussell (talk) 22:45, 16 September 2017 (UTC)

Wikipedia has a bias, which is to provide more weight to mainstream views than the views of small minorities. Just because someone expressing an opinion is an academic does not give it weight, you need to show that those views have a degree of acceptance in academic literature. Eric C. Hendriks btw appears to use the term "cultural Marxism" to mean the culture promoted in Communist countries, which is not the subject of this article. TFD (talk) 23:32, 16 September 2017 (UTC)

However, according to NPOV, viewpoints of significant minorities should also be represented at Wikipedia, using a neutral and encyclopedic voice. This article is short of a neutral presentation in my opinion, as well as other editors who have participated in this long-running discussion. JerryRussell (talk) 00:04, 17 September 2017 (UTC)

It does not say, "using a neutral and encyclopedic voice." It says,

"Giving "equal validity" can create a false balance." So we mention the view because it is significant and also say that it is a conspiracy theory because that is the consensus opinion of experts. And it is a conspiracy theory to think that all the social changes in America occurred as a result of a secret plan developed by German academics almost a century ago. TFD (talk

) 02:02, 17 September 2017 (UTC)

But the problem is and always has been that the term is used differently in different contexts. In academic writing, it refers to Marxist analysis of culture; in modern right-wing discourse, anything from a loose pejorative akin to "political correctness" to a term to describe what is indeed an all-out conspiracy theory. And beyond that, the term or any one use of it is not the topic of this page anyway – the Frankfurt School is. Recent changes have at least made a better stab at noting the different uses here, but it's still a really unsatisfactory way of dealing with all this, all rooted in an unhappy AFD "compromise" outcome. As I think I said a while back, also using the "neoliberal" analogy, the set-up is like having "neoliberalism" redirect to the Mont Pelerin Society page and then having a section there that describes use of the term "neoliberalism" simply and solely as part of a leftist conspiracy theory about the MPS being the origin of a capitalist plot to take over the world, just because some people use it to claim as much – even though the term has wide academic usage and usage barely connected to the MPS. N-HH talk/edits 09:13, 17 September 2017 (UTC)

The relevant guidline is

"Disambiguation" We have different articles with different names for different topics, with links allowing editors to find the one they want. So the term neoliberalism was coined three times but it is the meaning from the 1990s that stuck. If people want to read about the ideas that Gary Hart and others developed in the 1980s, someone can write a separate article. TFD (talk

) 23:34, 18 September 2017 (UTC)

I'm beginning to wonder whether creating a disambiguation page for "Cultural Marxism" may not be the easiest and quickest solution for this, with one of the targets being this page (the others possibly the related, if not identical, topics of "

Critical Theory", and other pages focused more on the pejorative/conspiracy usage, etc). This page could and should then lose some of the wider debate around the term, as well as the detail on the views of fringe right-wing figures, retaining only a short section on conspiracy theories directly relating to the Frankfurt School itself, rather than all this confused and tangential stuff taking up about a third of the page. N-HH talk/edits

09:09, 19 September 2017 (UTC)

A disambiguation page would be better than the simple redirect we have now. But, it forces the reader to decide which topic they want to follow, based on very little information. Add a few descriptive paragraphs to each of the disambiguation links, and you've got an article. What a novel idea: an article! JerryRussell (talk) 00:17, 20 September 2017 (UTC)

We could have a hatnote in this article. TFD (talk) 01:21, 20 September 2017 (UTC)

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